Note 11 — Chapter V · FROM VAN TO BITLIS

It may perhaps be found that this exterior discloses elements which, blended together, are of high importance to the study of art. The form of the church, the geometrical ornaments are Byzantine in character; on the other hand, of all the churches which we visited during our wanderings none other was decorated with bas-reliefs of human figures after the manner of this edifice. Such treatment would be repugnant to the chaster spirit of the architects of Ani, and may denote that the standard of culture in the southern principality was not so high as in Shirak. The friezes partake of the nature of those with which we are already familiar; but they are more daring and much more freely drawn. They may constitute an important link between the art of the ancient Assyrians and the art of the Arabs and the Byzantines. Layard, who visited Akhtamar, has most pertinently drawn our attention to the resemblance between the principal frieze and the embossed designs on some bronze dishes which were discovered at Nimrud (banks of the Tigris); but he has not noticed that the bulls’ heads which adorned the ends of the arms of the king’s throne at Nimrud are almost exactly reproduced in some of the stone ornaments which project from the face of this church.11