Early Christian Architecture - Ravenna, Syria and East

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The fifth and sixth centuries endowed Ravenna with a number of notable buildings which, with the exception of the cathedral, demolished in the last century, have been preserved to our day. Subdued by the Byzantine emperor Justinian in 537, Ravenna became the meeting-ground for Early Christian and Byzantine traditions and the basilican and circular plans are both represented. The two churches dedicated to St. Apollinaris, S. Apollinare Nuovo ( 520) in the city, and S. Apollinare in Classe ( 538), in what was formerly the port, are especially interesting for their fine mosaics, and for the impostblocks interposed above the capitals of their columns to receive the springing of the pier-arches. These blocks appear to be somewhat crude modifications of the fragmentary architraves or entablatures employed in classic Roman architecture to receive the springing of vaults sustained by columns, and became common in Byzantine structures. The use of external arcading to give some slight adornment to the walls of the second of the above-named churches, and the round bell-towers of brick which adjoined both of them, were first steps toward the development of the "wall-veil" or arcaded decoration, and of the campaniles, which in later centuries became so characteristic of north Italian churches. In Rome the campaniles which accompany many of the mediaeval basilicas are square and pierced with many windows.

The basilican form of church became general in Italy, a large proportion of whose churches continued to be built with wooden roofs and with but slight deviations from the original type, long after the appearance of the Gothic style. The chief departures from early precedent were in the exterior, which was embellished with marble incrustations as in S. Miniato ( Florence); or with successive stories of wall-arcades, as in many churches in Pisa and Lucca; until finally the introduction of clustered piers, pointed arches, and vaulting, gradually transformed the basilican into the Italian Romanesque and Gothic styles.

SYRIA AND THE EAST

In Syria, particularly the central portion, the Christian architecture of the third and eighth centuries produced a number of very interesting monuments. The churches built by Constantine in Syria--the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem (nominally built by his mother), of the Ascension at Jerusalem, the magnificent octagonal church on the site of the Temple, and finally the somewhat similar church at Antioch-were the most notable Christian monuments in Syria. The first three on the list, still extant in part at least, have been so altered by later additions and restorations that their original forms are only approximately known from early descriptions. They were all of large size, and the octagonal church on the Temple platform was of exceptional magnificence. The columns and a part of the marble incrustations of the early design are still visible in the "Mosque of Omar," but most of the old work is concealed by the decoration of tiles applied by the Moslems, and the whole interior aspect altered by the wood-andplaster dome with which they replaced the simpler roof of the original.

Christian architecture in Syria soon, however, diverged from Roman traditions. The abundance of hard stone, the total lack of clay or brick, the remoteness from Rome, led to a peculiar independence and originality in the forms and details of the ecclesiastical as well as of the domestic architecture of central Syria. These innovations upon Roman models resulted in the development of distinct types which, but for the arrest of progress by the Mohammedan conquest in the seventh century, would doubtless have inaugurated a new and independent style of architecture. Piers of masonry came to replace the classic column, as at Tafkha (third or fourth century), Rouheiha and Kalb Louzeh; the ceilings in the smaller churches were often formed with stone slabs; the apse was at first confined within the main rectangle of the plan, and was sometimes square. The exterior assumed a striking and picturesque variety of forms by means of turrets, porches, and gables. Singularly enough, vaulting hardly appears at all, though the arch is used with fine effect. Conventional and monastic groups of buildings appear early in Syria, and that of St. Simeon Stylites at Kelat Seman is an impressive and interesting monument. Four three-aisled wings form the arms of a cross, meeting in a central octagonal open court, in the midst of which stood the column of the saint. The eastern arm of the cross forms a complete basilica of itself, and the whole cross measures 330 × 300 feet. Chapels, cloisters, and cells adjoin the main edifice.

Circular and polygonal plans appear in a number of Syrian examples of the early sixth century. Their most striking feature is the inscribing of the circle of polygon in a square which forms the exterior outline, and the use of four niches to fill out the corners. This occurs at Kelat Seman in a small double church, perhaps the tomb and chapel of a martyr; in the cathedral at Bozrah, and in the small domical church of St. George at Ezra. These were probably the prototypes of many Byzantine churches like St. Sergius at Constantinople, and San Vitale at Ravenna, though the exact dates of the Syrian churches are not known. The one at Ezra is the only one of the three which has a dome, the others having been roofed with wood.

The interesting domestic architecture of this period is preserved in whole towns and villages in the Hauran, which, deserted at the Arab conquest, have never been reoccupied and remain almost intact but for the decay of their wooden roofs. They are marked by dignity and simplicity of design, and by the same picturesque massing of gables and roofs and porches which has already been remarked of the churches. The arches are broad, the columns rather heavy, the mouldings few and simple, and the scanty carving vigorous and effective, often strongly Byzantine in type.

Elsewhere in the Eastern world are many early churches of which even the enumeration would exceed the limits of this work. Salonica counts a number of basilicas and several domical churches. The church of St. George, now a mosque, is of early date and thoroughly Roman in plan and section, of the same class with the Pantheon and the tomb of Helena, in both of which a massive circular wall is lightened by eight niches. At Angora (Ancyra), Hierapolis, Pergamus, and other points in Asia Minor; in Egypt, Nubia, and Algiers, are many examples of both circular and basilican edifices of the early centuries of Christianity. In Constantinople there remains but a single representative of the basilican type, the church of St. John Studius, now the Emir Akhor mosque.