The main building of the museum is VILLA ILLISIA, built in 1848, a neo-Renaissance-style mansion.
Constructed at the bank of the river Ilissos. It was the residence of the Duchess of Plaisance. The museum possesses one of the richest collections of Byzantine icons. Some of the masterpieces of the Byzantine religious art exhibited are the Panagia Glykofilousa from Bithynia in mosaic, the rare wood-carved relief of Saint George from Kastoria, the icon of the Archangel Michael, and the well-known icon of the crucifixion from Thessaloniki.
There is also a collection of fabrics and inscriptions from Coptic churches, and in the courtyard stands a phiale, which is a reproduction of a fountain represented in one of the mosaics at Daphni. One of the halls in the museum has been converted into a small basilica with a nave and two aisles, and another into a cruciform church with a dome, while a third hall has been converted into a post-Byzantine church.
The first room houses sculptures from the 3rd century AD. The ancient art form and symbols attained new content through Christian beliefs. Secular objects, jewelry, and vases. In the next room we can see sculptural parts, as initially sculpture had an important role in the decoration of the temple. Later on, churches will be mostly decorated with murals and mosaics.
Another room is dedicated to Coptic art. A double tomb was discovered in Stamata of Attiki. The next part is dedicated to the administration of the Byzantine Empire. A large collection of coins is displayed. The older ones belong to the reign of Emperor Flavius Arcadius. The newest belongs to the Palaiologan period, circa 1328 AD. Another thematic unity is dedicated to the centuries of crisis (7th–8th centuries).
The constant wars and the economic crisis of the era slow down the development of Byzantine art. Sample murals from various temples are displayed here. Further along there are icons that present the influence of the Italians on Byzantine art as Constantinople is invaded by the Venetians in 1204 AD.
A room contains the objects of everyday life during this period. The next room is dedicated to the art of the Palaiologan period. Even if the Byzantine Empire is seized by the Turks, the development of Byzantine art does not stop here. Crete is governed by the Venetians. Another unity is dedicated to the Ionian Islands, where the Italian influence was also strong. The last part of the museum displays icons made in the 18th century and the decoration of the churches built by the new Greek state.
The Sidamara sarcophagi and old forms—new symbols.
Christian art was born in the period of late antiquity (2nd-4th centuries AD). Under the rule of the Roman Empire, and in order to express their belief, Christian artisans chose to employ. The figurative language of the age. They borrowed familiar forms from the Graeco-Roman world and imbued them with new content.
The figure of the shepherd carrying a lamb on his shoulders, ultimately derived from the Greek statues of the calf bearer (moschoforos) or kid bearer (kriophoros), was used to portray him. The idea of Christ as the Good Shepherd who gives his life for his sheep.
Another suitable figure was Orpheus, the mythical lyre player from Thrace, who worked his musical spell over wild animals that were shown gathered round him in late antique art. Christians considered that Orpheus could be understood allegorically as Christ, who with his words tames the hearts of even the fiercest of men.
The table support is presented in the periodical exhibition Europe on the Move. A journey through the early Middle Ages. The transition from the ancient world to the Byzantine one was gradual. The political, economic, and religious structures of the ancient world began to break down from the end of the second century. A milestone in this transition was the legalization of the Christian region.
In 313 AD. By the emperor Constantine the Great. Christian art now acquired a public character and was put to work in the further propagation of the new faith in parallel.
Lamps produced in North African workshops (5th century)
During the early Byzantine period, public and private life retained their defining characteristics. More or less unchanged from Graeco-Roman times. Many ancient cities continued to exist, and even new urban centers came into being. The greatest part of the population lived in the countryside, and the empire’s economy continued to be supported by agricultural production. Industry and commerce were still the basic modes of activity. The new religion left its impression.
Both on luxury products of high artistic value, such as jewelry, and on the cheapest and commonest objects, such as ceramic utensils and metal objects. A clay storage amphora was found at Troizenia of the early Christian basilica of Damalas (6th-7th century). Clay storage amphora from the Mygdaleza basilica of Stamata, Attica.
Copper weights used for weighing coins from the 6th-7th centuries, head weights used for weighing commercial goods, and a steelyard weight shaped as the bust of an empress. 5th-6th century. Copper coins of various values. Clay seal with cross and inscription, part of a jar rim with the imprint of a similar seal, 6th century. The so-called Ilissos Basilica, located to the east of Olympeion, is the most important of the early Christian churches in the city.
It dates to the 5th century and is thought to have been dedicated to the martyr Leonidis, who was put to death in Corinth along with seven women during the persecution of Decius in 250 AD. It was a three-aisled basilica possessed of a cross with projected wings, a narthex, and an atrium. Outdoors on its north side is an underground martyrium of Leonides and his followers.
The legalization of the Christian regions in AD 313 and the prevalence of Christianity across all the empire’s provinces took place during a time when the ancient world and its religious structures were beginning to be shaken. A part of the process of decontaminating the places where idols had formerly been worshiped. Many ancient temples and monuments were converted to Christian churches. This reuse of ancient structures for new purposes appeared across the empire in the course of the 6th century.
Christians did not miss the opportunity to demolish pagan monuments and works of art when circumstances allowed.
The Christians of Egypt are called Copts, a term derived from the Greek word "Aigyptios" in the Arabic language. Coptic art can be traced back to the first Christian centuries and continued after the Islamic conquest of Egypt in 642 AD. Two artistic traditions are married.
In Coptic art: a) ancient Greek art and b) oriental art. Parchment leaf from a purple book of Gospels from the 6th century. (Sarmusakli, Cappadocia) It belongs to purple codex N, today in the National Library of S. S. Petersburg. The very few purple codices that have survived date from the 6th century and contain texts from the Bible.
The text is written in silver and gold on purple-dyed pages. Inscribed marble slab referring to the foundations of a tower by Bishop Leon of Athens. A double-sided icon with the Crucifixion and the Virgin Hodegetria. The front features three different painting layers (9th, 10th, and 13th centuries.)
The representation on the back dates from the 6th century AD. Iron tags-seals for stamping the host, unleavened eucharist bread used in the Latin church with incised lily flowers and Solomon's knob, found at Thebes in Boeotia, 13th century. Iron tongs seal. Byzantine ceramic workshops produced vast quantities of wares to meet the everyday needs of households. Masses of simple jugs, pots, and glazed ceramics were fired in potters’ kilns.
Already from the 6th century, the practice of glazing, the application of a thin layer of glass to the ceramic surface, was adopted for tableware in particular. Three techniques—relief, painted, and incised—were used for applying decorative designs, which comprised vegetal and geometric.
Patterns as well as animal and human figures. Worship in the Byzantine period was not restricted to public displays of religious devotion in churches. But it was also carried out in the home, where small or portable icons served as the object of reverence and focus for prayer. Less commonly, there were also books of religious content. The privileged possession of prosperous and educated families.
One widespread and especially cherished custom in Byzantium was to make the long and costly journey to the Holy Land. Pilgrims returned with various types of phylacteries, objects prized mainly for their apotropaic and protective properties, such as flasks of blessed oil or pectoral reliquary crosses.
Marble slab of the 4th century, probably a funerary stele with a relief representation of a young man.
Accompanied by an animal, the grape-picking scene was carved in the 12th century. From Athens, with its strategic position on the Eastern Mediterranean trade routes, Crete was an advantageous possession for the Venetian colonial power, and Candia was an important center for export and international trade in the region as a whole.
The products of Crete were sent to other Venetian colonies and Venice as well, while luxury goods such as furniture, jewelry, and precious ceramics were imported to the island. From Italy to meet the needs of the wealthy bourgeois. Icon with the Hypapante 1669
Lances from the Zoodochos Pege monasteries in Paros and Andros, 19th century. Zeons are small jars necessary for the preparation of the Holy Communion in the 16th-18th centuries. Clay vessels for household use, plates, bowls, mugs, and small amphora jugs (3rd-6th century).
Lamps and stands, copper lamp handles with representations of victorious racehorses, are found in Olympia. 4th-5th century. Unslipped clay vessel with spout, probably used for milking. Spata, Attica, 6th-8th century. Glass unguentaria for perfumes and cosmetics, Mani, 6th century. Clay unguentaria, 2nd, 3rd, and 6th centuries. Clay ampullas decorated with human figures or crosses.
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