Note 560 — Chapter XIX

The influence of Byzantine art upon the West does not fall within the limits of my task. But every one interested in the subject is aware that during some centuries its influence was dominant. In the composition of pictures as well as in their drawing and treatment Western artists for a long time copied those of Constantinople. In painting, Byzantine influence prevailed throughout Italy from Justinian to the middle of the fourteenth century. Giotto, who died in 1336, was, says Kugler, the first to abandon the Byzantine style. In the intervening centuries the monasteries of Constantinople, Salonica, and Mount Athos were the central ateliers of painting, and furnished the models for artistic activity to all Europe. The mosaics in the church of San Vitale at Ravenna are magnificent illustrations of what Byzantine art was in the time of Justinian. Those in Hagia Sophia, as well as its general plan of colour-ornamentation, are still unsurpassed. Those of the Kahrié Mosque belonging to the fourteenth century are interesting and show a deep feeling for colour-combination as well as accuracy of drawing. Byzantine architecture in like manner greatly influenced the builders of churches in Western lands. The front view of St. Mark’s in Venice in the thirteenth century placed side by side with that of the Kahrié Mosque at the present day shows that the plan of the earlier one was familiar to the architect of the other, and, as has been pointed out by an architect who has made a careful study of the two buildings, when St. Mark’s differs from the Kahrié, the difference may be found in details reproduced from another church in Constantinople, that of the Pantocrator. The resemblance between St. Mark’s and the Kahrié illustrates Mr. Fergusson’s observations on the decoration of the exteriors of Byzantine churches. He points out that while the interior of Hagia Sophia is ‘the most perfect and most beautiful church which has yet been erected by any Christian people,’ the exterior was never finished (Fergusson’s History of Architecture, ii. 321). The Kahrié of to-day resembles St. Mark’s of the thirteenth century before the exterior casing was added to it.

The question of the influence of Byzantine art and architecture on the West has often been dealt with. For a list of books on the subject see Karl Krumbacher’s Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur, pp. 1124–27.