Краткий обзор дохристианских культовых сооружений

A brief overview of pre-Christian religious buildings. Why should church architecture serve as the starting point for readings on the history of church art? A brief overview of pre-Christian religious buildings: megalithic monuments, ritual forms of home worship, features of the structure of primitive temples, Greco-Roman temples. We will begin our study of various branches of Christian art with architecture, not because this type of art at the very beginning had prominent representatives in the Christian world and at first found solid ground for its development. This was not the case, and we must admit, on the contrary, that in the first centuries of Christianity this branch of art was placed in very unfavorable conditions for its development due to the constrained position of Christians in the Greco-Roman world and the predominance among them, so to speak, of home and, as it were, family worship. I take church architecture as the starting point of my readings on the history of Christian art, bearing in mind the special significance of the church for worship, and, consequently, for all those forms of art that are inextricably linked with worship. The church, no matter how imperfectly we begin to imagine it, is the constant focus of liturgical practice, no matter how simple and sparse it may be: this latter, i.e. liturgical practice develops in its entire breadth only where there are permanent places of prayer meetings, and where an individual religious feeling acquires a public character. One can, of course, imagine a religion without churches, but this religion will always be poor in external environment, and in the area of ​​such abstract, internal worship of God there is no place for art and ritual symbolic forms. How, for example, can church painting develop outside the church? What, in its absence, can many other branches of art join or where will they find a foothold? Where will the liturgical rite itself find a place and be improved? The history of mankind, with a series of serious facts, in the form of monumental remnants of its long-gone way of life, convinces us of the historical axiom that the first glimpses of art coincided with the first monuments of religiosity, whether they were graves, altars or idols in the form of roughly hewn stones. But before religious consciousness reached the idea of ​​the church in its complete form, before worship had developed so much as to necessitate systematically arranged buildings of this kind, art had to pass through a whole series of forms in which the religious idea was gradually and little by little expressed, and the model of the church with all its liturgical devices was gradually formed and grew. The work of mankind to create this sanctuary lasted for millennia; Almost every generation laid its own new stone in this majestic building until it developed its ideal type, which, as it seems to me, was realized most fully and holistically in the Christian churches of the flourishing era of the church. But this is already the end of the path traveled by the Christian church itself: let us look, as far as the distance of almost 19 centuries allows, at its beginning and try to understand, first of all, how Christianity reacted to the church and generally architectural types developed by the pre-Christian world, what and how it took advantage of, and where, in fact, the history of the Christian church began; Let us at least outline the main points of this complex, centuries-long religious construction work. The primitive era of mankind is better known to us from guesses and more or less probable considerations than from reliable data. We know about the life and initial external forms of worship of primitive man either by analogy with the life of present-day uncultured tribes, or from later comparative historical reviews; the material remains of its life clarify the fate of the archaic church only to the weakest extent. In the initial stage of religious consciousness, apparently, all of nature was that vast church in which the deity appeared to primitive man, manifested its power, and where it lived, according to his idea. Living himself in the open air or somewhere in a cave or dugout, he did not, as it seems, firmly tie his religious ideas to a specific place and therefore was still far from thinking about a church. But over time, he tries, so to speak, to localize his religious ideas, to associate the presence of the deity with certain places, which become the first centers of worship, prototypes in a sense of later churches, or, better said, their foundation and cornerstone. Man tried to distinguish these places, mark them with some visible sign, dedicated them to the deity and adapted them for the performance of his religious rites. Thus, it seems to us, the first foundation of the church was laid. It is easy to understand from here the close connection in which the first idea of ​​a church or sanctuary stood with the emergence of religious rituals and the appearance of the first stable signs of piety. But, on the other hand, the first stone of a church building is the result of a person’s inherent need to express his religious feeling in external forms: take away this need from him, limit the scope of his religious life to the consciousness of the deity alone, and he will not need to come to a conventional place for his relations with the deity, much less to place any image or altar on it. Various considerations or, better to say, impressions guided primitive man in choosing a place and setting for his religious practices - and, of course, outstanding natural phenomena, memories of significant adventures that took place here or there, and finally, general symbolic-poetic ideas determined such a choice and attached religious consciousness to ready-made centers. The dense forest with its secrets, widely spread perennial trees, caves and grottoes in mountainous areas, the banks of rivers and lakes - attracted the religious feeling of man and showed him the place for the altar. From this era, an example of a church in the so-called altar and gravestone has been preserved for us. Sometimes both were mixed, but sometimes they existed separately, and this separation became especially noticeable in the era of more developed religious cult. I will not cite those passages from the Bible that indicate the existence and religious use of the altar in patriarchal times, nor point to numerous data on this kind of cult practice in the pagan world. Legends about these times are still preserved in the memory of history; medieval life, the news of ancient Western missionaries, the evidence of our chronicles and many other historical monuments tell us that the primitive altar remained in the pre-Christian life of peoples for a very long time and stubbornly refused to give up its place to the influence of the preachers of Christianity. In the decrees of the church authorities and in the news of the chroniclers, we continually find indications of arbores, saxa, lapides, fontes (trees, rocks, stones, streams), which served as dens of cult among the peoples of Central Europe, with priests and bloody sacrifices, with a whole system of rituals. Living witnesses of this cult have survived to us in various kinds of funeral and sacrificial structures of primitive man. They have long attracted the attention of historians and tourists, but their scientific processing and classification began recently, and even later their original purpose became clear. The oldest that we have to get acquainted with these monuments belongs to the so-called megalithic structures. Megalithic monuments, understood in the broad sense of the word, embrace the most ancient human structures made of huge stones and had a funerary or sacrificial purpose. They were built without cement from huge slabs or stone masses and received only weak processing and the most primitive technical devices at the hands of man. By their origin, they belong to the prehistoric life of mankind and constitute the first monuments of its religious architecture. “Although there is still no desire for artistic decoration or subtle elegant taste,” notes one Russian researcher, “and only traces of exorbitant efforts spent on a rough structure appear, the general character of these stone masses amazes with wild grandeur. One cannot help but be surprised at the unknown people who, with their hands alone, perhaps without the help of mechanical tools, were able to move these huge masses and pile them one on top of the other. It becomes clear, looking at the enormous size of the slabs and the colossal fragments of wild stone, why the popular imagination attributed these primitive structures to giants.” 10 Geographically, the area of ​​these monuments is very wide; it embraces the northern and central zone of Western Europe, the southern edge of Russia, then moves beyond the Urals and Altai and captures part of the New World, and according to its representatives it falls into several classes. Let's get acquainted with the simplest and more famous forms of these monumental structures. The most ancient among them should be considered caves. They represented a ready-made shelter for primitive man, serving as housing, protection, and a funeral crypt. Here many remains of his archaic life were found, in the form of flint or stone tools, such as axes, knives, arrows, spears and some bronze objects, such as rings, neck jewelry and other household items. In some caves, faint traces of ornamentation are already visible. Primitive man tried to decorate and clean the finished room given by nature, thus putting his stamp on the work of nature. He covered the walls of these unpretentious rooms with writings, or, better said, with cuts and geometric designs; Here we found, albeit occasionally, crude images of animals and fish, scratched on stone or bone with a sharp tool. These primitive caves were later occupied by people of a higher and, relatively speaking, already cultural race, who made burial grounds in these excavations and used underground grottoes to build churches. This is how it happened in India, and this is how the cave churches of Syria and Palestine appeared, converted from caves by the hands of Christian hermits. Mounds, tumuli, had a more special purpose. This is the name given to the cone-shaped earthen mounds that covered the graves of the dead buried under them and also served as a place for religious ceremonies. The origin of the mounds dates back to the distant prehistoric period of human life and borders on the first glimpses of culture and the embryonic practice of burial. Historical news about mounds is significantly late compared to the first experiments of this type of structures and relates to the historical period of mankind. I will not go into a detailed description of the structure and purpose of the ancient mounds, nor dwell on the religious rites that they witnessed; I will limit myself to just a general remark that the graves were the most ancient centers of cult and prevented the appearance of special prayer buildings or church buildings. Many of the mounds dug in central Europe and within southern Russia, judging by the household items discovered in them, placed with the deceased, belonged to the so-called Stone Period and appeared, apparently, in an era when man did not yet know the use of metals, making do with only tools made of stone or bone. In the history of the church, burial structures, as the most ancient centers of cult, occupy a prominent place from the architectural side. We will subsequently see the imitation of tumulus forms in architectural buildings of later times and their application to the construction of churches. Primitive structures of the same religious and ritual type also include the so-called Celtic or Druidic monuments. But when using this name, I must make a reservation that it is not accurate and, if it has not yet been expelled from the book language, it is only due to age and habit. Celtic monuments appeared with this name thanks to those scientists who first explored them in central Europe and associated them with the Celtic people and their religion of Druidism. It has now been found that Druidic monuments belong to almost all of Europe, are found in Africa, in the New World, and with further research they promise to become the property of the whole world. Therefore, the question of the nationality of the ancient builders of the so-called, not exactly, Celtic buildings, loses its force and must be resolved in accordance with the historical and ethnological data of the country to which these monuments belong. Their very names: dolmens, menhirs or pelvans, cromlechs are due to the conventional language of researchers and borrowed from the old Celtic language. 11 Dolmens, or stone tables, are made of huge unhewn stones and look like a table, the top board of which lies on 2, 3 or 4 stone slabs, placed edge-on. This board sometimes lies at an angle and is covered with grooves for the drainage of sacrificial blood and libations. Sometimes the stones are covered with writings and rough reliefs, which gives an idea of ​​glimpses of an aesthetic sense among the primitive villagers of the area. Sometimes dolmens are made up of a whole series of stone blocks, arranged in the form of walls, covered on top and representing, as it were, a chamber or gallery. What was the purpose of dolmens? There are two solutions to this question and with the same rights. Some consider them to be the remains of primitive altars, others - grave boxes and tombs in which the dead were placed. But for us, in this case, it is not of great importance which side will take precedence, because, leaving aside their special funerary purpose, we will have to classify them as cult monuments. It has been positively proven that the burial rite was one of the earliest forms of cult, and at all times was closely associated with religious rites - and sacrifices were most often made at burial sites. Excavations made recently in Crimea showed that bones lay under a pile of stones. Sometimes, under the tire, as if in a box, they opened the skeleton, in a semi-lying position, leaning against the wall of the dolmen, as if sitting. Based on one ancient explanation, this position was given to those buried by analogy with the position of a baby in the womb, and the dead, according to the ancients, descended into the earth as if into the womb of a common mother - nature. This means that in the primitive era, dolmens served instead of coffins, where the deceased was placed, like in a box, and where skeletons are still preserved in this sitting position. Менгиры или пёльваны имеют вид более или менее высокого столба, сложенного из камней. Its top sometimes represents a narrowing or expansion, and the entire stone in the latter case takes on the appearance of an overturned obelisk. Sometimes pelwans are covered with inscriptions and images, but more often they do not have any decoration and represent a rough mass of piled up stones (blocks). And it has not yet been positively decided what purpose the monuments had. Some believe that these were burial structures, others that they were crude images of idols, similar to stone women found in the southern zone of Russia. Но что бы они ни означали, их религиозное назначение не подвержено никакому сомнению. Что около них были приносимы жертвы, на это указывают находимые около них в небольших вырытых ямах кости, уголь и зола. Очевидно, это остатки производившихся здесь жертвоприношений, а может быть, и остатки человеческих жертв, которые были приносимы на месте каких-либо замечательных событий или вблизи кладбищ. The combination of several pyolwans, arranged in the shape of a circle or ellipse, constitutes the so-called cromlechs. Cromlechs are among the ancient monuments left by the aborigines of Central Europe, and are marked by a certain religious character. Cromlechs are nothing more than a sacred fence, denoting a place chosen for sacrifice and dedicated to some deity. This purpose is clearly seen from the fact that in the middle of the cromlech there is sometimes a dolmen, like an altar. The cromlech, therefore, is a more complex, more furnished form of the ancient altar, closely bordering on the era of the appearance of churches in the form of fenced or tree-lined spaces that had a religious and cult purpose. The missionary Lafiteau, who visited North America, says that he saw in Indian Virginia a church built in the form of a similar ring or belt, lined with stone pillars. In conclusion, I will mention another original type of monuments, known as stone women. The structures known under this name are sometimes simple stumps of stone with a human head placed on top, but more often they have the appearance of a human figure, half-naked or completely naked, with ugly outlines, indicating the lack of taste and extreme poverty of technical means that their builders had at their disposal. Stone women cover the area from the upper reaches of the Yenisei to the mouths of the Danube and the Black Sea. There are quite a few of them in the Ekaterinoslav and Kherson provinces, where they are found in dozens, but more and more are disappearing from extermination and from being transported to various museums. In these rude sculptures we have images of idols or busts of the dead who were buried in nearby mounds, and whose memory they wanted to preserve through these rude statues. The original era of their appearance is not indicated in history in the same way as the original ideas that caused their appearance; but their sacrificial and religious purpose in the life of later historical tribes is beyond any doubt. The traveler Rubrukvis, who passed through our southern region in the middle of the 13th century, drew attention to the stone women and witnessed the religious cult associated with them. The first proselytes of Christianity, who lived long, long after the first inhabitants of this region and the builders of these statues, had to fight against these same remnants of paganism. The Novgorod Chronicle says about Stefan, the enlightener of Perm, that he taught the land of the Zyryans the faith of Christ, where previously they bowed to animals, trees, fire, water and the golden woman. 12 Оканчивая на этом перечень религиозных сооружений первобытного человека, мы должны заметить, что сохранившиеся их представители не всегда относятся к примитивной поре человечества, но принадлежат во многих случаях историческим временам. But even belonging to this relatively late era, they owed their origin to tribes that stood at the lowest level of culture and therefore represented the closest analogy with the life of archaic tribes. This analogy becomes all the clearer since we find similar structures among modern savages, and nothing prevents us from seeing in them a repetition of what existed centuries and millennia before their appearance. Дайте ребенку ящик с деревянными кубиками, и он сейчас же начнет строить из них дольмены, менгиры и кромлехи. Infant tribes used blocks, stones, and fragments of rocks instead of toy material, but they did essentially the same thing. Man did not develop simultaneously on the great surface of his earthly fatherland: some earlier, others later - and that is why, while Italy and Palestine were already seeing the first experiments of Christian churches with their typical architecture, at the same time somewhere in India or in central Europe the pagan cult with its primitive furnishings continued in full force; while the Parthenon was famous in Greece, cave temple buildings continued in India, and somewhere in a more remote corner of the world, among its many uncultured tribes, religious rites were still confined to dolmens, cromlechs, mounds and other archaic forms of the altar. Not every nation went through all these stages of construction activity and not every one of them left traces of megalithic buildings, but this does not in the least prevent us from accepting these latter as the primary, rudimentary forms of architecture and from them to begin the most ancient period of its existence. Here we have before our eyes both primitive building material in the form of boulders and rough stone masses, and primitive technical means, and the most primitive manner of construction, in some places determined by the very first and most immediate ideas of symbolism. But, at the same time, megalithic structures are not simple everyday buildings, intended for the unpretentious needs of nutrition, birth and self-defense; This is not a yurt or the tent of a modern savage, but actual structures, striking with their enormous shape and having some special meaning that goes beyond the ordinary. We will not hesitate to call this meaning cult - this circumstance left a kind of monumental stamp on them and ensured their longevity. This principle was guided, for example, by the Egyptians, who built solid stone tombs as an eternal home for their dead, while their ordinary housing was built in a hurry, and not a trace remained of it. The dwellings of the gods, that is, the churches, were also among the same privileged buildings, as is proven by the colossal ruins of the latter, which have survived to this day and amaze every observer. These are the primitive structures that served as the primary form of church buildings, and to which the people of the most ancient period confined the performance of their religious rites. As is easy to see, all of them were far from satisfying the idea of ​​a church in the later established sense of the word. We find a more complete and organized form of the church in the so-called home cult. It is known that among ancient peoples, before the order of the public cult, ceremonial, public, was formed, worship was performed in the family and at home, as a result of which the very furnishings of the home received some adaptations and changes in accordance with the conditions of this patriarchal cult. The starting point for the creation of this practice was the veneration of deceased family members and relatives under the name of patrons and defenders of the family hearth. The custom of burying the dead in the house where they lived dates back to ancient times and was practiced before the eyes of history by the Thebans. At first, the domestic cult was grouped around these household deities, but over time it expanded more and more, accepting into its midst more famous representatives of the numerous cycle, under the name of laurels and penates. This cult, common to all peoples, in its most developed form is known from Roman practice. According to Macrovius, every family in Rome held annual holidays at home in honor of their patron gods. At these family ceremonies in front of his penates, the head of the family enjoyed the ancient patriarchal right of a liturgical person or priest, and the family hearth was temporarily transformed into a religious institution, into a special kind of family church. How vividly this religious significance of the father of the family in relation to the members of his house was recognized in Roman society is evident from the expression with which Roman legal practice designated the relationship of a minor son to his father. “A sacris patris dimitti” is the formula with which the Roman designated the separation of an adult family member from parental care. Likewise, the adoption of someone was expressed by the term: “obstringi sacris patris, a quo adoptebatur.” Считаю излишним замечать, что домашний культ римлян нимало не исключал общественных центров богослужения и публичных религиозных обрядов, которые были строго определены законом и имели прочно сложившуюся иерархию. Обычай домашнего культа шел рядом с ним и был отголоском древнейшей практики, общей всем патриархальным народам и некогда во всей силе, державшейся у римлян. Внешняя сторона этого культа при всем разнообразии обрядовых подробностей, вносимых каждым семейным кружком, может быть представлена в следующих общих формах. Древние отводили в своих домах особенные помещения для семейных богов и в этих-то молельнях справляли в честь их религиозные обряды. Эти помещения находились во внутренней части дома, откуда и сами боги домашнего цикла получили название: penates, от penitus-penitior, dii penetrales. Their images were kept in special boxes or arks; к последним иногда приделывались дверцы, которые хозяин в случае нужды мог отворять и затворять, – вещь, похожая на наши киоты и божницы. Since home cult was very widespread in ancient times, there was a special workshop of artisans who were engaged in the preparation of these reliquaries. Demetrius the silversmith, mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, also belonged to this kind of artisans, who was engaged in preparing silver boxes for the statues of Artemis of Ephesus, whose cult was very widespread in Asia Minor. This home shrine was placed on a table or tripod, against which an altar was placed, and on this latter sacrifices were made and libations were made. In the history of pagan cult, these reliquaries or icon cases with home shrines have the important significance that they constitute the transition to the construction of permanent temples or the establishment of public cult. Ancient writers, both pagan and Christian, talk a lot about carts or chariots on which images of the gods were carried. They attribute the introduction of this custom either to entire nations or to individuals, and although such references are mostly legendary, they are important as an echo of the ancient legend about this long-standing and widespread form of cult. The Tabernacle of Moloch in the prophet Amos, and the Tabernacle of Eusebius in Eusebius constitute the same phenomenon, only more developed and richer in furnishings than before. History and archaeological monuments indicate that the use of sacred chariots with images was an essential part of all ancient religions and took place in the practice of the Egyptians and Phoenicians. In later times, among the Greeks and Romans they were called movable churches, “templa gestatoria,” and were used in the cult of the most famous gods, who were considered patrons and guardians of entire areas. So, in Rome they carried an image of the goddess Τύχη, or Fortuna, the patroness of the city, on a chariot, and in Greece the statue of Pallas enjoyed the same honor. A carriage with her image, accompanied by a whole crowd of people, moved in a solemn procession through Athens until it reached the river. Inakha, where she and her chariot were immersed in water, then this water was sprinkled on houses and city buildings. The structure of permanent churches, as definite centers of worship, is not separated from the religious buildings of primitive man by any sharp boundary line, but is in close contact with them. The church, as the dwelling of the deity, is a further development of the concept that was contained in the idea of ​​the archaic altar, and is a more complete and broader satisfaction of the need to enclose, bind, and strengthen the deity, which man has always been aware of and tried to realize externally. A cromlech or an open stone fence is, in my opinion, the prototype of an ancient church and the first step taken by man on the transitional path from the altar to structures of a more complex church nature. Since a huge distance of time separates us from the era of the construction of primitive churches, it is clear that not one of them has survived to us in its entirety, and we can now judge them more or less tentatively on the basis of the remains of archaic structures, representing more or less preserved ruins. I will point out, for an introduction to this primitive architecture, the remains of large stone structures in the county of Wiltshire, north of Salisbury, in Ireland. These stone ruins are called “Stonehenge” 13 and have the appearance of 4 concentric circles made of standing stones, connected at the top along the entire length of the circle by architraves or beams. In the center of the middle circle there is a large stone slab, more than half embedded in the ground, and many archaeologists mistake this slab for the remains of an altar. A simpler design was limited to the construction of one row, that is, the construction of a fence, which marked the place chosen for worship and stood out from a number of others as special, holy, designated to serve as the abode of the deity. Therefore, primitive churches had the architectural feature that they were built without a roof and remained open at the top. An indication of this feature of the church structure can be found in the very name templum, which comes from the ancient Latin verb templo, which means look, observe. The etymological meaning of this word shows that churches, according to the ancients, were open places, from where the gaze extended to all sides and could be freely turned to the sky, where the heavenly bodies were located, and these bodies served, as is known, as deities of the astral cult. Another more ordinary etymology of this word, which has one common root with the Greek τέμενος, leads to the same conclusion. Τέμενος in its original meaning means any space - separated, cut off (from τέμνω), and from here, further, defined for a certain purpose. Often the word τέμενος meant a part of the earth or a certain space set aside for religious actions performed by augurs, as well as a part of the sky outlined by the augurs’ staff, on which they watched the flight of birds and performed their fortune-telling. Even more often they began to give this name to the church in its simplest form, thus indicating its external appearance, as a place surrounded by a fence or planted with trees. Inside the fence there was an altar with a statue of an idol, and people came to it to perform religious rituals. The ancient Germanic names of the church, as explained by Grimm in his Deutsche Mythologie, have their root in words denoting forest, which, of course, has its basis in the customs of the ancient Germans to offer their sacrifices in forests and sacred groves under the shade of branchy oaks. If such open spaces were at first gathering points of worship in a well-known tribe or community, then it is not surprising that in later church buildings the same type was repeated and the most ancient cult traditions were expressed. However, symbolic or simple practical considerations caused such a structure of churches; there is no doubt that it took place in primitive architecture and left traces in historical monuments. For example, the famous Karnak Church in Egypt has no covering over most of its area; the roof is built only over the sanctuary and the adjacent halls. Probably, at first they began to cover the place where the statue of the god stood and where the priest performed rituals, while the rest of the space remained open; in basilicas and ancient Christian churches the court retained this feature until a relatively late time. Ciampini, in his Vetera monimenta, presents a plan for such a building. The church in this picture looks like a quadrangle, surrounded on all sides by a wall. In one of them there is a quadrangular span leading into the interior of the fence and, obviously, serving as a door. There is no trace of arching or narrowing anywhere, and no hint of a roof. With such a device, any openings on the side for light transmission become unnecessary. The side windows appear later; even when they began to vault the roof, the building was illuminated not by side windows, but from above through an opening that was left in the center of the dome. The Pantheon and the Church of Romulus were built in this manner. But these are buildings of a later time. Moving now from these preparatory basic forms to architectural structures that realized in a more complete form the idea of ​​the church as a sanctuary, that is, a certain focus of cult, we must make one remark in advance that these later, more consistently carried out church forms, in essence, depart from the most ancient ones, develop and develop them into more or less complete structures. So some of them imitate the form of housing accepted here or there, others start from the burial mound, others represent the further development of caves. Hindu temples belong to the last two types and represent a very curious phenomenon in the field of ancient temple architecture. The original religion of the Hindus - Brahmanism, as is known, was distinguished by its pantheistic character and represented the supreme being, Brahma, in the form of a world spirit, manifesting itself in incarnations, the result of which is the Hindu trinity, Trimurti. Outside this moment of incarnation, the deity is elusive and indescribable; it is a spiritual world force penetrating the universe and living in it, escaping any limitation and definition, whether it be a local limitation or a theoretical-logical definition. Imagining the supreme being in the forms of absolute existence, the Hindu transferred to him the idea of ​​the immensity and diversity of the forces of nature and identified the latter with the former. It goes without saying that this form of religion is not conducive to art and the development of church architecture. This latter has received citizenship rights from the Hindus since the time when the ideal representation of the deity was replaced in Buddhism by the real, anthropomorphic one and gave a new direction to art and piety. Three centuries before the birth of Christ, thanks to the energetic efforts of King Asoka, the teachings of Buddha became the state religion of the Hindus, and the first typical monuments of Hindu architecture are associated with this revolution. And it is curious that the earliest of them are associated with the name of Buddha and are closely associated with his memory. After the death of Buddha, his body was divided, as Hindu legends say, into eight parts and buried in eight places, under eight burial mounds (stupas, tops). Then, already under King Asoka, seven of these relics were taken out and subjected to a new division, so that there were 84 thousand pieces, which were placed in precious arks and sent out to all, even small cities of the kingdom. To preserve the memory of the first burial place of the eight relics of the Buddha, each of these relics was placed under a mortar. From this burial mound, which later turned into a round stone tower, the first Buddhist temples originated. For us they are important not because of their legendary basis, which can be accepted or not without important consequences for scientific conclusion, but in relation to the basic form that they took as their point of departure. And this form of tumulus tells us about the power of influence that grave structures had on the development of the architectural form of the pre-Christian church and on its further implementation. And, indeed, in various places in the East Indies one comes across a large number of churches, processed in the form of large mounds. The best preserved monument of this kind is the church at Bgilza, described by Ferposson and Lassen. It looks like a massive building on a round foundation, conically designed, in the form of a mound or a bulk grave. Its height is 54 feet, the diameter of the foundation is about 120 feet; there is a covered gallery around it, and from the outside this entire building is surrounded by a stone fence, looking like an enclosed haystack. Four gates, located in the direction of the four cardinal points, lead into the building and are remarkable for their sculptural decoration. In front of the north and south entrances are two columns 33 feet high. 14 If we take away the extensions, then in the Bgilza temple we will have an exact copy of the tumulus, which, in the best possible way, corresponded to the Hindu idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe fragility of everything earthly, for which the soap bubble served as a symbol. To finish with the form of the top, let's say that these monuments were built of baked clay, as most buildings are now built in Central Asia and India, and faced with lime. Their size varies greatly: some are over 200 feet in height. 15 Another no less common form of Hindu temples came from cave structures and takes these latter as the starting point. Primitive man, when arranging both his dwellings and the premises for his god, always resorted to the means that were at his fingertips, and without further ado he adapted to this purpose what nature gave him. But the man of the most ancient period, who lived in mountainous areas, was by necessity a troglodyte, that is, he used natural caves and grottoes to live and tried to apply these excavations to the unpretentious conditions of his home life. If the cave was protected from the wind and not easily accessible to animals, had an entrance open to the south, so that it received enough heat and light, this was enough to turn such a cave into housing. Subsequently, people began to prepare caves artificially, expanding existing ones or breaking through new ones in soft mountain layers, for example, in sandstone. Our Crimea and Transcaucasia are rich in such caves, where the most diverse forms of cave dwellings, carved by human hands, have been preserved. Just like what we can study in comparatively miniature sizes at home are the gigantic prehistoric caves of India and such forms as the famous Menton Cave with the skeleton and everyday remains of primitive man found in it. We find the most ancient adaptations of caves for the construction of large churches in India and Egypt, but if we move from these archaic colossal forms to the later ones, we will find that most of the mountainous countries of Europe are filled with them, and the history of church architecture has long turned to these monuments as one of its very important sources. The oldest of these structures in India are located on the left bank of the Falgus River, a tributary of the Ganges. They are carved out of very hard rock and well finished. Their general shape is a series of low galleries, tapering upward in a vaulted manner. In some of them there is a carved semicircular recess in the form of a niche, and in this projection a stone elevation in the form of a tumulus is sometimes placed in memory of the Buddha. The second group lies in Orissa on Udayagiri or "mountain of sunrise". It represents a more complex system of cave structures and is distinguished by the connection of galleries with underground rooms. Larger caves have balconies or galleries in front, supported by pillars (6 to 10 feet wide). From this portico there is a passage into the main internal cave, the dimensions of which vary in one area or another. The largest is 56 feet long, flanked by two smaller ones, separated from the main one by two or three columns at the entrance. The walls of these dungeons are sometimes decorated with bas-reliefs depicting military scenes, monstrous figures, plant forms, and sometimes Brahminical gods. The connection between underground churches and later church architecture cannot be subject to any doubt. There are two possible methods of application: the first - on a wide scale, when the underground space was cut in different directions by wide galleries that spread out to the sides in the form of a network; or the second - on a small scale, when a natural cave or artificially processed excavation was used for liturgical purposes and turned into a church. An example of the first system is the catacombs, which we will discuss in detail below, and the second is very many cases of conversion of individual caves to Christian churches or artificial processing of them for this purpose. To get acquainted with this last type of monuments, I will cite one interesting piece of news from the life of Savva the Sanctified, transmitted by his biographer, Cyril of Scythopolis. It is known that the Lavra of Sava the Sanctified was located near Jerusalem, and its first inhabitants, not having proper community life, set up hermitages and monasteries for themselves near the main center, ruled by Sava, and settled in groups. “One night, blessed Savva left his cave and headed to a nearby stream, singing psalms. And then, on the western cliff of the stream, he sees a pillar of fire, resting on the ground, and with its top touching the sky. Approaching this place, he found here a large and amazing cave, as if by nature itself, processed in the form of a church: on its eastern wall there is a ledge (κόγχη), on the northern side there is a compartment similar to a deaconium, and on the south there is a wide entrance, sufficiently illuminated by the sun’s rays penetrating here.” Thus, the mouth of the cave was facing south, towards the sunny side - a feature that is seen very often in cave dwellings and served as one of the conditions for the suitability of the cave itself. “Having put this cave in order and cleaned it with God’s help, he decided to perform the usual rule in it on Saturdays and Sundays.” 16 Our ancient pilgrims loved to visit this cave, and this is how abbot Daniel speaks about it: there is to the west of the stream “a wondrous cave under a stone rock, and in that cave there is a church of the Holy Mother of God, and in that cave God showed St. Sava with a pillar of fire.” 17 Our Kyiv caves, Inkerman caves in Crimea and Caucasus caves, processed in the form of churches, belong to this type. The imitation of the type of ordinary human housing in the design of churches is confirmed in the reviews of ancient writers about shrines and churches among different nations. The human dwelling, in any case, was the best of all the premises designated for habitation. The adaptation of this room to the convenience of man expressed all the art, all the power of ingenuity of primitive people, and for the installation of a deity they could not think of anything better than to borrow from here the model of a church - especially since the deity, in their opinion, had the same, only better properties and stood in the closest relationship to the life and needs of man, being the guardian and master of his home and family. There are no archaeological monuments of this kind preserved; they disappeared from the face of the earth along with the dwellings of ancient man, leaving a trace in dark legends and several fragmentary news of ancient writers; but travelers and missionaries still open such churches among modern savages, almost no different from ordinary dwellings. A hut, a hut, a hut, a dugout, a wooden or stone structure - these are the premises that a person of lower culture gave to the deity for housing, and which he decorated and decorated, surrounded by the same furnishings as his own premises. Sacrificing to him arrows and spears, the best parts of killed animals, the trapper furnished the shrine with the same items of furniture and food that made up the best decoration of his own home. A more cultured person changed this situation in accordance with the conditions of his life, but in general remained true to the idea that the deity is something very close to him in his position, needs and participation in the immediate interests of his unpretentious life. In comparison with all these structures, Greco-Roman architecture represents a broad step forward and a jointly developed type of architecture. The Greek, in the creations of his art, idealized nature and, starting from its known forms, processed the latter, giving them what is called an artistic form - it is worth, for example, comparing a tree trunk and columns of various orders. The same artistic reworking is manifested in the concept of an entire architectural building, say, a church. Of course, it is impossible to equate it with any primitive form of housing, with some ordinary everyday examples. The connection with them is already so distant that to carry it out consistently would be a major stretch. It can only be stated that the ancient world inherited the idea of ​​the church as the house of the deity, and tried to enclose the latter in a specially arranged room for it, which was allocated to it in a special room or cella located inside the church. Then the colonnades surrounding it, a portico with a pediment, rich sculptural decorations on the external facades, and sometimes paintings - all this already bears the stamp of artistic decoration, constitutes the work of thought and rich education. In Greco-Roman buildings we have three main types, the characteristics of which are necessary for understanding Christian temple architecture. The first type, in the proper sense of the church, is generally known; it consists of a pediment at the entrance and a series of columns. Let's get acquainted with its internal structure. The main part of the Greek church was a small section known as the cella. It, in fact, was designated for religious functions and constituted a chamber or room where there was a statue of a deity with an altar on which gifts were placed and sacrifices were made. This compartment was usually located on the western side of the church and had an entrance from the east; and closer to the western wall there was an image or άγαλμα on a raised platform. Judging by the way the cult required, the cella was either completely covered with a roof, or part of it remained open. In the first case, light penetrated through the side doors, and when this was not enough, then through special holes, όπαΐον, from above, in the roof. Around the cella, which sometimes occupied a central position, there were several rows of columns on which the roof rested, which jutted out as a pediment or triangular shape from the façade. These porticoes or galleries of columns surrounding the cella served as a place for the people and sometimes had a vestibule or προπύλαιον, an open area that served as an entrance or porch. Sacrificial tables were sometimes placed here, on which offerings were placed. A distinctive feature of Greek architecture, both in church buildings and in civil and domestic buildings, is the use of straight lines. The Romans slightly changed this typical Greek church plan and retained its main spatial division. The second type is represented by churches with a round base. They are produced from tumulus and the east is considered their homeland. Roman mausoleums, baths or baths belong to this type of building, and the famous pantheon is a typical representative. In terms of its structure, it is a rotunda or a round building, ending at the top with a hemispherical, domed covering, similar to how our circuses and railway rotundas for locomotives and carriages are built. The third type consists of the so-called basilicas. These are not churches, but private buildings where courts were held and trade was conducted. Their distinctive feature is the elongation of the plan and the division of the building along the length into an odd number of compartments, the so-called naves, by rows of columns. The middle compartment sometimes ended with a projection or apse. These three architectural forms exhaust the main types of Greco-Roman architecture. How did Christianity react to them, how and what did it use when developing its church styles, and what path did the development of Christian church architecture take? But in order to answer these questions, we would have to step over the first three or four centuries of the Christian era, because only here could we encounter monuments of early Christian architecture and observe the application of well-known architectural laws to church buildings. But Christian religious meetings and the first rudiments of worship, with which the internal arrangement of prayer buildings should have been consistent, were given much earlier, and therefore the history of the Christian church begins long before the appearance of typical examples of this kind and coincides with the first aspirations of the newly formed Christian community for independence. I. Places of prayer meetings of Christians of the 1st–3rd centuries Prayer churches and open Christian churches of the first three centuries. Meetings of the first believers in the Jerusalem Temple and in their homes. Position and structure of the early Christian prayer room; adapting it to the needs of worship. How long has the custom of meeting in homes existed among Christians? How early Christians have special religious buildings. Historical information about the existence, position and internal structure of the first churches in open spaces. Objections to the existence of open churches among Christians during this time and their analysis. Where and how the first Christians met for prayer - the general answer to this is given by the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles, especially the second chapter of the book of Acts, in verse 46 of which the following is said: “And every day (the apostles with other believers) remained with one accord in the church and, breaking bread from house to house, took food with joy and simplicity of heart.” From here it is clearly revealed that the first Christians had common public meetings with the Jews in the church (έν τω ίερω) and more crowded and secluded ones in their homes (κατ' οίκον). The former were a necessary consequence of the emergence of Christianity among Judaism and the close relationship of Jesus Christ and His disciples to the Temple of Jerusalem. Although the confession of Christ and baptism into Him drew a sharp line between the Jewish and early Christian societies, the Old Testament Scripture and prayer, to the extent that they were part of the Jewish church worship, could serve as a propaedeutic of Christianity for the Jews and prepared them for the latter especially through their educational side. The second, that is, meetings in houses, met the needs of the first Christians, as a special religious society, coming out of their natural desire to retire, perform their own rituals, and pray to God among their brothers and fellow believers. If the former had a mainly missionary task and were visited by Jewish Christians, then the latter satisfied the religious interests of Christian society and served as a means for mutual unity and intercourse among its members. In mixed church meetings, of course, there was no place for celebrating the sacrament of the Eucharist and Christian worship in general. This last thing happens in Christian home meetings. Over time, the latter took precedence over the former and served as the soil where the Christian rite was born and little by little matured, and those liturgical and disciplinary requirements were gradually formed with which the subsequently opened churches of Christians had to be conformed. As soon as the seed of a Christian community has formed, its members, numbering one hundred and twenty people, gather in Jerusalem in a special upper room, where they all remain with one accord in prayer and supplication (Acts 1:13–14:16). It is not known whether this was the same upper room in which Christ celebrated the Easter supper with his disciples and established the sacrament of the Eucharist, as some suggest; but there is no doubt that it was the property of one of the persons belonging to this small community. When the number of members of the Jerusalem community, as a result of the inspired preaching of St. Peter on the day of Pentecost, increased significantly, and one house, no matter how spacious it was, was not enough, believers began to gather for prayers and breaking bread in houses in groups or circles. These first meeting places for Christians were prayer churches, chapels in private homes, and not churches in the strict sense of the word. Christianity began with them, as does every newly emerging religious community, in which worship is still in its infancy and therefore does not require complex devices for its implementation, and the external position is not secured, and material resources are not great, so even if one wants to improve and develop the ritual environment, there are insurmountable obstacles. Christians of the first time, it should be noted, did not have such a desire. What is now called worship was so unpretentious and monotonous among them that they easily managed with simple home remedies. They observed well-known hours of prayer, the model for which was the custom of the Jerusalem Temple, and which among Christians acquired a special religious character due to the memories of Christ associated with them. But whether to pray during these significant times of the day, or regardless of them, of course, it was possible with the complete convenience of home. Christians do just that: they gather for common prayers in the homes of their fellow believers and practice solitary prayer at home. As for the celebration of the Eucharist, it was not at first some complex liturgical action with a wide ritual setting; in its original form it was simple on the outside, but mysterious on the inside, the breaking of bread and the blessing of the cup, performed with well-known prayers by the leader of the meeting. When large gatherings were held on Sunday or in the presence of the apostles, more spacious premises were chosen for them in the houses of wealthy Christian owners, and the divine service itself took place with a more developed ritual setting. In this form he depicts the ap. Paul held prayer meetings of Christians in Corinth, where the reading of Scripture with its explanation, the singing of hymns, and the Eucharist with agapes took place. In the language of the Apostolic Epistles, this is called coming together (επί τοαυτό), and the meetings themselves are designated by the word εκκλησία. These crowded gatherings, even in the apostolic age, apparently differed from close family circles and were called churches - έκκλησίαν, that is, meetings of κατ' εξοχήν. They are clearly contrasted with houses that served everyday purposes and had no liturgical purpose. So up. Paul, reproaching the Corinthian Christians for indecent behavior at common love suppers, pointing out the greed with which some allowed themselves to use the public table, says in conclusion: “Do you not have houses to eat and drink, or do you neglect the church of God and humiliate the poor! "(1 Cor. 11:18,20–22,33–34; cf. 14:34–35). Here the church (εκκλησία) is something completely different from the house (οικία); it is opposed to it not as a room, not as a place of meeting, but by its purpose for special functions of a religious liturgical nature. Thus, the word εκκλησία does not give any indication of the appearance of prayer buildings, prayer rooms, and is conveniently reconciled with each of them, starting with a simple house and ending with the most perfect Byzantine church. Likewise, the name of Christian churches as a house of worship or simply a house does not always indicate house premises for worship meetings, but is very often applied to churches as open buildings, which they undoubtedly were in the 4th century. This designation is important in the history of church architecture, as a memory of the time when churches were in houses, and when Christian worship was confined entirely within their confines. In the same general sense of the meeting, those expressions of the apostle should be understood. Paul, in which he addresses Aquila and Priscilla, Nymphas, Philemon and others, welcoming them along with their home church. “Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus... and the church at home” (καί τήν κατ οίκον αυτών έκκλησίαν). 18 Of course, we are not talking about the building here, and it is unthinkable to send greetings to the premises, but the terminology is important for us, precisely the connection in which the εκκλησία is placed here with the οίκος, like a religious community with its liturgical center. With this practice in mind, St. John Chrysostom once remarked: “before houses were churches, but now the church has become a home”; as in another place, depicting the strict morals of the first Christians, he expressed himself this way: “they (i.e., Christians) were so pious that they could turn their house into a church.” 19 It goes without saying that there can be no question of an exact reproduction of the early Christian house of worship. Not only have no images of it survived, but there is also no satisfactory description of its structure; there are not even the most general indications of the situation in which these chapels, at least for the duration of liturgical meetings, differed from ordinary Christian dwellings of that time. Therefore, we have to note only a few details of this archaic Christian church based on brief fragmentary news and random notes that have come down to us from the writers of that time. After the Ascension of the Lord, His disciples, returning from the Mount of Olives to Jerusalem, ascended to the upper room (άνέβησαν εις τό υπερώον), where they all remained with one accord in prayer (Acts 1:13). Tabitha was laid in the upper room (έν ύπερώω) awaiting burial (Acts 9:37:39). The same Acts of the Apostles talk about the visit of St. Paul of Troas and about the prayer meeting that the apostle had here with other believers. “During a long conversation with Pavlova, one young man named Eutychus, who was sitting on the window, fell into a deep sleep and, staggering, fell down from the third dwelling and was picked up dead” (Acts 20:9). The house was three-story (τρίστεγος), and the upper room, in which the meeting and breaking of bread took place, had windows and was illuminated at night by a fairly significant number of lamps. Thus, several contemporaneous evidence points to the location of Christian liturgical meetings in the upper part of the dwelling, in the inner room of the upper floor of the house. The author of Philopatrix, a famous satirical work where the morals of Christians are ridiculed, 20 a work not recognized by modern criticism as the genuine work of Lucian of Samosata, also makes several hints about this position of Christian prayer houses. “Chance led me to an unfamiliar house,” he says on behalf of the hero of his work, “climbing the stairs, I found myself in a room with gilded cornices, which resembled the chambers of Menelaus. Here I found, however, not the beautiful Helen (the culprit of the Trojan Massacre), but kneeling people with pale faces.” There is no reason to see in this place only one caricature and to blame the author for maliciously distorting the matter; in his words it is not difficult to notice features pointing to a prayer meeting of Christians in the house of one of their rich members. Christianity, from its earliest times, was not only a religion of the poor. Ananias and Sapphira were landowners; Philemon, to whom St. Paul was writing an epistle and had a slave for whom the apostle intercedes. The great multitude of Christians in Rome, as catacomb monuments and inscriptions show, consisted not only of slaves, but also of rich and noble people. The presented description of the early Christian house of prayer is so general and pale that it can be attributed to any dwelling, to any room, regardless of the special purpose that they received in the liturgical use of Christians. This circumstance is of particular importance in the eyes of researchers. Since the structure of ordinary dwellings of that time, especially Greco-Roman houses, is quite well known, scientists, by examining the internal arrangement of the latter, hope to give some more definite and detailed indications of the premises and decoration of early Christian chapels. The word οίκος, which is sometimes used in the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles to designate places of prayer meetings of Christians, according to some scholars, in the early days of Christianity meant not houses in general, but a certain structure and purpose of the room in them. If this position cannot yet be considered proven in relation to Jewish and eastern dwellings in general, then it should be recognized as indisputable in relation to Greco-Roman houses. Samples of the latter have been preserved to us in Pompeii and Herculaneum, where they were discovered under a mass of lava ejected by Vesuvius in the 79th year after the Nativity of Christ. Judging by these relatively well-preserved monuments and the descriptions of Vitruvius, a specialist architect of the time of Augustus, Pompeian houses, 21 with striking similarities to each other, almost all were two-story, consisted of many small rooms and were divided into two halves: the front - public, and the back - family. Through a narrow passage - our front door - we entered from the street into the so-called atrium - a rather large quadrangular hall with a hole in the middle of the roof to let in light and to conduct rainwater, which poured into a stone reservoir located on the floor. A number of small rooms were grouped near the atrium, the economic and everyday purpose of which is now difficult to determine with precision, just like their number and relative position. It is only clear that the Romans of that time lived much more closely and comfortably than we live now. Adjoining the back side of the atrium, directly opposite the entrance from the street, was a tablinium, which served as a kind of office for the owner of the house, where he received visitors on business. This workroom ended the front half of the house, which communicated with the back, accessible only to friends and close acquaintances, through corridors. The central part of the family room was the peristyle - a large magnificent hall, which received its name from the rows of columns placed parallel to the walls. Like the atrium, the peristyle received lighting from above and was also equipped with a swimming pool. On the sides there were small family rooms, such as bedrooms, a dining room, a dressing room and others. Continuing our way through the peristyle deeper into the house, we come across, closer or further from it, an oblong quadrangular room known as οίκος (in Latin oecus). What was this οίκος? Despite the unevenness of its size and arrangement in different Roman houses, it was still a fairly spacious hall, sometimes divided lengthwise into three parts by two rows of columns that supported the roof. It surpassed the family chambers surrounding the peristyle not only in its vastness and size of windows and doors, but also in its decoration. Its walls were decorated with paintings, the floor was decorated with mosaics, and lamps and chandeliers hung on the walls for night lighting. Constituting the most capacious and honorable part of the master's half, these ecus or ikos served as a festive dining room or triclinium, in which not only family members, but also close acquaintances and friends of the owner of the house gathered for feasts and conversations. These spacious rooms, away from street noise and immodest prying eyes, and at the same time well furnished, could serve, according to scientists, as a comfortable room for Christians during crowded meetings for conferences among themselves, prayers, the celebration of the Eucharist and the suppers of love associated with it. The assumption is very plausible, justified to some extent by the Gospel narrative. The room in which the first believers gathered, intended for suppers, served as a dining room. The resurrected Christ, appearing to His eleven disciples, found them reclining (άνακειμένοις), asked about food, and they gave Him part of the baked fish and honeycomb (Mark 16:14; Luke 24:41–42). The likelihood of the assumption increases even more because Vitruvius and other ancient writers compare the ikos we noted and even identify them with house basilicas (basilicae domesticae) - those most magnificent and enormous halls that were built in the palaces of the Caesars and in the chambers of the noblest Roman citizens. But that house basilicas sometimes had a liturgical purpose is proven partly by their similarity to the structure of the first Christian basilica churches, but mainly by positive historical data. In the so-called “Memoirs of St. Clement" it is said that one of the noble Christians in Antioch, named Theophilus, "consecrated the huge basilica of his house under the name of the church" (ut domus suae ingentem basilicam ecclesiae nomine consecret) and handed it over to his fellow believers. 22 So, the first Christian churches, to put it imprecisely and presumably, were the dining rooms of private houses. Choosing these, and not other premises, for their liturgical meetings, Christians, no doubt, made some adaptations to them, in accordance with the needs of their worship. The table, seats and other necessary accessories of ordinary dining rooms could, of course, serve as a natural setting for Christian prayer meetings and related religious activities, but the latter, of course, could not do without special deliberate devices. The Savior Himself, before celebrating the last supper, sends two of His disciples ahead to prepare the Passover for Him; He performs the latter and institutes the New Testament sacrament in a large upper room, furnished and ready. The example of the Lord was sacred and binding on all who believed in Him. In the absence of positive data, it is impossible to say, however, definitely what exactly the concerns of the first Christians expressed in organizing and adapting their home premises in relation to the needs of Christian worship. One can only assume with high probability, however, that these devices consisted of preparing a table for celebrating the Eucharist, a platform for the reader, places for the celebrants and those praying, and a special table, and perhaps a separate room where the offerings of believers were stored before the substances necessary for the sacrament were separated from them. In the Apostolic Constitutions, the house of prayer, as we will now see, already has rather complex devices necessary for the celebration of the Eucharist by the bishop with the presbyters and deacons serving him, in view of a crowded meeting. True, the monument to which I refer is a little later than the time I am talking about; but we must not forget that the image of the church described in it and the order strictly observed in the latter did not appear suddenly, but developed gradually and, without a doubt, are based on the early Christian house of prayer with its apostolic practice. The custom of believers of the first centuries to gather for prayer and worship in the most spacious and comfortable houses of their fellow members, caused by the special circumstances in which the young, poor and persecuted Christian community found itself, was not, however, a purely forced phenomenon, and therefore did not cease with the apostolic and post-apostolic centuries. Finding support for itself in the patriarchal structure of the family and in the lack of open and fully capacious churches, supported by the cramped position of Christians in the Greco-Roman world, this custom deeply entered into the mores of Christian society and was expressed in the construction of prayer houses or small churches in homes. “And the houses of God (τούς οίκους τοΰ Θεοΰ),” the fathers of the Gangra Council say about the latter, “we honor the meetings that are in them, as holy and useful, we accept, not confining piety in houses, but honoring every place created in the name of God” (right 21). In canonical monuments they are more often called οί εύκτήριοι οίκοι ένδον οικίας. In these prayer churches, located inside houses, Christians continued to gather for prayer, celebrate the Eucharist, baptize and perform funeral services. However, in view of the heretics and schismatics who appeared from time to time, who adhered to false teachings, special customs and were alien to the hierarchy and public worship, the church authorities began to distrust these closed home meetings and little by little restrict their independence. From here began a long series of positive disciplinary measures, going back to the 4th century, aimed at limiting household gatherings for worship. Thus, the Council of Gangra, whose words about the houses of God we have just cited, excommunicates those who form special assemblies, “not having with them a presbyter by the will of the bishop” (Right. 6); The Council of Laodicea does not allow the Eucharist to be celebrated in homes (right 58); The Council of Trullo prohibits baptism in a prayer book located inside a house (right 59, fn. 31), and the second Council of Carthage decreed even stricter rules in this regard. Bearing in mind the schismatics of his time, St. Basil the Great also said: “Listen, you who leave the church (τήν έκκλησίαν) and gather in common houses, where you bring pitiful fragments of a (supposedly) honest body: you must offer prayers in the midst of Jerusalem, that is, the Church of God.” 23 It is difficult to determine with precision from what time Christians began to build special buildings for their liturgical meetings, when their first open churches appeared, which the Caesarea archpastor points out to the sectarians in the words just quoted. And this difficulty increases even more because the line separating the home chapel from the church in the proper sense is almost imperceptible, and the transition from the first to the latter could be accomplished thanks to the most insignificant adaptations. The prayer building could be more or less prominent and open, judging by what was the position of Christians in a particular area, and depended to a large extent on the material resources of the community. How to understand the words: οίκος, εκκλησία and other synonymous expressions of writers of the first centuries when it comes to the appearance of church buildings - this question will remain insoluble until we have more specific signs that explain these expressions in relation to the form of early Christian prayer buildings. However, by the end of the second and at the beginning of the third centuries, there was already news of the existence of open churches among Christians, and I will cite the more typical and reliable ones. At the beginning of the 3rd century, most of the regional cities of Asia Minor already had a church hierarchy, and Christian communities were grouped around their bishops with a clergy subordinate to them. The planting and building of churches was part of their pastoral concerns and was one of the means of uniting the communities themselves. St. Gregory of Nyssa in “Sermon on the Life of St. Gregory the Wonderworker" represents his activity in this field: having arrived in Neocaesarea, he "immediately began building the church, because everyone contributed to this enterprise with money and labor. This church is the same one, the construction of which he laid the foundation for, and one of his successors worthily decorated it. We see this church to this day... This great man founded it in the most prominent place in the city, laying, as it were, some foundation of his priesthood, and accomplished this work with the help of divine power, as subsequent times testify. For during the strongest earthquake that happened in the city in our times, when almost everything was destroyed to the ground, when all the buildings, both private and public, collapsed and turned into ruins, this one church remained intact and unharmed.” Residents of the city of Comana, neighboring Neocaesarea, send to St. Gregory received an embassy with a request “that he come to them and establish the church they have as a priesthood,” i.e. “appointed one of them as bishop of the church established among them.” 24 Another more famous and earlier evidence dates back to the time of Emperor Alexander Severus (222–235) and is associated with his personal attitude towards Christianity. This sovereign was distinguished by religious tolerance and had a rather favorable attitude towards the religious societies of the empire. Respecting Christ as a remarkable historical figure, he placed His image in his shrine (in larario) along with images of Abraham, Orpheus and other domestic gods. The following story makes it clear that the North not only tolerated Christians, but even allowed them, apparently, to openly practice their worship. The Christians probably acquired a plot of public land (quendam locum, qui publicus fuerat) and wanted to build a church on it. This place must have turned out to be advantageous for building an inn, and the innkeepers began the process with the Christians. When the matter was reported to the emperor, he ordered in favor of the Christians and expressed himself in this way: it is better to let the Divinity be worshiped in this place in any way than to give it to the popinarii (rescripsit melius esse, ut quomodocunque illic Deus colatur, guam popinariis dedatur). 25 Depicting the comparatively calm situation of the Christian church under the emperors preceding Diocletian, Eusebius does not find words to express his joy at the presentation of this prosperity. “Who and how,” he asks, “will describe these numerous appeals to Christ, this multitude of meetings in every city and these wonderful gatherings in houses of prayer (έν τοις προσευκτηρίοις), which is why, no longer content with old buildings, Christians in all cities began to build large churches from the very foundation.” (ευρείας εις πλάτος ανά πάσας τάς πόλεις έκ θεμελίων άνίστων εκκλησίας). 26 It is remarkable that the edict of Diocletian is directed with particular force against their religious buildings and commands “everywhere to destroy churches to the ground.” “We saw with our own eyes,” the church historian notes on this occasion, “the destruction of houses of worship from top to bottom (έξ ΰψους εις έδαφος) - to the very foundations, and the burning of divine and sacred books among the squares” 27 ... All this shows that churches at that time were already prominent property of Christians and were among the objects subject to government persecution. And what these churches were like can be partly judged from the following story by Lactantius. In Nicomedia, the residence of Diocletian, a church belonging to Christians was destroyed, and these are the circumstances under which its destruction occurred. “At the first dawn of the day, military and police officials with a significant detachment of guards came to our church and, breaking down the doors, began to look for images of the Deity, burn sacred books, rob and destroy everything. Some stole all sorts of things, others fled in fear. Galerius and Diocletian looked at this disgrace with indifference, for the Nicodemus church was built on a hill and could be seen from the palace. They discussed among themselves whether to burn this sacred building.” Out of fear of a fire that could threaten neighboring buildings, it was decided to break it down. “Then the Praetorians armed with axes and other weapons approached him, and although the church was very high (editissimum), it was destroyed to the ground in a short time.” 28 From this it can be seen that the Nicodemus church was a building of quite large dimensions, rising to a considerable height and surrounded by public buildings. But the ability to break it, albeit with the help of an entire cohort, shows that it was not a building of solid construction and did not stand out in this respect from ordinary residential buildings. To complete this essay, I will give a few more news and considerations about the position, appearance and internal structure of the first open Christian churches. Tertullian, in his treatise on idolatry (cap. VII), speaking of Christian artists who were engaged in the preparation of pagan statues, expresses himself in one place in this way: “Isn’t it bitter to see how a Christian, leaving idols for a while, comes to our church; how he comes from the demon’s workshop to the house of God.” 29 These words themselves, of course, do not give a direct indication of the existence of the church as an open building intended for public worship; The expressions: ecclesia and domus Dei can be rightfully accepted here in the sense of a home liturgical room, in the meaning of a prayer church. But Tertullian has another place in his essay against Valentinian, from which it is clear that he is talking about an open church, as a building with a specific purpose and an established, so to speak, architectural plan. “The house of our dove,” he says in his usual figurative language, “is simple, always in an elevated and open place and facing the light: the image of St. The East loves the Spirit – the image of Christ.” 30 Here, by the house of the dove (domus columbae), in contrast to heretical assemblies, Tertullian means Christian assemblies and their center - the Christian church. To reinforce this idea, I will cite a very similar passage from the second book of the 57th chapter of the Apostolic Constitutions, where the structure of the Christian church is described in more specific and detailed terms. Although the second book of the Constitutions will be a little younger than the named treatises of Tertullian and is recognized in its present form as a work of the third century, it should not be overlooked that no typical architectural form appears immediately as a deus ex machina. “Let it be,” it says here, “the building is oblong, facing east, with pastophoria on both sides to the east, like a ship. 31 In the middle let the bishop's throne be placed, on both sides of it let the presbyters sit, and let the deacons stand around, dressed in full vestments... By their order, in another part of the building, let the laity sit with complete silence and decorum, and let the women sit separately, and let them sit, observing silence. In the middle, let the reader stand on a certain elevation and read the books of Moses. And let the gatekeepers stand at the entrances of men, guarding them, and deaconesses at the entrances of women.” In the eighth book of the same monument, the first part of the church (βήμα) or the altar with the altar (θυσιαστήριον) is outlined to us with even greater clarity, near which the clergy was located, headed by the bishop, who celebrated the Eucharist. 32 From the canonical letter known by the name of St. Gregory of Neocaesarea (after 264), we also know that not only full members of the Christian community, but also different classes of penitents occupied their specific places in the church. So, those crying stood outside the gates of the prayer house (εξω της πύλης τοΰ ευκτήριου), those listening - inside the gates in the vestibule (ένδοθεν της πύλης έν τω νάρθηκι), and those falling were placed already inside the gates of the church itself (έσωθεν της πύλης του ναοΰ). From the above evidence and historical and canonical data, it is not difficult to see that the existence of open churches that were quite clearly defined inside and outside among Christians at the end of the second and third centuries constitutes a positive historical fact and by itself eliminates the idea of ​​the opposite. But despite this fact, people in the West objected to this fact not very long ago, and some of our home-grown sectarians still find that the Christians persecuted by the pagans could not perform their divine services openly, and therefore could not have special churches. Remaining within the limits of historical fact, without suspecting the authenticity of the documents from which we borrow the information presented by us, and there is no reason to suspect, one cannot help but see in this objection some misunderstandings and stretches, with the explanation of which the matter itself takes on a completely different look. First of all, there is no need to insist on the large number of such open churches among Christians of the second and third centuries and to assume that they contained monumental buildings in the full sense of the word, built at great expense and luxury. The first Christian οίκοι εύχης, έκκλησίαι could arise only in those areas where the position of Christians was somewhat secure from the violence of the pagans, and only when government officials were not distinguished by fanaticism and cruelty. That there were such persons, that for Christians there came times of peace of more or less duration, this can be seen already from the quoted words of Eusebius. Despite some exaggerations and his pessimistic view, the named historian speaks of Valerian’s successors and some other emperors as persons who were disposed towards Christianity or, at least, were indifferent to it. If we also remember that Christians of the second and subsequent centuries continued to perform their services and prayers in private homes, then a significant percentage of Christian places of worship should go to this type of church. One cannot think that Christian meetings in these houses were always secret and forbidden. The government could know about these gatherings and not prevent Christians from gathering, and this is especially likely at a time when well-meaning and fair people were at the head of the government. Now the Christians had only to take one step forward, and their house of worship could easily turn into a Christian church in the strict sense of the word. Adapted to open worship and a large gathering of Christians, marked on the outside with a cross or some other external, visible sign indicating its sacred-religious purpose, such a house of worship was precisely the same open church that is now being discussed, and the possibility of which was suspected by old Protestant researchers. Apparently, their other objection, directed from Christian spiritualism and which has not lost all its significance even in our time, had more force. The meaning of this objection is that the Christians of the first times were alien to religious appearance, did not build altars and temples in contrast to the pagans, and thereby aroused the suspicion of the government, which saw in them people hiding and escaping the world, recognized them as a secret sect, and considered their meetings immoral and criminal. The reason for this conclusion is provided by the reviews of some apologists: Minucius Felix, Arnobius, Origen and others, who, in response to the reproach of the pagans addressed to Christians that they have “no temples, no altars, no generally accepted images,” not only do not deny this fact, but, apparently, directly agree with it and see in this lack of religious appearance among Christians a direct advantage of Christian worship in comparison with pagan. According to Origen, Christians do not build churches to their God, because their bodies are churches of God. According to Minucius Felix, Christians do not need churches and altars at all. “Do you think,” he asks the pagans in his Octavius, “that we are hiding the object of our worship if we have neither temples nor altars? What image of God will I make, when man himself, rightly considered, is the image of God? What church shall I build for Him, when this whole world, created by His power, cannot contain Him? And if I, a man, love to live spaciously, then how can I imprison such a great creature in one small building! Isn’t it better to keep Him in our minds, to sanctify Him in our hearts?” 33 But what, strictly speaking, follows from here in relation to the question that concerns us? The fact that Christianity, as a religion of spirit, posits the whole essence of relationships with God in serving Him in spirit and truth; but this in no way implies a denial of religious appearance and, in particular, churches in principle. Christians were content in their religious relations with the most modest liturgical setting, which for the Romans of that time seemed something impossible and seemed like a denial of external worship in comparison with massive altars, monumental buildings and generally artistic objects of pagan cult. Accustomed to this ostentatious side of the cult, the pagan looked down on a religion poor in these forms, and reproached its supporters for their absence. The Christian apologist argues ad hominem, pointing out the meaning and power of religion in its spiritual content. Without this apologetic device, he would remain in deliberate contradiction with the positive data with which he was familiar from his own experience. So already up. Paul mentions the existence of an altar (θυσιαστήριον) or throne (τράπεζα). Ignatius the God-Bearer says that Christians should have one altar, just as there is one Christ. In the Revelation of John the Theologian (Rev. 11:1–2), the ideal church of God, the dimensions of which were to be taken by the viewer, consists of three parts: the altar, the place for worshipers and the outer courtyard or vestibule. Tertullian clearly speaks of a throne or altar when he calls it altare and aha. Thus, the comments and judgments of apologists about the absence of churches and altars among Christians cannot be accepted in their own sense and contradict factual data. But even leaving these judgments to the apologists, we would be wrong if we took them as an expression of the views of the entire Christian society of that time and identified the sublime ideas of the learned defenders of Christianity with the actual state of affairs. That Origen, for example, in his review stands on abstract ground and does not convey a historical fact - this can be asserted on the basis of his own words, as soon as he descends from this elevated area into the world of ordinary everyday relations and comes face to face with the concepts of the majority. Starting from this latter, in one of his conversations he says about the Christians of his time that they paid respect to the servants of God, willingly followed their instructions, with sincere disposition and complete readiness tried to decorate the church and serve at it, but cared little about the internal purification of themselves. This one-sidedness is, of course, a drawback in the eyes of the preacher, but where there was harmony between the disposition of the soul and piety, the full expression of the Christian ideal was achieved. Elsewhere, Origen directly states the fact of the existence of churches among Christians of his time when he says that on the occasion of the earthquake for which the Christians were accused, persecution began against them and their churches were burned. Thus, the argument of opponents of the existence of open churches among Christians of the second and third centuries is refuted by the internal meaning of the evidence they cite in their favor and by the available facts. It is based on tendentious thought, which has now lost all meaning, thanks to the successes of historical science and especially archaeological discoveries. II. Origin, purpose and structure of the Roman catacombs Origin, purpose and structure of the Roman catacombs. Historical information and evidence of the purpose of the catacombs. The connection of the catacombs with the funeral customs of the ancients. Opinions about the time and method of formation of the Roman catacombs; results of Rossi's research on this issue. Evidence of the liturgical purpose of the catacombs; their device. How fair is the opinion that the catacomb crypts represent the prototype of later churches? We have outlined the conditions of origin and the main features of the structure of early Christian churches, first as house chapels, and then as open places of Christian worship. But the prayer meetings of believers of the first three or four centuries still had a secret, underground history, which took place unknown to the rest of the world under the arches of caves and which, relatively speaking, was only recently revealed in all its details, becoming the subject of scientific research. We mean the Roman catacombs. Despite the enormous and extremely important importance that the catacombs enjoyed in the social and religious life of the original Christian society, no detailed information has been preserved about them from the most ancient era. Almost none of the contemporaries of the glorious time of their existence left us information about when, by whom and how they were built, what purposes they served, as if this gigantic structure did not exist at all then or was completely unknown to them. True, numerous inscriptions and images located on the walls and vaults of these dungeons indicate the presence of Christian dead in them, reproducing before us the names of Roman bishops and martyrs of the 2nd–3rd centuries and countless numbers of ordinary believers; but this genealogy of the catacombs was drawn by an outside hand and not at all in order to tell the world the history of the famous necropolis: it is the caves themselves that speak about themselves and their ancient fate... The literary fame of the catacombs begins from the time when underground Rome, having fulfilled its historical purpose, began to become a monument of the past. With the exception of brief indications accidentally dropped by a few ancient writers, the earliest and most significant that we know about the Roman catacombs belongs to two almost contemporaneous Western writers: Blessed Jerome and Aurelius Prudentius. The first, growing up in Rome, visited these dungeons and left us a living sketch of the personal impressions he took from these visits. “Together with my fellow peers,” Blessed Jerome says about himself, “I had the custom of visiting the tombs of the apostles and martyrs on Sundays, often going down into caves dug in the depths of the earth, in the walls of which on both sides lie the bodies of the deceased, and in which there is such darkness that here this prophetic saying almost comes true: let them go into hell alive ( Ps.54:16). Occasionally, light admitted from above moderates the horror of the darkness, so that the opening through which it enters is better called a crevice than a window. There they walk step by step (groping), and in the midst of the gloomy night this Virgilian verse comes to mind: “there is horror everywhere, and silence itself frightens the soul.” 34 Describing in verse “The Suffering of the Most Blessed Martyr Hippolytus,” Prudentius introduces several new features into the image of the catacombs and thereby complements Blessed Jerome. “Not far from the place where the city rampart ends, in the cultivated area adjacent to it, a deep crypt opens its dark passages. A sloping path, winding, leads to this shelter, devoid of light. Daylight penetrates into the crypt through the entrance, and in its winding galleries, already a few steps from the entrance, the dark night turns black. However, clear rays are thrown into these galleries from above by holes cut in the vault of the crypt; and, although there are dark places here and there in the crypt, nevertheless, through the indicated openings, significant light illuminates the interior of the carved space. In this way, it is possible to see the light of the absent sun underground and enjoy its radiance. In such a hiding place the body of Hippolytus is hidden, next to which an altar for divine rites is erected.” 35 From the 4th century, the catacombs began to lose their original purpose; from that time on, Roman high priests ceased to be buried in them, and Pope Melchiades (314) was the last who had to find posthumous rest in coemeterio Callisti. His successor is St. Sylvester, so famous among the contemporaries of Constantine the Great, was no longer laid to rest in an underground crypt, but in an above-ground basilica, specially built for this purpose and named after this pope. The people began to follow the example of the clergy. Although in the 5th century burial still continued in the catacombs, the majority of believers began to prefer above-ground cemeteries to dungeons, adjacent to those memorials or open buildings that from a very early time Christians began to erect at their burial sites, primarily above the tombs of martyrs and other most revered of their deceased brethren. The reduction in the number of funerary inscriptions preserved in the catacombs from this period quite clearly indicates a decrease in the number of burials there. However, this did not prevent the Roman catacombs from enjoying great fame and reverent veneration in the Christian world. The sacred memories associated with these dungeons, dear to the Christian sense, could not immediately emerge from the bowels of the earth to its surface and continued to attract devout worshipers of the Christian shrine here. In the 4th–5th centuries, numerous crowds of pilgrims, driven by the desire to worship at the graves of the apostles, martyrs and confessors, headed to the Roman caves. Leaving on the walls of the catacombs, especially near the tombs with the relics of saints, traces of their visits in the form of images and inscriptions, some of these fans recorded their observations in travel notes, which, in connection with martyrologies, still serve as an important tool for researchers when studying the catacombs. But soon there was no incentive to visit the saints of underground Rome. After the defeat and terrible devastation caused by the Goths, Vandals and other peoples in Rome and its environs, the Roman high priests, for various reasons, began to remove the remains of the most revered shrines from the catacombs to suburban and city basilicas, and this transfer continued for several centuries. How diligently the popes acted in this field is proven by the official lists of the relics they brought out and the chronicle news. Pope Boniface IV, on the occasion of the consecration of the pantheon to the Christian church, took, according to legend, thirty-two carts with the relics of saints from the catacombs. In the 9th century, under Pope Paschal, as the inscription in the Basilica of Praxeda says, two thousand three hundred holy relics were removed from the catacombs. As a result of this circumstance, as well as due to the gradual abandonment of the sacred dungeons, the number of their fans has greatly decreased. At the end of the 9th century, travel to the Roman catacombs almost ceased, and in the 11th–12th centuries, single cases of such visits were only occasionally mentioned. Underground Rome, which attracted the attention of the entire ancient Christian world, falls into oblivion in the dark medieval era: for a reason that is not easily explained, even above-ground Rome almost completely forgets its glorious cemetery and all the relatively little that has been written about it. Three hundred years ago, in 1578, on May 31, workers digging up the ground near Rome to obtain building materials suddenly came across stone slabs covered with ancient inscriptions and images. The area where this accidental discovery took place is located in via Salaria - on the Salar road leading to Rome from the north. The find aroused great interest, and rumors about it soon spread in Rome and its environs, attracting, as always, crowds of curious people to the excavation site. No one could then predict the great consequences for science associated with this apparently insignificant discovery, 36 and yet, thanks to it, archaeological science began its existence from then on and, one might say, first came into being along with underground Rome and the great many monuments of ancient Christian art preserved in it. But where did this underground world come from, what brought it to life, and to whom did it owe its origin - these questions did not lend themselves to a satisfactory solution for a long time, and only in relatively recent times was it finally possible to master the key to the explanation and come to positive conclusions. The origin of the Roman catacombs is connected with the burial customs of the ancients and is most closely explained by the conditions of burial in Rome and the situation of Christians in this city. Two main methods of burial existed in the ancient world: burning the corpse (crematio) and burying it in the ground (inhumatio) or burial in the proper sense. The Semitic peoples adhered to the latter method; in Greece both existed, but the predominant form was cremation. In Italy, in the cities it was also customary to burn corpses, but in rural life, especially among simple and poor people, the ancient custom of burying the dead in the ground was maintained. In mountainous areas, most often a special place was carved out in the rock for each deceased - a hole, which was filled with a stone or covered with a slab. Sometimes, for the same purpose, entire rooms were pierced along the slopes, like large rooms or crypts, along the walls of which small depressions were cut out, where the dead were placed, as if they were placed in a coffin. A special type of underground graves was also known, when instead of chambers in the rock, underground galleries with rooms were dug in softer layers of soil, where the dead were taken down, placing them in rows along the walls in prepared niches. These underground galleries, sometimes extending over a very considerable distance, make up what is now called catacombs. 37 As they originate from a burial custom widely practiced in antiquity, the catacombs, of course, cannot be confined to any specific area. Now it has been found that they belong to almost all of Europe, are found in considerable numbers in Asia and Africa, and with further research they promise to become the property of the entire ancient Christian world. The most famous in modern archaeological science for their antiquity and wealth of monumental material, in addition to the main ones - the Roman ones, are also the Neapolitan, Gallic, Sicilian catacombs and the large gallery near Alexandria with an interesting fresco of the Eucharistic content found in it. All the catacombs, both western and eastern, in addition to the similarity in their structure, also have the peculiarity that they open onto large roads and lie outside the city limits - extra muros, according to custom, which for hygienic reasons prohibited burying anyone in the city itself. This requirement in relation to Rome is expressed in the law of the XII tables as follows: Hominem mortuum in urbe ne sepelito neve urito, i.e. the dead in the city should neither be buried nor burned. And since this law was mandatory for everyone, it turned out that Christian, Jewish, and Roman graves ended up in one place, not far from the city. Representing a network of underground corridors going in different directions, the Roman catacombs occupy a huge space, but their length is even greater. Although they do not go further than three miles beyond the city limits and stay constantly in this area, the number of galleries is so large, they intersect so often that the overall result is a very complex labyrinth with many branches and several floors. If these corridors and passages were deployed in one line, they would take up an extremely long stretch. Although the exact dimensions of the catacombs are not yet fully known, according to Father Marka’s calculations, the space they occupy is 1200 kilometers, and according to later, more accurate calculations by Mikel Rossi, their explored network extends to 876 kilometers or 120 geographical miles (120x7 = 840 versts). The cultivation of such a vast space, which initially had undoubtedly more modest dimensions and expanded gradually, was the work of several centuries. 38 On this all researchers of Christian antiquity agree with each other, but they differ greatly in resolving the issue of the time and method of formation of this remarkable underground cemetery. Until very recently, it was almost generally accepted that underground galleries near Rome and Naples were dug long before the Christians by the Romans or by the primitive inhabitants of Italy for their own needs. Some of the defenders of this opinion, including Bosio, argued that the catacombs were nothing more than ancient Roman quarries, from which workers extracted building material (tuff). Since the demand for stones and sand was very high, the quarries themselves became quite large over time. In order not to damage the topsoil necessary for agricultural work, the Romans dug these underground mines at a significant depth, while the topsoil remained untouched. These quarries, which Cicero mentions when speaking about the murder of a Roman citizen in them, were called by the Romans arenariae - lathomiae and were located outside the city. Over time, these quarries were abandoned. During the era of persecution, Christians took advantage of these little-known and inaccessible dungeons as a place of refuge. Here they buried their fellow believers and held their services. They could take advantage of these abandoned dungeons and then strengthen them for themselves all the more easily since the work in the quarries was carried out by slaves and people of the lower classes, to which most of the first Roman Christians belonged. It is also known that the Roman government was in the habit of not only appointing Christians to excavation and construction work, but also exiling them to the mines for confessing their faith. Thus, under the Emperor Trajan, St. Clement of Rome was exiled to the Inkerman quarries near Chersonesus - present-day Sevastopol. The Christians who worked in the quarries reported them to their fellow believers as a safe refuge from enemy persecution, and, being well familiar with the location of the cave passages, they could easily become their leaders in this underground labyrinth. Other defenders of the pre-Christian origin of the catacombs, and among them Pellicha and Binterim, attributed their origin to deep prehistoric antiquity and explained the formation of these dungeons from the custom of ancient peoples to lay underground paths in mountainous areas for convenient communication. To prove their hypothesis, they referred, among other things, to the testimony of Strabo, who says that such a custom once existed in Campania. When the aborigines of this country were displaced by new inhabitants who did not know about these underground structures, the original purpose of the catacombs was forgotten and traces of their existence were lost. This continued until the Christian era. Christians occupied these forgotten dungeons because no one owned them and no one needed them. Once at their disposal, these underground passages were restored and used for burial purposes. Applying this hypothesis to the formation of catacombs in general, the scientists we named especially use it to explain the origin of the Neapolitan catacombs. Some of the Romans were also inclined to the same assumption at the time when the finds at the site of the catacombs first became known. Conveying the current rumor about these underground wonders, one writer of that time says the following: “the Romans were extremely surprised to learn about the discovery of hitherto unknown underground passages and cities, and on this occasion they involuntarily recalled the ancient stories about the underground passages of Campania.” 39 In modern times, the theory of the pre-Christian origin of the Roman catacombs has been abandoned in one form or another. Marchi and Rossi, based mainly on the structure of the catacombs, which differ sharply from quarries and sand pits, and the catacomb epigraphy, supported by historical data, came to the completely opposite conclusion that these dungeons are the work of Christian hands and owe their origin and processing to them alone. This opinion, which has now become dominant in science, may seem paradoxical at first. The question arises: how could Christians carry out such a huge undertaking almost in front of their enemies? No matter how secretly they conducted their business, this underground work near the city and in view of the city administration could not remain a secret to anyone. But even if we assume the latter, no matter how strange it may be, it will remain inexplicable: with what means was this enormous work accomplished, and on what rights could Christians become the owners of such a vast expanse of land? If we begin to resolve these issues with the data that the written monuments of that time tell us, for example, the martyrologies and church history of Eusebius, then such a matter seems impossible and is at odds with the position of Christians in Roman society. The study of the catacombs significantly weakened the pessimistic view of the church historian and presented the initial attitudes towards Christians of Roman society in a slightly different light. De Rossi was able to prove that the catacombs were formed from private land holdings that belonged to Roman owners. These latter, by right, retained ownership and passed them on to their heirs when they converted to Christianity; and performed this act of transfer by gift - ex indulgentia. Here they built either a single grave or an entire family crypt, where they admitted their heirs and loved ones, precisely designating the circle of these persons and their rights to the grave. One inscription discovered by de Rossi in 1853 in the catacomb of Nereus reads: Marcus Antonius Restutus fecit ypogeum sibi et suis fidentibus in Domino. Another inscription, found by the same person in 1865, states the matter even more clearly and reads as follows: Monumentum Valerii Mercurii et Iulittes Iuliani et Quintilies verecundes libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum at (= ad) religionem pertinentes (pertinentibus) meam. Then the inscription indicates how much land belongs to this monument: Hoc amplius in circuitum circa monumentum lati longi per pedes sinos, quod pertinet at ipsum monumentum. 40 According to the inscription used in Roman tombs: Hoc monumentum haeredcs sequitur - this monument is given to the heirs; epitaphs of the same kind are found on Christian tombstones. All this indicates the full legal rights of plot owners. In the above inscriptions, one of the owners of the grave (ypogeum) expresses the desire that only his coreligionists find a posthumous shelter in his crypt, and the other extends this right to freedmen, freedwomen and their descendants, subject to the condition that they belong to Christianity. This is how sepulchra familiaria were formed - family tombs, which probably served as the starting point for the formation of the catacombs. Being at first private possessions - a kind of topographical units, over time these family crypts gradually expanded and connected with each other, entering the system of a common underground cemetery, which more and more covered the suburban space of Rome. This increase or growth of the catacomb territory can be guessed by the various names of the burial crypts: in these names one hears the names of individuals and entire families who were the original owners of a certain area, one or another part of the current catacombs. Among these owners were persons of wealthy families and noble origins, and therefore the opinion that Christian society in Rome consisted only of slaves and poor people is not entirely fair. Indeed, there were many Christians from this class, and it is easy to understand why Christianity made rapid progress among this segment of the population; but next to them, an influential part of Roman society, persons of high position and patrician families, soon found themselves on the side of Christianity. In the catacomb tombs, between the mass of dark, unknown coffins, Rossi found monuments with venerable names from the family of Caecilians, Cornelians, Emilians, Flavians and others. It is also known that Christians were initially mixed with Jews, who lived in large numbers in Rome at that time; but the Jewish nation enjoyed the protection of the laws of the Romans and had legal rights that extended to its religious beliefs, as long as these latter did not diverge from state interests. Thanks to this circumstance, Christians could at first enjoy some of the benefits of the tolerant sect and freely perform their funeral rites. Such a lenient attitude was in the spirit of Roman legislation itself. According to Roman laws, the coffin with the body of the deceased was considered a sacred object (res sacra), and any place intended for burial was recognized as inviolable, as locus religiosus. Roman customs required everyone to bury a dead body that came across anywhere, or at least throw a handful of earth on the dead person and pronounce the prescribed prayer words. 41 The right of burial was not denied to the criminals themselves. That is why the remains of Christian martyrs were often carried away and buried by their brothers in faith before the eyes of their tormentors. Without a doubt, pagan fanaticism made this matter extremely difficult: the mob sometimes attacked Christian cemeteries, threatening them with destruction. Tertullian's famous exclamation: areae non sint, of course, was repeated many times by the pagans, but this was not a formal deprivation of the right of burial from Christians. Until the middle of the 3rd century, not a single edict or government order was known that would have taken away this right from Christians; and there is no doubt that most of the catacomb crypts arose at this time. Even the decree of Emperor Valerian in 257, which prohibited “conducting meetings or visiting the so-called tombs,” was directed not against the funeral rite itself, but against the meetings for which it gave rise, meetings that seemed suspicious to the Roman government. In 260, Gallienus canceled the order of his predecessor and placed at the disposal of Christian bishops “places of worship” - loca religiosa, and between them the tombs, confiscated by virtue of the Edict of Valerian. 42 Since that time, government regulations regarding Christian cemeteries have changed and their use is endangered. But now, more than at any other time, Christians were forced to hide in their dungeons and make places of refuge out of them. Finally, this freedom of burial in Rome is supported by the rights and advantages granted by Roman laws to associations of poor people, formed to provide their members with a decent burial. These corporations, the so-called collegia funeraria, were caused by two reasons: the lack, and therefore the high cost, of burial places and the poverty of the majority of people of the middle and lower classes, freedmen and slaves. Both motives were so urgent that they forced the government, which was generally distrustful of corporations, not only to tolerate them, but also to protect their existence with a positive law. Inscriptions found in Roman columbariums or tombs attest to their existence in the most graphic manner. So, for example, according to the law of the college of Aesculapius and Hygeia, as it is set out on one grave monument, two persons: Silvia Marcellina, daughter of Gaius, and Publius Zeno, freedman of Augustus, donated in memory of the deceased persons from the college of Aesculapius and Hygeia a certain amount of money and, in addition, a plot of land, limiting the use of this donation to certain conditions. Another highly curious monument of this kind represents, as it were, the charter of the funeral college and introduces us both to the details of its internal structure and to the ritual side of burial and commemoration. It shows that each college, which usually elected some deity as its patron, had its own holidays associated with the names of its prominent members. On these days, the main meetings of participants of one or another association took place. The ceremonies observed at this time consisted of the relatives or executors of the will of the deceased going to his grave, decorating it with wreaths and strewing it with flowers, namely: roses on the day of the rosary and violets on the day of the violary. In addition to flowers, libations were sometimes made and a funeral sacrifice was generally made. At the end of these rituals, a memorial dinner was held for people close to the deceased and participants in the ceremony. It is known from other sources that the members of the college monthly contributed a small amount, about seven kopecks, to the general treasury for the construction and maintenance of the tomb and, according to the contribution, received an allotment of a certain size. The resulting plot became the full property of the owner, and he had the right to dispose of it at his own discretion. He could not sell it, donate it or bequeath it, just as he could not increase the size of the allotment through purchase and inheritance. 43 Christianity appeared and made its first advances at the very time when funerary societies were becoming widespread in the Roman Empire, especially in Rome itself, and when the law ensuring the existence of these associations was in full force. Thanks to Rossi's research, it turned out that Christians, along with other funeral colleges, widely took advantage of this law. Their partnerships are known in inscriptions under different names. In one, their college is called ecclesia fratrum, and in the other, its members are called fratres and αδελφοί; sometimes this partnership is designated by the expression cultores Verbi, or simply by the word corpus. It is known from Tertullian that Christians made a monthly contribution to the church treasury, part of which was used for the burial of the poor. 44 They, just like the Romans among whom they lived, practiced the custom of decorating the graves of fellow believers with garlands of flowers. At least from the words of Blessed Jerome, it is clear that some husbands scattered violets, roses, lilies and purple flowers on the graves of their wives and with these commemorations eased their heartfelt grief. 45 Judging by the vast spaces excavated in the vicinity of Rome, one can imagine what a busy work was then going on in underground Rome and how much hard work was put into fulfilling this duty of pietatis towards the dead. For Christians, this work fell on the responsibility of a special class of lower ministers of the church, the so-called fossores, κοπιαταί. At each tomb, apparently, there was a certain number of such persons, as can be concluded, for example, from the following inscription: έπέγραψεν Χρυσής, ή ούμβνος αύτοΰ. These χωρία, or areas, were marked with special icons, by which each of them recognized the boundaries of their area. There is some reason to think that all together the fossori constituted a properly organized institution, the importance of which has increased especially since the 3rd century: they are now ranked among the clergy of the lowest rank - ordinis minoris and are in charge of the tombs under the supervision of the bishop or presbyters appointed by him. Their duties included not only the allocation and preparation of graves in a common area, but also mediation between purchasers and sellers. One inscription records something like an agreement between the digger Gilar and the buyer Artemisius, concluded in the presence of two witnesses - the gravedigger Severus and a certain Lavrenty, and the price for the sold grave is also indicated. Here are the restored words of this inscription: Emptum locum ad Artemisio bisomum. Hoc est et pretium datum fossori Hilaro, id est folles numero 1500, praesentia Severi fossoris et Laurentis. 46 Or, for example, Herculanus et Claudia se vivis emerunt a Aurentino fossore... Serbulus emit bisomum a Leontio fossore. 47 The pioneering church commemorated the Fossori in its prayers under the name of the toilers, and in the Roman catacombs their memory is still preserved in the images of grave diggers on the walls of crypts and galleries. Here they are presented either at work, or standing quietly with the tools of their craft, among which are given: an axe, a pickaxe, a crowbar and a clay lamp to illuminate the dark corridors. Remarkable in this regard is the image of Diogenes's fossor in the tomb of St. Marcellinus and Peter with the following inscription above him: Diogenes fossor in pace depositus octabo calendas octobris. In addition to their funeral purpose, the catacombs served as meeting places for Christians for prayer and worship. In general, it should be noted that even in the pre-Christian world, cemeteries were considered sacred places and enjoyed special respect. For Christians, the cemetery acquired even higher religious significance because between the graves of fellow believers and relatives, the precious remains of martyrs were kept here, who, in the words of witnesses to the martyrdom of St. Polycarp of Smyrna, they were valued more than gold and precious stones. The veneration of the memory of the martyrs, annual meetings for prayer on the day of their death or natalitia martyrum were the grain of the Christian cult of saints, and therefore the places that kept these remains were chosen above all others for liturgical celebrations. This is where our thrones begin with the particles of St. placed in them. relics, and the name of the hole (sepulchrum) where relics are placed in the West came about; hence the commemoration of the dead and the very structure of some parts of the ancient liturgy. In the Apostolic Decrees (VI, 30) the following instruction is given: “gather in the tombs (εν κοιμητηρίοις) to read the sacred books and sing psalms for the deceased martyrs and for all the saints from time immemorial and for your brethren who have fallen asleep in the Lord. And instead, offer the figurative (άντίτυπον) pleasant Eucharist of the royal body of Christ in your churches and tombs, and when you carry out the deceased, then see them off with psalmody, if they believe in the Lord.” 48 The oldest surviving calendar, the so-called Roman one, bears the title: Depositio martyrum and lists many names of martyrs whose bodies were kept in the catacombs, for example, Fabiani in Callisti, i.e. coemeterio, Sebastiani in Catacumbas, Januarii in Pretextati, Saturnini in Thrasonis. There is no doubt that on the days of remembrance noted here, divine services were celebrated in those places where the remains of the martyr were located, and this itself indicates that liturgy and prayers were celebrated in the catacombs. “What bitter times,” says one inscription from the tomb of Callistus, cited by Baronius, “we cannot perform the sacraments in safety and even pray in our caves!” But, recognizing the liturgical purpose of the catacombs as an indisputable fact, one should not see in them any extensive and well-furnished premises for performing the liturgy. Their funerary purpose was in the foreground, and the liturgical purpose was satisfied only to the extent that it was compatible with the first. To see this more clearly, it is necessary to become more familiar with the location and structure of the catacombs, with their architectural features. In general, the structure of the catacombs is the same wherever we observe them; but in particulars many features are noticeable, which depended either on the properties of the soil in which they were dug, or on local burial customs. Roman catacombs, dug at a depth of 8 to 25 meters, sometimes consist of one floor, sometimes of two, three or even four - and the lower floors communicate with the upper and with the surface of the earth through staircases carved in tuff, in some places lined with marble slabs. These stairs, sometimes narrow and steep, sometimes sloping and wide, lead either directly into underground passages, or forward into small rooms with places for sitting sometimes carved into the walls. Starting at the bases of the stairs or the just-marked front ones, these passages or galleries cut through the underground space in all possible directions, stretching along a straight or broken line for a considerable distance, and every now and then they intersect at right or obtuse angles with other galleries; these, in turn, intersect with new paths that spread out to each side, like a complex network of nerves in the body. Catacomb galleries are long narrow corridors carved into the tuff quite regularly, as opposed to arenariums, dug not according to plan, but in the direction of the deposits of mined material. Some of these galleries can be walked freely by two people abreast, while others can be difficult to navigate alone. In some tombs the galleries are low, barely exceeding human height; in others they reach several fathoms. In the flat or arched ceilings of the corridors, so-called luminaria are occasionally punched - quadrangular or round holes, which, through pipes communicating with the surface of the earth, weakly illuminate the underground paths and somewhat refresh their suffocating atmosphere. The walls of the corridors in several rows, located horizontally one above the other, like shelves in a closet, are covered with oblong quadrangular recesses. This is a loci, loculi - a place of various sizes where they placed one, two, three and even four bodies of the dead, 49 tightly sealing the hole with a tiled or marble slab, on which an epitaph was written, accompanying it with symbolic or historical images. Along the length of the galleries, in their walls, there are gaps - a kind of doors that lead to rooms, scattered here and there in a network of corridors and known as cubicles and crypts. In ancient Christian tomb inscriptions there is no strict distinction between the names cubicula and crypta, and both expressions are used indifferently; but in the language of new researchers, it is customary to distinguish cubicula from crypts and understand the former as separate, smaller rooms. Cubicles are nothing more than family crypts, intended for the burial of members of one, in most cases, family. And there are still inscriptions inside the cubiculum in which you can read the names of their owners, for example, cubiculum Domitiani, cubiculum Gaudentii, Argentarii and others. Being, like crypts, varied in shape: square, polygonal, round, etc., the cubicles are cut along the walls, like galleries, by numerous loculi. There are some of them in which there are up to seventy or more locules of different sizes, located in ten or more rows. The anterior, main and most prominent part of the cubicula is the monumentum arcuatum and arcosolium. What kind of accessory is this? This is a vault-shaped niche, like the mouth of a Russian stove, carved into the wall of a cubicula, which contained either a marble sarcophagus with the remains of the deceased, or, more often, a more or less significant depression made vertically towards the floor and served as a tomb for buried bodies. This is where the very name of this arched niche with a coffin comes from: monumentum arcuatum or arcosolium, i.e. monument under the arch. The word solium meant to the Romans an urn where the ashes from a burnt body and even a sarcophagus were kept; Christians used this name to designate semicircular recesses in the wall, where bodies were generally placed, but especially the one that contained the relics of the martyr. His remains, placed in this recess, were covered with a slab at a certain distance from the floor, and the arched part of the niche remained completely open. The horizontal slab covering the tomb of the martyr was called mensa and served as a throne on which the sacrament of the Eucharist was celebrated. The following passage from the poet Prudentius refers to this throne: “This altar,” the latter notes, having spoken about the construction of the throne on the tomb of St. Hippolyta, the dispenser of the sacrament and at the same time the faithful guardian of her martyr, preserves his remains in the tomb until the expected coming of the Eternal Judge and feeds the inhabitants of the Tiber with holy food.” 50 The structure of the crypts was somewhat more complicated, by which new catacomb researchers mean the connection in one whole of two, three or even more underground rooms. Surpassing the cubicula in size, and often in interior decoration, especially the abundance of architectural ornaments and frescoes covering their ceilings and walls, crypts primarily served as places where Roman Christians gathered for prayer and worship. They are now often called chapels and even basilicas, as premises adapted to some extent for the purposes of public worship and built at the expense of the church community, and not private individuals. The most famous of the catacomb crypts is the church in the tomb of St. Agnes, discovered in 1842 by Father Marki and attributed by scientists to the time of its origin no later than the beginning of the 3rd century. Representing in general an oblong quadrangle (46 feet long and about 8 feet wide), 51 it consists of five square cubes connected to each other in a straight line. An ordinary catacomb gallery cuts this longitudinal section almost at a right angle into two unequal halves: one into two cubes, the other into three. Starting from the custom of the ancient church to separate men from women during worship, Marks and others believe that the smaller half, in which nothing remained except fragments of marble slabs, served as a room for women, and the larger half, in three halls, was intended for men and an altar. The latter occupied an entire cubicula and was separated from the other two, probably by gratings, the line of which is marked by half-columns made of tuff, knocked out at the entrance to this third front cubicula and apparently serving both as a support for the gratings and as a boundary line between the place for the laity and the altar. In the front side of the latter there is a small semicircular niche, and in it there is a bishop’s seat carved from stone, like a chair with arms, on the sides of which there are rough stone benches for presbyters. The throne has not survived, but it should be supposed to be in the middle of the altar, in front of the bishop’s seat. To the side of the described church there are two more cubicules, connected to it and to each other by a common corridor. They either had one funeral purpose, or served as a place for catechumens, and perhaps satisfied other needs of Christian worship. It is needless to say how important for the history of Christian church architecture is the study of catacomb churches - this architectural prototype of Christian liturgical buildings. But, unfortunately, this interesting side of the matter is only partially explained in the current state of the catacombs, and it is far from possible to derive a holistic idea of ​​the structure and location of the catacomb church from the structure of the crypts. Some of these signs have been destroyed by time, and those that have survived give an idea only of the main and essential features of the internal structure of the underground church, leaving aside its details. Further, it is not always possible to trust the testimony found here. The instability of the monumental data presented by catacomb architecture depends on two conditions: on the instability of chronological dates in determining the time of origin and final structure of this or that catacomb crypt and, secondly, on the subjective view of researchers and the elasticity, so to speak, of the explanations they make. Chronological data about the structure of one or another crypt and even an entire cemetery are often based on the guesses of scientists; much that is considered to belong to deep Christian antiquity actually appeared later. The catacombs expanded and were built gradually, and researchers often lack criteria for accurate chronological conclusions. And without this criterion there can be no talk of a real prototype or fundamental principle of church architecture. The elasticity of the explanation of certain catacomb forms lies in the fact that researchers explain the surviving features of catacomb architecture by analogy with the now established forms; from this, many things receive an unusual purpose and incorrect illumination. So, for example, many scientists have found and are finding in the catacomb churches separate rooms for men and women, a vestibule for the catechumens, a compartment for the altar, but on grounds that are not stable enough, solid and more a priori. The only positive thing that can be stated is that in the catacomb churches the undoubted features of the ancient altar structure have been preserved, and in this regard, crypts can indeed serve as the primary type of Christian altar. We have already said how the throne was built in the catacombs in the form of an arcosolium; but besides this form, another is found here - this is a quadrangular throne, supported by four legs or columns in the corners. The front part of the crypt often extends into a semicircular projection, occupied by the coffin of a martyr or the seat of a bishop; this absidal form of the altar was later adopted in basilicas and Byzantine churches and is still used in both the east and the west. Episcopal sees were preserved in remarkable preservation and in considerable numbers in the catacombs - the primary examples of the present mountainous place from where bishops preached and taught the people. These departments were not separate elevated seats, but in most cases were carved into the front wall of the crypt in the form of a low chair with blank walls. On the sides of the main pulpit and slightly below it there were seats for the elders - a kind of co-throne. They look like a low stone bench around the circumference of the apse or along the walls of the altar. The latter, together with the arcosolium, was sometimes separated or, better to say, protected from the pressure of those present by a carved lattice, traces of which are still preserved in the tombs of Priscilla, Callistus and some others. The altar floor was occasionally located slightly higher than the platform of the rest of the church. These are the main and, it seems to us, indisputably ancient forms of catacomb architecture, which became typical for church architecture and were maintained in the internal plan of subsequent Christian churches: this is the sense in which the remark of many archaeologists can be considered true that in underground churches, in the catacombs there is a prototype of further church architecture. On the attitude of Christians of the first centuries to art in general, to painting in particular About the attitude of Christians of the first centuries to art in general, to painting in particular. The state of classical art before the advent of Christianity. How apologists, the majority of members of the Christian community and heretical circles treated works of art. The position of art in the early Christian world in general. Christianity appeared after the ancient ancient world had gone through a long path of development in all aspects of cultural life. All these aspects, as is easy to understand from the general structure of Greco-Roman life, were imbued with elements of paganism and associated with its religious ideas. Classical art stood on the same ground. It expressed its artistic ideals, its universal human content in forms that corresponded to the worldview of that time, and due to the close connection that existed between them and the ideas of ancient mythology, it entered deeply into religion and served as its guide. Art was filled with mythological images, and the classical artist could not rid himself of them in his creations. With this character appeared not only images of gods, heroes and certain accessories of the cult, but often ordinary phenomena of life and objects of nature. The most widespread and brought to the highest degree of perfection branch of art in the classical world was plastic or sculpture, but in statues and sculptures the latter revered its gods, and this type of art merged so closely with ancient religion that it seemed completely inseparable from it. Not to mention plastic, other branches of art and, above all, works of painting were fed and, so to speak, inspired for the most part by myths and legends, brought to the stage in genre pictures from the way of life of that time, in landscapes and ornaments that decorated the lampshades and walls of Greco-Roman dwellings. Items of room decoration and ordinary household utensils, such as alfalfa or light bulbs found in columbariums, perfume boxes and other trinkets of the women's toilet, even kitchen utensils like scales and pots, strainers and cake tins, in their decorations are also not free from this mythological motif, decorated in the same pagan-classical taste. None of the peoples of the ancient world possessed such artistic flair, and nowhere did art occupy such a prominent position in the general structure of life, in particular in the religious sphere, as in Greece. The very religion of the Greeks, in the person of their gods, was nothing more than a cult of aesthetic anthropomorphism, and therefore the artistic form in which the religious ideas of the Greeks were clothed became an essential element in their religion, united with its content and cultivated a religious feeling more accurately than any dogmatic formulas and theoretical rules. The Romans borrowed from the Etruscans cosmogony and mythology, close to Greek, and then, when they entered into direct relations with the Greeks as victors, they adopted the most aesthetic shell of the Greek religion and its artistic forms. Most artists, especially painters who worked in Rome, were originally Greeks or Romans educated in their school; Most of the plots were entirely borrowed from Hellenic mythology and epic. We should not forget that with the decline of ancient religion and the disintegration of Roman society, the time came for general moral degradation, as a result of which art took a false direction, assimilated and developed motives that were favorable to the then licentiousness of morals. So, for example, one cannot help but see that the painting of the times of the empire gives preference to some of the subjects and almost does not touch upon myths and legends, which contained something important and serious, or hidden some philosophical thought, religious or moral truth under fiction. A faithless and morally corrupt society liked in mythology and legends what was graceful and piquant in them. It was interested in myths that told about the love and love affairs of the gods of Olympus, about their adventures and various kinds of weaknesses. “It seems,” notes Jules Mart, characterizing the state of painting under the empire, “that Greco-Roman painters knew no other subjects than love ones. With rare exceptions, their mythological pictures are only sensual and voluptuous anecdotes.” 52 Not content in their works with playful cupids, naked Nereids and Bacchantes in the most immodest poses, fauns and satyrs enterprising in love, the artists of this era painted lampshades and walls with the adventures of gods and goddesses of the highest rank - the pranks of Jupiter, Mars, Apollo, Neptune and Bacchus, the sins of Venus on Olympus and beyond, with the adventures of Diana and Endymion, Juno and Paris, Polyphemus and Galatea, Circe and Ulysses, Leander and Hero, etc. Anyone who would doubt the similar nature of Greco-Roman art during the advent of Christianity would do well to go to Italy in order to see these works of painting and sculpture designed to excite low passions in the secret sections of its museums and the excavated houses of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and to observe on the spot an endless series of even more seductive and already completely obscene paintings. 53 In ancient classical art, when strict aesthetic taste guided the artist’s chisel and brush, form was the expression of an idea in the best sense of the word; in the era of the decline of art, form was placed above all else, and sensually provocative positions replaced the artistic forms of ancient painting and plastic arts. This is, in general terms, the situation in which Christianity found the ancient world with its at least seemingly charming, but, in essence, light and refined art that served the interests of the pagan religion. It goes without saying that Christianity, in view of the crudely sensual direction of Greco-Roman art, could not make peace with it and, in the person of some of its representatives, became a decisive opposition to it. Added to this was the influence of Judaism, which stood in such close dogmatic and liturgical relations to Christianity, and from whose midst came its first followers. Turning Jews away from idolatry and based on the idea of ​​​​the inimaginability of the Divine as an absolute being, the Old Testament religion, with its commandment: do not make for yourself an idol or any likeness (Exod. 20:4; Deut. 5:8), prohibited the representation of the Divine in any sensual image. To what extent the second commandment condemned art in its principle is a completely different question; but it is remarkable that in some theological circles its understanding was very literal, and Christian moralists used this formula against the use of art in the church and for their apologetic purposes. In the first centuries of the existence of the church, when intolerance towards paganism was expressed in the form of a sharp protest, and religious antagonism prevented members of the new religious society from drawing a line between art and the ideas with which it was associated in the pagan world, a party was formed among Christianity that was so hostile to classical art that in the heat of polemics it was ready to deny in principle its application in Christianity. The most striking exponent of the beliefs of this harsh, anti-artistic party, which reached the most extreme conclusions, is, without a doubt, Tertullian. By his nature, he belonged to those living, quickly carried away natures who do not know prudent and restrained tactics, but, pursuing a favorite thought, are either extreme optimists or notorious pessimists, depending on the nature of the matter. Imbued with hatred of idolatry and intolerant of everything that had any connection with it and could serve as food for it, Tertullian from this point of view sees in art the support of pagan concepts, the reason for their successful spread, the support of a cult hostile to Christianity. The power and influence of paganism would, according to him, be insignificant without the pomp and vain splendor of its worship. “Before idol makers appeared in the world, the churches were empty and their walls bare. Although idolatry existed before, it did not have a name. And when the devil introduced into the world the makers of statues and all kinds of images, this ulcer of the human race received, as it were, a body and a name.” Of course, Tertullian’s harsh attacks were directed mainly against the makers of idols, but his ardent nature could not resist on this basis and, in the heat of his passion, went so far that he did not separate art in itself from the position it occupied at that time in the pagan world, from the truly ugly role that it had to play in the fate of ancient religions. According to his concept, art is secret idolatry, and those who devote their energies to it - whether they are sculptors, painters or engravers - they all serve the cause of the devil and spread the interests of paganism. Any art that produces an idol, no matter what kind it may be, becomes the head of idolatry. And it doesn’t matter whether the image comes from the hands of a sculptor, sculptor or seamstress, whether the idol is made of plaster, paint, stone, copper, silver or thread. No matter what the idol is made of, it doesn’t matter, since the matter is not in the material, but in its form, in what is called the word είδος. Είδωλον is a diminutive of είδος, and this in Greek means form, image. Thus, every form, every image - large or small, must be called an idol; Anyone who makes images participates in the sin of idolatry. 54 Tertullian not only declared a protest against pagan art, but also challenged its very principle - the formal side. Just because art deals with images and forms, he recognizes it as an instrument of idolatry and extends this harsh response to all types of art without exception. “There are many other types of arts,” he notes in another place, “which, although they do not come into contact with the preparation of idols, are not innocent in that they give strength to the latter. It doesn’t matter whether you build or decorate, whether you erect a church, an altar or a shrine, whether you make metal strips or arrange decorations or even a room for idols.” 55 “God equally forbids,” the apologist continues to reason, “both making idols and worshiping them. An image or idol is made in order to worship it... That is why, in order to eradicate idolatry, the divine scripture says: “Thou shalt not make for yourself an idol or any likeness, such as the tree in heaven, or the tree below on earth, or the tree in the waters under the earth.” Some of the images that the Jews had, for example, the copper serpent in the desert, were made at the special command of God, with an educational and mysterious purpose and constituted an exception to the rule, but did not destroy it. 56 The Old Testament law is valid for Christians as well. And then, turning to Christian artists who continued to make idols, did not want to give up their former profession and, in justifying themselves and their old craft, referred to the words of the apostle: “Whoever is in a rank, in it he is called, let him abide in it” (1 Cor. 7:20), Tertullian notes that even though a clear instruction in this regard was not given, the rite of baptism alone is enough to convince that the art of preparing idols is contrary to our faith and unworthy of a Christian who denies Satan and all his works. Alluding to the baptismal vow, he asks: “Can you deny with your tongue what you acknowledge to be the work of your own hands? profess faith in one God, preparing many? I only do, but do not worship them, you say. True, but you prepare them for worship, sacrifice your talents and labors to them - you become more than a priest for them, because, thanks to you, they will have priests.” For idolmakers, “who really should not have been accepted into the bosom of the Church of God,” 57 Tertullian recommends turning to related crafts for food so as not to die of hunger. 58 He would also not be averse to expelling works of art from the Christian environment and does not allow their use even in home life. The decorative side in the furnishings of homes - and that should be abandoned, as not corresponding to the strict morals and sedateness of the members of the new spiritual religion. Tertullian does not like the fact that during pagan celebrations, lamps are lit at the entrance to Christian homes, and even in such large quantities that they leave behind the houses of the pagans. Laurel wreaths, which Christians used to decorate their homes on holidays, also arouse displeasure and protest in him. 59 Without sharing the extreme views and harsh judgments about Tertullian’s art, other apologists, early and late in time, were also far from sympathetic to the use of sacred images by Christians. Although they did not speak out on this subject as fully, clearly and decisively as Tertullian, this is evident from their argumentation where they had to deal with works of art in their cultic use in the classical world. In such cases, apologists judged art for the most part not as objective, calm observers, but as polemicists and moralists. Everywhere it appears to them as an inseparable companion of paganism, an invariably constant attribute of it, or in discord with good morality. In this regard, the writers of the first centuries of Christianity, with few exceptions, revealed a striking unanimity: a judgment expressed by one almost always finds a place in one form or another in another. The difference noticed between them is small and depended on the dissimilarity, so to speak, of the ground on which they stood, and the points of view from which they started in their reasoning about the images of the Divine and the religious and cult significance of the arts. Tertullian, as we have seen, rejected the latter due to their connection with idolatry and due to the dangers from paganism. Most of the ancient Christian apologists, based on the concept of God as a single originless and uncreated Being, an invisible and omnipresent Spirit, whose greatness is immense, argued that He cannot be imagined in any sensual way, and He does not need this, demanding from us only spiritual worship. There were also among them, however, very few, who did not see the need for the fine arts in the matter of worship of God, based on the sublime idea of ​​​​the nature of man, who can enter into communication with the Divine without any visible means. Aristides wondered how the Hellenes, being superior in education to the barbarians, who worshiped images of created beings and objects in their churches, themselves came to worship insensitive idols. “I’m surprised how they, seeing the latter, made by masters, tied and rotated by them, did not understand that these were not gods. Their poets and philosophers say that the images were made in honor of God the Almighty and are similar to Him, Whom no one has ever seen to judge what He is like, and no one can see. They talk about Him as having a need for sacrifices, libations and churches, but God does not seek any of these, and people who think so are mistaken.” 60 “We do not make many sacrifices,” wrote St. Justin Martyr, 61 – we do not make wreaths of flowers in honor of those whom people made and placed in churches and called gods; for we know that they are soulless and dead and do not have the image of God. We do not think that God resembles such images in which some say they presented Him for veneration... And is it really necessary to tell you, when you yourself know how artists shape matter, trim and cut, melt and forge, and often from worthless vessels, through art, changing only the appearance and giving them an image, they make what they call gods. 62 This is what we consider not only contrary to reason, but also offensive to God, Who has ineffable glory and image." Tatian, according to whom pagan philosophy is full of contradictions, and poetry served only to depict battles, love affairs of the gods and corruption of the soul, seriously studied classical art and came to the conclusion that “his works contain a lot of nonsense.” He laughed at the statues of famous masters depicting unworthy husbands and even more often depraved women, and advised the pagans to destroy monuments of such wickedness and look for what is truly beautiful. “God, Who cannot be seen with human eyes, cannot be depicted, according to him, by any art.” 63 Reproaching the arrogance and boasting of the Greeks, who considered themselves inventors of the arts, Tatian, on the contrary, emphasizes that they borrowed art from the barbarians, that the Babylonians invented astronomy, the Egyptians - geometry, the Phoenicians - writing, the Cyclopes - metal production. And one should not boast about these inventions. The reverse side of the matter, according to Athenagoras, who seemed to complement Tatian at this point, is that as long as there were no arts, there was no idolatry. If there were no plastic arts, there would be no idols; If it were not for painting, images of the gods would not appear in outline with paints. Artists and their art were needed for statues and images of gods to come into existence. Will Christians, who distinguish God from matter, become worshipers of idols made from matter, will they be supporters of the arts that created the religion of paganism and strengthened its worship of God? 64 “But there are people,” notes Meliton of Sardis, “who say: in honor of God we make an idol, and we honor precisely the image of the hidden God. They do not know that God is in every place. And you, miserable person, for whom God is present in you, outside of you and above you, you go and buy yourself from the artist’s house a tree that has been cut and processed to reproach God; you sacrifice to this idol and do not know that the All-Seeing Eye condemns you and says to you: how can the invisible God be cut out? 65 It seemed especially funny to Theophilus of Antioch that the stonecutters, sculptors, painters and smelters themselves valued their gods while they were in the workshops of the artists finishing them, and then, when they moved them to the churches, they came to them with zeal and with a supply of sacrifices and libations, forgetting that these gods continue to remain the same as they were in their hands, that is: stone, copper, wood, paint or other what substance? “The appearance of God,” notes St. father - indescribable and inexplicable"; it can be contemplated with the eyes of their souls only by people who are free from sin, who have cleansed themselves of all filth. 66 The idea of ​​the possibility of internal communication between man and God and its superiority over external worship of God was especially clearly put forward by Minucius Felix. To the pagan’s reproach that Christians cannot see for themselves or show others the God Who is revered, he remarks: “Yes, we believe in God because we do not see Him, but we can feel Him with our hearts... God is everywhere and is not only close to us, but is also inside us.” “What image shall I make of Him,” the apologist asks himself a little higher, “when man himself, rightly considered, is the image of God? What church shall I build for Him, when this whole world, created by His power, cannot contain Him? Isn’t it better to keep Him in our minds, to sanctify Him in the depths of our hearts?” 67 Clement of Alexandria, who depicts in bright colors the sensual direction of classical art and skillfully exposes the absurdity of pagan veneration of insensitive idols, warned the believers of his time against both and found the Old Testament prohibition of making any images of the Divine very wise. “The legislator wanted to elevate our minds into contemplative areas, and not stop them at matter. It is not true that the greatness of God will lose its splendor if the Divinity is not represented by ordinary art; on the contrary, to worship an incorporeal Being, noticeable only with the spiritual eye, depicting Him in a sensual image, means only to humiliate Him. The Jews also thought so when they erected a church without idols in it.” Christians act even better and more correctly, “without tying the presence of the One who embraces the entire universe to any specific place. A pure soul is a church more pleasing to God than all the magnificent buildings erected in His honor by human hands.” 68 Supporters of the same spiritualistic view and, together, opponents of religious-ritual appearance were Arnobius, Lactantius and Origen. Not feeling the need himself and not recognizing the religious and educational significance of Christian symbols for others, Arnobius strongly rebelled against images of the Divine and even directly found their religious use offensive to the greatness of God. 69 His disciple, Lactantius, while accepting images as reminders, resolutely denied, however, the need for an image to honor the omnipresent God and looked at painters and sculptors as distributors of idolatry and pagan superstitions, along with poets. Origen, as a sublimely self-absorbed nature, in whose eyes the bodies of Christians were churches of God, did not, of course, attach importance to works of only outward piety and did not approve, for example, of persons who made efforts to decorate churches, but cared little about correcting their character and cultivating a religious disposition in themselves. He also had an unfavorable attitude towards art, seeing a kind of lie in it, seeing how with its works it distracted foolish people from spiritual objects and thoughts about God and turned them to the earth, clinging their spiritual eyes to the sensual. 70 Of course, in the life of each of the named writers, their origin, education, individual inclinations and passion for one or another teaching, for example, Montanism and asceticism, one can find circumstances that did not favor the use of images by Christians for religious purposes: but the common reason for the apologists’ reluctance to art was, without a doubt, its crudely sensual direction in combination with its service-cult role in the pagan world. The first works of art that circulated in Christian society and came out of its midst could have given rise to an unfavorable attitude towards religious and artistic images. Whoever the artists were who were engaged in this work, at first they necessarily belonged to the ancient school and adhered to its models. They had not yet had time to develop an independent form for expressing plots and profaned these latter not with malicious intent, but out of inability to rise above the usual methods of the school of that time. Having changed their religious beliefs, they turned out to be powerless to change their artistic style, get rid of centuries-old traditions and become in line with the content of biblical and gospel stories. It turned out, therefore, that Christian images of the good shepherd were somewhat similar to genre pictures of classical artists, in which shepherds were brought onto the stage, surrounded by flocks and with sheep on their shoulders; apostles and prophets were depicted with the attributes of venerable persons of the Roman official world, and new religious ideas were often expressed in symbols of pagan origin. Even in relatively late times, artists made attempts to depict Christ in the features of ancient Zeus. If a similar method of depiction was allowed on the walls of the catacombs, in Christian tombs, which were probably under the supervision of clergy, then what can be said about home life, about private use, where this supervision did not penetrate, where objects of art had decorative significance, and therefore allowed more freedom in execution and were accepted with less legibility? But Christianity could not stop at a negative attitude towards religious art. With an unconditional condemnation of art, any ecclesiastical appearance was rejected. At such a cold height of judgment, at which some of the ancient Christian writers stood, Christian feeling could not maintain itself without entering into a hopeless contradiction with the needs of the heart and the natural inclinations of its nature. The solution to this important problem of the use of art in the field of Christian worship should have belonged to a more moderate and calm view, and it was not slow to make itself felt at the very time when unsympathetic voices were heard against art. The representatives of the negative trend themselves have already given rise to such a conciliatory view. If we exclude the harsh, merciless review of Tertullian, after all, in their opinion, art is hostile to Christianity not in principle, but in the application that was made of it, using it as an instrument of paganism, a means for the expression and dissemination of its religious ideas. With such an explanation of the matter, the question of Christian art was not necessarily resolved negatively, and its possibility was not undermined. Not to mention the church fathers of the 4th-5th centuries, who defended the use of art against attacks on it and quite decisively defined the service that it provided, is providing and will provide to the church, 71 even the first prejudiced connoisseurs of art attached great importance to the artist’s personal attitude to his work and distinguished the craft, work, the formal side from how, for what and for what reasons it was produced. Tertullian in his time, as we have seen, already dealt with such artists who, even after converting to Christianity, did not want to part with their old occupation - making idols, and assessed the significance of their arguments from the point of view not of art, but of the cause for which they served with art. Unfortunately, Tertullian and other apologists, generally speaking, who shared this view, did not develop it in detail in their writings and did not carry it out consistently only because they were in the fight against paganism and saw art as a powerful tool for its propaganda. When they looked at monuments of art from a historical point of view, they reasoned completely differently. Here they turned out to be connoisseurs and connoisseurs of art. With visible interest, they include on the pages of their treatises this or that news about many works of ancient plastic art, sometimes describing them in detail and involuntarily paying tribute to these wonderful works of art. Despite the apparent antagonism, the writers of the first centuries of Christianity brought significant benefit to the history of classical art, noting many of its most remarkable monuments and explaining their inner meaning. Having themselves come from an intelligentsia environment, they showed a good familiarity with Greco-Roman art and its artistic ideas. They were not afraid to offend the feelings of their contemporaries or to cast an unfavorable light on Christian dogma when they used, for example, comparisons taken from the field of art, explaining the Christian teaching about the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the body; 72 or, wanting to visually present the biblical teaching about the creation of the world, they depicted the Creator under the guise of an artist creating a planned sculpture from plaster or clay. 73 Similar artistic images and allusions, which were especially readily and widely used by moralists, dogmatists and exegetes of subsequent times, can be found in large numbers in the works of the first Christian writers. In denouncing heretics, Irenaeus of Lyon, for example, quite often, for comparisons and similarities for certain persons and objects, turned to the field of art, 74 to which he himself was clearly disposed and to the study of which, as a kind of virtue, he invited false teachers. 75 The Holy Father was deeply aware and explained in some detail the meaning of the Old Testament ritual instructions and New Testament sacred rites and their importance for man as a physical-spiritual being. Feelings of gratitude, love and reverence for God can only be expressed in a visible way; on the other hand, “the similarity of spiritual, heavenly objects cannot be brought closer to our understanding otherwise” than with the help of earthly things. 76 With such a view, Irenaeus of Lyons could not be an enemy of sacred images and did not blame the Carpocrats just because they depicted Christ. Clement of Alexandria, who taught about the spiritual worship of God and jealously protected Christians from pagan idolatry and the morally corrupting influence of ancient art, 77 as a deep connoisseur of classical culture, was also not in principle an opponent of the latter. Art deserves praise and respect, as he would argue, but it should not be valued on an equal basis with truth άνθρωπον ώς άλήθεια). He knew how to understand real art and, together with his contemporaries, paid due tribute to the wonder of the works of famous masters: Praxiteles, Lysippus and Alelles. “Without a doubt, no one will find it difficult,” he said about others, “to distinguish true artistic painting from vulgar and vulgar, decent music from unbridled, true beauty from fake.” 78 But since in reality Clement often had to observe how harmful the effects of the arts can be on people, especially vicious ones, he made a difference between the latter, dividing them into less useful and more useful. Of the latter, his particular love was architecture, which, according to him, extremely refines mental abilities, makes the soul most receptive to understanding and capable of distinguishing truth from lies and, finally, elevates us from sensory objects to things comprehended only by the mind. 79 However, these theorists—writers with their ideal, or at least one-sided, views on the matter—could not be the deciders of the question of art in its relation to Christianity. Personally, they could stand above the need for a visual, artistic expression of religion and have a negative attitude towards any external cult. But this is not how the mass of Christian society viewed the matter, for whom the judgments of intelligent individuals, such as apologists, hardly had, let’s not say, binding force, but even guiding significance. And this is the reason for the contradiction in which the strict views we outlined above found themselves when they collided with the interests of the living environment and with the existing experiences of artistic activity among Christians. The neutral ground on which Christian rules and pagan traditions could most easily coexist became a mediating instrument for bringing these contradictions closer together. For the first time, such an environment became the home life of Christians, where objects of art were kept as everyday furnishings and, as a kind of indifferent custom, did not come into conflict with new religious ideas. Here the fears of paganism could not be as strong as in the church sphere, and the natural inclination towards the pleasant atmosphere of home life, towards familiar pleasures and pleasures, found free satisfaction in art and its works. Clement of Alexandria, to whom church-historical science owes many precious information regarding the private life of the first Christians, on the one hand, states the widespread development of aesthetic needs in them, and on the other, expresses his own opinion that these aspirations, correctly set and satisfied, do not contradict Christian morality. He did not, like Tertullian, eliminate the decorative side from the everyday life of believers, but, on the contrary, allowed painting, plastic arts and small industrial arts as a means to improve everyday conditions and arrange life more or less with pleasure. The inhabitants of Alexandria of his time, especially women, were infected with a passion for luxury in clothes, in attire, and in attire in general. Advising Christian women to restrain themselves in their pursuit of this kind of thing, to dress decently, that is, cleanly, simply and unpretentiously, he does not, however, express an absolute prohibition against wearing gold jewelry and clothes made of finer and more delicate materials. He condescends to women living in prosperity, especially to the rich, and allows them, at the appropriate time and within the limits of moderation, to dress up not out of vanity or luxury, but only to please their husbands. It allows not only wives to wear a gold ring on their finger, but also husbands to wear a ring - not for decoration, but in remembrance of the marriage vow of fidelity and for putting seals in the household on what requires protection. 80 Only with the demands of Christian solemnity in mind, Clement of Alexandria rebels against the indecent images found on the rings of that time, and instead of the subjects accepted by the pagans, he recommends that Christians carve symbols of a more strict and dignified nature on them. “We should have seals with the image of a dove, a fish, a ship with open sails, a musical lyre, which Polycrates used, a ship’s anchor, which was carved by Seleucus. If anyone is a fisherman, let him (let) remember the apostle and the nets taken out of the water.” He further advised to avoid images of a sword or bow on rings, as objects related to war and strife, bowls (κύπελλα), as accessories of pagan cults. “We are friends of the world,” he explains, “and we must be temperate people. Many wear rings with naked images of their male or female lovers on them, as if to involuntarily remind themselves of their love pleasures: this is licentiousness” 81... Even Tertullian, despite his hostile attitude towards modern art, had to inevitably speak for him when he referred in polemics to Christian bowls with the image of the good shepherd and a sheep (procedant ipsae picturae calicum vestrorum; quern in calice depingis). 82 The testimonies of both teachers of the church, justified in the best possible way by the existing objects of art that have survived from this ancient period, show us what range of subjects was in use by the believers of the first centuries, and how early the best of them drew the line of division between Christian and non-Christian elements in art. The second environment where art could develop more freely, and where it was looked at much more leniently, was the heretical circles of the first centuries. Regarding the role they played in relation to the art of that time, it should be noted, however, that it was at the same time both positive and negative, useful for its future and harmful. The heretical sects of the first centuries were, as we know, quite numerous, and if art found a home in these scattered circles, this could no longer help but propagate it in the modern Christian world; but, on the other hand, as societies not recognized by the church, they could not have sufficient authority to support his reputation in the Orthodox environment. If the everyday life of Christians put forward mainly the decorative side of art, then heretical sects almost made the first attempt to put into circulation some works of brush and chisel with the nature of sacred and religious images. If over time the last assumption is rejected as erroneous, then even then it will not be possible to question, much less deny, the validity of the idea that the heretical sects of the first centuries and, in particular, the Gnostics had a prominent role in the original fate of Christian art. The heretics express a very definite view of Christian religious art at the very time when representatives of the Orthodox side, due to fears from paganism, spoke on this score unsympathetically or hesitantly, and we know very little about their positive significance in the history of early Christian art. Gnosticism combined the principles of Platonism and Alexandrian philosophy with Christian views and sought to bring both into balance. The religious cults of the East with their symbolism, mysteries and secret teachings formed the setting for Gnostic doctrines and inspired sectarians to engage in art, leaving a peculiar mystical imprint on it. St. Irenaeus, Tertullian and subsequently Epiphanius of Cyprus, who introduced us to the doctrine and various customs of the Gnostic parties, also noted several facts indicating their practical significance in the original fate of Christian art. Thus, Tertullian reproached Hermogenes for adding the pursuit of art to other deviations from the truth. Pingit illicite - this expression used by Tertullian allows for two explanations: it can be understood either in the sense that the painting that Hermogenes was engaged in is an impermissible art, or in the sense that he used it impermissibly, that is, he used art for some tendentious purposes, put into circulation unworthy artistic experiments. The latter understanding seems more plausible to us, since sectarians generally used the arts, in particular painting, in order to visually represent their false teachings through them and thereby make it easier for the masses to assimilate them. But no matter how this passage is understood, one thing remains certain for us, that in the society which Hermogenes laid the foundation for, certain branches of art were practiced, and Tertullian treated this matter with indignation, calling the heresiarch: pictor pessimus. 83 Traces of Christian iconography and its religious use can be found among the followers of Basilides. According to Irenaeus, they “engaged in sorcery, used images (utuntur imaginibus), spells, evocations and other tricks.” 84 Having adopted some features of the cult practice of paganism and taking advantage of the dual faith of the first proselytes of Christianity, the Basilidians attracted the latter to their side with magic, spells, invocation of spirits and, as one might guess, special superstitious rituals in front of the images that came out of their workshops. Irenaeus does not explain what exactly these images were. The key to the solution, however, may be what he says next about the Carpocrats. The latter, according to him, used images made with a brush, as well as those made from other materials. According to sectarians, these images, by the way, represented Christ in His true form, which allegedly came down in a photograph taken by Pilate. “They decorate them with wreaths and display them together with images of secular philosophers, namely, with images of Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle and others, and show them other signs of respect like the pagans.” 85 Epiphanius, complementing Irenaeus, comments on it in the sense that the named heretics performed their sacraments and made sacrifices before them. In addition to artistic images of Christ, the Gnostics probably also had images of other persons from the circle of Christian iconography, such as, for example, images of the apostles Peter and Paul, who, according to Eusebius, then circulated among Christians. But perhaps most of all, the artistic activity of the Gnostics was concentrated on the fabrication of a considerable number of gems preserved from them, known in science under the name: “Abraxas,” in which the religious syncretism of these sectarians was especially clearly expressed. Gnostic gems date back to a very early period of Christian art and are medallions with symbolic images and inscriptions, and at one time had the meaning of amulets or talismans. The name Αβραξας is derived by some from the name of the supreme god of the followers of Basilides, others associate this word with Αβρακουρα - the name of the mother of the gods Isis; but the more likely explanation is those who see in this word the letter designation of the supreme god or Pleroma, since the number of Greek letters that make up this word, if translated into numbers, will be 365, equal to the sum of the days of the solar year. 86 The place of origin of these gems, so to speak, their homeland, were Syria and Egypt - the main centers of Gnosticism. Without dwelling on other factors in the initial history of Christian art, based on the data presented, we can come to the conclusion that the position of art in the early Christian world was not entirely secure, that its works did not find an equally sympathetic reception among all Christians. Art had to overcome the dislike of, first of all, some representatives of theological thought of that time in order to acquire the rights of generally recognized citizenship among Christians and then take its rightful place in the area of ​​their worship. Having first made a nest for itself in a Christian home, art then imperceptibly penetrated into the church, gradually moving into those aspects of church life that were closely related to everyday life, such as, for example, marriage and burial rites, the agape environment and other socio-religious institutions. It is in this cautious movement of early Christian art, and most importantly, in the selective and even, perhaps, suspicious attitude of many ancient Christian writers towards its works, that lies the feature that old Protestant researchers called Kunsthass - technophobia or the hostile attitude of the first Christians to art. Now this theory has almost been abandoned in church archaeological science, and the best representatives of the latter, for example, Professor Kraus, speak of it as a fable (die erste und schlimmste Fabel); 87 but the fact, designated at one time by this word - Kunsthass, remains in its former force and is justified to some extent by the actual situation of early Christian art. But one must never lose sight of the following circumstances. The unsympathetic attitude towards art and even the aversion from it of some of the leading Christians have little in common with those religious one-sided views that originally caused this theory (vom Kunsthass der ersten Christen) - we mean the first Protestant dogmatists, who needed it to confirm their teaching about not venerating icons. But the position of art in ancient Christian society can only be connected with this polemical device only in an artificial way. Dislike of works of art was far from universal among the first Christians and was expressed in its harsh form only by some individuals and, at most, by circles. Finally, we must not forget that this unsympathetic attitude was caused mainly by opposition to modern ancient art and an ardent desire to eliminate its corrupting influence on the doctrine and morals of early Christian society. And these fears of the strict zealots of Christianity could not last long. One only had to put Christian content into artistic forms, revive them with the Christian spirit, to ensure forever the position of art in the Christian world and make it a powerful educational tool in the hands of the New Testament church. This favorable, positive movement towards art began very early and led to a completely opposite phenomenon, that is, to the widest introduction of external forms of worship and objects of art into the field of Christian worship. How early this desire began is shown by the inventory of the catacombs. The tombs, with their archaeological richness, belong to the earliest era of Christianity, and, judging by the inscriptions and artistic style, some of the images that survive in them date back to the 2nd-3rd centuries. It is remarkable that even in those places where Christians in the era of persecution barely found a corner of safety, even at a time when they did not have the opportunity and, perhaps, good material means to widely stage their worship and take care of religious appearance - here and at this very time the makings of the future prosperity of art were laid in its main branches: architecture, painting and sculpture. The vaults and walls of these dungeons are covered with paintings, the sarcophagi are decorated with bas-reliefs; even church architecture found its representatives here in the crypts, which, by the way, were also intended for liturgical purposes. Christianity now had the task of giving a new direction to the outdated classical art, re-creating it, clearing it of pagan growths, and in this purified form applying it to its needs. How this isolation of Christian art went, how the independent language of Christian feeling was consistently developed - the solution to this question is the subject of the history of church art. From the history of church painting I. General remarks on the development of Christian painting General remarks on the development of Christian painting; three periods in its history. Painting as a decoration of everyday life and as a means of expressing religious and moral ideas among the first Christians. Painting in Christian churches and its religious and cult purpose. The nature of the relationship to church painting of Christian writers: Eusebius of Caesarea, Epiphanius of Cyprus, the fathers of the Council of Elvira in 306, Basil the Great, John Chrysostom, Asterius of Amasia, Gregory Dvoeslov, Nile the Ascetic and others. Iconoclasm, its relation to church art and its significance in the history of the latter. We will begin our review of the history of church painting with general preliminary remarks regarding the conditions of its origin in the Christian world and find out the starting point for a further review of its monuments. In fact, where is the starting point and point of origin of this branch of art in the Christian world, and where did its development begin? To resolve this issue, we should recall the historical point from which we began the history of the Christian church. Just as there we began with home meetings and in the arrangement of ordinary chapels we outlined the prototype of the Christian church, the basic unit with which the movement of church architecture began, so in the question of the origin of church iconography we have to start from the same home. Before art penetrated into the church and entered the service of the church, it made a nest for itself in the Christian home, lived in domestic use and served as an environment for everyday life. In this primitive period of its existence, it could be called Christian by the environment in which it revolved, partly by the content of the plots, but in form, in the processing of this content and in purpose, it was closely related to the ancient art of that time and had not yet managed to become the language of Christian consciousness, the organ of church-religious life. Then it begins to separate and takes on a religious character, as can be seen in catacomb painting. Without abandoning ancient forms and techniques, painting of this era strives to express Christian ideas, its own content, but with a lack of independent forms, it resorts to the help of symbols and is expressed in figurative language. Biblical and historical subjects appear next to the symbols. They mark the first step of this art in the field of objective, historical, personal, and not symbolic depiction of subjects from the Christian cycle, along with New Testament persons and events. But these persons entered the catacomb painting as members of an entire historical picture, and not as individual typical individuals; and if they acted separately, it was only under the same symbolic coloring. So Christ is depicted here under the image of Orpheus, in the form of a shepherd with a lamb on his shoulders, or in the form of some Old Testament personality who had typological significance in relation to Christ. Further church art had to develop iconographic types for persons and events of the Christian cycle, determine the essential features for each of such images, and thus subordinate icon painting to models approved and verified by church use. These phases contain the circle of development of Christian iconography from its first experiments to the period after the iconoclastic period, when the principle of iconographic tradition was established, and religious painting became iconography and received an exclusively ecclesiastical purpose. According to this schedule, the entire path traversed by Christian painting falls into the following three periods: 1. The early Christian period, the monuments of which are works of Christian art of the first three centuries. During this period, painting technically follows the classical style and develops under its predominant influence. The cycle of pictorial subjects is still very limited and mixed with images of ancient and universal human content. 2. The second period, coinciding with the era of Constantine and lasting until the 8th century, i.e. before the time of iconoclasm, relative to the volume of the pictorial cycle, it was incomparably fuller and richer. It already embraces a complete system of Christian subjects and, due to the dominant nature of their reproduction, can be called historical in contrast to the previous – symbolic period of art. This was a flourishing time in the history of Christian art, when, on the one hand, it had not yet lost the grace of its ancient form, and on the other, being given freedom of artistic execution, it was not constrained by the conventional rules of church control. 3. The third and final period, which is most conveniently called the period of establishment of iconographic types, begins approximately from the time of iconoclasm and continues through the entire history of subsequent Byzantine iconography. During this period, the artistic side of iconography declines, and the theological direction gains predominance over it, i.e. processing of iconographic subjects based on church tradition and strict dogmatic formulas. Since then, the history of church painting has been divided into two directions: Byzantine and Western. Byzantine, following in all its rigor the foundations of iconographic tradition, preserves the church style, but, continuing to follow the path of accepted models, it freezes in motionless forms and becomes smaller. The Western is gradually abandoning the conditions of iconographic tradition, delving into artistic realism and adopting a secular character. Within these boundaries we will consider the history of Christian painting. There is little historical and literary data about the first works of Christian art, as well as about everything that concerns the everyday life of believers in the first three centuries. We have to judge them based on a few fragmentary information transmitted by ancient church writers: Tertullian, Irenaeus of Lyons, Clement of Alexandria, and on the basis of the monuments themselves that have come down to us from deep Christian antiquity. From them we judge not only the position of art in the Christian society of that time, but also about its various types that were used by the artists of that time. Depicting the methods that the latter used in practicing their profession, Tertullian says that they knew the art of sculpting, carving and weaving; they made images, he explains, from plaster, stone, copper, silver and thread; painted with wax paints using a tool known as a cauterium. Irenaeus, exposing the false teachings of the Gnostic sects of his time, confirms the existence among Christians of the branches of art named by Tertullian, in particular, paintings and various kinds of sculptural works. In the writings of Clement of Alexandria, who fought against luxury in the lives of the wealthiest members of Christian society, especially condemning the extravagance of women and their vain passion for clothes, one can find indications of many household items: painted glass bowls, mirrors, rings, etc. This class of objects, the vast majority of which occupy a middle place between works of art and handicrafts, has been preserved in large numbers in the Roman catacombs. The study of the latter, which continues to this day, every day, one might say, increases the mass of monuments of this kind already found in them and gradually replenishes and enriches our meager written information about the artistic and everyday side of the life of ancient Christians with more and more new material data. The most ancient cemeteries in their setting were a miniature, so to speak, likeness or imitation of the daily life of those generations who laid down their bones in their graves, crypts or caves. Pre-Christian antiquity looked at the coffin as the last dwelling of a person, where he goes to begin a new and endless life, however, similar to the one he led on earth. Hence, the coffin, in contrast to temporary housing, became and was called the “eternal home” of the soul, a place of prolonged sleep and peace passing into another world. In the words of one ancient inscription, the coffin is a second home, quo dormiendum et permanendum est. Haec est domus aeterna, ubi omnes pariter aevum degerent. According to this idea, the custom arose in the very preparation of grave premises to imitate the structure of ordinary dwellings, to resemble their structure as much as possible, and to furnish the graves of the dead with various objects from their household life. What constituted the furnishings and decoration of temporary housing, according to the view of the ancients, should have found a place for itself in their eternal dwelling. The furnishings and decoration of the graves therefore largely correspond to the cultural state of the society from which the deceased came, and give an idea of ​​his beliefs, external way of life, and the aesthetic side of his life. Traces of the same idea were partially preserved in Christian epigraphy: traditional views taken from the people’s environment could not quickly disappear or immediately fall under the influence of Christianity. Thanks to this circumstance, the following inscriptions appeared in Christian tombs: Florentia, quae vixit annos XXVI, crescens, fecit benemerenti et sibi et suis domum aeternam, in pace, 88 or: domus Amorati, domum emit sibi 89... John Chrysostom was strongly armed in his time against this name and the very custom of burying with the dead in in the graves are the very objects that served them in everyday life, and the Council of Elvira even decreed the rule: Cereos per diem in coemeteriis non incendi, inquietandi enim sanctorum spiritus non sunt (can. 34). In connection with this symbolism of the coffin, many different kinds of objects appeared in Christian tombs. Based on their location, they can be divided into two groups: the first, the most numerous, was located inside the tombs, that is, in loculi and arcosolia, the other - outside them or on the surface. This latter group includes various kinds of metal, bone and glass things, pressed into lime or cement, which were used to lubricate and seal the edges of tiles and slabs that covered the entrance or opening of loculi and arcosoliums. Excavations carried out in the catacombs show how many of these objects are found. So, in the tombs of St. Agnes, containing 5753 loculi, when opening and examining them, the following were found: 33 clay vessels, 131 lamps, 283 glass vessels and works of enamel, 6 glass dishes, 148 bone rings, 29 coins and up to 150 smaller objects and various purposes, so that the entire inventory of things obtained in this tomb extends to 780. Between the loculi there are many completely empty and plundered by hunters for profit, but others are very richly furnished and apparently belonged to wealthy people. Previous archaeologists took these objects as conventional signs or symbols by which Christians recognized each other among fellow believers, recognized and distinguished their graves from others; they were given a religious meaning; but now this explanation has been abandoned by many, and since the time of Raoul Rochette, the presence and purpose of these objects in Christian graves began to be explained by analogy with similar accessories found in Roman pagan tombs. Those and other objects, with relatively few exceptions, had everyday rather than religious and cult significance. 90 And since this is so, we have the right to judge from them in general the direction and character of the art of that time, about those ideas and subjects that were the most popular and beloved among Christians at that time. In this regard, the images on various household items found in the catacombs are very interesting, such as lamps, bowls, toiletries, children's toys, etc. Two types of images predominate here: subjects of a purely decorative nature, borrowed from natural objects and phenomena of everyday life, and partly biblical historical scenes with some images of the Christian picturesque circle. For example, a terracotta lamp is designed in the shape of a ship with rigging and a helmsman; On the top of other lamps there are images of a child's or woman's face, and on many there are embossed figures: a candelabra, a palm or olive branch, a lamb, a dove, an anchor, a horse, etc. As if in parallel with them, on other numerous objects of the same household equipment there are images: a fish, a dove with an olive branch in its beak, the prophet Jonah, captured or thrown out by a sea monster, Orpheus, the good shepherd, the letters: α and ω and especially often the monogram of the name of Christ. Glass vessels with painted bottoms (Vetri d'oro, Goldgläser) also provide several materials for this characteristic. Some of them, later in time, decorated with images of Jesus Christ, the apostles Peter and Paul, the Mother of God and saints in general, apparently had cultic use, probably served as vessels for the Eucharist, cups for wine during agape, etc., but a much larger number of the oldest of them belonged to household items and are marked with inscriptions and images of a household nature. So, for example, on many of them the words are read along the edges: πιε ζεσες (more correctly: ζήσης, that is: Drink, live! This exclamation, something like our toast while drinking, had the meaning of a toast. Quite often, in the middle of the bottom there is a male or female figure, a married couple, or even a whole family inscribed in gold, i.e. parents with their children, to whom, in fact, the above exclamation and similar good wishes apply. Here we have, therefore, portrait-like images of persons to whom these vessels were presented as a gift during their lifetime, generally belonged, and together with whom they went to the grave. Others depict purely everyday scenes: a master carpenter among his apprentices busy at work, a hunter with hounds in pursuit of a deer and a wild horse, young men in the palaestra fighting among themselves, a circus rider on a quadriga. On many vessels, family life consistently unfolds before the viewer. It is curious, for example, the often repeated image of a young couple, over whom a winged genius holds a wreath or directly places wreaths on their heads; or, for example, a mother sits on a low bench with her breasts bare, and next to her stands a baby whom she is apparently going to feed. The inscription surrounding the figure reads: Coca vivas (cum) parentibibus tuis. Or, for example, a richly dressed young woman is shown sitting on an armchair with a child on her lap, next to whom stands an equally elegant maid and fans her with a fan. Inscriptions on vessels, like the one now transmitted, usually express good wishes to the persons depicted on them and involuntarily draw the researcher’s attention to analogous formulas of Roman epigraphy, which in turn were borrowed from everyday language. This was the first stage from which fine art began its history in the Christian world, an intermediate stage, so to speak, between craft and real art. In this form of its existence, in the initial stage of its development, early Christian art shared the same tasks as the ancient art of its day. It went hand in hand with household customs, served as a decoration for everyday life, and with its products satisfied first and foremost the aesthetic aspirations of the Christian society of that time. This was precisely the side of the matter from which Clement of Alexandria looked at contemporary Christian art; he allowed the use of works of painting, plastic and small industrial arts as a means of improving the home environment and arranging one’s life with pleasure and more or less comfort and rebelled only against the seductive and generally indecent images found on the rings of that time, advising resorting to symbols of a more strict and worthy Christian nature. His words, which we have already cited above, as well as existing works of ancient Christian art, make it clear that already from his very first times a circle of images with specifically Christian content began to emerge. The latter found a place for themselves already on household items, as we have seen, and little by little they took precedence over ancient subjects. And having become a conductor of Christian concepts and becoming more closely connected with the religious needs of Christian society, art naturally had to take on a more specific character. This turn began to show itself very early, when art had not yet had time to leave the confines of the house, but, of course, it emerged with all clarity after it found its application to wedding rites, funerals and other manifestations of the religious life of believers. Christians looked at marriage differently than the pagans (Eph. 5:31–32), and of course it is no longer by chance that on the glass bowls used in their marriage ceremonies, instead of a cupid with wings, we see Christ placing crowns on those being healed, or we find His monogram, or a gospel scroll between the heads of the newlyweds. It is not without intention, of course, that the latter are depicted on the vessels joining their hands above the altar, and it is not by chance that the inscription: vivatis in Deo - “live in God” surrounds their image. With all these details, the Christian artist wanted to say that marriage and married life should be about the Lord. Christians had their own special ideas about the afterlife; they, naturally, found expression in grave inscriptions and those objects and decorations with which burial places were furnished and cleaned. Under the influence of these ideas, a ship, an anchor, a palm tree, a dove, an olive branch became a visual expression of the well-known attitude of Christians towards their dead, a figurative idea of ​​the afterlife, and thus received a special inner meaning that pushed them far beyond the limits of simple decoration and gave them a symbolic meaning. During farewells, burials and commemorations of the deceased, Christians sang psalms, read prayers and holy books, spoke teachings, celebrated the Eucharist, celebrated funeral dinners in the form of agape, distributed alms, in a word, observed special funeral rites. Naturally, the objects used in the performance of the latter had to correspond to them in appearance and decoration. Once Christians gathered at their tombs to celebrate their holidays and rituals, they inevitably brought their own special coloring into this intimate world, into their sacred dungeons, and in one way or another processed and decorated those objects that were assigned for similar functions in pagan life. And this is the reason why, next to the well-known classical scenes on tombstones, on various utensils and general items of catacomb inventory, we find a significant number of images of a biblical-historical nature. If we move from these small items to the wall paintings of the catacombs, then it will be impossible not to notice that in them the Christian character is expressed even more clearly: here are already well-known combinations of biblical subjects, formed, so to speak, into well-known groups and selected with a certain thought to express Christian concepts of death and resurrection. These and similar images, in addition to their immediate, ornamental purpose, as picturesque paintings, were supposed to speak to the consciousness of the then Christian society and produce a certain kind of moral impact. The degree of understanding of this symbolism and the clarity of its assimilation, of course, is a different kind of question, but this no longer depended on the purpose of the images, but on other reasons. And if Meliton of Sardis or anyone else under his name was engaged in explaining the meaning of the most ordinary images of the painting of that time, this shows that they had already acquired a special inner meaning and a special educational value. In addition to the wall paintings of the catacombs, the same type of art monuments includes the above-mentioned vessels with golden bottoms of the 4th and subsequent centuries and ancient Christian sarcophagi with a predominant range of biblical and New Testament subjects. In this application to didactic purposes, art took on a special, in a certain sense tendentious, character, and became one of the means for carrying out certain ideas and for expressing even polemical relations. Having managed very early to become the language of Christian consciousness in everyday life and underground tombs, the art of painting, upon its transition to churches, took another step forward, set and openly adopted religious and cult goals for itself. From painting with religious content, it is transformed into iconography, essentially becoming res sacra, and the attitude towards it gradually changes into a strictly religious one. Paintings and carvings acquire the character of sacred images, and icon veneration takes place publicly in churches. But on the way to the last goal, at this stage of its internal development, Christian art had to experience the most misunderstandings and only after a long struggle did it manage to win a strong and independent position. When we talk about this, in a sense, new, position of painting in churches, this does not mean that the first open churches, let’s say basilicas, were already abundantly supplied with its works and put forward a special circle of images, which art had never known before or to which it had a completely different attitude. On the contrary, the first churches, as much as we know about them from the monuments that have survived to this day and the oldest written information, were relatively very poor in painting, for example, mosaics, and were rather, for the most part, bare walls lined with marble. Even less can it be said that in the first Christian churches painting was taken for iconography in the later sense of the word. But the fact is that from the time, in fact, of the construction of open, often most magnificent churches, the religious and cult purpose of painting in question begins to develop very noticeably, and traces of which in private Christian use go back and are attributed by scientists to even more distant times. Writers of the 2nd and 3rd centuries, apparently, had already encountered isolated cases of such use. Seeing in works of art the support of paganism, and in artists - the continuers of the work that the makers of idols served, although continuers in a milder form, Tertullian, as we know, resolutely rejected their use in Christian society. Tertullian's sharp protest against all kinds of images was based, in the end, on the fear that with the admission and conversion of the latter among Christians, they would not develop a custom similar to the pagan veneration of the Divine in an external image. The turn in this direction was not long in coming and found expression in the practice of some sectarian communities: Basilidians, Carpocratians, Collyridians, who performed superstitious rituals in front of the images of Christ and, as it seems, the Mother of God they had: decorating them with wreaths, making sacrifices and showing them other signs of religious respect, like the pagans (reliquam observantiam, ut gentes faciunt). It is clear that anything resembling such relationships in Christian practice could not but cause severe condemnation. Once the image became, as it were, a representative of a revered religious being, turned into a sacred object, in front of which a person prayed when coming to the church, this could easily give rise to the assumption that the religious attitude was directed to the image itself, to the person depicted or to the picture. Like any innovation, sacred images and icons, having appeared among Christians in churches and for public use, could not be greeted from the very beginning everywhere and by everyone with approval; they could not help but provoke resistance in some, and especially in Jewish Christians, who were strictly forbidden to make idols. From here arose a series of fears and misunderstandings that continued for centuries and only, in the end, were resolved in a positive sense, in the form of clarified and dogmatically substantiated icon veneration. Let us note here the main points of this, in some way, struggle between the two sides and find out the motives due to which centuries-old misunderstandings occurred. It is well known from catacomb painting, Irenaeus and other authors that facial images of the Savior, the Mother of God and the apostles were already circulating among Christians in the 3rd century; a whole series of biblical figures and, at least from the 4th century, martyrs, saints in general, decorated churches, houses and even Christian utensils. But then Constance, the sister of Constantine the Great, turns to Eusebius of Caesarea and asks him to get her an image of Christ. A very natural desire, to the fulfillment of which she had as much right as dozens, hundreds of people who owned such images. How did the educated bishop react to this desire? He writes a letter to Constance, in which he rather sharply condemns her desire and asks: “What do you mean and what kind of image of Christ is this, as you say? Is it true and unchangeable and bears His features in essence, or is it the one that He took on for our sake, taking on the form of a servant?” Christ should not be depicted, since from the divine side He cannot be depicted, and from the human side, to depict Him in the image of a slave would mean to humiliate His dignity and bring Him down to the level of those images about which the Scripture says: “Thou shalt not make for yourself an idol or any likeness.” For a simple-minded understanding, there was nothing indecent or strange in Constance’s request, but Eusebius looked at the matter as a theologian and began to resolve the issue in principle. At the same time, he imagined an analogy between the image of a deity or hero in the pre-Christian world and the image of Christ, between the veneration of images of idolaters among pagans and the possibility of similar abuse among Christians. Having reminded Constance of the commandment by which it was forbidden to make an image of what is in heaven and on earth, Eusebius concluded his speech with a story about one woman who brought to him some two images, apparently of philosophers, and passed one of them off as Christ’s, the other as Paul’s. bring upon ourselves the condemnation of idolatry by representing our God in the image.” Eusebius of Caesarea, as can be seen from what has been said, was not only against the public use of sacred images, but did not want to allow them even for private use. But here's another example. Epiphanius of Cyprus, when he was in Palestine, passing through the village of Anavlat, drew attention to a lamp burning in front of some building. Having learned that this was a church, he entered it to pray and on the (altar) curtain he saw an image of Christ or some saint (imaginem quasi Christivel sancti cujusdam) - “for I do not remember whose image it was,” he explains in a letter to John, Bishop of Jerusalem, - he saw and became indignant. “When I saw that, contrary to Scripture, an image was hanging in the church, I tore the veil” (Quum vidissem in ecclesia contra auctoritatem Scripturarum pendere imaginem, scidi illud, i.e. velum) and ordered the clergyman to take it out and use it to wrap the body of a dead poor man. When the guards began to grumble about Epiphanius’s act and demanded that they pay for the destroyed fabric with a new one, he promised to fulfill this fair demand. Sending a new veil to the Bishop of Jerusalem, Epiphanius asked him to impress upon the presbyter of this church, “that in the Church of Christ we should not hang such veils that are contrary to our faith.” This letter from Epiphanius of Cyprus is recognized as an inauthentic work of St. father, and perhaps rightfully so. In this case, this question is almost indifferent, but what is important for us is the motive, the view that is expressed in the letter, whether it will be a century younger or older. Epiphanius (†403), of course, saw a lot of similar scenes in his lifetime: there were so many sacred paintings in everyday life at that time - but he was dissatisfied with why this image was hung in the church, and he seemed to be ironic about the image itself, noting that he didn’t even know well who it actually represented. He, as a Jew by birth, can guess that it was unpleasant that in the church, in full view of everyone, there was not just a painting or a series of decorative scenes, but a human figure, a lonely face, on which the general prayerful attention was concentrated. An expression or, better to say, an echo of the same position of pictorial art in the Christian church is one of the definitions of the Illiberitan or Elvira Cathedral, which took place in 306. Its 36th canon, which served in the hands of Protestant writers of the 16th and 17th centuries as the basis of their religious views on the veneration of icons, reads as follows: Placuit picturas in ecclesia esse non debere, ne quod colitur et adoratur in parietibus depingatur, that is, the cathedral desires that there should be no picturesque images in churches, that there should not be depicted on the walls that which serves as an object of veneration and worship. This decree of the Spanish council has not yet found a satisfactory explanation, and, in any case, its real meaning is explained by some special conditions of this provincial church, but, unfortunately, they remain unknown. Those explanations that are proposed by scientists, or take as their starting point the expression: in parietibus, i.e. they say: images are allowed, but not on the walls, in order to protect them from profanation, to prevent the possibility of desecration of sacred objects by the pagans persecuting Christians at that time and in the interests of disciplinae arcani; or they are sent from the words: colitur et adoratur, i.e. They want to say that this rule does not allow painting with a brush such objects that are worshiped; it is prohibited, in other words, the religious and cult purpose of painting. The last explanation has more probability on its side, since it is justified by the immediate meaning of the entire rule and further phenomena of church life. The fact is that a number of evidence unfavorable for church painting does not end with the definition of the Elvira Council about it, but goes much further, right up to iconoclasm, forming a kind of special direction or trend in the field of Christian thought, which can be called, if not iconoclastic in the later sense of the word, then, in any case, negative and a kind of iconophobia. All this often fragmentary news comes down to the same beginning and is explained by the same reasons that formed the basis for those unsympathetic reviews of sacred images that we cited and conveyed above. The party opposed to the latter in the 4th and subsequent centuries more or less clearly aligned itself with various heresies: Eunomians, Nestorians, Monophysites, but did not itself directly emerge from the origins of these heretical sects, but rather used them as a reason to protest against other phenomena of church life of that time. So, for example, under the emperor Zeno, one of the representatives of Monophysitism, Philoxenus, bishop of the Syrian city of Hierapolis, who hid icons of the Savior in inaccessible places and destroyed icons of angels, reasoned about the latter in this way: “Incorporeal angels should not be made corporeal and depicted in a bodily image, as if they had human forms. One should not equally give honor and glory to Christ through His picturesque icon; on the contrary, one must know that He accepts only service in spirit and truth. You also need to know that depicting the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove is a sign of childish thought, since the Gospel legends nowhere teach that the Holy Spirit was a dove, but only say that he once appeared in the form of a dove. If He appeared once in this form, then it does not at all follow that it is proper for pious Christians to make a bodily image of Him.” Anastasius of Sinaiti (VI century) was forced to defend the use of icons against some unknown enemies who allowed them to be vilified. “Just as someone who dishonors a portrait of an emperor is subject to just punishment, as if he had insulted the emperor himself, although the portrait is nothing more than wood and paints mixed with wax, so, in the same way, someone who dishonors an image (of a saint),” according to him, “offends the very one whose image it is.” In the 7th century, John, Bishop of Thessaloniki, in one of his words testifies that some people of his time called Christians pagan idolaters for their veneration of icons and said about this: “how is it possible to depict the invisible God, God the Spirit, in a sensual form? If Christians, in their defense, say that God appeared in the flesh, then on what basis do they depict angels, disembodied spirits, and rational beings?” The number of these testimonies could be increased by several new ones, but for us in this case it is not the figure that is important, but the fact, not the quantity, but their quality, or, better said, the result to which these historical testimonies of different times and places are reduced. But this is only one side of the matter. Next to the above-mentioned data on opposition to the use of icons in the church and simultaneously with them, another stream is formed and flows in an uninterrupted stream, another direction of consciousness, which can only be called iconophilia. By stating the very fact of the use of icons in the church, it spreads, even more often justifies and defends this custom against attacks by a hostile party. This direction of church consciousness of that era corresponds to the actual practice of Christian society, which, both in its home life and even more so in church life, opens the widest place for religious painting and uses it for religious, educational and cult purposes. It was primarily on this basis that some of the representatives of theological thought of that time stood. So, for example, Basil the Great saw in painting the best means for depicting martyrdom and supporting his oratory. Addressing the painters, in a word in memory of Barlaam the martyr, St. the father says the following: “Rise now before me, you glorious painters (ζωγράφοι) of ascetic merit. Add this incomplete image of the wrestler with your art. With the colors of your wisdom, sanctify the crown bearer, who is unclearly represented by me. Let me be overcome by your depiction of the valiant deeds of the martyr; I will be glad to recognize such a victory of your fortress over myself now. I’ll look at this fighter, more lively than the one depicted in your picture.” Some of these images then reached the level of portrait likenesses of a famous person and were placed on paintings and various household items. John Chrysostom says about the Antiochian bishop Meletius that “many inscribed his image on vessels, and on rings, and on seals, and on the cups of the wedding chambers, and on the walls, so that they could see his bodily image everywhere and in this way have consolation in separation from him.” According to Asterius, Bishop of Amasia (IV century), “a certain pious painter with great skill and very vividly presented in the picture the story of all the sufferings” of the martyr Euphemia “and hung this picture near her tomb so that everyone would look at it”... “When I remember the picture,” Asterius notes about himself, “I involuntarily shed tears, and a feeling of strong grief interrupts my narrative.” Gregory of Nyssa also could not pass by the image of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac without tears. Gregory the Theologian in one of his poems conveys an incident of the amazing impression that an icon sometimes makes on a person’s soul. “Some intemperate young man invited an indecent woman. When she approached the gate, on which there was an icon of the attentively looking St. Polemon, then, having seen this icon, immediately, they say, returned, having been defeated by this gaze; She was ashamed of what was depicted on the icon: as if it were alive.” We will not continue these extracts, but in this case we will limit ourselves to just a comparison of the noted facts and will try to briefly clarify what was the burning side of the matter in the issue of icon use, and what served as the main reason for the formation of these two different camps. The possibility or impossibility, accessibility or inaccessibility of known religious objects for artistic reproduction, for depicting them with a brush or chisel, was a private question that took place regarding such iconographic subjects that were not easily amenable to external reproduction, for example, God the Father, the Holy Spirit, angels. But in most cases, disagreement stemmed from the question: how to treat artistic images, i.e. whether to consider them as one pious, impressive decoration, as a well-known historical plot, or as a religious image, i.e. for an object of worship? It is this last circumstance, despite the widespread dissemination of church painting in the West and East, starting from the 4th–5th centuries, that continues to occupy and excite the minds of that time and calls for clarification from representatives of the church. I will cite several facts from the history of that time that testify to the still unestablished idea of ​​the use of icons in church practice and the difficulties that arose in determining its true meaning or significance. Thus, Seren, Bishop of Marseilles (VI century), destroyed icons in his church, recognizing their use as tempting and dangerous, and was forced to this drastic measure by superstitions and extremes to which some of the members of his diocese went in relation to them. Pope Gregory Dvoeslov did not approve of the action of the Bishop of Marseilles and sent him a special letter in which he explained in what forms it was prudent and useful to allow the use of icons and not to deprive the church of this decoration. These arguments are very interesting for characterizing the views of such a prominent church figure as Pope Gregory the Great, and, together, they explain the position of the controversial issue. “It has become known to me,” the latter wrote to Bishop Serenus, “that you, excited by unreasonable jealousy, destroyed the images of saints under the pretext that they should not be worshiped (ne adorari debuissent). For the fact that you forbade them to be worshiped, we praise you, but for the fact that you destroyed them, we blame you. Tell me, brother, have you ever heard of a priest doing such a thing? Shouldn't the consideration that you are not holier or smarter than others should have stopped you from this act? For it is another thing to worship what is depicted as God, and another thing to learn through the image and give honor to the depicted. What is for those who can read writing is replaced by images for those who are illiterate. One should not destroy what was appointed in the church not for worship, but for instruction (non ad adorandum, sed ad instruendum). Prove that you are predisposed not against the very images on icons, but against unworthy treatment of them, and therefore do not interfere with those who want to make images of saints, but warn them against venerating the very substance of the images.” The same category of data should also include considerations expressed a century earlier by Nilus Sinaite, an ascetic of the 5th century, also in a letter to Bishop Olympiodor. Only here the point of departure for reasoning about icons was not a crudely sensual and superstitiously suspicious attitude towards them, which needed to be dispelled, but a phenomenon of a slightly different nature - an extreme intensification of religious appearance, extreme zeal for it, expressed in an excess of pictorial decorations. Eparch Olympiodorus, one of the important dignitaries of the empire, planned to build a church in honor of the martyrs and his opinion about the plan of the church, and most importantly, its interior decoration, told Nile to the ascetic, whom he respected as his mentor, asking him for advice on the painting of the church. The latter, according to the builder, was supposed to contain the following circle of pictorial subjects. He wanted to place images of Christ and the martyrs in the altar, and on the walls of the church itself to depict catching animals, fleeing hares and chamois, fences extracting fish from the sea - in short, to display a whole series of landscapes and rural paintings. Neil did not like this diversity of images. A strict ascetic and an enemy of any excess, he did not approve of such a variety of subjects and warned Olympiodor that such diversity and luxury in the decoration of the church could have a harmful effect on the spiritual disposition of those praying in it and would counteract the goals of religious edification. “In my opinion,” the ascetic reasoned, “there is a lot of unreasonable and childish in this intention to burden or delight the eyes of those present with such a great variety of images. For an established and mature religious sense, it is decent and sufficient in the sanctuary, to the east of the most divine altar (τεμένους) to depict only one cross and nothing more (ενα και μόνον σταυρόν), for with one saving cross the human race has been healed and the desperate everywhere hope is proclaimed,” and the walls of the church are decorated with sacred images. “Let the hand of the painter,” he wrote, “fill the church with the stories of the Old and New Testaments—for what? So that those who do not know literacy and cannot read the divine scriptures, looking at picturesque images, bring to mind the courageous deeds of those who sincerely served God and are excited to compete with the glorious and ever-memorable virtues, according to which they exchanged earth for heaven, preferring the invisible to the visible.” Decoration with crosses and sacred stories was also recommended by Nile for the church vestibule. According to his thoughts, he is the same as St. Gregory the Great and other best moralists of that time, icons should be allowed in churches in religious and moral forms, as a powerful educational tool and a very useful custom, along with the reading of the Scriptures and church preaching. Examples of the abuse of pictorial art in church life, similar to those noted in the letters of Gregory the Great and St. Nile of Sinai, and several more could be cited. Old Protestant writers very diligently collected them and commented on them in their favor, but, strictly speaking, no serious conclusion can be drawn from them in view of a whole, long series of irrefutable facts of a reasonable and completely legal attitude to iconography and its use. It is a well-known truth that the shadow is as old as the light... The facts only indicate that over the space of several centuries there were different directions in resolving the issue being treated, and from the collision and struggle the truth was developed, the average normal course along which historical life always moves was gradually clarified and determined. Iconoclasm, which began with the beginning of the 8th century, 91 from its internal side, represented a continuation of the same trend, which three or four centuries ago declared itself at first incredulous, and then clearly hostile to the use of icons in the church for religious purposes. Only in the era of iconoclasm did these relations take an acute form and expressed themselves in the form of sharp protest and bilious opposition. Thanks to the fundamental formulation of the question, this matter assumed wide dimensions and became a historical-dogmatic phenomenon. The negative side, relying on the support of the government, moved from words to deeds, launched despotic measures, began to destroy and exterminate icons, banned their production and thus appeared with a repressive character, like an iconoclast. This movement is important not only in the history of dogma, where it has its most essential side, but also in the history of art, for which it provides many valuable historical indications and factual explanations. From this side we will touch upon this phenomenon. Wanting to justify their positions with historical data, both sides, that is, icon worshipers and iconoclasts, looked at and tried to critically evaluate the news of ancient writers about icons and their use in the church. For the Orthodox side, this historical-critical work was complicated and made more difficult by the fact that some of this evidence seemed to speak rather in favor of their opponents, and therefore needed protection and explanation. It was on this apologetic basis that one of the first defenders of icon veneration, John of Damascus, spoke out in his three most famous words: άγίας εικόνας. Opponents of icon veneration referred in their justification to the letter of Epiphanius of Cyprus, already known to us, in which he talks about his act with the image on the curtain in the Anavlat church. John of Damascus, without going into a detailed consideration of the objection, cuts the Gordian knot by rejecting the authenticity of this letter, and notes that Epiphanius could never do this in his church, which is still, until the time of Damascus himself, rich in icons. And even if it were true what is said in the letter about Epiphanius, then even then it would constitute an isolated fact and would not undermine church tradition in the least. Patriarch Nicephorus of Constantinople wrote a whole defensive essay for Epiphanius, in which he argued that the latter shared the church’s view of divinity and humanity. Christ and the icons, that in his response to the Carpocratians there is nothing hostile to the latter, and that the letter to which the iconoclasts referred is forged and belongs not to Epiphanius, but to some other author who shared the opinions of the Docetes, Manichaeans and other heretics, whom he calls Έπιφανίδης. 92 The Iconoclastic Council of 754 laid particular emphasis on the weak points of this criticism. He further referred to the authority of Eusebius of Caesarea, who, in the letter we cited above to Constance, spoke so sharply against her desire to have an image of Jesus Christ. The Orthodox Council did not attach any importance to the testimony of Eusebius, as coming from the pen of an Arian. But, unfortunately, the council did not find out what connection there was between Eusebius’s Arianism and the view he expressed in his letter on icons. When iconoclasm, condemned at the Council of Nicea in 787, again rose under the protection of the emperor Leo the Armenian and Theophilus, and the literary struggle of the two parties began again, Patriarch Nicephorus subjected the arguments of Eusebius to dogmatic criticism and refuted them from this point of view. Eusebius asked, as we saw, Constance, in what form she would like to have an image of Christ: whether from the side of His unchangeable inner nature or in the image of a slave? Patriarch Nicephorus says that this objection does not make sense, that this question is as strange as if a painter, wanting to take someone’s portrait, asked this person: should he present an image of his soul or body? Both sides in Christ are inseparable, just as in every person the soul is inseparable from the body. The iconoclasts also cited evidence from the work: “The Travels of St. apostles”, as if St. John the Theologian expressed his dissatisfaction when he was shown an icon painted by the painter from him, which one of his disciples, a certain Lycomedes, placed in his bedroom, crowned it, lit candles in front of it, and thereby expressed his respect. After reading this entry at the seventh ecumenical council, its members noted, not without irony, that the iconoclasts based their false teachings on apocryphal sources that did not deserve any trust. The fathers of the Council of Nicaea, it should be noted, used two meetings to inform and analyze historical evidence about icons, and the very documents containing this information were reported, and excerpts from them were even included in the council acts. For a historian, this information is very important and instructive. Some of them retain instructions borrowed from sources that no longer exist; others were brought by contemporaries and eyewitnesses regarding icons known to them; others, finally, are remarkable in exegetical terms, as an example of resolving controversial issues and as material for characterizing the church views of that time. The cathedral recognized the practice of the ancient church as the most compelling argument in favor of icon veneration, and therefore tried to bring to light and put into perspective everything that had reached it on this issue from ancient writers. However, few such instructions have been preserved, and this is the reason why all apologists for the veneration of icons cite the same historical arguments, analyze the same evidence from practice and tradition. Let us briefly note here the most valuable. We referred to the story of Gregory the Theologian, which we have already conveyed above, about the image of St. Polemon, who initially led a dissolute and generally disordered life, but then, under the influence of the conversations of the philosopher Xenocrates, abandoned his previous way of life. The image representing Polemon at the time of this correction produced, according to St. fathers, a strong effect, as we have already had occasion to say, on the moral disposition of those persons who had the opportunity to look at this icon. From Gregory of Nyssa they quoted at the council the place where he described the touching image of the sacrifice of Isaac, and an excerpt from his praiseworthy speech to Theodore Tiron, which describes the interior decoration of the church built in honor of this martyr, and talks about his image, which represented in the most; vivid and vivid features of the main moments of his martyrdom. From Basil the Great they quoted that passage from a conversation in memory of the martyr Varlaam, where he, turning to painters, invites them to depict the martyrdom of Varlaam in features that are more concrete and vivid than is possible for an oratorical word. They referred to Chrysostom’s laudatory speech in honor of the Antiochian Bishop Meletius, which mentions the images of this respected shepherd that were in private use at that time. They also pointed to the letter of the ascetic Nile to Olympiodor, but it is curious that the iconoclasts at the council of 754 also referred to it, but they cited it in a distorted form, namely, instead of the words: “decorate the walls of the church with sacred images,” they read: “leave them unpainted.” This was admitted by some of the members of the council of 787, who previously belonged to the iconoclast party and signed the definitions of the council of 754. However, justice requires saying that even at the Orthodox Council they were not always guided by the strict rules of historical criticism and did not always pay attention to the authenticity of the documents they used. So, for example, they referred to the story about the image of the Savior in Verita, who was defeated by one Jew and at the same time bled from himself, which was the reason for the conversion of the Jews there to Christianity. This legend was given with the name Athanasius. On the other hand, authentic documents were quoted here, now, as we said, unfortunately, lost and now known only from the acts of this council. This is precisely the testimony of Antipater, Bishop of Bostra, about the famous statue of the Savior in Paneas, borrowed from one of his sermons, now lost. The testimony of Eusebius of Caesarea about this monument, as indecisive, expressed with reservations and doubts, could not serve as a strong argument, and besides, the authority of the historian in the eyes of the Orthodox council stood very low, and they tried to bypass him, as a heretic and a person generally unreliable, if possible. That is why the reference to Antipater was so important. Of no less importance was the testimony of Asterius, Bishop of Amasia, given at the council, about the depiction of the martyrdom of St. Euphemia in the church named after her in Chalcedon. Also worthy of special attention is a whole series of testimonies about miraculous icons - evidence, partly stated by eyewitnesses, partly borrowed from historical acts. Such was the icon of the Savior and the Mother of God with Cosmas and Damian in the church of these saints in Constantinople. When it was announced about the miracles that took place during the transfer of the relics of the martyr Anastasius from Persia to Caesarea in Palestine, where his image was located, then the representatives from Rome, the ambassadors of Pope Hadrian, declared that his icon and its head were transferred to Rome and are still in one monastery near it. In the same way, when the icon of Saints Cyrus and John in Alexandria and the miracles performed from it were testified, one monk explained that this image stands there to this day and performs healings. To the same time, there are two testimonies contained in a letter from Patriarch Herman: one is about the icon of the Mother of God in Sozopol in Pisidia, which exuded myrrh from her hand, the other is about the image of the apostles and prophets with their sayings about Christ, which was in the imperial palace. How numerous these testimonies were, and what a strong impression they made, is shown by the statement of Patriarch Timothy, who said that the hearts of the faithful are saturated with the legends of the fathers, and Theodore, Bishop of Mir, who held before iconoclasm, after these testimonies were given, exclaimed: “Thanks be to the Lord, who led to the knowledge of the truth through the sayings of the fathers.” When at the beginning of the 9th century, despite the decree of the Ecumenical Council of 787, iconoclastic unrest was again raised by the emperors Leo the Armenian, Theophilus and others, Orthodox theologians were again called upon to defend icon veneration and, like their predecessors, paid special attention to the consideration of historical arguments. In addition to the references already known to us, the letter of the three Eastern patriarchs to Emperor Theophilus provides several new data from the field of iconography. For example, it attaches great importance to the legend that St. Luke painted an image of the Virgin Mary. The apology further repeats the entire testimony of Evagrius about the image of the Savior not made by hands, given to Abgar of Edessa, and at the same time even provides a detailed description of the external appearance of Jesus Christ, according to which Constantine the Great ordered the image of Christ to be painted for himself. But where the message borrowed this information from is unknown, and what remains known is that the description of Christ’s appearance depended on the iconographic type that existed at one time or another. Iconoclastic unrest did not pass without a trace for the West. True, they touched him only partly, on the side; but still, the West did not remain an indifferent witness to the movement taking place in the east and expressed its opinion on the controversial issue. Popes: Gregory II, Stephen III and Adrian firmly took the side of the defenders of icon veneration and, wanting to prove their independence from the court party, boldly refuted the arguments of the iconoclast emperors. But Gallia reacted to the matter somewhat differently than Italy. Three years after the Second Council of Nicaea, a famous work appeared in the West, treating the controversial issue, the so-called Books of Charles (Libri Carolini). They were compiled on the initiative and on behalf of Charlemagne by one of the theologians of that time and probably belonged to the pen of his favorite and adviser Alcuin. Charles says that he undertook this work with the consent of the bishops of his kingdom in refutation of false opinions expressed during the iconoclastic unrest. His attitude to this issue is ambiguous. He does not share the views of either side, finding them extreme, and tries to follow the middle path in resolving the controversial issue. This middle path, in his opinion, consists of recognizing icons as decoration of churches and as monuments reminiscent of the past. With such a view, of course, there can be no question of a religious attitude towards them. The work is divided into four parts, of which the first two deal with criticism of biblical and historical evidence for and against icon veneration; the third sets forth a profession of faith, and the fourth deals with various subjects relevant to the point in dispute. To assess the direction of this work and the point of view from which its compilers look at the matter, we will present several excerpts from the historical part of Charles's books. One cannot take away from them the dignity of strict criticism, sometimes extending to proofreading the text of a well-known quotation, but one cannot help but see at the same time how Libri Carolini, with apparent impartiality, try to reduce the strength of the arguments for the veneration of icons, which naturally followed from the position they adopted on the controversial issue. Thus, regarding the correspondence of I. Christ with Abgar, where there is an indication of the Image Not Made by Hands, Libri Carolini note that this document is forged, and what is known from Eusebius says nothing about the Image Not Made by Hands. Let us note that historical criticism has no reason to consider the documents cited by Eusebius to be forged, and therefore the conclusion of Charles’s books does not have sufficient strength. Another thing is the question of what conclusions can be drawn from these documents regarding the history of the Image Not Made by Hands, and to what extent they, i.e. documents may justify the established opinion about the miraculous origin of this famous image. The author does the same with the evidence of the image of Polemon, that is, he considers it unhistorical and inauthentic. Regarding the famous passage from Gregory of Nyssa, where he describes the depiction of the sacrifice of Isaac, the same author limits himself to a superficial remark: “His life and this sermon are unknown to us.” Even further, he suspects the very authenticity of this work. Supporters of icon veneration, wanting to weaken the significance of Epiphanius’s harsh act with the veil in the Anavlat church, pointed out that this church has many sacred images made by his disciples. Libri Carolini responds to this argument by saying that these images were not made at all to worship them, but simply for decoration; and besides, good teachers often produce bad students. Regarding the legend about the icons of the Apostles Peter and Paul, which were presented by Pope Sylvester to Constantine the Great, our essay makes the remark that these icons were not intended for veneration, but for use as portraits. Analyzing the argumentation of the second Council of Nicea, Libri Carolini dwells, among other things, on his remark that Epiphanius, apparently treating icons unfavorably, does not, however, include icon worshipers in the category of heretics. To refute this consideration, the author refers to Blessed Augustine, who classifies the Simonians and Carpocrats as heretics, of whom the former revered the images of Simon the Magus and Helen, his companion, and the latter paid the same honor not only to Homer and Pythagoras, but also to the images of I. Christ and the Apostle. Pavel. But the answer, as is easy to see, is far-fetched. Without continuing with excerpts from this curious church-historical document, we will limit our acquaintance with the monuments of literary polemics caused by iconoclasm to these data. Without mentioning the dogmatic justification of the controversial issue, we encounter here for the first time an attempt to take a critical look at the historical evidence of icon veneration and bring to light the most ancient sacred images as factual evidence of the ancient church practice of icon veneration and as a visual refutation of the opposite view. This is the historical and apologetic side of the matter, which became clear during the iconoclastic unrest. What influence did the latter have on the course of church art itself, and what consequences were they accompanied in its future destinies? By its very essence, iconoclasm was a phenomenon hostile to the development of church art, and if the iconoclastic unrest had some consequences of the opposite nature and gave church art a slightly different direction, then this depended not on the very principles of this anti-artistic phenomenon, but on the conditions and influences of outsiders, on the situation that was created at the meeting of two different trends in the field of Christian thought. Iconoclasm challenged the very right to make any images of sacred objects for religious use and thus condemned an entire branch of church art to stagnation. The iconoclasts were the actual enemies of the latter, because they treated his works with vandalism, destroyed icons everywhere, destroyed manuscripts with miniatures, and persecuted artists. Whatever the motives of the famous edict of Leo the Isaurian (726), he condemned first the removal from the altars, and then the complete expulsion from the churches of all kinds of images, whether they were executed with a brush on a board, or in mosaic work on the walls, or in any other way on church vessels and altar curtains. That the imperial order was not a dead letter, but was carried out, is shown by the facts themselves. Thus, the famous copper statue of the Savior, located in Khalka, above the entrance gate of the Imperial Palace of Constantinople, was overthrown and destroyed, and a bloody clash occurred between the military guards carrying out the assignment and the crowd of people, in which women distinguished themselves with particular enthusiasm. The act of Emperor Theophilus with the painter Lazarus is known, whom he tortured and tormented in order to divert him from his craft, and when he saw that he still did not stop doing his work, he ordered his hands to be burned with a hot iron. Only the petition of Empress Theodora saved him from certain death. Patriarch Photius, in a letter to the Bulgarian Tsar Michael, depicts in the harshest terms the mode of action of the iconoclast emperors; says that the icons of Christ were subjected to all kinds of profanation during their presence: they were dragged through squares and streets, trampled underfoot, and finally burned. The question, however, is not whether more or less icons were destroyed at this time, whether Lazarus alone was persecuted for his profession or many of his brethren, and how great their number was... The importance is not in these individual cases of persecution, which ceased with iconoclasm, but in the state of affairs that was created by this phenomenon. Let us group, as briefly as possible, its main results. For church art, of course, this was not a favorable time. Many hunters could not come to engage in a forbidden craft: the fear of prohibition does not allow time and means to devote oneself to the task with complete convenience; but, in any case, it would be an exaggerated opinion to say that during the time of iconoclasm there was a complete stop or cessation of an entire and such a significant industry as church art. Many valuable monuments of Christian painting, mosaics and especially sculpture were lost at this time, many books with miniatures were destroyed. This vandalism is evidenced by indisputable evidence; but in general, the loss was not so important and significant as to affect the fate of church art in general. This did not stop, for example, the Studite monks from preparing excellent manuscripts with miniatures at the same time, some of which have survived to this day. Private enterprise may have been retarded to a certain extent, but taste and love for art have lost nothing. Iconoclastic emperors were not vandals towards art in general. True, Leo the Isaurian, that rude soldier who accidentally came to the Byzantine throne, destroyed several statues in Constantinople, but the historian correctly identified the motive for such a barbaric act, saying: δια τό άλογον αύτον είναι. The last of the iconoclastic emperors, Theophilus, despite his tendencies, gained even greater fame in the history of Byzantine art as a zealous builder, restorer of the palace and patron of artists, whom he summoned and retained in every possible way. Of course, only thanks to artistic legends could such prominent figures in the field of art as Constantine Porphyrogenitus and others appear with the next dynasty - the Macedonian. Instead of religious painting, iconoclastic emperors called for landscape and decorative painting. Emperor Theophilus, having destroyed icon images in one church, ordered it to be covered with floral and geometric patterns, so that its interior was then, according to the apt expression of the annalist, like a garden and vegetable garden. In view of the unsatisfactory state of icon painting revealed by iconoclastic disputes, the church was led to the idea of ​​strengthening control over the execution of pictorial images assigned for church use. An expression of her care to put some boundaries to the personal arbitrariness of artists in the field of Christian iconography was the remarkable decree of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, according to which it is not the invention of the painter (έφεύρεσις) that creates and produces icons, but the inviolable law and tradition of the church (θεσμοθεσΐα και παράδοσις); to her, the holy fathers, belongs the content, the right of composition of icons (διατάξις), and to the painter only their execution (τέχνη). On the basis of this church view, an icon-painting tradition developed, which formed the basis of the so-called originals or manuals for painting. But, thanks to them, having gained in the relative uniformity and rigor of the execution of religious subjects, church art lost much in artistic and aesthetic terms. This deterioration of the pictorial style was influenced, among other things, by the fact that since the time of iconoclasm, church painting in the East has severed all connections with sculpture and thus has largely abandoned the examples of ancient art. It should generally be noted that, although this branch of art from the very beginning was not widely used in the Christian church, as it stood in especially close relations with the traditions and cult of the pagan world, nevertheless, the places of worship of Christians were decorated with works of plastic and sculpture, even in the form of statues, and this did not initially create a great temptation. But since opponents of icon veneration looked at the use of icons as a repetition of idolatry, comparing them with pagan idols, the Orthodox side now had to remove from the practice of icon-latria everything that could give food to such accusations, and give the veneration of icons the most spiritual meaning possible. That is why the Council of Nicea in 787 treated plastic so strictly, and Patriarch Germanus, defending icon veneration, found it necessary to make a reservation regarding the use of statues and sculptures as follows: “We do not say this in the sense of recognizing the use of copper statues as convenient” (έπιτηδεύειυ έκ χαλκού στήλας). He condemns plastic even more severely and decisively in another place: “An image (είκών) is another matter, and a statue (άγαλμα) is another matter. And when God formed (molded) Adam, He said: Let us create man in Our image and likeness, and He created man in the image of God. So what? If man is the image of God, then isn’t he a sculpture, a statue? And if so, is it idolatry and wickedness? It won’t happen!” The author of Charles's books, who lived in the era of iconoclastic unrest and, of course, well understood the attitude of contemporary theological thought to the question of the use of sculptural images in the church, makes it very clear that plastic works at that time in the East were looked at very unfavorably and suspiciously, and this attitude was determined and strengthened even more under the influence of the resolution of the Council of Nicaea. With this unfavorable view in mind, the author of Libri Carolini disputes the idea that painting alone can be called pious art, that is, as if it does not share with other branches of art the conditions of piety and impiety. It's all in the use. Avoiding statuary plasticity, eastern church art retained sculpture only in bas-reliefs and ornamentation, in the form of carvings. Book covers, ivory diptych tablets, royal doors and many other items of church utensils were decorated with carvings. The reduction of sculpture, which was subordinated to decorative purposes, was also reflected in Byzantine painting. Historians of the latter, based mainly on the study of miniatures in Greek manuscripts of the 8th–13th centuries, come to the conclusion that Byzantine painting of this time, deviating from the examples of the classical elegant style, is falling more and more artistically. Miniatures from the time of the Macedonian dynasty, at least, for example, from the manuscripts of the works of Gregory the Theologian, the Psalter of the 9th century in the Paris Library, are becoming less common, not at all the same as in the time of the Komnenos, they are being replaced by compositions of poor design and a generally artisanal nature. About the style of these miniatures, Unger noted: “Even the best of them have nothing in common with the grace of the previous ones. A lot of gold is used on them, the figures are long and angular, with rough outlines; the heads are clumsy and the draperies are very elaborately finished. The beginnings of this degeneration of art were revealed even earlier, an example of which is already represented by the miniatures of Vasiliev’s Minology of the 10th–11th centuries, the work of eight masters of that time who left their names under the works of their brush. Labarthe says about them: “In these miniatures there is no longer a trace of ancient art. The drawing in many miniatures is quite correct, but the positions are often very artificial, the cutting movements. Moreover, one notices a tendency in the proportions of the figures - a feature of the Byzantine school of the 11th century.” There was even one useful side, although it occurred against the will of the leaders of the iconoclastic movement, it was this that contributed to the spread of Byzantine art outside the eastern empire, mainly in the west, in Italy and Germany. The persecution brought against the icon painters forced them to leave their fatherland and emigrate to Italy, where they found a warm welcome, first of all, among the popes. Quite a few Byzantine monastic artists moved to the West, and they were knowledgeable not only in painting, but also in other branches of art and industry. Pope St. Paschal (817–824) put a special monastery at their disposal and instructed them to paint the church of St. Cecilia. 93 As a result, the artistic connection of the East with the Adriatic coast and Lombardy became even stronger and was expressed in the Byzantine features of the church architecture of the latter, in the appearance in the West of painting schools of the Byzantine style, in the wide distribution here of numerous and varied works of carving, foundry, and enamel of a Byzantine nature. Of course, we do not think that this migration of Greek artists and craftsmen to Italy alone explains the influence of Byzantium on the works of Western art in the Romanesque period, but among the many factors that determined this phenomenon, iconoclastic unrest should occupy a very prominent place. 94 II. The symbolic nature of ancient Christian painting and the reasons that determined it The symbolic nature of ancient Christian painting and the reasons that determined it. The relationship of early Christian painting to ancient painting; subjects borrowed from Greco-Roman art and their processing in Christian art (Orpheus, Phoenix and others). Symbols of Christian origin; biblical and evangelical stories. Notes on Christian symbolism in the Middle Ages. Having outlined the path that Christian art followed in its development, and having clarified its position in domestic life, underground tombs and church use, we will now try to understand the mass of works of ancient Christian painting and resolve the question of the original form and the nature of its subjects. Having turned for a solution to the monuments of early Christian art and to evidence about this subject in ancient church literature, we will have to come to the conclusion that most of the images that were in use among Christians of the first times belonged to the symbolic cycle. Almost the entire mass of works of ancient Christian art, with the exception perhaps of some decorative subjects and paintings of purely historical content, since the time of the first explorer of the catacombs Bosio began to be explained and still very many are explained in a symbolic sense, that is, they see in them conventional signs for the visual representation of certain dogmatic ideas. Aringi compared early Christian images with a special kind of books and writings in general, which only differ from the works of dogmatists and preachers in that they are written in a different, more visual font, using different graphic means. In the words of Professor Pieper, this whole circle of images was intended to express the basic Christian concepts of sin, law and redemption. The whole religion, its dogmas and morals, its hopes and promises, says Martigny, found expression in this hieroglyphic language, in this witty, polysemantic system of symbolic images. According to some researchers of ancient Christian art, the latter even reflected controversial issues that worried the early Christian world. Starting from such an exclusive assessment of the monuments of early Christian art, researchers reduced the entire task of interpretation or, in technical language, interpretation to isolating from this or that monument, this or that image of the concepts and ideas contained in it, and recognized the Holy Scripture and church literature as an auxiliary means for such work. According to this technique, the firmness of the explanation of certain plots increases as the number of citations in its favor increases and the higher the reliability of the sources to which the interpreters refer. As for special cases of explanation, this technique has full force. To understand the meaning of the symbolic ιχθύς in Christian art, the best means lies in those explanations of this word given by church writers; To enter into the spirit of the symbolic lamb on Christian monuments, there is nothing better than to trace its meaning through the Bible and, in particular, through the Apocalypse. But to elevate this ecclesiastical method of interpretation into a general law, to use it at any given time - this would not exhaust the entire essence of the matter and in many cases would turn out to be untenable from the historical side. One of the disadvantages of this method of interpretation is the multiplicity of thoughts in the same plot, and at the same time the subjectivity of the assessment. Following this method of interpretation, in the depiction of Adam and Eve one would have to see an image of the re-creation of fallen humanity in Christ, and a protest against Gnostic teachings, and evidence in favor of the repetition of repentance, and an instruction on obedience to the law of God. Due to such a subjective view of the objects of catacomb painting, in the eyes of the Catholic and Protestant parties, it became an instrument of religious goals, which both sides used to justify their ready-made positions, with which the monuments of early Christian art sometimes had nothing in common, but were among the witnesses in a case that arose a thousand years later, thanks to a misunderstanding or a deliberate tendency of people leading a dispute on one issue or another. If, according to Catholics, in the Roman catacombs a solution was given to the issues of the primacy of the pope, the veneration of icons, the transubstantiation of the holy gifts, on various particular points of church practice, then this did not in the least prevent supporters of the opposite direction from calling underground Rome to confront the above-ground and proving the obvious contrast of early Christian views with later Catholic doctrines. Moral-religious, demonstrative and apologetic character began to be assigned to works of Christian art not in the first period of its existence, as we said above, but only subsequently. With such a character, least of all, and at the same time, from the very beginning, works of catacomb and tomb art could appear that had a close relationship with the funeral setting. They received this meaning mainly in open churches, becoming an educational tool in the hands of the church. Disciplina arcani or the desire to hide, keep secret from the uninitiated, i.e. pagans, and partly from catechumens, objects of faith and cult, was undoubtedly one of the main reasons, a strong argument in favor of the symbolic direction of the works of early Christian painting, but it was not, in any case, the only source for the origin of the latter. It is known that this rule (disciplina arcani) extended to a relatively insignificant number of dogmatic truths and ritual forms, concerned mainly with the sacraments of baptism and communion, and yet the relatively insignificant proportion of images in the picturesque circle of the catacombs belongs to the area of ​​these latter. The exclusively symbolic understanding of these subjects is also contradicted by the fact that the same image is repeated several times in the same gallery, cubicle and adjacent loculi. Why was there such a preference for some subjects over others? From the point of view of symbolism alone, it is impossible to explain and it is difficult to guess what ideas they wanted to give rise to by putting forward this particular group of images, this type of subjects, preferably over others? The explanation (why early Christian art adopted a symbolic character), proposed by Professor Pieper and based on the law of the gradual development of a religious idea in the very consciousness of Christians, as the opinion of an expert on Christian antiquities, deserves to dwell on it in some detail. In the history of Christian art, according to him, two periods can be distinguished: the first - until the 4th century, in which art is conventional, symbolic in nature; and the next one after him is after Konstantinovsky. In the first, emblems and likenesses were the subjects of painting and sculpture; in the second, historical figures and events became its subjects. Some of the latter are not found among their own images even in the second period, continuing to appear on monuments as before in symbolic form. This gradualism, quite noticeably indicated in the character of ancient Christian art, had its basis not in any external circumstances, such as, for example, Christians’ fear for their safety or the reluctance of them to show off before the pagans and thereby profane objects of the greatest importance for them, this gradualism was rooted in the conditions of the very development of Christian religious consciousness. The difference between symbolic images and one’s own and historical ones is that in images of the latter kind the artist’s thought finds full and comprehensive expression. The image that the artist uses here to embody his idea is adequate to its content and is organically connected with it. This is not the case in symbolic art: there there is no necessary, direct connection between the subject of the image and the image itself, but only an external, conditional connection. Not the whole idea is embodied in a symbolic image, but only partly. That is why the transition from symbolic forms of art to one’s own ideas indicates the highest development of the idea and reveals its maturity, thanks to which its transition from the sphere of dark consciousness to the region of complete and clear real detection is made possible. This process of development of an idea constitutes the general psychological law of life, and it was followed in its development by the history of all art, on the first pages of which we are greeted with works of symbolic art. Before the word reveals the innermost thought of a person and brings an idea to the light of God, it is necessary that this idea arise and firmly enter the area of ​​​​the conscious life of the soul, so that it strengthens and becomes the inner property of a person, a part of his personality, and until then it will not take on a sound form and will not pour out of the soul in the clothing of the word. So the early Christian society had to first assimilate new divine ideas and only after that give them life outside, give them external artistic expression. It is from this mutual relationship between the development of an idea and its implementation that the form in which the first works of Christian art appeared is explained, namely the symbolic form in which the picture still externally relates to the idea, does not express, but only implies and weakly resembles it. 95 Professor Pieper's explanation presents a very ingenious theory, but suffers from some artificiality and exaggeration. The relatively weak consciousness of Christian truth in the first period of life as a Christian community did not necessarily lead to symbolism in its expression. If it comes to expressing dogmatic ideas or sublime moral ideas, then they could never and nowhere do without a symbolic shell, because they stood and stand above any positive form and cannot be expressed in any adequate image. If we are talking about the depiction of historical subjects, then they began to appear very early with the character of historical paintings, took place in early Christian art and developed simultaneously and alongside subjects with symbolic content. Without completely denying the significance behind this theory and admitting the influence of disciplina arcani on the formation of the symbolic direction of ancient Christian painting, we think that the reason for the latter also lay in the indecisive attitude of the then society towards art, in misunderstandings about its meaning and in the mutual relations of Jewish Christians and pagan Christians among themselves. The first, standing on the strict basis of the Mosaic Law, treated art with hostility and even hostility; the latter were on his side. The latter attitude, sympathetic to works of art, eventually prevailed, but at first it had to be limited to half measures in order to reconcile, if possible, the interests of both parties. It was necessary to find such a neutral ground on which both sides would converge, and a reconciliation of ancient traditions with the rigoristic ideas of Judaizing Christians could take place. It was necessary to find a form of artistic representation that would satisfy the aesthetic aspirations of the young Christian society and, at the same time, would correspond to its spiritualistic direction. In both respects, symbolic representation constituted the most convenient form for art. In it, the external image served only as a reminder of another higher content and in itself had no independent meaning. It was a sensory sign, the purpose of which was to raise thought from a given object to ideas of a different kind and focus attention on them. If on the walls of the catacombs the eye encountered an image of a fish, then this image had nothing to do with the representation of fetishism, because the power of the image lay not in the figure of the fish, as a well-known specimen from the animal world, but in the meaning that was connected with the word ιχθύς, which graphically and symbolically depicted Christ, the Son of God, the Savior. In the same way, the figure of a shepherd carrying a sheep on his shoulders or standing among the flock was not a portrait of Christ, a sensual image of Him, but personified the idea of ​​Christ as a good shepherd, depicted his attitude towards the believing soul in the sense of the well-known parable about the latter. However we begin to explain to ourselves the origin of the symbolic trend in the works of early Christian art, whatever the motives for this phenomenon, we must not lose sight of one important circumstance for assessing these monuments and for establishing more durable methods of their interpretation, namely: catacomb images have a close connection with ideas about the persons buried in certain crypts and consist in a close analogy with the subjects on Greco-Roman tombstones monuments. On the Greek tombstones of the most ancient era, a whole mass of images can be seen, through which they intended to convey some features from the life of the deceased or to express an idea known about him that stemmed from his personal qualities. So, for example, they depicted a warrior in military armor, children in a fight among themselves, young men at the moment when they, going to the palaestra, rubbed oil on their body, relatives and friends in a friendly conversation or at the table, in a word, they presented scenes from the life and past relationships of the deceased, in which, in the words of Goethe, the artist more or less successfully perpetuated the memory of the deceased and visually expressed his thoughts about the afterlife a man who has left the worldly stage. The same view was held on later Roman monuments. In the paintings on the ceiling and walls of burial crypts, in the sculptures of sarcophagi, the daily life of a person unfolds in its main moments and outstanding events, such as: the birth and raising of children, marriage, exercises in the palaestra, circus games, shepherd life, hunting scenes, funerals and other subjects of a similar everyday-realistic nature. As we will see, early Christian art did not remain alien to this trend. Catacomb murals and tombstones of Christians often depict the same personal everyday features from the life of the deceased and various objects of his profession. In later times of Greek art, under the influence partly of Roman concepts, the objectively calm direction of tomb painting and sculpture began to change, and a new circle of images appeared, in which many mythological subjects appear. Instead of people, gods and heroes appear, but the main idea remains the same as before: to present the phenomena of everyday life under this mythological shell. Thanks to this direction of the chisel and brush, instead of two young loving faces, Peleus and Thetis appear, the adventures of Jason and Medea decorate the sarcophagus of the newlyweds, the adventures of Meleager replace the usual hunting scene, and Pelops and Anomaus, as the mythical founders of the Olympic Games, are instead youths among the palestric exercises. In addition to these paintings with a predominant individual character, next to the depiction of events from the lives of the dead, a whole cycle of general mythological images appears and develops, expressing the ideas of death, afterlife and, if you like, immortality in the form of continuing life in Elysium or Hades. These are: Eros and Psyche, some Bacchic scenes, ornaments expressing the idea of ​​life and the constant change of destruction and renewal in nature. Christian art arose at this particular time of the predominance of the mythological trend in classical art and, under the influence of this trend, transferred some of these mythological subjects to its monuments in the form of ready-made symbolic images or as simply grave decorations. That between these images ended up in Christian catacombs and those that were closely related to the ideas of the Greco-Roman world about death and the afterlife, this is confirmed by such subjects as Cupid and Psyche, Phoenix, Nereids, Dioscuri, the head of Medusa and several others. But this influence was very limited; many of them are found only sporadically and have not left a trace of themselves in Christian art, appearing as if by chance and also disappearing without response. But Christianity, no less than the ancient world, had a need to express ideas about life, death and resurrection on tomb monuments. Only in expressing these ideas did it go much further than the ancient worldview and created a number of its own images, borrowing them from the general language of nature and from biblical events and persons. It was under this condition that many of the latter entered the field of catacomb painting and found a place for themselves in its murals and on Christian sarcophagi. Biblical events and persons often appear here in connection with ideas about the dead or along with such symbols that are marked by a sepulchral character and are known with the same meaning in ancient Roman art, for example, a peacock, masks, the four seasons, a pomegranate and others. The combination of these images undoubtedly involved a guiding thought, and not the arbitrariness of the artist. A whole series of biblical figures and scenes perfectly suited the expression of these ideas and completely replaced analogous figures from the field of classical mythology. Just as Meleager, Selene, Ariadne, Adonis, Endymion bore the features of buried persons and served as their representatives, so in Christian art Noah in the ark was depicted in the features of a face buried behind one or another slab, the figure of Jonah sometimes served as a reminder of the young man, Lazarus and Daniel in the lion’s den also bore typical features of famous persons and could serve as their spokesmen. With the same meaning, some ancient writers have the types of Job and Sampson. This use of biblical historical figures and events, as reminders of the persons and objects of the funeral cycle, has its basis in the universal belief of the ancient church in the resurrection of bodies after death. To prove this truth against the pagans who disputed it, apologists referred, among other things, to biblical events, especially to the miracles performed by Christ. The Savior, according to Justin Martyr, demonstrated His miraculous power in order to fulfill Old Testament prophecies and provide visual assurance of the future resurrection. The resurrection of the daughter of Jairus, the son of the widow of Nain and Lazarus, in the words of Irenaeus, had the goal, ut ejus (Christi) de resurrectione credatur sermo. 96 In the eyes of ancient church writers, the miracles of the Old Testament had the same apologetic significance, such as the bringing of water from a stone, the taking of Elijah into heaven, Ezekiel’s vision of a field strewn with bones, the salvation of three youths in the Babylonian furnace and Jonah spewed out of the whale’s mouth. And these images were predominant in catacomb art, a kind of favorite subjects of a biblical nature. Without touching on their artistic significance, but from this dogmatic-apologetic point of view, they are brought together into one whole and examined by the Apostolic Constitutions - a well-known monument of church literature of the 3rd-4th centuries. “He who raised the four-day-old Lazarus, and the daughter of Jairus, and the son of the widow, and raised Himself up according to the will of the Father, who gave us the guarantee of resurrection in the person of Jonah, who was brought out after three days in the belly of the whale, who freed the three youths from the furnace and Daniel from the mouth of the Lions, will not be powerless to raise us from the dead.” 97 We are talking further about the miracles of the New Testament, and from a comparison of these phenomena the writer comes to the same conviction of the necessity of the resurrection. Art took advantage of these same data as ready-made ideas that were so closely related to the goals of tomb painting and widely applied them to the field of its artistic forms. And so, when a Christian artist was presented with the task of decorating the tomb and crypt of his fellow believer with images corresponding to their purpose, he naturally turned to those biblical scenes that both in literature and in the general consciousness of the then Christian society received this special understanding and were presented as typical images of the future resurrection. And since among these scenes, faces and miracles some acquired special power, fame and evidence in relation to the presentation of the resurrection, they, naturally, found themselves a particularly warm welcome and wide application. Of course, it is impossible from this point of view to evaluate the entire mass of subjects and forms of early Christian catacomb art; that would be a stretch and an exaggeration. Whole groups of symbols and biblical images do not fit into this frame, but there is no doubt that a very significant number of both are easily explained from this point of view and receive special coloring and illumination. With this understanding, their wide area of ​​symbolism acquires more solidity, stability and uniformity. A whole group of subjects and forms arises with a certain internal meaning, which they would not have had outside of this general idea, with a subjective and one-sided symbolic interpretation, which wanted to find in them the justification of moral, dogmatic and cult positions that developed later and had no direct relation to the tasks and goals of early Christian art. But we will see further that the above-mentioned idea does not exhaust the area of ​​symbolic signs existing in the catacombs, that among them there is a whole series of those in which ideas of a different kind were expressed, and in the example of such complex symbols we will give and analyze the images of fish a little lower. So, early Christian art chose primarily a symbol as its external form; the symbolic motif, as the surviving monuments show, was predominant in it. Where did it borrow its symbols from, in what way did it assimilate them and adapt them to the artistic expression of Christian ideas? A symbol, as a conventional sign for expressing a known idea, as a reminder form of a thought connected to it, has no meaning in itself, but receives it through connection with the idea it represents. Therefore, the field of symbolic language is very vast, and its forms are scattered everywhere. Vast nature with its diverse phenomena, into which artistic creativity puts its soul, in which the imagination finds correspondence with the phenomena of mental life, and man himself in his various relationships - these are the two main sources from which art drew rich material for its symbolic language. Early Christian symbolism borrowed its content primarily from this same circle of images. In this respect, the pre-Christian world and the Christian world, the classical peoples and the Romanesque tribes, the medieval era and modern times converged with each other, while remaining at the same time more or less independent and free in the field of art. It was not so much the slavish imitation of ready-made artistic models that guided the choice of previous subjects in this case, but the universal, so to speak, meaning by which they became universal, world property. Each era had its own special ideals, created its own special language, its own favorite artistic forms; but not a single era could, at the same time, do without the help of this universal poetic language of nature. Since ancient times, for example, they used to depict in funeral crypts and on gravestones pictures of destruction borrowed from the life of nature: a bird was represented on a tree pecking fruits, a goat was plucking leaves, an eagle was tearing apart a snake, a lion was devouring a deer. They also depicted pictures of love, fidelity and happiness, placing the spouses side by side on the sarcophagi, shaking hands with each other. These artistic images were adopted by Christianity not only from the formal side, but also from the side of their internal meaning. The genesis of such artistic forms of flora and fauna as images of a wreath, palm tree, peacock and many others, included in the content of Christian symbolic art, was rooted in the end, we repeat, not so much in any national characteristics, but in the universal language of mankind. This easily and quite naturally explains why quite a significant part of Christian symbols are in close connection with the forms of classical and oriental art. Another source from which early Christian symbolism borrowed its forms was biblical images and ideas. The language of prophecy and all Jewish poetry, rich in figures and allegories, provided abundant material for early Christian symbolism. The dove with an olive branch, the candlestick, Aaron's rod, many biblical events and persons belong to this category. And Christian ideas themselves also influenced the development of symbolic language and created several typical forms that constitute its best decoration. Many of them were developed on the basis of New Testament tributary ideas and were primarily due to the Gospel narrative, such as the image of the good shepherd, the vine and the friend. In this regard, the development of Christian symbolism was strongly influenced by the typical language of the Apocalypse with its mysterious visions and dramatic pictures. Let's point out some. The letters α and ω are often found on ancient monuments. Having been borrowed from the Apocalypse, they served as an emblem, an expression of the Eternal God, and together they were, as it were, a sign of Christianity, the seal of the living God, which sealed the members of the new eternal kingdom of Christ. The symbols of the four evangelists, although they have their basis in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel, but, judging by the fact that they appear in Christian art only in the 4th century, we can conclude that these symbolic animals had the Apocalyptic vision as their prototype. Finally, one of the most widespread and beloved symbols, which has gone through a number of changes, having such a close relationship with the idea of ​​Christ as the Messiah and Redeemer, the symbol of the lamb has its own poetic, if I may say so, justification in the Apocalypse. Works of Christian symbolic art are scattered everywhere, found in abundance both in the east and in the west; but the main area from which the largest part of them came is the catacombs. 98 This painting covered the lampshades and walls of the tombs, as well as the slabs with which the loculi were sealed. Attention is drawn to the artistic, so to speak, symmetry that governed the distribution of the catacomb murals. Usually the ceilings, and often the walls of tombs, are divided into various more or less regular geometric shapes. Either it is a circle or a polyhedron, occupying almost the entire ceiling; then a circle crossed by a cross or monogram; then a circle divided by radii into several parts. The middle of the ceiling, like these latter ones, is most often filled with a white background with a number of images, sometimes close to each other in internal meaning or connected by some common idea. The center of the vault in the tomb of Domitilla is occupied, for example, by the image of Orpheus playing the lyre, and around him, along the slopes of the ceiling, Daniel among the lions, Moses pouring out water from the rock, David with a sling, Christ raising Lazarus, interspersed with scenes from shepherd life. In other catacomb rooms the combination of figures on the ceiling is different, but everywhere it is subject to a kind of system in the arrangement of symbolic images and even simpler ornaments. Symbolic images on monuments of ancient Christian, mainly catacomb art can be reduced to three groups. The first and most insignificant of them in terms of volume contains tomb images, entirely borrowed from ancient monuments. They passed into early Christian art either due to their internal universal meaning, which corresponded to Christian ideas about death and resurrection, or were copied unconsciously, moving from Roman burial monuments to Christian ones due to the routine of the masters. Here and there they are found sporadically on monuments of the 2nd and 3rd centuries and, if we exclude from them decorative motifs, common to catacomb painting with the ornamentation of Roman, and partly Jewish tombs, are known by comparison and in very small numbers. This is, for example, the image of Cupid and Psyche. The content of this poetic myth is well known, in which the ancients expressed the idea of ​​the affinity of souls and the meeting for a complete mutual life of loving beings in the afterlife. There is no doubt that it was with this meaning, and not as a simple decorative decoration, that this plot was adopted in Roman tombs. This legend was too well known to remain incomprehensible to the common people, and even more so to the educated part of Roman society, who saw in this story a well-known philosophy that was perfectly suited to tomb painting. And by association of ideas, the image of Cupid and Psyche adorns the ceiling in the catacombs of Januarius near Naples, and the figure of Eros with wings and a quiver behind his back occupies a prominent place in the entrance hall of the tomb of Domitilla, one of the most ancient Roman catacombs. This group also includes figures from the Bacchic cycle, for example, panthers, goats, masks. Bacchic scenes on Greco-Roman tomb monuments were related to the cult of Dionysus, which symbolized the change of seasons, the constant process of renewal of nature, and, accordingly, the struggle between life and death. Of course, Christian art could not accept these scenes in all their details: they contained many details with too strong an imprint of paganism, which repelled Christian feeling; but excerpts from these paintings come across very often. It is enough to point out the scenes in the catacomb of Januarius and some Roman tombs to be convinced of the presence of similar motifs on Christian monuments. With such meaning, images of the Nereids, Gorgon, pomegranate, sirens and some others could move into the area of ​​​​the pictorial cycle of Christian graves. This influence of pagan symbolism is nothing strange. Ancient folk ideas and the images of art based on them entered so closely into the consciousness of the first pagan Christians, so firmly held in their memory, that whole centuries had to pass in order to displace these familiar subjects and replace them with new ones. There is no doubt that in many cases the inner meaning of these subjects was well understood by the artists, but, due to the lack of suitable popular symbols of Christian content, the former were temporarily replaced by the latter. The work of the Christian spirit was expressed only in the fact that the whole picture of mythological content was torn apart and, by tearing out less sharp details from it, thereby weakening its original typical inner meaning, overshadowing the mythological meaning and little by little reducing it to the level of decorative decoration. In this meaning, ancient symbols continued to exist during the period of full development of Christian symbolism, having acquired that indifferent universal character, which no longer contained anything specifically pagan and could well correspond to the views of every religion and every cult. Scientists of the old school were therefore not entirely right in explaining such images in some Christian sense and deriving it from there with more or less stretching; The other side was also wrong, for which this entire group of plots seemed to be meaningless forms of decorative properties, plots with which, in the minds of the society of that time, there was no special meaning attached. The second group of symbolic images consists of subjects of pre-Christian, most often pagan origin, but reworked under Christian influence. In the first group, Christian art passively accepted suitable forms of Greco-Roman art. In the form that we will discuss further, it reveals the first glimpses of independence, comprehending in its own way and modifying ready-made forms of ancient art in this direction. The number of subjects of this second group is very significant, and the vast majority of pre-Christian symbols have undergone this processing. In some subjects it is easy to trace this work of Christian consciousness by simple comparison with analogous forms of pre-Christian art; regarding others we have positive evidence from Christian writers; but then there remains a significant part of the plots for which this way of verification does not exist, and we cannot positively affirm what special meaning the Christian consciousness connected with them. That is why they remain in doubt. However, the point is not in the number of these forms: for us it is much more important to get acquainted with the more typical of them and to find out those ways and analogies through which this processing was carried out, the artistic material developed by ancient art was comprehended, and its placement on Christian soil became possible. For this analysis, let us take the image of Orpheus and explain how it was assimilated into Christian art. Simonides and some Greek poets tell a fabulous legend about Orpheus, as if he, having perfected playing the lyre, had with his art a charming influence not only on people and animals, but also on soulless nature: he attracted the mercy of the gods, calmed the fury of the sea waves, stopped the flow of rivers, pacified wild animals, forced trees and rocks to listen to his sounds. In the image of Philostratus, Orpheus is a young man, with a sharp and penetrating gaze, with a barely noticeable beard. It is this type of Orpheus that was preserved in the mentioned tomb of Domitilla in the greatest purity of the ancient style and with all its traditional features. Here he is represented sitting on a rock, among trees bending towards him, wearing a Phrygian cap and a short belted tunic, with a cloak thrown over his shoulders. With his left hand he holds the lyre lowered on his left knee, and with his right hand he plucks the strings. In the trees and at the musician’s feet, birds and animals: a peacock, pigeons, a lion, a horse, sheep, a hare, a snake, a turtle and, apparently, a fox, listen to his playing in different positions. The location of the fresco, which Boldetti was inclined to consider one of the most ancient, and the biblical paintings surrounding the image of Orpheus, put its Christian origin beyond any doubt. The Old and New Testament scenes presented on it are closely related to the main plot, complement it, and all express the same idea that man, despite his powerlessness, is strong, with the assistance of God, to triumph over forces hostile to him and even to conquer nature itself. In addition to wall painting, the figure of Orpheus, with some variants in detail, is sometimes found on lamps, gems, coins and other small utensils, but generally speaking, it is quite rare and, according to Rossi’s observations, did not acquire citizenship rights in catacomb painting; not to mention church mosaics, in which we do not see it at all. What motives guided Christians who gave Orpheus a place in the series of their symbolic images, what meaning did they connect with him? The transition of the fabulous Thracian singer from pagan monuments to Christian ones had two kinds of reasons for itself: artistic and theological. The latter is explained by the view of church writers on Orpheus and his significance in the history of the ancient world. Eusebius of Caesarea in his “Eulogy to King Constantine” draws a very clear parallel between Christ and Orpheus in the following expressions: “The Savior of people,” he says, “through the human body, which He wanted to unite with His Divinity, bestowed blessings and salvation on everyone, just as a musician showed his art to everyone through the lyre. Orpheus, as told in Greek fables, charmed all kinds of animals with his singing and, striking the strings of a musical instrument with a plectrum, tamed the fury of wild animals. The Greeks sing of these miracles and believe that the soulless lyre not only inspires meekness in animals, but that, obeying the enchanting music, even trees move from their places. In exactly the same way, the wisest Word of the Divine, by whose strength and power everything is held, heals human souls mired in all kinds of vices in various ways, and, having taken human nature into His hands, like some musical instrument - the creation of His wisdom, began to jingle mysterious songs no longer to dumb animals, but to rational beings, and with the healing of heavenly teachings, it healed all the savagery in the morals of the Greeks and barbarians, even all the frantic and brutal passions of souls." Seeing in the Orpheus Lyre a symbol of the beneficial influence of the teachings of Christ on the hearts of people, Christian antiquity did not limit itself, however, to the rapprochement of Orpheus with Christ within the limits of the myth that had developed in him, but carried the meaning of the latter further, considered Orpheus to be a representative of the sublime teaching about God in the ancient world and perhaps the first exponent of monotheism there. In many places in his writings, Justin Martyr says about Orpheus that at first he was a preacher of polytheism and taught about 360 gods, but at the end of his life he repented of his error and passed on to his son another teaching, so pure, as if he had seen the glory of God face to face. 99 Based on this idea of ​​Orpheus, ancient church literature has preserved for us several passages of Orpheus’ poetry containing monotheistically sublime ideas about God as the Spirit and Creator of all that exists. Of course, there can be no doubt that the Orphic poems in the form as they are transmitted by Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria and others, not only cannot belong to the fabulous Thracian singer and appeared already in the Christian era, under the influence of Christian teaching; but the very name of Orpheus, placed at their head, shows how much sympathy this person enjoyed among Christians at that time, and how easily she could enter the circle of symbolic images of ancient Christian art. This idea about Orpheus survived the era of the first church writers, apostolic men and apologists, and found a place in the writings of dogmatists of the 4th–5th centuries. For this, it is enough to point to Gregory the Theologian, Chrysostom, Augustine, Theodoret and Lactantius. The presentation of I. Christ under the image of Orpheus could have been prompted by the related artistic type of the good shepherd, under which early Christian art especially loved to depict Christ. The image of Orpheus in this regard is, as it were, a further development of the idea of ​​the good shepherd and constitutes its excellent complement. Just as here he calls the sheep together with his pipe, so there, in the image of Orpheus, he not only calls them together, but also attracts them to himself with his lyre, and pacifies wild animals and makes them tame. Another symbol, no less common in monuments of ancient Christian art, which is also based on a legend of pagan origin, and which, in its basic idea, belongs to the realm of mythology or, better said, to the cycle of animal fables, is the image of the Phoenix. The legend of the Phoenix is ​​of very ancient origin and was known to almost all peoples of the pre-Christian east. Herodotus is the first to tell us this legend and even describes the appearance of the bird itself. According to him, Phoenix flew from Arabia to Egypt every five hundred years and brought with him the dead body of his father to the church of the sun in Iliopolis, where he burned it. Herodotus says that this wonderful bird resembled an eagle and was covered with red and gold feathers, but at the same time notes that he himself has not seen this bird, but knows about it from drawings. For a long time after Herodotus, history is silent about the Phoenix. Ovid already has the honor of restoring this fable and decorating it with even greater and incredible details. Together with Pliny, the legend of the Phoenix owes the addition that this wonderful bird, supposedly sensing its imminent death, prepared a nest for itself from fragrant plants, lay down in it and died; from her corpse a worm was born, and from it a chick developed, which buried the ashes of its father. Tacitus, summarizing various legends about this bird, sets out its entertaining history in particular detail, but does not assert anything positive on his part, but only conveys what he knows from other sources, and is expressed vaguely: “they say.” It is remarkable that the legend of the Phoenix did not remain completely alien to Jewish poetry and found application in the ideas of the Semites, where it was accepted, apparently, in the same sense as in the pagan world. Job says: I will die with my nest, and my days will multiply like a Phoenix. The relationship between the concepts: nest, Phoenix, life expectancy cannot be doubted; This is how many of the Bible commentators translate this place, but the LXX interpreters translated “phoenix” - date tree, and in our Russian translation by Archimandrite Macarius it reads: “and my days will be many, like sand” (Job 29:18). In the legends about the Phoenix, one feature stands out noticeably, which gives it a special meaning, and for which we would look in vain in the fate of any other living creature - this is the endless continuation of the life of the Phoenix, its eternal renewal and revival. And since this feature was associated with the finished image, it began to be used as a symbolic sign of immortality and resurrection and used to express these truths in the field of art. In this meaning, the Phoenix was depicted on the coins of the Roman emperors in conjunction with the words αιών or aeternitas (eternity) and with other expressions signifying the greatness of Rome, the glory and strength of the royal house and the apotheosis of the emperors. In another, more general, meaning, this image is found on ancient Greek sarcophagi, as an expression of faith in immortality. In this last sense, the image of the Phoenix was all the better suited to the matter because the story that served as the basis for it already contained an adaptation to the then custom of the Romans to burn the bodies of the dead, and the Phoenix, performing the burial rite over the corpse of his father, seemed to serve as the personification of this sacred duty towards the dead. The popularity of this symbol in the Christian world was no less widespread. Already St. Clement of Rome, a famous apostolic man, cited the legend of the Phoenix and his miraculous fate to confirm the truth of the future resurrection, transformed by phenomena of visible nature. “Do we consider it amazing and incomprehensible if the Creator of all things resurrects those who, in the hope of good faith, holyly served Him, when He reveals to us in this bird the greatness of His promise?” 100 “Like a dying Phoenix,” as St. Gregory the Theologian, “blooms for new youth, after many years being born in fire, and from the old ashes an immortal body arises, so should the dying, who burn with a fiery desire for the King Christ, live forever.” 101 The same argument is made by the Apostolic Constitutions 102 against the Greeks who doubted the future resurrection; St. also refers to him and for the same purpose. Cyril of Jerusalem, 103 revealing the creed's doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. Without citing other evidence of the same content, we would rather point out the new dogmatic application that ancient church writers make of this myth. The same St. Gregory the Theologian, expounding the doctrine of the origin of St. The Spirit from the Father, in contrast to the miraculous birth of the Son, also explains the story of the Phoenix. The amazing origin of this bird is considered by some Western writers to be an analogy of the supernatural birth of Christ from the Virgin Mary. So Rufinus uses the Phoenix as an argument to shame the pagans who mocked the supernatural birth of Christ from the Blessed Virgin. By analogy with the same legend, in medieval poetry many hymns were composed in honor of the Mother of God, where frequent allusions to the history of the Phoenix are heard, and the Blessed Virgin Mary is called the fire of life, in which the ancient Phoenix was renewed and in an incomprehensible way gave birth to a new representative of its fabulous family. With such a broad application of the legend of the Phoenix to the understanding of various dogmatic truths, it is clear that this symbol could move from the field of pagan art to the sphere of religious and artistic representations of Christian creativity. And we really find it in Christian tombs on sarcophagi and small utensils, on coins of the post-Constantine era and other monuments of ancient Christian art. In some cases, the Phoenix was combined with the image of a palm tree, which, in addition to the similarity in their symbolism, was greatly facilitated by the common Greek name φοτνιξ for the palm tree and the Phoenix. They are found in this exact combination on one ancient sarcophagus described by Bosio and Aringi. In the main place is depicted I. Christ standing on a rock; on both sides there are two palm trees, and on one of them the Phoenix is ​​represented. The image of the Phoenix remained in Christian art for a relatively long time and was adopted, among other things, in the mosaics of Ravenna and especially Roman basilicas, where the Phoenix was sometimes represented with a halo or radiance around its head, like a crown on the face of saints. Towards the end of the 13th century, our fabulous bird appears on one of the Lateran mosaics in the following original and meaningful combination: at the bottom of the chest-length image of the Savior there is a large cross, from the foot of which four springs flow, by analogy with the four rivers of paradise. Directly below the cross is a city, in front of whose gates stands a cherub with a drawn sword; in the middle of the city there is a palm tree, on top of which sits a Phoenix. 104 The city in this symbolic picture means the new Jerusalem or the city of the eternal living God - the Church, and the Phoenix personifies the spirit of life that revived the dry human bones of Ezekiel's vision, i.e. serves as a symbol of the resurrection of the peoples, among whom the Church will be built. An angel with a sword, by its resemblance to the Edenic cherub, gives the idea that the Church is a new paradise planted by Christ. The story of the Phoenix had a very wide application in the field of Christian art and left clear traces of its influence not only in painting, but also in the religious literature of the Middle Ages. It can be said that from this mythical type the Christian worldview has extracted so many aspects suitable for apologetic and didactic purposes as from hardly any other ancient myth. And we must admit that this poetic tradition of the ancient East was in the minds of theologians and served a great service to the cause of Christianity. The third symbol of pagan origin, more often than the Phoenix found on Christian monuments, is the peacock. The peacock, the sacred bird of Juno, was one of the favorite subjects of pre-Christian art. Being a simple decoration of some of his works, on other monuments he appeared as an exponent of the idea of ​​eternity, serving as a symbol of immortality. To explain this meaning of the image of a peacock, first of all, it should be said that it belongs to those birds that annually, with the onset of winter, lose their feathers in order to feather again in the spring, when all nature is renewed and, as it were, comes to life again. Blessed Augustine in his essay: “On the City of God,” following the ideas of the ancients, notes another even more relevant property of the peacock. Explaining with natural examples the validity of the idea that “the bodies of people condemned to eternal torment will burn in fire without being burned and suffer without dying,” he asks among other things: “Who else but God, the Creator of everything, imparted to the meat of a dead peacock the property of not spoiling?” Although my story may seem incredible, such a case happened to us. In Carthage we were offered this cooked bird; we ordered a piece of flesh of sufficient size, in our opinion, to be cut out of her breast and hidden; this piece, after a number of days after which any other meat would have spoiled, when it was offered to us, did not have the slightest unpleasant odor to our sense of smell. Having hidden it again, we found it the same after more than thirty days, and the same after a year, with the only difference that the meat had become somewhat drier and tougher.” 105 In view of the pre-Christian symbolism and noted properties of the peacock, it was quite natural for the first believers to use it to express their doctrine of the resurrection of bodies after death, and they really skillfully used it. The peacock is quite often found on their tombs, on the walls and vaults of the catacombs and on many other items of grave goods. He is depicted on them either completely separately standing calmly with his tail hanging down, or more often in connection with other signs and images, admittedly containing a direct or indirect allusion to immortality and resurrection. The peacock is presented here among greenery and trees, as if in a heavenly setting, with olive or palm branches - symbols of peace and victory, in particular, the afterlife and victory over death; then - in connection with the image of the good shepherd with a lamb on his shoulders, the story of the prophet Jonah, the resurrection of Lazarus - all such subjects that do not leave the slightest doubt about the symbolism of the bird that interests us. In the catacombs of St. Agnes and in the tomb of St. Marcellinus and Peter the peacock is depicted standing on a ball with a fan-shaped tail; Commentators on these two frescoes, not without reason, apparently see in the ball as if the earth is being left behind by the resurrected body, and in the beautiful feathers of the peacock raised upward - the sky, where it is heading. 106 A cross was found in India, on the top of which, according to some, there was a dove, according to others, a peacock. If the latter is true, notes Rev. Christopher, “then in the image of a peacock on the cross in the most visual and significant way, Christian truth met, so to speak, with the truth of pagan religion, faith in immortality, through the cross, with the dark feeling of immortality, expressed under the symbol of paganism.” 107 The same category of mixed symbols includes the image of a ship as a symbol of life heading towards the inevitable pier for all - death. “The path of life, how dangerous it is!” - says one Greek poem. “Pressed by storms, we are often in poverty, like a swimmer at sea. Fate sits at the helm and steers the fragile ship. It’s as if a dangerous path is walking along the waves of the sea. One is favored by a fair wind, the other is not, but in the end each of the swimmers is received underground by the gloomy pier of death,” “I have found a pier,” the deceased exclaims in one ancient epitaph, “and the pier of all is death,” says Epictetus. In accordance with this symbolism, one catacomb plaque depicts a ship sailing with open sails towards the lighthouse standing to the right of it, which indicates the proximity of the desired pier. At the top is the inscription: Firmia Victoria, qui vixit annos LXV. 108 This should also include images: palm trees, wreaths and crowns, as symbols of victory, in particular, victory over death; olive branch - a symbol of peace, the afterlife; anchor - a symbol of hope, in particular - the Christian hope of a future resurrection. The third and last group includes symbols that owe their origin to Christianity and are unknown from ancient monuments. They constitute the overwhelming majority and are borrowed for the most part from Old and New Testament sources, sometimes with an admixture of apocryphal tales. Many of these subjects are of a historical nature, because they reproduce persons and events depicted in the Bible, and therefore their place, apparently, should be in the field of historical images; but we attribute them to the symbolic circle on the basis of their internal meaning, in view of the special significance with which they appear in the field of church art, and which overshadows their immediate, immediate historical meaning. These are, for example, images of: Noah, the prophets Jonah and Daniel, the resurrection of Lazarus, the miraculous feeding of the people in the desert, the miracle in Cana of Galilee and much more. The depiction of Noah is very simple and typical. He usually appears as a bearded, sometimes, however, beardless young man, standing in a quadrangular box representing an ark. His hands are raised towards the dove carrying him an olive branch - a sign of peace. No other additions taken from the biblical story are found in ancient monuments of Christian art. The interior of the ark with its contents, the scene of the entry and release of animals, the image of Noah’s family - all this already belongs to later art, and in ancient monuments there is only one characteristic addition in the form of a figure standing near the ark with raised hands and signifying the person buried in this place. With the same thought, one ancient sarcophagus depicts a woman standing in the ark with her hands raised in prayer and, as can be seen from the inscription, this figure is nothing more than just an image or, in its own way, a portrait of the deceased woman placed in this sarcophagus. The Prophet Jonah appears in catacomb painting in different positions and everywhere retains the classic type of a young man. Most often, Jonah is depicted at the moment when a sea monster throws him out of its mouth onto the shore, but you can also often see him thrown into the sea by shipmen and swallowed by an animal. Without a doubt, in the first scene they wanted to depict the moment of resurrection, and in the last - the moment of death, resolved by revival. No less characteristic is the third position of Jonah, where he appears to be resting under the shade of a broad-leaved plant, which protects him from the sultry rays. This coolness and contentment of a resting or seemingly asleep person in the tomb painting expressed the idea that death is, as it were, a peaceful (in pace) sleep, a state of repose in a green and cool place. From the artistic side, the figure of Jonah itself is remarkable here, usually naked, beautifully crafted, in many ways reminiscent of the classical type of Apollo. In terms of the method of depiction and the internal meaning, the image of the Prophet Daniel in the lion's den comes very close to this figure of the prophet Jonah - a very beloved image and therefore very common in the frescoes of the catacombs and in the sculpture of sarcophagi. At first, the Prophet Daniel was usually depicted among two lions, with his hands raised in prayer and, with rare exceptions, completely naked and without any accessories; but then little by little they began to clothe him, and in this form his frescoes and miniatures of the Middle Ages are presented to us. The resurrection of Lazarus often appears on monuments in the form of an addition to the prophet Daniel and is placed in close connection with him, as a homogeneous scene. This image, despite the sketchy design, in the best examples amazes with its grandeur and the majestic figure of Christ, who either turns with an imperative gesture to the cave where Lazarus lies, or touches the dead man emerging from it with a rod. Lazarus is usually depicted as a swaddled mummy, standing, or, better said, leaning against the portal of a small ancient monument, which is a cave. In the reliefs of the sarcophagi, this scene is complemented by the image of Mary weeping at the feet of Christ, the presence of the apostles and other witnesses to this wonderful event. By bringing together these multi-colored and heterogeneous subjects, that is, the three youths in the cave of Babylon, the prophets Jonah and Daniel, and the resurrection of Lazarus, often placing them in tombs on the same vault or sarcophagus, as if in a memorized combination, ancient Christian art had in mind the internal connection that exists between them, and this connection was the truth of the resurrection, which was excellently expressed by all these events, and which the first Christians were completely imbued with. Of the symbols that owe to the Christian consciousness not by their external form, but by their origin or, better said, by their content, we will note two more important and commonly used ones, namely, the image of Christ under the image of the good shepherd and in the form of a fish. The meaning of the first symbol is so clear that it does not need explanation, but its artistic history warns of the catacomb image of the good shepherd and represents several types analogous to it in classical art. Raoul-Rochette, Pieper and other researchers, who spent a lot of work on clarifying the origin of the artistic type of the good shepherd, considered its prototype to be the classical representation of Hermes or Mercury in the guise of a shepherd carrying a lamb on his shoulders, which is why the Greeks called it κριοφόρος. According to Pausanius, a church was dedicated to him in Tanagra (in Viotia). On a holiday in honor of this patron of flocks, the most handsome of the city’s young men walked around its walls with a lamb on his shoulders, in memory of how Hermes once saved the city from the plague in the same way. Scientists have related the image of the Christian good shepherd to the figure of a satyr carrying a sheep or goat on his shoulders. On one of the sarcophagi of the Lateran Museum there is an image of a Bacchic procession, at the head of which walks a satyr with a lamb on his shoulders, and next to him another with a kid on his back. The first figure bears a visible resemblance to the Christian Good Shepherd, of course, if the satire is replaced by a person. Finally, they point to images of shepherd life in paintings of bucolic content and in the idyllic poetry of the Romans, where the type of shepherd with a sheep on his shoulders or a kid on his chest constitutes a very common and beloved image. 109 Among the series of images of this idyllic content, one of the paintings decorating the inside of the funeral crypt of the Nazon family is especially remarkable. Between the many scenes of various kinds scattered across the ceiling of the tomb, spring is emblematically represented here in the guise of the following rural scene: on one side, a girl with a full basket of flowers on her head returns home, on the other, a shepherd with a staff in his right hand and with a lamb on his shoulders, which he holds by the legs with his left hand. Here, on the ceiling of the crypt, another shepherd is depicted, surrounded by a flock, closely reminiscent of similar images in fresco painting and on Christian sarcophagi. This similarity in the images of the classical shepherd and the Christian good shepherd sometimes extends so far that it becomes almost impossible to draw a line between them and unmistakably classify the monument they mark as Christian. It would, of course, be strange not to recognize this obvious analogy, but the essential question is: is there a genetic connection in this case, and is the good shepherd of Christian art really just a copy of the idyllic shepherd in Roman paintings? It is even less possible to draw this analogy into the content and spirit of this plot and tear it away from its native soil in the gospel narratives, in the parable of Christ - the Good Shepherd of the spiritual flock. In conclusion, it remains for us to make a few comments about one very widespread and intricate symbol, which occupied a prominent position not only in the circle of ancient Christian symbolism, but also in the field of dogmatic ideas. We mean the image of a fish. The explanation of this sign and its origin have been the subject of many ingenious considerations, but a general basic principle for such an interpretation has not yet been proposed, and the matter is limited to more or less consistent individual guesses. To establish such a guiding criterion, one must keep in mind the entire mass of images of this kind and begin their history from ancient times. By origin, this symbol belongs to the pre-Christian world; in various combinations, long before Christianity, it appears on Syrian, Phoenician, and Egyptian monuments, and its popularity in the east is not subject to the slightest doubt. In Christianity, the image of a fish becomes known very early, judging by the words of Clement of Alexandria, who recommended it to Christians for decorating rings and rings, among other things, and has survived in a very large number. It is curious that in the west this sign passed and was known with a Greek name, and its explanation here, as in the east, was based on the Greek ΐχ~ύς - its native formula. What meaning did the early Christian consciousness associate with this symbol? Ancient church writers and most of the later researchers of art started from the anagrammatic or enigmatic meaning of the word ιχ~ύς, in which, when decomposed into letters, they found the initial letters of the full name of the God-man or the following five words: Ίησοΰς Χριστός, Θεού Υΐός, Σωτήρ. This literal meaning of the word ιχ~ύς was early noticed by Christian exegetes, and probably in Alexandria, this center of allegorical interpretation, the mysterious meaning of this famous word was first discovered and brought to light, which later became a common term for designating Christ the God-Man. Already Clement of Alexandria, in his hymn to the Savior, makes several rather transparent allusions to this inner meaning of the fish symbol and to its special relationship to Christ. Addressing Him, the compiler of the hymn says, among other things: “Fisher of mortals (fishermen) saved by You! You catch clean fish in the waves of hostility from the sea of ​​wickedness for a blessed life.” 110 Tertullian carries the meaning of the symbol even further and explains it directly at the same time in relation to Christ and Christians. “We are little fish,” he says, led by our Ίχ~ύς, we are born in water and we will be saved only by staying in water.” Origen briefly and without any explanation notes: Χριστός ο τροπικώς λεγόμενος Ίχ~ύς - Christ, allegorically called the fish. This anagrammatic meaning of ίχ~ύς was clearly revealed by Western writers, who, of course, did not come up with this explanation themselves, but borrowed it from the East. “If we combine into one word, says Blessed Augustine, the initial letters of the following five Greek names: Ίησοΰς Χριστός, Θεού Υίός, Σωτήρ, then we get the word Ίχ~ύς, which mysteriously denotes the name of Christ.” Probably, Blessed Augustine was guided in his interpretation by the poem that was included in the Sibylline books, was known to Eusebius and was composed acrostically, so that from his initials the acrostic was obtained in translation: Jesus Christ, Son of God, Cross (Σταυρός). As soon as such an explanation was given, ιχ~ύς became a kind of cabalistic sign, a sacred formula that contained the essence of the Christian confession, and the very image of the fish served as an expressive, completely understandable sign to distinguish the followers of Christ from members of all other religious societies. In the word ίχ~ύς, using the expression of Optatus of Milevitus, per singulas litteras turba sanctorum nominum continetur. 111 But the fact is that such an interpretation of the fish symbol was formed later and was first encountered, as we have seen, at the end of the 3rd and 4th centuries, while the use of the symbol itself began much earlier and, one might say, its most famous and characteristic images belong to an earlier era. Along with this anagrammatic explanation, in the church literature of the ancient period there are other explanations of this symbol in relation to Jesus Christ, as the founder of the sacraments of baptism and communion. Accordingly, in the field of art, a special unique cycle of images of fish is compiled. Starting from these artistic data, the anagrammatic explanation will have to be recognized as insufficient and pale, in need of a more specific technique that would come closer to the Eucharistic meaning of the sign of fish. It is to this side that the explanations of ίχ~ύς are now directed. Let's list a few of them who are more affluent. It is known that the saturation of the people in the desert by Christ was accomplished through several loaves and fishes, and that Christ, having appeared after the resurrection to his disciples on the shore of Lake Tiberias, shared a meal with them after a miraculous fishing, and, taking the loaves and fishes, distributed them to them. Church writers explained both of these gospel events in relation to the Eucharist, and therefore the fish received a Eucharistic meaning in the minds of Christians. By analogy with this, to explain the symbolism of the fish, the words of the Savior are cited: “Which of you, if a son asks him for bread, will give him a stone, or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake” (Matthew 7:9-10)? Here the fish, in contrast to the snake, meaning the devil, refers to Christ as the true bread of life, which is why he is called on one inscription ιχθύς ζώντων - fish of the living or bread of life. Now, so that this Eucharistic meaning of fish becomes clearer to us, let us get acquainted with the main images of this kind on monuments. A number of them opens with a picture that often comes across in the catacombs, which depicts a table with several loaves and fishes lying on it and seven participants in the meal sitting at the table. This picture, of course, is nothing more than a reproduction of the Gospel story about how the resurrected Christ shared a meal with his disciples near Lake Tiberias. In this appearance of Christ and in the abundant fishing that preceded it, exegetes saw an indication of the success of the gospel preaching, and in the meal itself an analogy with the Last Supper, especially if we remember that on another similar occasion Christ was recognized by the disciples “in the breaking of bread.” Thanks to this analogy, fish became so closely associated with the spiritual meal of Christians that it became a symbol of the Eucharist. This also includes the fresco in the tomb of St. Callista, in which there is also a table with a fish placed on it, and near the table there are two figures, one of which - male - is explained in the meaning of a priest performing a sacrament, and the other - female, praying with raised hands in the sense of the upcoming church. Further known is the image of a fish carrying on its back a basket with seven loaves of bread and a bottle of red wine under them. Again symbols of the Eucharist. Finally, I will note another interesting composition of the same Eucharistic content, where fish appears in connection with the story of the multiplication of loaves and the transformation of water into wine at the wedding in Cana of Galilee. We are referring to a very interesting picture discovered in the catacombs near Alexandria, which have now, unfortunately, collapsed. It was placed in the altar above the throne and had the following appearance: in the middle of the picture stands Christ, and on his sides are the apostles Peter and Andrew, of whom the latter brings two fish to Christ on a platter. At the feet of Christ are several boxes filled with bread. On the left field of the picture there is a wedding in Cana with guests sitting near the table, between whom a prominent place is occupied by a figure with the inscription: ή αγία Μαρία. On the right field there are several people also sitting at the table, with the inscription above their heads: τάς ευλογίας του Χρίστου έσθίοντες, that is, eating the blessed bread of Christ. The term ευλογία, which in later times meant antidor, blessed bread in general, in ancient church language meant the Eucharist. So, in this fresco, under the cover of biblical scenes that had Eucharistic significance, the central point is the image of a fish. How clear this symbolism of the fish was then, and how broadly it could be interpreted, can be proven by two ancient Christian epitaphs: one over the tomb of Averky, Bishop of Hierapolis, who during his lifetime ordered it to be made on his tomb, and the other on the tombstone of a certain Christian Askhandius. Having told about his travels through the cities of Syria and his stay in Rome, where he went to venerate the remains of the apostles and martyrs, Averky says that during these wanderings “faith brought and offered him fish (ιχθύν) for food from the source of life, the great immaculate fish, which the most pure Virgin (αγνή) accepted παρθένος), gave it to her friends (by faith) as food, and she also gave them a good mixture of wine and bread.” Averky concludes his confession with the following appeal: “Everyone of the same faith with me, pray for me!” The figurative language of the epitaph gives more allusions and hints than a clear idea of ​​Christ as the Eucharistic bread communicated in the sacrament to believers, but the main motive is clear. In addition to the Eucharistic content, this inscription is also important in its relation to the teaching about the Mother of God and represents Her as the source from which the flesh 'Ιχθύς ζωής' received its origin and received. The gravestone inscription of Askhandiya captures a wider range of ideas, reveals at the same time, under the image of a fish, the doctrine of baptism and communion and constitutes one of the most important monuments for Christian archeology. A marble slab broken into six pieces with this epitaph written in Greek was accidentally dug up in 1839 by workers in the Christian cemetery of the southern French city of Autun, on the site of which in ancient times there was the famous Roman Augustodunum (near Lugduna or present-day Lyon) - a rich trading settlement with a significant Greek colony. Christianity was strong here already in the second century. The Lyon and Vienne churches were then in constant relations with Asia Minor, receiving church hierarchy and enlightenment from here. One of the residents of the city, the Christian Lectorius, placed a slab with an inscription on the grave of his parents, which can be translated as follows: “O divine race of the heavenly Ίχθύς, accept with a heart full of respect the immortal life between mortals. Renew your soul, O friend, in the divine waters with the eternal streams of wisdom that bestows treasures. Take the food of the Savior of saints, sweet as honey; take, taste and drink, you hold Ίχθύς in your hands. 'Ιχθύς, give me the mercy that I ardently desire, Teacher and Savior: may my mother rest in peace, I beg you, light of the dead. Askhandiy, my father, whom I adore together with my tender mother and with all my relatives in the world of Ίχθύς, remember your Pectory.” The inscription, noticeably divided in content into two sections, forms an acrostic with the initial letters of its first five lines: ιχθύς. It has so many common thoughts and even expressions with some passages from the works of Irenaeus of Lyons that one of the scientists who restored it (Lenormand) was inclined to recognize the compiler of the epitaph as one of the companions and interlocutors of the just named St. father. Constituting the predominant content of tomb painting, symbolic forms survived the era of Constantine the Great and, as a remnant of the former artistic language, as an echo of ancient tradition, are often found in the mosaics of Christian churches of the 4th–6th centuries, and on the frames of diptychs, and on carved ivory tablets, and in the stamp of coins; but these were no longer frequent phenomena, relatively speaking. Beginning with the time of the same emperor Constantine the Great, especially during the heyday of mosaic painting, ancient Christian symbolism little by little began to lose its immediate, so to speak, freshness, noticeably began to decline, gradually being replaced by historical images and iconographic types. The period of its weakening lasted, however, for a relatively short time. In the Middle Ages, symbolism was revived with renewed vigor and found a place not only in the fine arts, but even in architecture, poetry and theological literature of that time. After a certain interval, the previously used symbols were again brought to life, supplemented with new ones and formed a wide range of images that were kept alongside and on a par with the subjects of historical content. The Middle Ages introduced a fairy-tale element into this area and composed partly on the basis of mythical tales, partly under the influence of free inventiveness, a cycle of symbolic forms of the most fantastic, monstrous nature. Having a decorative purpose, they, however, were not pure fiction, empty forms without any content, entertaining only idle curiosity and giving nothing for the moral education and development of those who sought edification in the church. Many, perhaps, could not see anything beyond this or that artistic form and were satisfied with one decorative side, not suspecting anything other than what it gave to the eye; but such an attitude was, in any case, an abnormal phenomenon and did not justify the purpose that church symbolism was supposed to serve. If even in the early Christian era symbolic forms of art found justification and meaning in the appropriate interpretation, if even then church literature did not leave aside the internal content covered by a symbolic shell, much less could later theological thought remain indifferent to this analysis, when religious art, having emerged from its infant state, submitted to the influence of the church and became an instrument of its educational goals; when, finally, the soil that gave the very life and meaning to these images disappeared. Always having its foothold in the consciousness of time, in the favorite ideas of a certain era, symbolic art has never been without interpretation and has been commented on in one way or another in poetry and literature. Ancient Christian writing went hand in hand with artistic symbolism, on the one hand, it explained it, and on the other, it itself prepared the types and provided material for its works. Medieval literature stood in the same relationship to symbolic art. Even Alexandrian scientists, probably under the influence of allegorical ideas characteristic of the East in general, discovered a special disposition towards allegory, mysticism and theosophy. Among them, almost for the first time, mystical-allegorical interpretations of phenomena and objects of nature began to appear and circulate widely in individual formulas and entire collections of different names, such as: ιερά, μαγικά, τεράστια, θαυμάσια, ακούσματα. Under the influence of these interpretations and on the basis of the mentioned collections, medieval physiologists appeared; some of them were known with the names of famous ancient writers, Greek and Roman. This is how the work De piscibus et animalibus treated the name of Apuleius; the treatise Περί ζώων was attributed to Philo. Many other names, with the authority of supposed antiquity, have acquired fame in this type of literature. Some of the early Christian writers who adhered to the allegorical method in exegesis continued to be important for the symbolism of medieval art: Barnabas with his mystical interpretation of Scripture, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and another Clement of Alexandria speaks, for example, allegorically about the hyena and the turtledove; Origen, calling his explanations physiology, reasoned in the same spirit about the lion, deer, stork, kite and other individuals of the animal world. Epiphanius of Cyprus, whose name was used in the work Περί λίθων, which did not belong to him, Gregory the Great, Isidore of Seville, Rabanus the Maurus, Alcuin, Bernard of Clairvoy and many others occupy not the last place in this branch of medieval literature. To familiarize the learned world with it, Cardinal Pitra rendered a great service, publishing several documents of this kind in his collection of previously unpublished Greek and Latin ecclesiastical authors. 112 Here is placed, under the name of Melito of Sardinia, a famous writer of the half of the 2nd century, an extensive compilation of allegorical interpretations, covering three entire chapters: de bestiis, de hominibus and de civitate. Judging by the numerous anachronisms found in the work, it cannot be recognized as a whole as a genuine work of Meliton; but there is no doubt that it included several chapters from the latter's now lost encyclopedic treatise: Clavis. Let us cite a few excerpts from it to give a clear idea of ​​the techniques and nature of the interpretations contained in it. In the department De bestiis 113 from what meanings are acquired by the wolf. The wolf is the devil. Reason: the mercenary sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep and runs. The wolf symbolizes heretics and evil princes: ravenous wolves will come to you in sheep's clothing. The wolf is a deposed predator: the wolf and the lamb will graze. Wolves meant demons. In De hominibus 114, the word mulier is interpreted in the following meanings. Woman means church. There is an analogy for this interpretation in ancient Christian art. Wisdom; the basis is the saying of Solomon: Have fun with the wife of your youth. Sensual thoughts. Soul controlled by the mind. Symbol of weakness. The personification of Babylon. Heretical delusions. Another document of the same content, cited by Peter under the title Φυσιόλογος, 115 known from a manuscript of the 12th, 13th and later centuries, contains an explanation of the nature of quadrupeds, birds, fish, reptiles and stones. Its compiler reveals significant knowledge of natural history and ancient literature, including apocryphal works. In the manner of his descriptions and explanations, one senses a rationalist, arranging his information in a system and sequence. The writer usually begins with a brief description of this or that subject, points out its main features or characteristic features, and for each offers its own special interpretation (ερμηνεία), with which some moral teaching is connected, or a parallel is drawn between the explained feature and some historical, dogmatic or liturgical concept. The method followed by the author of the Physiologist is the same everywhere and can be approximately expressed as follows: at the head of each section is the name of one or another animal being explained, for example, about a lion, about a snake, about an ant; then some typical text is given concerning one or another of them, and after that the author speaks on his own: the physiologist said about such and such an object that it has two, three, four distinctive properties (φύσεις). It states what the first property is and then immediately gives an allegorical explanation; The compiler does the same with the second, third, etc. property. In this way, our Physiologist explains more than 60 names of various animals, introducing into the circle of his interpretations even the names of mythological creatures and fictional animals, borrowing them from classical mythology, fairy tales and apocrypha. In connection with the above and similar scholastic-allegorical interpretations, a circle of symbolic images of medieval art developed, and if we compare the latter with the explanatory formulas of physiologists, then it will be impossible not to see that artistic creativity rarely went beyond the boundaries outlined by the interpretations of physiologists, and adhered to the same images and ideas that constituted the content of the mystical-allegorical exegesis of that time. III. Own or historical images on monuments of ancient Christian art Own or historical images on monuments of ancient Christian art. Description of some of them; remarks about their significance in the formation of icon painting types. Image of God the Father. The opinions of some church teachers about the indescribability of Him. Symbolic images of God the Father; the later appearance of His own images and their main types. Image of Jesus Christ. The existence of images of Jesus Christ in the early times of Christianity among pagans, heretics and Orthodox. Opinions of the fathers and teachers of the church about the appearance of the Savior. The ideal type of Christ in catacomb art. Images of the Savior on monuments of Byzantine art. Eastern and Western legends about the Image Not Made by Hands. Another class of ancient Christian images consists of subjects of a historical nature. In comparison with symbolic ones, they occupy a secondary place and are inferior to them in quantitative and qualitative terms. Christian art of the first times seemed to be afraid of objective images, using the clothes of allegory and symbol to express not only abstract concepts, but even to represent biblical persons and events, without risking depicting them in their immediate form, in their natural outlines. 116 The basic character of early Christian art thus remains symbolic; the historical element first comes to it as an addition, and reaches independent significance only later, after the 4th century. The first experiments in objective painting or images of one’s own, without allegorical coloring, belonged to decorative painting, where objects of the plant and animal kingdom appeared without any symbolic lining, simply as decoration, as a more or less successful reproduction of nature. This further includes images of various everyday objects that indicated the lifestyle, the social status of the deceased and corresponded to those objects of everyday life that, for one reason or another, were placed with the deceased in the grave. These are, for example, images of scales, a hammer, an anvil and many other craft tools. Often the dead themselves are introduced to their everyday activities. Thus, a blacksmith processes a piece of metal, a sculptor in his workshop, grave diggers use a pick to make indentations in loculi, an owner with a vessel in his hand, a tailor working in his workshop, a gladiator in the arena in a fight, children playing with tame animals, shepherds near herds. One fresco in the tomb of St. Callista represents a seller of flowers, and perhaps vegetables, who, having laid out her goods on trays, offers them to customers. In these and similar images, thus, the past life of the dead unfolds before us, their practical interests, their home environment come to life, in a word, that side of life which, according to the current church view, has no place on grave monuments, but which was completely in the spirit of the ancient worldview and deeply entered into the practice of the then Christian society. 117 A very interesting group in this section of subjects is represented by images of family tables. Some of them have a Eucharistic content, as we have already said, but others represent no more than a family scene and are distinguished by spontaneity. Around the table, or, better to say, on the edge of a semicircular cushion or sigma, several men, women, and sometimes children sit or recline. On the table there is bread and fish on dishes; there is also a bowl of wine and glasses. One painting of similar content also shows the table servants, to whom those seated address with orders. So, above the head of one of them the following inscription is read: Agape misce mi, i.e. Agape, mix the wine (the Romans did not drink wine in its pure form, but diluted it with water and combined it with various spices). The duty of another servant standing on the other side of the table is explained by an inscription that reads: Irene da calda - Irina, bring warm water. The whole picture breathes the freshness of real life and reproduces the usual home furnishings of the table. Similar scenes are often found in Roman pagan tombs, depicting the so-called meal of the dead. There they have a purely everyday character and represent a deceased or buried couple in one of the ordinary everyday activities. How closely the similarity between the catacomb tombstones and the tomb scenes of the Greeks and Romans extended in this regard can be seen from a comparison of classical images with Christian ones, and this similarity extends so far that the Christian master, apparently, was sometimes guided by the accepted ancient models. But if in some cases the imitation of ancient painting came out very close, then in others Christian artists left a peculiar imprint in the details of the picture, in some small, but nevertheless original features. So, for example, it is no coincidence, of course, that they depicted the table participants most often as seven people, a number that, without a doubt, was related to the seven apostles who took part in a meal with Christ on the shore of Lake Tiberias. Even less accidental is the presence of fish on the dishes, and the raised hands of those feasting involuntarily resemble a Christian prayer gesture. The historical images in the catacombs include the reproduction of some church rites, as they were performed in the early Christian era, namely baptisms and marriages. As for the other sacraments, there are no indisputable images of them in the catacombs, and attempts to explain in this sense some dubious subjects are mostly unsuccessful and are carried out with the pre-occupied idea of ​​proving the antiquity of certain liturgical institutions through monumental data. It goes without saying that, when speaking about historical images, we include in this number the so-called biblical subjects, but we must make a reservation about some that have a symbolic connotation and rather belong in their direction to the area of ​​improper images. The penchant of Christian artists for symbolism has left very noticeable traces in this area. Symbolic art seemed not to want to immediately give up its place to historical images, but only little by little it freed itself from symbolic coloring. This indecision, this hesitation to take the straight road, leaving the roundabout path of symbolic allusions, was expressed in the presentation of the same plot in a traditional symbolic and its own historical form, but in such a way that both of these techniques exist next to each other on monuments of the same time and even in the same image. Of the many examples of this kind, we take as an example the description of the murals in the Basilica of Felix, arranged by Paulinus of Nolan. Describing the mosaics on the altar apse, the latter introduces us to the following picture, where both of these techniques exist simultaneously. “In all the mysterious greatness,” he says, “the Trinity shines: Christ stands in the form of a lamb, the voice of the Father thunders from heaven, and the Holy Spirit descends in the form of a dove.” Following further after the descriptor, we see a cross surrounded by a brilliant crown (this crown was usually placed at the crossroads of the branches of the cross, in its very center), and near the cross a choir of doves, which meant the host of the apostles. And here is the description’s explanation of this picture: “The voice of the Father and the Holy Spirit,” he says, “testify of Christ as God, and the cross and the lamb depict Him as St. sacrifice, and the purple and palm are symbols of His kingdom and victory." All this, as we see, is a series of symbolic signs expressing the idea of ​​Christ suffering and triumphant in his very suffering. But here Christ appears in his own form, standing on a rock from which four springs flow - symbols of the four evangelists. In addition to the indicated technique, the transitional moment from the first to the second kind of art was also expressed in the communication to symbolic figures of the properties and actions of historical persons and objects. A remarkable example of such syncretism is represented by some of the bas-reliefs on the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus. This sarcophagus, extremely important in the history of art, judging by the inscription on it, was intended for the burial of Junius Bassus, who, according to Prudentius, belonged to a patrician family and died soon after his appointment as prefect of Rome. 118 The sarcophagus is made of white marble, decorated with Corinthian columns, which divide its front or front side into ten compartments, located in two zones: upper and lower. 119 On the frieze between them, the columns of the latter, between the arches, are the images that interest us, where instead of historical figures there are acting lambs. In the first interval, the lamb leads the sheep through the Red Sea, in the second, he hits the rock with his staff and pours out water, in the third, touching the coffers with the staff, miraculously multiplies the loaves, in the fourth, the lamb raised his leg over the head of another lamb in the water, on which the Holy Spirit descends in the form of a dove - obviously, the baptism of Christ is depicted; in the fifth section, the lamb receives the tablets of the covenant and, finally, in the sixth, he resurrects Lazarus. In a similar manner in the tomb of St. Sixta depicts Susanna, innocently condemned by the Jewish elders, who are represented on her sides in the form of two predatory animals, one of which resembles a wolf, and the other a fox. Above them is the inscription: senioris (instead of seniores), above the lamb - susanna. However, this method of depiction had no future in ancient Christian art, and such anti-artistic prosopopoeia went beyond the limits of plausible symbolism and crossed into the realm of allegory and facial morality. When their own historical images appeared on the stage, without any symbolic coloring, Christian art took an important step forward, but had not yet solved the last task imposed on it by the very course of historical development. We mean the establishment of types for historical events and especially for persons of the iconographic cycle. The fact is that the image, for example, of the prophet Jonah being disgorged by a whale, is a purely historical picture in which there can be no question of a typical image of a prophet - just like the image of Christ talking with a Samaritan woman, raising Lazarus, solemnly entering Jerusalem - a matter of a completely different kind than the individual pictorial type of Christ. Here, as is self-evident, the interest of the image is concentrated not on the typical image of Christ, but on the general content of the biblical picture, on the representation of the action scene, although at the same time it remains undoubted that in these purely historical subjects the seed was laid for the formation of types of Christian iconography, material was given for the development of certain iconographic samples. How these types were gradually developed and through what forms they passed before they reached complete iconographic completeness - this is shown to us by the history of the most important objects of the Christian iconographic circle. Let's start with images of the faces of St. Trinity. 1. Image of God the Father. The image of God the Father is one of the most difficult and inaccessible subjects for iconography, and this is primarily because the name of God the Father in the minds of Christians is associated with the thought of God in His absolute existence, detached from all sensory forms (just as in the Old Testament Jehovah was such an absolute being), or what in philosophical language is called the Divine. Early Christian spiritualism further complicated this task and made any attempt to embrace and contain an incorporeal and unlimited Being in material outlines impossible. On this ideal basis, completely understandable for the theologian theorist, stood, by the way, Origen, as can be seen from his following expressions, which are closely related to the iconography of God the Father. “The images of the gods among the pagans were different,” he says, “some more, others less perfect, as, for example, in the works of Phidias and Polykleitos. The same difference is noticed between Christians: there are among them those who created the most perfect image of the omnipotent God - an image with which the Olympian Zeus Phidias cannot be compared; these are those souls who contemplate God and imitate Him, but primarily this is the only begotten Son of the Father created in the image of God.” 120 In this passage, in addition to the remarkable comparison of Olympian Zeus with the image of the Supreme God of Christians as similar types of art, what is also important for us is the rapprochement between the image of the Son and the image of the Father as homogeneous, and this feature had an influence on the development and installation of the iconographic type of God the Father. This spiritualistic view of Origen regarding the indescribability of the Divine was shared by subsequent church writers. Thus, Theodoret of Cyrus (†450) says that “following the commandment of the decathlon, we must not depict the Deity in any sensory signs, since the Deity is invisible and indescribable.” A zealous defender of icon veneration, Patriarch German noted on behalf of the Orthodox that they never thought of depicting the invisible Deity in any form, image, likeness or outline (εικών, δμοίωμα, σχήμα, μορφή). But his contemporary and equally ardent defender of icon veneration, Pope Gregory II, speaks even more decisively and directly in the same sense. He makes it clear that at that time there were no images of God the Father, and the church did not accept them. “Why don’t we imagine in a sensual image and depict in colors the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? Because we do not know what He is, and because the being of God cannot be visible to the eyes and cannot be depicted with paints.” Among Western writers, the same view was expressed by Blessed Augustine and the author of the Books of Charles. It is natural, therefore, that the image of God the Father is rare in the art of the first three to four centuries, and if it is found, it is only in historical paintings from the Old Testament, where God the Father takes a visible part in the fate of man, or in a symbolic form, as one of the faces of St. Trinity. When, in cases of this kind, a historical plot required the image of God the Father, the artist became at a loss, and his imagination refused to give an image to an incorporeal Being. This predicament forced him to resort to symbolic forms of representation, following which God the Father was most often depicted in the form of a hand coming out of heaven, at first without radiance, and starting from the 5th century with a halo or crown around it. This hand has an Old Testament origin (“The hand of Jehovah was on me,” “Thy hands have made me”) and serves as a symbol of omnipotence and creative power. The symbolic hand is most often depicted in the sacrifice of Isaac, when Moses received the tablets of the law, in the scene of Melchizedek and others. Sometimes the hand of Jehovah is depicted holding a crown over the head of the martyrs as a symbol of reward for their patience. The symbolic form of representing God the Father in the form of a hand or under some other sign, it seemed, should have remained forever in the field of Christian art for images of the Almighty, and it actually remained in iconography much longer than other symbols, and continued to exist while others faded into the realm of history. But this form also had to yield to the influences of anthropomorphism. The hand with a halo and the radiance from the cloud provided little food for the imagination, especially in those cases when it was necessary to imagine God the Father in the features of a personal and active Being. And so, in order to satisfy this request, art begins to resort to humanoid forms of representation of the Almighty; As the oldest attempt of this kind, one can point to the mosaics in the Basilica of Mary the Great in Rome. Here we see a transition from the first symbolic techniques to anthropomorphic ones. One of these mosaics depicts the capture of Jericho. The presence of God the Father is indicated by a human figure protruding halfway out of the cloud. The other shows God the Father in the scene of Melchizedek blessing the returning Abraham. D'Agencourt compares these paintings with two bas-reliefs on Trojan's Column, which depict the battle of Roman troops with the Dacians and the appearance of Jupiter. In the further development of this type, the bust of God the Father is replaced by His full figure. We encounter two main variants of this figure. An example of the first can be God the Father at the time of the creation of Adam, where He is depicted as a young man or a middle-aged man, with a beard and a wide tunic. Bearing in mind this method of depiction, you naturally come to the conclusion that the anthropomorphic type of God the Father in ancient Christian art was formed by analogy with the type of the Catacomb Christ, or simply both of these types were mixed. How far this confusion extended is evident from the fact that in other paintings (for example, in the Church of St. Mark in Venice), God the Father at the moment of the creation of Adam is depicted with a cross in his hand. If the artist’s theological tact was offended by this confusion of two separate types and considered himself wrong in the face of dogma, even then he could find a way out of the difficulty in the idea of ​​the unity of the persons of St. The Trinity in essence and in the biblical presentation of the Son is the creative power and wisdom of the Father. Due to these dogmatic views, and most importantly, due to iconographic difficulties, Christian art allowed the confusion of the typical features of the iconography of the Son with the iconic image of God the Father. Origen's expression, to which we referred above, can serve as a starting point for reconciling the difficulties arising from this artistic syncretism. Another version of the same anthropomorphic type was formed in ancient Christian art under the influence of the prophetic visions of the Lord of Hosts in the images of Ezekiel and Daniel. But it is remarkable that the type of the Ancient of Days was already developed in later medieval art and thus was many centuries late before His young ideal type. Even in Daniel's vision, God the Father was represented as young. A special class of images is represented by gems and medallions of Gnostic origin, in which a parallel is drawn between Jehovah and Zeus. On one ancient gem of Gnostic origin, which researchers date back to the second and no later than the third century, is carved the image of Jupiter, who holds a scepter in one hand and throws lightning bolts from the other. Under his feet is an eagle, the usual symbol of Zeus, spreading its wings and raising its head towards the thunderer. On the reverse side of the gem is the inscription: ιαω σαβαω, in which one cannot help but read the abbreviated name of the Old Testament Deity: Jehovah of Hosts. This reading or, better to say, interpretation of the inscription has a basis in the explanation of Theodoret of Cyrrhus, who expressed himself in the following way about a similar inscription: Ιαω, and Macrovius appropriates this name Ιαω to the Supreme God of the Jews. In view of such a clear rapprochement, it seems to us a matter of complete indifference where this mysterious gem comes from - whether it came from pagan circles or from some Gnostic sect that adhered to syncretism, as it seems to us that art researchers rightly speak of it. The important general conclusion that we have the right to draw from it is that this monument preserves a visual confirmation of Varro’s thought, that the Jews (deviating into idolatry?) revered Zeus, although not under this classical name, and that such a parallel finds justification in monuments of art. Another remarkable monument of the same kind is a gem on which busts of Jupiter, Apollo and Diana are carved. It is remarkable that the head of Jupiter is crowned with the monogram of Christ with the inscription around: vivas in Deo. But this exclamation is one of the characteristic features of Christian epigraphy and undoubtedly belongs to a Christian master. The third gem represents an example of syncretism, in which Gnostic ideas about the supreme God are expressed in the image of Apollo or the sun with the inscription on the reverse side: Ιαω. The memory of this time of syncretism was also preserved in the news of Theodore the Reader about one painter who had the wicked idea of ​​depicting Christ in the features of the ancient Zeus. This painter, leaning towards the beliefs of one pagan, presented Christ in the form of Olympian Jupiter and did this in order to clearly show that the veneration given by Christians to the Savior should belong to Zeus and is a modification of the latter. Thus, this image was a claim on the part of the pagan party to retain for their debunked god his former greatness regarding the Christian cult. This act, however, was deservedly punished, and the artist, who dared to do this wicked deed, had his hand withered, and only later was it returned to him through the prayer of Patriarch Gennady. Our ancient iconography presents examples of all the types discussed above, starting with the symbolic hand and ending with the anthropomorphic image of the Ancient of Days. But the prevalence and even diversity of these types could not destroy the perplexities that run through the entire history of our painting and served as an echo of strict views on the inability to depict the Divine. These perplexities found a place in our Helmsman, in the well-known rule about the impossibility of depicting the spiritual and incorporeal being of God, but from time to time they arose and were renewed under the influence of various historical and theological conditions. Thus, in the middle of the 16th century, the clerk Viskovaty embarrassed the church authorities with his attacks on the iconography of that time, arguing that God cannot and is not allowed to be depicted in His essence, and rebelling on this basis against the then current images of the Ancient of Days, the Eternal Council, as well as against the facial image of the first member of the creed. Viskovaty's views, not accepted or, better said, half accepted in the 16th century, perhaps out of fear of rationalism, were repeated and proclaimed in our country on behalf of the Moscow Council of 1667. In view of the increasing disagreements regarding icon images, the cathedral, among other things, made the following resolution: “We command from now on that the image of the Lord of Hosts should no longer be painted in absurd and indecent visions, before the Lord of Hosts, that is, the Father, never seen in the flesh.” The cathedral vetoes one of the most widespread images of St. The Trinity in ancient Russian icon painting is an image with the following content: “It is extremely absurd and indecent to write the Lord of Hosts, with gray hair, and His only begotten Son in His womb, and a dove between Them.” We ask: why? The motive is given the same as before: “Who has seen the Father in Divinity? For the Father did not have flesh, and the Son was not born in the flesh from the Father before the ages."... Continuing its argumentation along these lines, the council says: “For this reason, for the sake of Hosts, Who is the Divinity, that pre-eternal birth of the only begotten Son from the Father is proper for us to understand with our minds, but to write in images is by no means proper and impossible.” The following argument is especially remarkable in this argumentation: “Even if Daniel the prophet says: for I have seen the Ancient of Days sitting in judgment, and this is not of the Father, of course, but of the Son, who at the second coming will judge every tongue.” Here one hears the same tone as in ancient Christian painting, which, wanting to eliminate the difficulty of depicting God the Father, due to the lack of suitable paints, used the iconographic likeness of Jesus Christ and depicted Hosts in this form. To put an end to the views of the Moscow Council, I will give one more excerpt from its resolutions concerning the subject we are examining: “They also write on the icons of St. Annunciation of Hosts, Who breathes from his lips, and that breath goes into the womb of the Most Pure Mother of God. And someone saw this, and some scripture testifies to this, and where did this come from? Obviously there is, as such is the custom and others similar to it are accepted by some superstitious or, more accurately, wise and insane people. And for this reason we command: from now on, let that vanity and placeless writing cease. Tochiyu in the Apocalypse of St. John is written out of necessity, and the Father is gray-haired for the sake of the visions there.” – In conclusion, an instruction is given to place a cross in the upper tier of the iconostasis instead of Hosts. The superstition, against which the Moscow Cathedral so strongly armed itself, was not, however, some kind of home-grown invention of ours, but has its basis in the examples of medieval Byzantine painting and intensified especially under the influence of Western painting, which in the patriarchal period begins to very noticeably penetrate into the area of ​​our iconography and causes strong protests from the strict church party. But one way or another, only the image of God the Father was not successful in church art and did not take a firm position, wavering between various “translations” and techniques. 2. Image of Jesus Christ. The face of the God-man, more than any other historical figure, had the right and reason to count on artistic reproduction and preservation in Christian society. All of Judea and Galilee saw I. Christ, listened to His speeches and easily, of course, could retain in their memory the appearance of their divine Teacher. But the Gospels do not tell us a word about the appearance of the Savior; they do not even give us the most general idea of ​​the features and character of His face. True, some of the researchers of the Holy Scriptures found an indication of the beauty of Christ’s appearance in the famous words of a woman: Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breast that You suckled (Luke 11:27), but this is a very artificial conclusion, and besides, it does not give anything for a visual representation of the face of Christ. No such information has been preserved from the first times of Christianity. Church sources, when speaking about Christ, always mean personalities, and forgetting about appearances, they see in Him an exponent of the spiritual perfections of human nature. This ideal image is portrayed to Christians by the apostles, apostolic men, apologists and other ancient Christian writers. This is the sense in which the ap. Paul had the right to write to the Galatians that the image of the crucified Christ was inscribed before their eyes (Gal. 3:1), although they had not seen Christ with their own eyes. In the field of Christian art, the image of the Crucified appeared only four to five centuries after this event and was late compared to images of other events in His life, meanwhile the ap. Paul uses in his letter to the Galatians (3:1) an expression of this kind that it is as if it were an image with a brush in a picture or an artistic image affecting the vision: προεγράφη κατ' οφθαλμούς, he says. From these and similar sources, since they are of a theological nature, of course, nothing can be deduced either for or against the existence of images of Christ at this time and one way or another can decide the question of their portraiture or conventionality. The latter’s decision had to belong to practice and undoubtedly came from that environment or circle where the idea of ​​​​Christ’s appearance was guided not by abstract theological considerations, but by memories of His face, traditions from people close to Him in time, where in the simplicity of their soul they wanted to have an image of Jesus Christ, just as everyone wants to have a portrait of a face dear to him or for some reason remarkable. And there is no reason to doubt the existence of images of the Savior from the very first centuries of Christianity. According to St. Irenaeus of Lyons, the Gnostics and, mainly among them, the Carpocratians, had some painted images, some made from other materials (imagines depictas et de reliqua materia fabricatas) and traced their origin back to the time of Christ Himself, pointing to His authentic image, executed as if by order of Pilate during the Savior’s earthly life; they decorated them with wreaths, placed them together with images of philosophers: Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle and others, and showed them signs of religious reverence, like the pagans. 121 Epiphanius of Cyprus, borrowing the story from Irenaeus, explains it in the sense that some of the images among the Carpocrats were painted with paints (εικόνας εύζωγράφους δια χρωμάτων), others were made of gold, silver and other substances (έκ χρυσοΰ καί αργύρου και λοιπής ύλης); that the said heretics performed their sacraments and sacrifices before them. From Syria and Egypt, these main centers of Gnosticism, products and part of the figurines of the Gnostics moved to the West, and a writer known by the name of Augustine, 122 says that a certain woman from the Carpocratian sect, named Marcellina, who arrived in Rome, according to the testimony of Irenaeus, under Pope Anicetus (157-168), worshiped images of Christ, the ap. Paul, Homer and Pythagoras. Lampridius, the biography of Alexander Severus (222–235), reports that in his home shrine (in larario suo) this emperor, along with images of gods, mythological figures - Apollonius and Orpheus and his ancestors, also had images of Christ and Abraham, paying them religious veneration in the morning hours. 123 All this shows that there was a folk tradition about the preservation of the real image of I. Christ, and under this name, both among Christians and among pagans, many such images passed from hand to hand in the first centuries: there was apparently a great demand for them and, accordingly, significant preparation. Constance, the sister of Constantine the Great, asking Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, to get her an image of Christ, was guided by the same immediate desire as other pious people who wanted at all costs to find and have the true image of the Savior. Having sharply condemned the completely natural desire of Constance, Eusebius, however, in a letter to her, 124 and in his church history, 125 states the existence in the then pagan life of the custom of depicting persons remarkable in one respect or another for domestic, so to speak, use, and the presence of picturesque images of the apostles Peter and Paul and Christ Himself among the Christians of his time. Another question is, to what extent did the images of Christ circulated among heretics, pagans and Orthodox Christians correspond to reality and reproduce the true features of the face of Christ? This question can rightfully be answered in the negative - already from the very first times of Christianity, the thread by which one could reach such a genuine image and say: this one of the surviving examples is the true image of Christ is lost, in such and such news we are talking about an image that has all the advantages of authenticity. Instead of such definite indications, we have several successively developing artistic types of the face of Christ and a whole series of historical evidence about the absence of such a reliable image. The fact is that already from the second century, from the times closest to the legends about the life and work of the Savior, a dispute arose in church literature about the nature of the face of Christ - a dispute that boiled down to the following simple question: what was Christ like in His appearance - beautiful or plain? Interpreting from a dogmatic point of view, guided by abstract theological considerations, the latter was then decided in different ways. Some of the teachers of the church, based on the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe humiliation accepted by the Redeemer, relying on the words of the prophet Isaiah: There is no form lower than glory: and we have seen Him, and not the name of the form, nor the kindness, but His form is dishonorable, lower than all the sons of men (Is. 53: 2-3; cf. Is. 52: 14), and based on the literal understanding of the words of the apostle. Paul: He humbled himself and took on the form of a servant (Phil. 2:7–8), - they expressed the idea that Christ had not only an unrepresentable, but positively ugly appearance. This opinion persisted for the first three to four centuries and had on its side prominent representatives of theological thought of that time. Justin Martyr in his Conversation with Tryphon 126 repeatedly says that Christ deigned to become a man without form and glory, appeared, according to the Scriptures, without beauty and, when he came to the Jordan, “was taken for a carpenter.” Having spoken about the divine origin of the Savior, Irenaeus notes that He was ugly, subject to suffering (indecorus et passibilis) and despised by the people. 127 “If the flesh is something slavish, as St. Paul, who would decorate a slave like a slave seller? – asks Clement of Alexandria. “And that the Lord Himself did not have a beautiful appearance at all, the Holy Spirit speaks of this through the mouth of the prophet Isaiah...” 128 The Lord “took upon Himself an inconspicuous and despicable body,” according to Clement of Alexandria, because he feared that the beauty of His appearance would distract the attention of the listeners from His teaching; The true beauty of the Son of God lay, according to him, not in the beautiful flesh that appears to the eye, but in His soul and spiritual perfections. 129 Tertullian expressed himself in the same sense, 130 and Cyril of Alexandria had already gone to the extreme and argued that the Son of God took the form of the ugliest of people. That such an opinion, despite its paradoxical nature, was quite widespread can be seen partly from the fact that Celsus, in his reproaches to Christianity, did not find it difficult to express, as a generally accepted position, that Christ had a nondescript appearance. Pointing out the discrepancy between His moral virtues, about which his followers speak, and the physical imperfections, in which they also agree, Celsus remarks: “If the Divine Spirit dwelt in Christ, then He should have been superior in appearance to all other people, but you yourself admit that He was short in stature and ugly in face.” 131 Other fathers and teachers of the church: Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, Ambrose of Milan, who did not share such a narrow literal understanding of the prophetic and apostolic expressions about the humiliation of Christ, held the opposite view and considered the God-man to be a representative of perfect beauty. “If He had not had something heavenly in his face and in his gaze,” wrote Blessed Jerome, 132, “the apostles would never have followed Him immediately,” and in another place: “Truly the radiance and majesty of the hidden Divinity, which was reflected in His human face, could attract them to Him at the first glance at Him.” 133 “Not only when he performed miracles was He worthy of wonder,” John Chrysostom writes about Christ, “but also when they saw Him, He was filled with great grace. Proclaiming this, the prophet sings: handsome in kindness more than the sons of men (Ps. 45:3). If Isaiah says about Christ: “no name for appearance, no kindness,” then he meant what happened during His suffering, the reproach that He suffered while hanging on the cross, the humiliation that He suffered everywhere throughout His entire life.” 134 With greater severity of dogmatic concepts about the face of Christ and their gradual understanding, these two opinions about His appearance, different to the point of opposition, received a slightly different formulation and joined the teaching about the dual state of the Savior: the state of humiliation and the state of His glorification. Origen expressed a very original view about the appearance of Christ, and at the same time, as if reconciling previous contradictions, the superiority of the body of Christ, in comparison with the bodies of other people, consisted in the fact that He appeared to everyone who looked at Him in the way that the inner state and good of each required. And it should not be surprising if matter, changeable and impermanent by nature, by the will of the Creator took on such forms and properties that one could say about Christ: He has neither form nor goodness, and sometimes became glorious, so amazing and worthy of wonder that the three apostles who were on the mountain with Jesus fell on their faces from His greatness and beauty. 135 In the appendix to the images I. Origen's reasoning of Christ, like all the above speeches of church writers, will mean that these images did not enjoy great faith among the latter, did not have in their eyes the power of any authorized model and were different. The variety depended on how this or that artist approached the matter, what task he set for himself and in what state or at what moment he wanted to depict Christ. Here a wide area of ​​subjectivity opened up, and Blessed Augustine makes it clear 136 that in his time there was no firmly established iconographic type of the Savior, and everyone depicted Him in their own way, guided by personal considerations. “The face of the incarnate Lord, which at every time (whatever it was) was one, is depicted differently according to the differences in countless forms of understanding.” (Dominicae facies carnis innumerabilium cogitationum diversitate variatur et fingitur). A similar thought, much later, was expressed, according to the testimony of Patriarch Photius (Epist. 64), and iconoclasts to the defenders of icon veneration, reproachfully asking them: “Which of the images of Christ is true: the one that the Romans, Hellenes, Egyptians have, or the one painted by the Indians? They are all different from each other." 137 How can we explain the absence or very early disappearance of the true image of Christ? How could it happen that the leading Christians did not make efforts, with the help of art, to consolidate and preserve in the memory of posterity the dear features of their Teacher, and those closest to the era of Christ so soon forgot His appearance? Both could depend on many reasons. Let us note those that seem most likely, explaining at the same time in what sense the matter must be understood when we are talking about the disappearance of the original image of Jesus Christ, about the oblivion of His appearance. It is difficult to admit that the idea of ​​an artistic depiction of the Son of God could arise in the minds of the Jews who believed in Christ, for whom the former religion’s strict commandment: Thou shalt not make unto thee an idol or any likeness (Ex. 20:4; Deut. 5:8) forbade the representation of the deity in any sensual image. The centuries-old aversion from any image and the old fears of idolatry could not quickly pass in their souls and be replaced - with all the reverence for Christ - by the need to reproduce His face with paints or a chisel. Even if we were to assume such a desire among Jewish Christians, no matter how doubtful its possibility may seem to us, there would hardly be an artist among them who would be able to realize it. Our speeches take a completely different turn in relation to pagan Christians, who usually worshiped their gods in statues and sculptures, and from childhood were accustomed to seeing various kinds of images of certain remarkable people in their home environment. Here, fears of idolatry, if they existed after the adoption of a new spiritual religion, were in any case not to the same extent as among converts from Judaism. Among pagan Christians, the desire to portray in one way or another I. Christ, the Son of God, could have appeared more quickly and, apparently, more easily been realized. But could their attempts of this kind have been crowned with complete success? What was portrait art at that time and what was its position then? Presenting the current strict requirements, it will be necessary to say that in general it was a weak semblance of the art with which we are currently familiar from exact photographic copies. In most cases, it did not rise to an impeccable rendering of the original, and the most that it achieved was generic, tribal typicality, expressed in the national characteristics of the face, in a certain cut of clothing, in a certain manner of posing the figure and in general in the treatment of the pre-personal, and almost everything individual and random eluded the attention of the artist, and there could be no talk of the specific. Even if the last requirement was met in the original image, when it was repeated in photographs, the individual features were gradually smoothed out, and only the largest distinctive features remained. Now, strictly speaking, we do not have portraits of either Constantine the Great or Chrysostom, despite the fact that these were extremely popular figures: their images were very common and were placed on various monuments. The bust of the Equal-to-the-Apostles Emperor on coins can rather be considered a conventional photograph of his face than a portrait: the Roman type of face, the official costume then accepted, the known attributes of royal power are retained - and nothing more. It is very difficult to single out this last one from the multitude of homogeneous numismatic figures, and the decisive importance belongs to the inscription and other conventional features. Varro, who compiled biographies of famous Romans, provided them with portraits. It cannot be said that they are distinguished by portraiture. Likewise, regarding the image of Jesus Christ, there was a complete possibility of such depersonalization even with the existence of a relatively close, historically accurate photograph of His face. This is approximately the same story that was repeated, much later, in Russian iconography, where saints of the same face were painted on the same face, not excluding some of their own, from whom the images were made during their lifetime. The church-historical and literary data to which we referred above also do not speak against the existence of ancient legends about the appearance of Christ. The disagreements between the fathers and teachers of the church in their judgments about the face of the Savior did not arise from various legends about His appearance, because it is impossible to imagine traditions so contrary, but owed their origin to considerations of an abstract dogmatic nature and corresponded to the state and nature of the then biblical interpretation. The negative side of the question, of course, did not imagine the God-man re ipsa as ugly, but had in mind the biblical idea of ​​the Messiah, His spiritual appearance, to which it also adapted its idea of ​​His appearance. In exactly the same way, the positive side judged the latter, guided by the views of an ideal property. Speaking about the beauty of the Savior on the basis of individual expressions of the Holy Scriptures and exceptional facts from His life, the fathers and teachers of the church did not mean ordinary natural beauty, but internal, unearthly beauty, shining through in the gaze, in all the features of His face. In Origen, according to whom Christ appeared to everyone according to his spiritual mood, we see not the historical Christ, not the object of external image, but a certain kind of moral character, an ideal type, presented more or less successfully, judging by the degree of spiritual receptivity of a person. Yes, representatives of spiritual thought of that time, like the closest disciples of the Savior, deeply imbued with faith in His divine personality, were somehow indifferent to the external side, to His human appearance. As an object of sensory perception, Christ was distant or seemingly different for them; Between Him, as a historical figure, and the consciousness of the theologians, there stood, if I may put it this way, a fog of philosophical speculation, through which the true features of Jesus’ face came through in an unclear form, and, on the contrary, His ideal image or symbolic Christ stood out. The authentic images of Christ had a more base, so to speak, origin, were based on unclear memories of His appearance, were associated with various kinds of legends and revolved mainly among the people; but, unfortunately, they had no future and did not have a noticeable influence on the formation and development of the iconographic type of Christ. They somehow got lost, giving way to more accepted images of the Savior, which have come down to us in catacomb monuments and in all subsequent works of church art. The catacomb image of Christ is distinguished by its ideal character. It is very far from historical reality and owes its origin to the work of an ancient master who, while painting Christ, transferred to Him the conventional features of the then Greek or Roman, giving Him, in addition, inappropriate youth and youthfully soft facial features. That the Roman artist copied faces familiar to him and added his own techniques is self-evident; As for youthfulness, it is best explained from the ancient concept of deity as a being possessing eternal youth and unfading beauty. The external attributes of power and unattainable greatness were alien to him, at least in the best times of early Christian art. The catacomb image of Christ has survived to us in two forms: the oldest, which is represented by historical paintings from the New Testament, where Christ is the protagonist, and the later, which includes individual full-length images of Him or chest images in a medallion. In most historical paintings, Christ is depicted with the features of a very early youth with a round, still unsettled oval face, without a beard - young men from 15 to 20 years old. This type is maintained very consistently and is closely related to the image of the good shepherd; only instead of rustic short clothes and accessories of shepherd life, He is given a classic costume in the form of a toga and tunic. For a real acquaintance with this youthful type of Christ, the image of Him in the scene of the healing of the bleeding woman on the fresco of the tomb of Pretextatus is very important. Imagine three young men with a round oval face, short curly hair, but without any signs of even a bushy beard; they are dressed in short shirts that outline the lower part of their beautiful legs; they have togas or palliums lightly thrown over their shoulders, and you will have an idea of ​​​​the image of Christ with His two disciples. They are represented standing; and at the feet of Christ a woman has fallen to her knees, she touches the hem of His shirt. Or, for example, Christ healing a man born blind, as he is depicted on the fresco of the tomb of Callistus. His slender, youthful figure is draped in wide clothes that fit his entire body with beautiful folds; Leaning forward a little and placing his right foot on a protruding piece of stone, He touches the eyes of the blind young man who is kneeling before Him. In other scenes, the same classical type is repeated, but the face of Christ appears to be somewhat older, which is proven by a more elongated oval and a small beard. Most of the single images of Christ belong to this type, where He is represented full-length or in a medallion. They served as a starting point for those who followed and were most suitable for the historical conditions of Christ’s appearance, although, of course, they did not completely correspond to them. Here the classical type was adopted, and Christ appeared in the clothes of a young, more or less important Roman, therefore, again in conventional features. When He is represented as a teacher, He is given a scroll of parchment, with which orators, rhetoricians, legislators and sometimes kings were usually represented among the Greeks and Romans at the moment of their speech or sentence, as well as consuls in their official attire. His hands are stretched out; At His feet are several round boxes with scrolls. A distinctive feature of his appearance is long hair, parted in the middle, falling on the shoulders in curly strands, a large open forehead; facial features and posture are imbued with nobility and dignity; feet are not wearing shoes or sandals. It is customary in Western science to explain the catacomb type of Christ by imitation of the figure of ancient Apollo, but there is hardly any need to resort to such an assumption. Ancient Apollo, as is known, belongs to the plastic arts, and his type was developed here; Almost all youthful figures of ancient art can be considered an imitation of him, but no one will argue that they really originate from here. In particular, with regard to the catacomb Christ, His long hair and beard, in most of the single images, do not fit the accepted type of Apollo and are much more naturally explained by imitation of the then images of living persons. The mosaic type of Christ is a continuation of the catacomb type and repeats both of its forms now indicated. Representatives of this type are the mosaics of Ravenna churches and ancient Roman basilicas, which constitute a very important and meaningful section of ancient Christian iconography. In comparison with the catacomb images, one notices in them a desire to develop an individual type of I. Christ, approaching reality; but this desire is only half justified, and the predominance of the ideal catacomb type is still noticeable. So, for example, Christ in the mausoleum of Galla Placida in Ravenna is presented in the form of a good shepherd, but with a halo or crown on his head, which ancient art does not know until the 5th century, and with a large cross in his left hand. He sits on a rock and with his right hand strokes the head of a lamb that has approached him. His clothes are wide, antique, and not shepherd's, the hair on his head is long, curly over his shoulders, but there is no beard. But He is represented completely differently in the mosaic of Apollinaris in Ravenna (VI century) at his trial before Pilate. A new feature appears here - an old face, long dry hair, a rather large mustache and beard; the whole face bears a dry icon imprint, while Pilate is immediately depicted as a young man, with a small beard framing his chin, with short hair and regular facial features. Byzantine art did not suddenly reach its current icon type. At first it stood quite close to the early Christian examples and differed little from his best works, but then, along with the decline of the traditions of the good school and in connection with the special direction of Byzantine icon painting, little by little that lifeless icon type began to develop, which was adopted in Byzantine murals and on icons. In contrast to the elegant simplicity of the classical type, where beauty and youth, the nobility of facial features paint before us the ideal figure of the most beautiful of the earthly, in Byzantine art the Savior appears either as the Almighty with the attributes of His divine dignity, or in the form of a bishop, a king, on a richly decorated throne in the atmosphere of a ruler and ruler. The entire environment surrounding Him is designed to convey this impression. But from this characteristic it does not yet follow that in later painting the ancient legends perished and some new, hitherto unknown type appeared. No, if we take the new types adopted for the depiction of Christ in later icon painting, we will see that they still preserved many ancient Christian features, which, having survived ten centuries, were unconsciously copied by painters and came to life in such products that had nothing in common with ancient views. For example, we have an image of Christ Emmanuel. He appears to be young, almost a youth, without a beard, with long curly hair, and soft, not yet established facial features. Cherubim are around Him. This type is nothing more than a repetition of the ancient Christian beardless Christ. In our iconography, the image of Δέησις is very famous: Christ on the throne with those present. Its prototype is also the catacomb images of Christ as a teacher, where He is represented standing on a pulpit with disciples or Jews listening to him. The arms are extended, the fingers are folded in a blessing manner; sometimes in the left hand there is a scroll, which in Byzantine painting is replaced by an open gospel. Despite the difference in historical and technical conditions under which the artistic types of Christ that we have analyzed came to light, they all represent a more or less ideal image, behind which Christ in the flesh is not visible. This is either the Holy Christ in the clothes of a good shepherd, or the young Christ - the personification of ancient blooming beauty, or Christ with the attributes of a venerable Roman, as a teacher, and, finally, as a king and high priest in the solemn atmosphere of a Byzantine ruler. Everywhere he stands very high above the earth, between him and the living historical Christ there is a whole abyss of distance; for immediate feeling, it emanates the coldness of an artificial concept, even if it was conceived and executed in the form of the deepest reverence for Christ and His divine-human personality. Christ of the theological mind, without a doubt, could not satisfy the needs of the majority of ordinary Christians, who wanted to see in Him a person par excellence and hear as many details as possible about His earthly life. To meet this natural desire, tradition came with its simple and very fascinating stories, among which legends about the appearance of Christ and how His true images came about were preserved. With these legends, in the era of their appearance, people least of all wanted to prove and justify anything; they were not approached with the deliberate goal of introducing any artistic type, giving rise to well-known images, establishing a certain technique in iconography, or, least of all, justifying the use of icons - these stories were subjected to this alteration already under the pen of dogmatic writers and in the attempts of theologians and historians to date them to a certain phase in the artistic development of the image of Christ. It is very clear that these legends were used most of all during the iconoclasm and, moreover, with an apologetic purpose, but they originated much earlier, and the reason by which they were caused lies much deeper. It is unknown who created them and put them into circulation. But it is remarkable that all of them, or at least the main ones, are associated with persons of non-Jewish origin - these are: Pilate, Lentulus, Avgar, Veronica, the bleeding wife, a Syro-Phoenician by birth. The first place between these legends undoubtedly belongs to the legend about the Edessa Image Not Made by Hands. It has a very ancient origin, and its first traces date back to the 2nd–3rd centuries AD, but it finally took shape with all its details no earlier than the 8th–9th centuries. Eusebius records a story about the written communication of Jesus Christ with Abgar, the prince of Edessa, and gives the very letters that they exchanged with each other; according to Eusebius, they were kept in the Edessa archive and from there they were extracted and published by him in his history. The name Avgar was a generic nickname for the rulers of Edessa, just as pharaoh and kagan were a common name for the rulers of Egypt and Khazaria. The Abgar who had relations with Christ was the 15th prince of Edessa and is called Abgar the Black or Ukhomo. He reigned, according to some, between 9–46, and according to others, between 13–50 AD. The rumor about Christ, as can be seen from the Gospel, also reached the ears of the pagans. She could penetrate into Edessa all the more easily because Mesopotamia, where Osroene, or the Kingdom of Edessa (present-day Orpah) was located, had close relations with Palestine (Jews lived in Edessa). 138 This is the main outline of Eusebius' story. Hearing about the miracles of the Savior, Abgar sent a confidant to Him with a letter and asked in it I. Christ to come to Edessa and heal him of his illness (leprosy). At the same time, Abgar invited the Savior to settle in his kingdom, where he promised Him a corner safe from persecution. The Savior refused this offer, but in a handwritten letter he promised to fulfill the request for healing and to send one of His disciples to Edessa for this purpose. By virtue of this promise, after the ascension of Christ, the ap. appeared here. Thaddeus was invited to the prince's court and healed him of his illness. This is where Eusebius’ story ends. As we see, he conveys only one side of the matter, namely, he states the fact of written communication between Christ and Abgar, on the basis of documents stored in the Edessa archives. The other side, where it is already a question of the image of Christ, and the history of the Edessa ubrus itself begins, is explained in the so-called “doctrine or teaching of Addaeus” - an essay written in the Syrian language and in 1876. published in English from a manuscript from the St. Petersburg Imperial Public Library. This work has the appearance of an official record, which was compiled by the royal scribe Lerubna and sealed by Anan, a state notary, or archivist. This document was placed last in the local archive, along with other official papers and royal decrees. According to the doctrine of Addaeus (in 344 of the Seleucid era or 31–32 of the Christian era), Avgar Ukhomo sent his two nobles Mar-Ukhab and Shaliashzran, together with the archivist Anan, to Eleutheropolis to the Roman governor Sabinus with some assignment. Returning home, they learn that Christ works miracles in Jerusalem and, captivated by the rumors about Him, they go to Jerusalem with the people going there to verify this with their own experience on the spot. Here Anan wrote down everything he heard about Christ and, returning to his place, reported this record to his prince. This news struck Abgar to such an extent that he decided to go to Jerusalem to see Christ himself, but, not receiving permission from the Roman governor, he sent a letter to Christ with almost the same content as the one known from the history of Eusebius, and received an answer to it from Christ. Having learned about Christ’s refusal to come to Edessa, Abgar sends Anan to him, who, being a “princely painter,” takes a portrait of Christ and brings it to Edessa to Abgar. This is the first clear trace in history of the famous ubrus, and since the document we named dates back, according to scientists, to the 3rd century, it means that the existence of this image prevents the story of Eusebius for a whole century. Why didn’t Eusebius mention the image of Christ? Because he stuck to only the text of the letters and was guided by them. This was an incomplete record, which included only letters, and there was no news about the image. Moreover, Eusebius himself says that he translated only one official documents. But the account of Addaeus's doctrine is more complete, and there is no reason to consider it fictitious or an arbitrary distribution of the same brief source used by Eusebius. This addition comes from the very essence of the story conveyed in the doctrine of Addaeus, namely, that Abgar passionately desired to see Christ, but, unable to fulfill this personally, had to limit himself to a portrait image of Him. This image was thus intended to replace his personal meeting. Moses Khorensky, an Armenian historian of the 5th century, adjoins directly to this legend and, outlining the history of Christ’s relations with Abgar in accordance with Eusebius, adds in conclusion a small note that Abgar’s messenger Anan, along with a letter from Christ, brought the very image, which has since been kept in Edessa. 139 Here is the second evidence, from which it is clear that in the 5th century in Edessa there was an image with which the legend about its direct origin from Christ was associated. And the city itself was even previously considered under the special protection of the Savior. Ephraim the Syrian, deacon of the kingdom of Edessa, expresses himself in this sense, addressing his city with the following appeal: “Blessed city of Edessa, mother of wisdom, you have received a blessing from the Son of God through His disciple. May this blessing be with you." The proclamation in itself is not very specific, but it is unlikely that the blessing in question here can be attributed to the presence of the Image Not Made by Hands in Edessa and its existence based on this quotation. In any case, this explanation cannot be considered a settled matter and, in turn, raises the question whether we are talking about some other circumstance here? The key to clarification in this sense is given by one passage from Procopius in his work de bello persico. Speaking about the fate of Edessa and the siege of it by Chozroes, he reports one omen, according to which its inhabitants considered their city inaccessible to enemies - namely, he says that between Christ and Abgar there was correspondence on a matter already known to us, and, if we believe the current rumor, Christ allegedly added in His letter to Abgar the assurance that his city would never be conquered by anyone. Hoc etiam subiunxisse fama est urbem semper inexpugnabilem fore barbaris (Lib. II, cap. 13). Without accepting responsibility for the reliability of such a message, Procopius adds that historians do not mention this circumstance; that only among citizens did such confidence exist, and that the charter itself, which contained Christ’s letter to Abgar, was sealed in the city gates, as a phylactery or safety precaution. Unfortunately, Procopius’s further story about this charter is interrupted by the loss of the text, and we further learn only our writer’s personal opinion about this subject; and the opinion is that, probably, these letters did not exist, the Edessians themselves invented such a boastful episode out of patriotic vanity. Thus, Ephraim the Syrian and Procopius convey another new detail, which, although unknown from Eusebius, is directly adjacent to his story and strengthens the fate of this charter for Edessa. Even further back, from the 6th century, there is already a whole series of positive evidence in the sense of the doctrine of Addaeus and the addition known to us in the history of Moses of Choren. Developing on the basis of the initial simple story, these additions then grow into a whole dramatic episode. In the 9th–10th centuries they were put together into a coherent story, and a complete history of the Not Made by Hands was compiled. Let us briefly trace its main stages. Evagrius, a contemporary of Procopius, speaks of the Image Not Made by Hands on the same occasion as the latter, namely in the description of the siege of Edessa by Chosroes. At the same time, he refers to the news of Procopius about the correspondence of Christ with Abgar, about the confidence of the inhabitants in the inaccessibility of their city, but adds for his part that such an addition regarding the future of Edessa is not in the original letter of Christ, reported by Eusebius. But that the conviction of the then Edeans was not in vain and was justified by the deed itself, he then proves this from the circumstances of the siege of Edessa, which was not successful and was lifted by the Persians thanks to miracles from the Image Not Made by Hands. When all efforts to light the twig siege rampart made by the enemies were in vain, and all hope for human help disappeared, the inhabitants of the city turned to the last resort - they brought an inscribed image of God (θεότευκτον εικόνα), made not by human hands, but sent by Christ to Abgar, who wanted to see Him (L. IV, p. 27). They place this icon in a ditch with water, sprinkle this water on the enemy’s lighted rampart; the fire destroys the siege structure, and the enemies flee from the city walls. They explain in even more detail and in the form of a whole romantic episode the origin of the Icon of St. Not Made by Hands. John of Damascus and Constantine the Porphyrogenitus. According to them, Abgar sent his painter Anan to Christ to take a portrait of Him, but the painter, with all his efforts, could not capture and convey on the canvas the features of Christ’s face. Then Christ condescended to the painter’s vain attempts and put a piece of canvas to His face - ιμάτιον, on which his image was imprinted. It was this that was sent to Abgar. 140 At the VII Ecumenical Council, the authenticity of the Image Not Made by Hands was placed beyond any doubt, and the story of John of Damascus became an expression of the council’s opinion about this wonderful subject. 141 Until now we have dealt mainly with legends about the Edessa ubrus. The question arises: how early and in what form does the very object that serves as the basis for them appear, and what was the further fate of this relic? The brief news of Moses of Khorensky that in his time this image was already in Edessa is the first positive indication of the existence of the Image Not Made by Hands, but it does not find witnesses until Evagrius, who for the first time, one might say, brings this shrine to the light of God and associates the fate of the city itself with it. It is clear that until this time the circle of her fame was not wide and was limited to the small corner from which this image came out and where it was kept; it did not have any general church significance, like most of the ancient Christian shrines, which were highly revered in their homeland and were associated with well-known legends that bore a personal, temporary imprint. Outside the conditions of this local coloring and subjective attitude, they lost a significant part of their internal value and found a weak echo for themselves on the side. Therefore, Tacitus’ rule: major e Ionginquo reverentia, i.e. “from a distance everything seems holier” did not matter in the early Christian world. To explain to us this long silence about their local shrine and ignorance about it in the world of that time, later writers, with Evagrius at the head, tell the following: the son of Abgar raised a persecution against Christians, and so, in order to save this shrine from destruction, the Bishop of Edessa Addaeus sealed the image of the Savior into the city wall, where it remained hidden until the sixth century. The invasion of Khozroy brought him into the light of God and testified to his miraculous origin. Evagrius was, of course, far from the idea of ​​​​spreading the news about this image and drawing everyone’s attention to it, but his story, clothed in such a convincing form, itself achieved this goal and brought to light such an important monument of Christian antiquity, which has not yet found due recognition. His fame began to grow from then on and reached particular significance in the era of iconoclasm. During this time, with extraordinary zeal, both sides, iconoclasts and icon-worshipers, tried to interpret and explain in their favor the ancient legends about icons; Thanks to this apologetic work, local legends about icons emerged and were explained, and existing monuments of Christian iconography were brought to light. At this time, the existence of such an image as the Edessa ubrus, which came from the hands of Christ Himself, was the greatest acquisition for apologetics and resolved many issues caused by the polemics for and against the veneration of icons. We have already mentioned how the Orthodox side took advantage of this argument; Now we can only add to what has been said that the council did not exhaust all the data relating to the Edessa ubrus, and limited itself only to the more well-known information about it, which was transmitted by Eusebius and Evagrius; Apparently, local forces, represented by the Mesopotamian clergy, did not take part in explaining the history of their shrine and belittled its importance in the controversial issue. Meanwhile, this image was already before everyone’s eyes, and St. John of Damascus says that this famous image was kept intact, and the Church of Edessa boasted of it as a royal scepter, i.e. I hoped to enjoy the world under the protection of this relic. A contemporary of Damascus, Leo the Deacon, when he was in Edessa, as he says, he personally saw this icon and witnessed the greatest respect that it enjoyed in this city. This was already on the eve of the general church fame of the Edessa ubrus. In the middle of the 10th century, it was moved to Constantinople, the center of the then eastern shrines, and in memory of this event a church holiday was established, known as the “Savior Not Made by Hands” on August 16. The details of this circumstance are set out in a special legend - narrative de imagine edessina, the compiler of which is considered to be Constantine Porphyrogenitus, under whom this transfer took place. But this opinion about the author is contradicted by the author’s appeal to the Image Not Made by Hands with a prayer for the one “who graciously and humbly commands us and worthily glorifies the memory of Your coming.” Constantine Porphyrogenitus, being the emperor at that time, could hardly express himself this way. It can be recognized as undeniable that this legend is contemporary with the transfer and was stated on the initiative and with the knowledge of the emperor, under whom and by whose will the transfer of the relic itself took place. Connecting with this image the legend about the greatness of their city, the Edessians valued it very much and only then decided to part with their shrine when Roman Lakapin, co-ruler of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, his father-in-law, threatened to destroy the city for disagreement and agreed to lift the siege under the condition of ceding this image. Having received it, he, according to the legend, not only stopped hostilities, but also paid a rich ransom for it (12 thousand pieces of silver) and released 200 noble Edessa captives. The transfer of the Image Not Made by Hands occurred in 944 on August 16. In the 13th century, Patriarch Germanus II of Constantinople wrote a canon in honor of the Image Not Made by Hands, and its celebration passed from Greece to Russia, as can be seen from the ancient month books in the Gospels, where this holiday is recorded in our country under August 16th. In Constantinople, the image was placed in the Church of Our Lady of Pharos and became one of the state relics that were taken out and shown to the people only on appointed days. Along with it, Christ’s own handwritten message to Abgar appears here, although this document is not mentioned in the legend of the transfer. How long did the Edessa ubrus survive here, and what was its further fate, where did it go - unfortunately, neither historians nor popular rumor give a positive answer to these questions. Some claim that it was taken from Constantinople by the crusaders along with other relics and was preserved in Rome in the Church of St. Sylvester. But it is remarkable that it continued to appear in the list of Byzantine palace relics in the 12th and 14th centuries, and it follows that either the copy was mistaken for the original, or the news about the crusaders was incorrect. According to other news, John Palaiologos (1341–1391), for the services rendered to him by the Venetians during dynastic strife, presented it to the Genoese commander Leonardo Montaldo; by this latter he was transferred to Genoa, kept first in his family chapel, and then was given away to the Armenian monastery of St. Bartholomew. Through further migration, he finally appears in Rome and is still shown here under the name of St. Ubrusa. Finally, there is a story that the Icon Not Made by Hands drowned while being transported to Venice. Where the truth is is difficult to decide; the historical path by which one could get to this relic is lost, and we now only have to get acquainted with the original from those images that with the name of the Image Not Made by Hands or το αγιον μανδήλιον were preserved in Byzantine and Western iconography. This type is known. From the artistic side, it resembles the image that was adopted for single images of Christ in the catacombs and received further processing in mosaics. Closely related to it are descriptions of Christ’s appearance. They all have an obvious relationship with each other and reproduce the same basic pattern, which in different versions of the descriptions was developed and modified in accordance with the development of iconography and under the influence of types of living reality. There is no doubt that these descriptions are closely related to the Edessa ubrus and are based, if not on the image not made by hands, then at least on copies and examples of an iconographic type identical to it, and therefore do not introduce special, hitherto unknown features into the iconography of the face of Christ, developing the old type, only in a direction that is more real and suitable to the tribal features of the face of I. Christ. The oldest of these descriptions is conveyed in the so-called Lentulus Report to the Roman Senate. Lentulus, on whose behalf it is written, was allegedly the proconsul of Judea during the time of the Savior and is called the predecessor of Pilate. He presented his description to the Roman Senate. But one quick glance at this portrait is enough to see its later Christian origin. Let's give it in more detail. “Greetings to the great and honorable Senate of Rome from Publius Lentulus, ruler of Judea. At the present time, a man gifted with great power has appeared and is still living in Judea - his name is Jesus Christ. The people call him a strong prophet, and the disciples call him the Son of God. He raises the dead and heals all kinds of illnesses and diseases. This man is tall, important and has an appearance full of dignity, so that he inspires fear and love in those who look at him at the same time. The hair on his head is smooth, darkish in color (chestnut), falling from his shoulders in strands and parted in the middle, according to the custom of the Nazarenes. His forehead is open and smooth, there are no spots or wrinkles on his face, his complexion is slightly reddish. The beard is red and thick, not long, but forked. The eyes are blue and unusually shiny. His figure is tall, his arms are straight and long, his shoulders are beautiful. His speech is thoughtful, faithful and restrained. This is the most beautiful of earthly creatures." Reading this description, one cannot help but notice that it came from the pen of a Christian and contains such a reverent attitude towards the person described and such familiarity with the Scriptures, which can only be expected from a person familiar with the gospel; but when exactly this description appeared, there is no positive indication of this. In any case, it refers to a whole series of pseudonymous works, of which so many were published under the names of different writers in the 3rd and 4th centuries. The name of Lentulus, as the ruler of Judea, is not found in the official lists of Roman monuments of that time and is just as fictitious as the very content of this notorious message. It is positively known that Pilate's predecessor was not Lentulus, but Valerius Gratus. This description is now known in a Latin translation and was found in a manuscript between the works of Anselm of Canterbury, therefore, in a list of the 11th–12th centuries; but the Greek original is, without a doubt, much older and predates Anselm’s copy by many centuries. Already the Gnostics associated the image of Christ they practiced with the original that came down from Pilate, probably due to the same connection by which the first description of Christ’s appearance is traced back to the Roman proconsul. John of Damascus undoubtedly knew this legend and in his description of the appearance of Christ only reworked it in the sense of the Jewish national type; or maybe he used a ready-made revision, which he refers to under the name of ancient historians, without explaining which ones. The prosopography of Christ owes him some more specific features, of which we note the following: fused eyebrows, thick (a sign of beauty), long nose, stooped (slightly bent), black beard, complexion - ripe wheat (σιτόχρους), slightly dark, like that of the Virgin Mary. In this description, the typical features of the Jewish physiognomy are already noticeable, only somewhat neutralized by ancient tradition and confused with the Byzantine icon style of that time. If we compare with it the later description contained in the history of Nicephorus Callistus (Ts.I. I, 40), then the similarity between both will be very great, but Callistus, guided by Damascene, is somewhat different from him and, it seems, because he was under the influence of the then Byzantine tribal traits and obeyed the icon style accepted here. He reports the exact measure of Christ’s height (7 spits = spans), points out His reddishness, and says that He was very similar in expression, complexion and manners to the Mother of God. This description served as the basis for the depiction of Christ both in Greek and in our iconographic originals. The type of Christ depicted under the name το αγιον μανδήλιον is a product of Eastern iconography and is predominantly the Byzantine type of the image of Christ. The main idea that is expressed in this face is the idea of ​​the greatness of the Savior, and in this regard, the Image Not Made by Hands is, as it were, a continuation and modification of the same type that was formed in early Christian art. The West, just like the East, was not indifferent to the question of the true type of the face of Christ and had its own Image Not Made by Hands and a special history of its origin. Only this legend is much later and is a reworking of the Eastern into the Western style. But the nature of the image is significantly different from the eastern one and constitutes the prototype of “ecce homo”, i.e., the suffering Christ. This alone shows that the Western type does not belong to early Christian art, but was formed no earlier than the 6th–7th centuries, when they began to openly depict the suffering Christ. But there is also no reason to push it back to the Middle Ages. The fact is that John of Damascus and Constantine the Porphyrogenitus already make reference to the image of Christ, known with the name Veronica, and do not significantly separate it from the eastern one. What kind of legend is this? Without going into details, we will present it briefly. One pious woman who lived in Jerusalem, named Veronica, who was also Martha, the sister of Lazarus, gave Jesus Christ a towel to wipe away his sweat while He, tired from the weight of the cross, passed by her house on the way to the Place of Execution. When Christ applied this towel to His face, His image was imprinted on it, and when this towel was folded in three, three impressions were obtained in an unknown way. One of them remained in Jerusalem, the other two were sent to Rome and Spain. A later legend adds that Veronica did not want to part with this expensive acquisition for anything, but when Tiberius learned that this image had healing powers, he sent his close associate Volutian to Jerusalem with instructions to bring this image to Rome. Volutian kidnapped him from Veronica and came with him to Tiberius. Having learned about the kidnapping, Veronica followed in the footsteps of the kidnapper and also reached Rome. Tiberius received healing from one glance at this wonderful image. Other editions of this legend come even closer to the basic form of the eastern legend about the Edessa ubrus. According to one testimony from the 12th century, the evangelist Luke, at the request of Veronica, three times began to remove the image from the face of Christ, but each time was unsuccessful. Then the Lord took pity on him, came to Veronica and, sitting down at the table, asked him to wash. On the towel with which He dried His face appeared His image. But despite its characteristics, the Western legend has the closest relationship to the Eastern one and there is another version of it and further development. People change, the circumstances of the case are modified, but the main features remain the same, of course, if we compare these legends in their detailed, established form. The eastern lining can be heard in the name itself: Veronica, around which this whole story is grouped. This is not a proper name, but a common noun and in the Latin adaptation means a true, authentic image (vera - είκών), from which the proper name was derived, which served as the basis for the whole legend. The image known by this name, just like the Edessa ubrus, represents one face of Christ, only covered with a crown of thorns. The face expresses suffering and deep despondency. The best artists of the West tried their hand at reproducing this type. Our depiction of the crucifixion with the crown of thorns - a relatively recent origin - originates from here. IV. About the most ancient images of the Mother of God About the most ancient images of the Mother of God. How early do images of the Mother of God become known? Catacomb images of Her: the Mother of God in the form of a praying woman (orantis); The Virgin Mary with the Child Christ; image of the Mother of God in the tomb of St. Agnes. Byzantine type of the Mother of God. The legend about the painting of Her icon of St. Evangelist Luke; objections against it and their analysis. The initial fate of the images of the Mother of God is very poorly illuminated in the monuments of ancient Christian writing, incomparably less than the artistic history of the image of Christ, and therefore can be traced on the basis of a very small number of literary data. From the first three centuries of Christianity, no indications relating to the iconography of the Mother of God have reached us, and evidence from the 4th–5th centuries and some a priori considerations speak, apparently, even against the existence at that time of genuine Her images or those recognized as such. “We do not know the face of the Virgin Mary,” wrote Blessed Augustine, “from whom Christ was born, unmarried and incorruptible, miraculously... We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ was born from the Virgin, whose name is Mary. But whether Mary had such a face as she imagines in our minds when we talk or remember about it, we do not know at all and are not convinced. One can say, keeping faith: maybe She had such a face, maybe not like that.” 142 We do not think that these words had anything to do with the images of the Mother of God and only meant what Blessed Augustine wanted to say on his own behalf and on behalf of his contemporaries: neither I nor they saw the Mother of God, and therefore we do not know what kind of face She was. If in the Church of Hippo at the time when Blessed Augustine lived and ruled it (†430), authentic, faithful to the point of portraiture, images of the Mother of God existed and were generally known, and the church, as such, would have given them faith, then Blessed Augustine could not have spoken so decisively about his and his contemporaries’ ignorance of the face of the Mother of God. The insufficient familiarity of the first proselytes of Christianity with the fine arts, the solitude and isolation of Eastern women, who appeared only with a veil over their faces, and finally, the special, extraordinary modesty of the Blessed Virgin, who avoided all ostentation: She composes verbs in her heart (Luke 2:19:51), apparently, can also serve as indirect evidence against the appearance of portrait images of the Mother of God among the first Christians. Already in view of what has been said, there is reason to assume that the first images of the Mother of God circulating in the Christian world were ideal types, that is, they expressed Christians’ ideas about Her - the ideal in which She appeared to the feelings and consciousness of believers of that time. Simulacrim mentis, figura probitatis - an image of an exalted mind and an expression of a high moral mood, as St. Ambrose of Milan, 143 these are the ideal features that permeated the appearance of the Mother of God, according to the views of ancient church writers, and which, combined with physical beauty, imprinted to a greater or lesser extent all of Her most ancient images that have survived to us. Subsequently, these general characteristic features were supplemented by one detail, so to speak, specific, individual, thanks to which the images of the Mother of God were placed in close connection with the iconographic likeness of the Savior. The author of the famous “Epistle to Emperor Theophilus on Holy Icons” and Nicephorus Callistus, describing the appearance of Jesus Christ, add in conclusion that He was similar in everything, especially in expression, color and shape of the face to His divine and immaculate Mother. 144 But since these descriptions were largely based on the images of the Savior that were circulating at that time, it is natural that this remark about the similarity of the Mother of God’s face with Jesus Christ corresponded to Her actual images. What has been said exhausts everything essential that can be said about the ancient iconography of the Mother of God on the basis of literary sources. 145 Relatively recent studies in the field of Roman catacombs have shed a lot of light on the artistic history of images of the Virgin Mary, significantly advancing the study of Her iconography, and what previously seemed to be a more or less solid guess now has visual evidence for itself. Newly discovered works of ancient catacomb art supplemented the scant historical information on this issue with positive facts and presented a number of images of the Mother of God. Contrary to the opinion shared by the majority of old Protestant researchers that before the Nestorian disputes there were no images of the Mother of God, we find in the material data a clear refutation of it and have the right to consider this old position as the result of a biased theory and deliberate ignorance of existing monuments of ancient Christian art. The whole question of modern archeology regarding the catacomb images of the Mother of God comes down to isolating them from a number of homogeneous figures of ordinary women, to establishing certain, positive signs for the iconography of the Mother of God. These signs, we must admit, are still very shaky and, with the exception of the images of the Mother of God in the Gospel paintings and a few figures indicated by the inscription: Maria or Mara, there is room for speculation: whether in this case we have a simple image of a praying woman or a woman with a baby in her hands, that is, the mother of a family - and nothing more. Even the author of the Books of Charles, a work that appeared in the West after the seventh ecumenical council and treated the issue of icon veneration, doubted the authenticity of the then existing images of the Mother of God and mixed them with images of biblical women, not without reason asked: “if the image of a wife with a baby in her hands is a reproduction of Isaiah’s prophecy about the Virgin having to give birth to a Son (Is. 7:14), and deserves veneration, how is it known that this image Our Lady? When you look at a woman with a baby in her arms, but without an inscription, how do you know: is it Sarah with Isaac or Elizabeth with John? That is why the newest researchers differ greatly among themselves in defining the catacomb subjects related to the subject that occupies us, and while some of them, for example, Schulze, number about fifty images of the Mother of God, 146 others, and among them Lehner, referring to the same catacomb material, describe more than eighty. 147 But, of course, the point is not in number, but in the firmness of the main iconographic criterion and in the general conclusion, which, despite fluctuations in numbers, leads to the undoubted conclusion that catacomb art gave birth to almost all the main types of later images of the Mother of God. Among the numerous images of praying people, the so-called orantes, on the walls and vaults of the catacombs, female figures of this kind are very often found and, incidentally, in the company of the good shepherd. For the ancient artistic history of the Mother of God, the latter are of paramount importance and undoubtedly influenced the development of Her iconographic type. Most of these figures do not have explanatory inscriptions and, most likely, represent women buried there or here. But among them there are several that are commented on by inscriptions that eloquently say that under the image of a praying wife, ancient Christians sometimes used to depict none other than the Blessed Virgin Mary. The similarity in pose, clothing and facial features between the nameless figures of this kind and those marked with the inscription: Maria, Mara, etc. shows that in these orants we do not have a portrait, individual type of the Mother of God, but a conventional image of Her, accepted for every sedate Christian woman. A long shirt (tunica talaris), grabbed by a belt, or a wide-sleeved dalmatic with purple stripes, a headscarf - a veil falling low on the shoulders (sometimes, however, the head is open), and raised hands in a prayer position - this is the usual setting of these figures, common to anonymous images of women and nominal figures meaning the Mother of God or some other saints, for example, Venus, Peregrina, Pudenziana. Since the veil served and serves as a veil for brides, it was not far from here to the symbolic meaning, according to which the Mother of God appeared as a bride and on this basis could personify the Church, which is called in the Holy Scriptures a pure virgin, betrothed to Christ, The greatest interest and significance for the iconography of the Mother of God are facial images of this kind on the bottoms of painted glass vessels found in the catacombs, which provide a significant percentage of nominal images of the Mother of God. Here She appears either between two trees, meaning paradise, then between the apostles Peter and Paul, then next to St. Anna and Agnes. Above their heads, along the circumference of the bottom, is the inscription: Petrus – Maria – Paulus, Anne – Mara, Agnes – Maria. But what is especially remarkable in this regard is the carved image on a marble tile found in southern France, near Tarascona, in the crypt of St. Maximina. It is dated by researchers no later than the 5th century and represents a praying wife wearing a wide dalmatic and, apparently, a head covering falling over her shoulders and chest; above Her head is inscribed in barbaric Latin: Maria virgo minester de tempulo Gerosale, Mary the Virgin - a servant from the Temple of Jerusalem. This inscription probably contains an indication of the ancient legend that the Blessed Virgin, after three years, was brought by Her parents to the Temple of Jerusalem and here dedicated to the service of God. This image of the praying Mother of God should be considered one of the most ancient; he survived the period of catacomb and mosaic painting and moved into Byzantine-Russian murals and icons. For this purpose, it is worth recalling the wonderful mosaic image of the Mother of God above the entrance door to St. Sophia of Constantinople, where She is represented in a round medallion, on the right side of the Savior, with her hands stretched out prayerfully to Him... The majestic images of the Mother of God with raised hands above the mountainous place in the Kiev-Sophia (Unbreakable Wall) and Gelati, near Kutais, cathedrals are a very close imitation of the catacomb type we are studying. The image of the Mother of God in the Deesis, so widespread among us, is also a repetition of Mariae orantis of catacomb painting. Generally speaking, this image of the praying Blessed Virgin is very important in the history of the cult of the Mother of God: in it She appears as an intercessor and intercessor of the Christian race. The image of Her among the trees, in a heavenly setting, indicates that She has especially close access to heaven and leads others there. Here She acquires an independent religious meaning, and not in connection with the Infant God, Whom She holds in Her arms in most images. A completely different iconographic type is developed in the catacombs for historical scenes in which the Mother of God takes part, according to the meaning of the Gospel story. Of these few subjects in the works of catacomb art, which, as is known, relate to the first days of the earthly life of the Savior, due to their antiquity and widespread occurrence on the monuments of the ancient Christian period, the worship of the Magi is evident. Images of this event are considered the most ancient of historical paintings and the best researchers date back to the 3rd and even the end of the 2nd century. In them, the Mother of God usually appears sitting on a chair of exactly the same shape as the episcopal pulpits in the catacomb churches. The Magi, in short belted tunics and Phrygian caps, three or four in number, present their gifts to the Savior, sitting on the lap of His Mother. The Virgin Mary, like Christ, is dressed in a long tunic with multi-colored stripes that falls to the feet, with a more or less long veil on the head. Simultaneously with this scene of the Magi, often on ancient monuments, mainly in the sculpture of sarcophagi, the Nativity of Christ is depicted, and thus the picture seems to be divided into two parts. The center of the entire image is Christ the Child. He lies in a manger - a basket very similar to a bathtub, swaddled in the form of a mummy; There is an ox and a donkey near the manger. At His head sits the Mother of God, and behind Her, in surprise, is Joseph, a mostly senile figure with a beard. There are shepherds with a stick, and from a distance the approaching wise men with gifts, guided by a star, are visible. In single scenes of the adoration of the Magi, one cannot help but see the first experiments in depicting the Mother of God with Jesus Christ, the first beginnings of the type that became most famous and widespread in Byzantine icon painting under the name: Μητήρ Θεού. This traditional Byzantine type of the Mother of God is expressed even more closely by two catacomb frescoes, most remarkable in their antiquity and artistry, in the tombs of Priscilla and St. Agnes. 148 If we had solid data to determine the time of origin of the named frescoes, and were not forced to be content with various considerations of researchers, then these two images would serve as sufficient grounds to assert that even the current Byzantine-Russian type originates from the earliest period of catacomb painting and has its first representatives there. On one of the inner walls of the arcosolium in the tomb of Priscilla, a beautiful young woman is depicted with a wide veil on her head falling in thick folds over her shoulders and chest. In her half-naked arms is a baby without any clothing; Throwing his head back a little, he clung to his mother's chest, apparently about to feed him. On the left side of the viewer, facing the woman, stands a young man with a cloak - pallium - draped over his left shoulder; in his left hand, it seems, is a scroll of parchment, and his right is raised in the direction of a star, almost located above the baby’s head. He appears to be saying something to a woman who is listening intently to his speech. This whole picture exudes freedom of conception and unconstrained artistic execution; she reveals in the painter an excellent acquaintance as much with the structure of the human body as with the techniques and techniques of the best era of classical art, and therefore the more authoritative scientists refer to the earliest era of Christianity, to the time of the emperors from the house of Flavius ​​and no later than the first Antonines. That the woman with the child in this fresco depicts the Virgin Mary and Christ, there can be no doubt; There is only disagreement between the interpreters of the fresco regarding the meaning of the male figure. Some want to see St. in her. Joseph the Betrothed and the whole picture are explained in the sense of a family scene in his house, others - one of the Magi, others, with the late de Rossi at the head, who opened the fresco itself, the prophet Isaiah, predicting that a great Light is about to appear in the world, which will illuminate people walking in darkness (Is. 9: 2-3; 60: 2-3: 19). Due to the incomplete preservation of the fresco, it is difficult to resolve the question positively, but taking into account the youthful appearance of the man and the image of clothing befitting philosophers, which were not characteristic of either the righteous Joseph or any of the wise men who came from afar to worship the Savior, we think that the latter assumption is more true. This image of the Mother of God, for all the non-hieratic, so to speak, nature of his writing, has a very close analogy with one of the later images of Her, known as the Mammal. The fresco from the catacombs of Agnes represents a prototype for the image of the Mother of God, even more famous and dear to us from historical memories. When Andrei Bogolyubsky, with the appanage princes at his side, approached Novgorod in 1169 and began to besiege it, Saint John of Novgorod, according to instructions from above, took out the image of the Mother of God from the Church of the Savior on Ilyinskaya Street and placed it on the city wall. When one of the enemy's arrows pierced the face of the Mother of God, the icon turned its back to the enemy. This inspired the besieged: they made a successful foray and drove away the last one. This circumstance gave the Novgorod icon the name of the Sign, and in memory of this event a holiday was established, which is now celebrated by our church on November 27. Of course, everyone knows well what kind of image of the Mother of God is written under this name. Although we are accustomed to consider it, together with the miraculous icon itself, as our home shrine, in fact it has a very distant history, and its prototype is located in the tomb of St. Agnes. On the flat wall of one of the arcosoliums of the latter there is a half-length image of the Mother of God, facing the viewer, with her hands outstretched in prayer; on Her head is a veil hanging down to her shoulders, her neck is decorated with a necklace of precious stones, and on her chest is the Child Christ, also facing the viewer. Two monograms symmetrically located on the sides of the fresco, the absence of halos on the Savior and the Mother of God and, finally, the features of the style sufficiently indicate that the image belongs to the time of Constantine the Great and the transitional era in the history of Christian art. If we compare from the artistic side this image of the Mother of God with the above-mentioned ones, especially with the Priscilla Madonna, then there will be a significant difference between them, despite some similarities. If the latter, in terms of technique and execution, entirely belongs to the ancient school of art and bears almost no traces of the influence of Christian teaching, then the first only resembles classical examples with the boldness of its master’s brush, the round oval of the full faces of the Virgin and Christ and the harmony of the lines of the whole picture. There, in the tomb of Priscilla, we see the Roman woman in her usual costume, in a lively and completely natural pose; here the entire image bears the imprint of a certain dryness, conventionality and even hieratic importance. Large round black eyes, an expensive necklace, a luxurious table covering the shoulders and arms, everything in the image of the Virgin Mary in the catacomb of Agnes already serves as a harbinger of those artistic principles of the peoples of the East, which later, in combination with the classical forms of obsolete Greco-Roman art, on the basis of Christian concepts, formed what is now commonly called Byzantine art. The Byzantine type of images of the Mother of God in the most ancient period of the history of art in the East was not separated from the Western by such sharp features as was later discovered. The graceful, purely feminine type of the Mother of God, exemplified by Her images in the best Ravenna and Constantinople mosaics, in the most ancient miniatures of manuscripts and partly in small monuments of carving and metal work, shows that in Byzantium at first they followed classical images and, generally speaking, adhered to the real direction. Only, unlike the catacomb Madonnas, the Mother of God, with rare exceptions, was depicted here with a large shawl or omophorion on her head, deeply draped in wide clothes, and in general they tried to imitate noble Byzantine women in all costumes. Byzantine artists sometimes painted Her much older than her actual years and with a stern expression on her majestically beautiful face. She represented, as it were, the ideal of a Byzantine woman, devoted to tender maternal feelings and at the same time completely alien to worldly passions and hobbies. Blessing his daughters for marriage or sending them to a monastery, the Byzantine father considered it his sacred duty to entrust the future of his brainchild to the patronage of the Queen of Heaven and supplied him with an icon of the Blessed Virgin. Constantine the Great, if we trust the later testimonies of Kedrin and Zonara, having founded his new capital, dedicated it to the Mother of God, under whose protection all the most important political events of the eastern empire were then carried out. Byzantine painters began to diligently study the legends about the life of the Virgin Mary, preserved in various written monuments; They diligently reread words of praise and hymns in Her honor, composed by church speakers, and at the same time, the circle of images of the Mother of God gradually grew and at times took on subjects of an apocryphal nature. But along with this variety of subjects, with this diversity of the situation, the installation of the icon type of the Mother of God was going on; in church literature, from time to time, collections of the main news about Her life and the circumstances of her death appeared, to which were sometimes added descriptions of Her appearance. A certain monk Epiphanius, a writer of the 12th century, devoted himself to this kind of work and in Byzantine literature acquired the same significance as the famous creator of the Legenda aurea in the west, Iacob de Voragine. Western art owed the golden legend many details concerning the iconography of the Mother of God, just as eastern art borrowed stable features from Epiphanius for the appearance of the Mother of God. These features, in a somewhat revised form, entered the history of Nikephoros Callistus and served as the basis for icon painters when depicting the appearance of the Blessed Virgin. “In all things,” the church historian writes about the Mother of God, “She was honest, said little and what was necessary; She was attentive and friendly, giving honor and respect to everyone. She was of average height, and according to some, slightly above average. She used the freedom of decent speech in relation to every person without laughter, without embarrassment and especially without anger. Her face was wheat-colored, her hair was light-blond, and her eyes were lively with pupils of a sort of olive color. She had steep and fairly black eyebrows, a rather long nose, pink lips, full of pleasantness during conversation; the face is not round, but slightly oblong, the arms and fingers are long. She was modest, not pretentious, did not indulge in effeminacy, and preferred humility. She wore clothes of natural colors with love, as evidenced to this day by the sacred veil of Her head. Generally speaking, great divine grace was present in all Her deeds.” 149 In this characteristic one notices a combination of living features of the eastern physiognomy with conventional touches of a moral character, which weaken the power of the immediate impression and present the appearance of the Mother of God much softer and more even. The energetic type of an eastern woman is neutralized here by artistic and moral considerations. “Description of the image and disposition of the blessed Mary the Virgin Theotokos”, made by Nikephoros Callistus and which, it seems, influenced the corresponding article of the Greek iconographic original, was translated into the Slavic language quite early and quite often comes across in our ancient handwritten collections with the above title. 150 Even more often you can find it in adaptations of old Russian scribes in relation to one or another circumstance. Let us give as an example one of these alterations based on the famous Tale of an icon image, how and when an icon image was conceived, and the Legend of the painting of the icon of the Mother of God Hodegetria. “The age of the average measure of Her,” we read here about the appearance of the Blessed Virgin. “It is a gracious and holy face, small in circumference and a sacrilegious forehead, with a long nose, lying more kindly to the left, and the eyes are green and kind, blacker and more beautiful than the apple of the eye, and so are the eyebrows. The lips of the All-Immaculate One are crimson with scarlet beauty, and the fingers of God-pleasing hands are thinned with fineness in moderate length, and the blessed heads are adorned with short hair. The robe is dark purple, just as David says: the garments are robed with gold, and are speckled and adorned; and on it again, above its head, there will be a star of this testimony, as before the birth of the Virgin. On the right shoulder also put a star of perfect immaculate virginity, like the Virgin at Christmas. To have the Ever-Virgin image near his head from both countries, the inscription to him from the letters is folded to the face: Μρ Θγ. 151 And this is the Greek writing, and this is interpreted in Sitsa: Μητηρ Θεοΰ, in the Slavic language: Mother of God. In the embrace of Her left hand it is imagined to be holding the all-containing eternal Child, our Lord Jesus Christ” 152... These stories or legends, judging by the many often illustrated lists in which they have come down to us, undoubtedly had guiding significance in the depiction of the face of the Mother of God by ancient Russian icon painters, who steadily followed Byzantine traditions. These alterations have not been completely forgotten to this day, and they can now be seen in icon painting schools at monasteries in the hands of monks who run them. A well-known tradition, shared equally by Orthodox and Catholics, traces the antiquity of images of the Mother of God to the time of Her life and connects their beginning with the name of the Evangelist Luke. The first who has an indication of the icon of the Virgin Mary by the latter is Theodore the Reader, a historian of the times of Justin and Justinian, preserved in fragments in some ancient manuscripts, most notably in the church history of Nikephoros Callistus. He reports that Empress Eudokia, the widow of Theodosius the Younger, having gone to worship in Palestine, sent from Jerusalem to Constantinople her sister Pulcheria, the wife of Emperor Marcian, an image of the Mother of God, painted by the Evangelist Luke. 153 Speaking about the event briefly, without any explanations or reservations, the historian, as it were, makes it clear that he has in mind an indisputable fact known to everyone. However, after Theodore the Reader, we do not find its confirmation in written monuments for more than two centuries. But from the 8th century there are several almost similar news about the icon that occupies us. St. Andrew of Crete, who died a martyr in 761, ancient tradition proving the use of St. icons, among other things, refers to the universal evidence that St. Luke "with his own hand depicted both the incarnate Christ himself and His immaculate Mother" and that these images, famous in Rome, are in Jerusalem. 154 Unknown author of the Word on Icons to Constantine Copronymus, taking advantage of the fact that St. Luke depicts the Mother of God for the same apologetic purposes, and notes about the icon that it was sent by an evangelist to a certain Theophilus. 155 In the famous life of Stephen the New, who suffered for holy icons in 757, it is told that the Archbishop German of Constantinople, exhorting Leo the Isaurian to abandon the idea of ​​persecuting icon veneration, in confirmation of the antiquity of sacred images, in addition to the statue of the Savior erected by a bleeding wife and the Odessa ubrus, also pointed to the image of the Virgin Mary, written Evangelist Luke and then sent somewhere from Jerusalem. 156 In the Epistle to Emperor Theophilus about St. The icons, attributed by scientists to the year 845–846 and attributed to the three Eastern patriarchs, convey that the divinely inspired Luke, during the life of the Most Holy Theotokos - while She lived in Zion, painted Her honest image on a board for subsequent generations with picturesque compositions and from the lips of the Virgin Mary herself heard the promise that Her grace would abide with his icon. 157 Simeon Metaphrastus, a great lover of rhetoric, who compiled one hundred and thirty-two biographies of saints, at the beginning of the 10th century conveys the legend that interests us in a somewhat common edition. “The most gratifying thing is,” he writes, “that the Evangelist Luke conveyed the human form of my Christ and the image of the One who gave birth to Him and gave Him human nature, so that they would be honored even to this day, considering them insufficient if he does not contemplate in images and images the features of his beloved persons, which serves as a sign of his ardent love. And he did this not only for himself, but also for all the faithful who love Christ.” 158 In the famous minology of Emperor Basil the Bolgar-Slayers (976–1025), it is briefly and clearly stated that Evangelist Luke was a native of Antioch, and was by occupation a doctor and a painter. 159 Theophan Keramevs, Archbishop of Tauromenia (1130–1150), in a conversation for the week of Orthodoxy, revealing with examples the idea that the veneration of icons from time immemorial and from above is established, adds in conclusion: “and Luke, the eloquent evangelist, painted with wax and paint an icon of the Mother of God holding the Lord in His holy hands, which is preserved to this day in the great city,” i.e. Constantinople. 160 We find comparatively more complete information on this issue for the first time in the church history of Nicephorus Callistus. Having noted, in accordance with Vasiliev’s minology, that St. Luke was a doctor and at the same time a very knowledgeable painter, the latter writes: “They say that he was the first to depict in painting the image of Christ and the Godly One who bore Him, as well as the supreme apostles, and that from him this high and venerable art later spread throughout the entire universe.” 161 Without providing any more information about the images of the Savior and the apostles Peter and Paul painted by the Evangelist Luke, Nicephorus Callistus does not leave us in the dark about his icon of the Mother of God and twice, although for the same reason, mentions its subsequent fate. Talking about the religious zeal of the Empress Pulcheria, listing the churches in honor of the Mother of God that she built, he says: “The second Hodegetri church, where she placed the icon of the Mother of the Word sent from Antioch, which the divine Apostle Luke painted with her own hand during Her lifetime. She saw this image and imparted grace to Her image. This icon first worked miracles in a place called the Tribunal, which are still performed today. Pulcheria established that in this church on the third day of the week a vigil and prayer should be held, which is observed to this day.” 162 Without citing here the rather numerous and varied news about the miraculous Hodegetria Icon of the Mother of God from Byzantine and medieval Western writers, 163 we will only note that this shrine, according to the unanimous testimony of all of them, enjoyed reverent veneration by all the Byzantines, was very important in their political history and was well known from rumors and copies of it to Western Christians. The legend about the painting of this icon by the Evangelist Luke himself was generally widespread among the Byzantines, did not arouse any distrust in them and, of course, only as an undoubted fact of religious life could it enter the Greek icon-painting original. The later compiler of the latter, who was strongly influenced by this tradition, giving instructions to painters about depicting the appearance of the apostles and evangelists, about St. Luke briefly says: “The Evangelist Luke is not old, curly, with a small beard, depicts an icon of the Mother of God.” 164 And indeed, on some ancient icons and in miniature manuscripts we see him with icon-painting accessories, painting an icon of the Mother of God or already presenting his completed work to her. Most often, this kind of illustration can be found in Russian manuscripts next to those already known to us: “Tales about the icon image, how and when it began” and “Tales about the painting of the icon of the Mother of God Hodegetria”, precisely against the following words of the text, which are not devoid of interest in the present case: “After the resurrection and after the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven and after the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, in the past fifty years, the glorious apostle and the Evangelist Luke, praise to him for the gospel of Christ, who wrote the gospel about Christ and about the ever-virgin Mary who gave birth to Him, and the Apostle also wrote the Acts of the Saints in little books. And again, the first of the divine icon images of the hedgehog, self-righteously inexperienced, wrote on the table the outline of our most pure Lady Theotokos and the Ever-Virgin Mary, dangerously resembling Thy’s graceful vision... And brings it to the prototype of the Lady and all the Queen. She, having laid her eyes on that icon and rejoiced, said to him with reverence and with authority: “Let my grace be with you.” 165 The attributes of the artistic title became, as it were, a distinctive iconographic feature of the Evangelist Luke, and for a long time he himself was considered in the Christian world the patron saint of icon painters, under whose protection entire societies of artists arose and existed in the West in the pious medieval era. A tradition that has a long line of substantially consistent witnesses should, apparently, not raise doubts about its authenticity in anyone, and yet many of the scientists who dealt with the legend in question did not believe in its authenticity. Some, but very few, archaeologists have even tried to explain the origin of this, as they say, legend and to undermine the strength of those who speak in favor of its evidence. The legend about the painting of the icon of the Mother of God by the Evangelist Luke, they say, has no solid historical support and is nothing more than a misunderstanding based on the confusion of two completely different names. The Madonnas, known with the name of the Evangelist Luke, are in fact supposedly the works of an 11th century Florentine painter named Luca Santo. Written by the latter, they were later attributed to the evangelist out of oblivion, due to the identity of the name and under the influence of a completely understandable desire to connect the origin of this or that respected shrine with the names of more remarkable and famous church figures. Perhaps such an explanation is fair in relation to some of those numerous Madonnas who are passed off as icons of the Evangelist Luke in Italy and other places in Western Europe, but in relation to the tradition that occupies us, it is, however, a witty, but arbitrary guess and does not explain anything. Evidence of the painting of the icon of the Mother of God by the Evangelist Luke warns the Florentine painter for several centuries, thereby making it clear that the legend did not arise with him or after him, as would follow according to the hypothesis under consideration, but existed long before Luca Santo. A similar inconsistency characterizes most of the objections that were invented and directed as negative criticism against the grounds given by the opposite side in defense of the authenticity of the legend about the Evangelist Luke as an icon painter. We do not see the need to bring here all these objections, 166 partly refuted by the latest discoveries in the field of ancient Christian catacomb painting, partly already examined in Russian archaeological literature, 167 but we cannot ignore in complete silence two or three serious bewilderments that this legend can and did arouse in the soul of an impartial researcher. Empresses Eudokia and Pulcheria, whom Theodore the Reader calls, reporting for the first time about the icon of Our Lady of the Evangelist Luke, are two remarkable female figures in the cultural history of Byzantium of the fifth century. The first, the daughter of a philosopher, was famous for her curiosity, classical education and devoted her leisure time to literary works, commenting on the book of Genesis and describing in verse the exploits of martyrs; the latter was distinguished by her piety, love of church building, and her name is associated with several monasteries built in Constantinople and its environs. The church historian Sozomen devotes several chapters of his fourth book to praise the virtues of Pulcheria and her sisters, the good teaching that she instilled in her brother the emperor; her steadfastness in Orthodoxy, which prevented the development of new heresies that emerged in the 5th century; religious women's community founded by the sisters, and tells in detail about the discovery of the relics of forty martyrs. Another church source, Socrates, in the penultimate chapter of his history, mentions the Empress Eudocia's pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 438 and the many contributions she made to various churches in the east. But it is remarkable that neither one nor the other historian talks at all about the precious parcel sent by the empress from Jerusalem to Constantinople to her crowned sister. Even more remarkable and incomprehensible in this case is the silence of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, which in its testimony on the veneration of icons did not mention this very important circumstance in a single word. It is clear that the council, which carefully examined and searched for ancient news about icons in support of Orthodox teaching, twice in its actions referred to the story of Theodore the Reader, either considered the latter’s testimony about the icon of the Mother of God of the Evangelist Luke weak, or did not know it at all. Otherwise, the icon, revered by everyone, located in one of the most famous monasteries of Constantinople, gathering crowds of pilgrims around it, should have served as a strong argument for veneration of icons. The silence of the council fathers about this icon gives reason to doubt that there was an icon in Constantinople at that time known with the name of the Evangelist Luke, and therefore for the reliability of the mention of it by Theodore the Reader there is not enough solid ground. Evidence of this icon appears, and then independently of Theodore the Reader, in the era of iconoclasm and among less competent writers, for example, in anonymous messages about icons, in the life of Stephen the New and other writings. In addition to these chronological, so to speak, difficulties associated with the history of the legend about the icon of the Mother of God, written by the Evangelist Luke, the reliability of the legend in question is also suspected on the basis of some historical considerations. The artistic activity of the Evangelist Luke is nothing more, they say, as an assumption devoid of solid foundations. The Apostle Luke, as we know, was a doctor in his occupation, and nowhere - neither in the Holy Scriptures nor among the writers of the church of the first centuries - is there even a hint that he was a painter or painted an image of the Blessed Virgin. Moreover, according to the same tradition, he is recognized as one of the seventy apostles and, therefore, a Jew by origin. But it is known that painting, along with other fine arts, was not familiar to the Jews due to the commandment not to make likenesses like those in heaven and on earth. By admitting, in agreement with some ancient teachers of the church: Tertullian, Jerome, Augustine and the newest scholars of the Holy Scriptures, that the Evangelist Luke was a native of the pagans, it will be easy to get out of the just mentioned difficulty and significantly weaken the force of the objection associated with it. It is much more difficult to resolve the confusion caused by the silence of historians and the fathers of the Council of Nicea about the precious shrine sent from the east. Of course, it is impossible to say anything positive and definite to clarify these perplexities. It is most likely that Sozomen and Socrates did not mention in their stories the sending of the icon of the Mother of God by the Evangelist Luke from Jerusalem, and the fathers of the Council of Nicaea did not refer to the latter in defense of icon veneration because both the fact of sending and the icon itself were too well known to their contemporaries. Whatever the reason for the fact that church writers and the Seventh Ecumenical Council did not mention the icon of the Mother of God received by Empress Pulcheria from Jerusalem, one cannot decisively conclude from it that the icon does not exist, that Theodore the Reader’s news about it is not authentic, and that the tradition itself is unreliable. It seems to us that an objective researcher, remaining within the limits of the latest historical evidence, without suspecting the authenticity of the documents from which they are borrowed - and there is no sufficient reason to suspect - should only come to the following conclusions regarding the subject under study: 1) Evangelist Luke, according to a very widespread legend, which does not contain anything incongruous and was transmitted by many later church writers, was familiar with the art of painting and, among other things, executed an icon of the Mother of God with wax and paints; 2) The circle of fame of this icon during the first four to five centuries was very narrow and was limited to the relatively small corner where this image came from and where it was originally kept. It did not have any general church significance, like most of the ancient Christian shrines, which were highly revered in their homeland and found relatively little recognition on the outside, and therefore probably did not influence the first artistic representations of the Mother of God; 3) The icons of the Mother of God of the Evangelist Luke 168, known in Greece and here in Russia, undoubtedly represent a repetition of the most ancient icon type, which was finally formed in the East; 5) Dedicated to the name of the Evangelist Luke, this Byzantine type, first during the iconoclastic unrest, and then during the era of the Crusades, was spread by Greek masters throughout Western Europe, mainly in Italy, where the Greco-Italian school of painting arose, which passed it on, with some changes, to subsequent generations and times. From here came the famous and respected Madonna of St. Bows, known in quite a significant number in Rome, Italy, Spain and other countries; 169 5) From the testimony of Theodore the Reader it is clear that the icon, painted by the Evangelist Luke, was transferred from Jerusalem to Constantinople around the middle of the 5th century and then was in the Odigitrievsky Monastery. In the 12th century, according to Theophanes Keramevs, it continued to be preserved in Constantinople. Nikephoros Callistus claims the same thing in the 14th century. It is interesting that long before this time, icons of the Mother of God of the Evangelist Luke, brought in the 11th–12th centuries from Constantinople, were already known in Rus', and in Catholic countries, for example, in Rome, icons attributed to the same evangelist were shown even earlier. Where the original icon painted by the Evangelist Luke is now located, what its actual fate was, what became of it is difficult to decide. The historical route by which one could reach this precious shrine and perhaps the most remarkable monument of Christian painting, if not completely lost, is, in any case, very difficult due to many contradictory and confusing indications regarding its location. V. Images of the cross in pre-Christian times Images of the cross in pre-Christian times. How early Christians began to venerate the cross. The reasons for the relatively late appearance of images of the latter on monuments of Christian art. Monograms of the name of Christ (cruces dissimulatae). The main types of direct image of the cross. Symbolic forms of the crucifixion; presentation of the crucifixion in its own form. The most ancient crucifixions and their descriptions. Symbolism of crucifixions. From the history of the sign of the cross. The great banner of Christianity - the cross, is at the same time a world, universal symbol. If the Apostle Paul says that the word of the cross serves as a temptation for the Jews, seems crazy to the Greeks and only for Christians is an object of strength and a sign of salvation, 170 then in these words he is not talking about the sign of the cross itself, as a well-known symbolic form, but about the special idea that has developed about the cross in the Christian world in relation to Christ, in connection with its meaning as an instrument of shameful death that befell the ancient educated peoples of the most notorious criminals. 171 Only in this last meaning did the Greco-Roman world treat the cross with contempt and consider its image shameful. But if we take into account the symbolic meaning of the latter, then it will be impossible not to see that in the history of mankind a brighter and more significant fate befell this sign, which, perhaps, would have been less explained to us if it had not fortunately coincided with the image of the cross of Christ and had not received, on account of the latter, a special right to the attention of science. The artistic history of the cross begins far beyond the Christian era and opens with a number of analogous signs in the symbolism of the Hindus, Egyptians, Babylonians, Etruscans and in the ornamentation of the peoples of the classical world. As a decoration, as a symbol and a well-known mythological attribute, the cross was one of the widespread signs and was often associated with religious ideas of the archaic world. Among the Hindus, a mysterious sign is often found either in the form of a perpendicular line crossed out by a horizontal line, similar to the printed G or Latin S, or in the form of four scales connected to each other by ends, or laid crosswise on top of each other. 172 The variants of this figure are varied, but they all do not depart from the general scheme of the cross and in science are known with the technical name of the swastika, or the sacred cross of the Hindus (crux gammata). In Egypt, the application of this sign was even more extensive; it appears here in the form of a cross with a handle (crux ansata), having the following form: a horizontal line, which has a circle directly above it, is crossed out from top to bottom with a perpendicular line 173 - a figure very similar to the sign of the planet Venus, where the upper circle is explained in the sense of the round mirror of the goddess, and the lower line - in the meaning of the handle to it. Egyptian kings and queens are often depicted with this sign; they hold him by the handle, kind of like up. Peter is the key. Egyptian amulets representing a beetle with outstretched wings belong to the same category of signs. On one Egyptian monument, dated by antiquity experts to the 15th century BC, the cross is presented in a circle, without any head; 174 sometimes the perpendicular spur of the cross was connected to the image of a snake, as if serving as a fulcrum for it. Among the Babylonians, a similar sign is found as a clasp on the chest of kings. One Assyrian monument discovered at Korsabad shows a man with an eagle's head, holding a ring in one hand and a cross in the other. The letter tau (Τ) should also be included in the area of ​​the same symbolic figure, the oldest outline of which is known from the Phoenician and Hebrew alphabets and looks like either an St. Andrew’s cross, or a straight cross, and sometimes even the present Greek letter tau. Combinations and forms of the sign in question, found among other peoples, are adjacent to the main form now described, as varieties of one common prototype, from which they emerge and develop. It is curious and important that the signs we described and similar ones on the monuments of ancient art were not accidental, did not appear so-so due to the arbitrary swing of the hand, but had an internal meaning, served as an expression of well-known ideas, and were symbols. What meaning was connected with them is not always easy and can sometimes be determined. Thanks to the philological and archaeological research of modern scientists, the most likely explanation remains for the Egyptian crux ansata in favor of its connection with the cult of the sun. In Egyptian symbolism, this sign is interpreted as an attribute of Horus, and the Egyptian Horus is the son of the sun and wears this circle with a cross-shaped handle as a symbol of his father. The Egyptian Ra, one of the gods of the astral circle, was depicted with the same sign. From here it becomes clear that the circle crowning the cross is nothing more than an image of the sun, the source of life, and the cross itself represents the rays emanating from it and is called by the Egyptians a word denoting life. The snake, which at times wraps itself around the head of the cross or rests against its perpendicular lower spur, also has some relation to the cult of the sun and involuntarily resembles a similar image of the Mosaic serpent raised on a pole, when looking at which the Israelites bitten by snakes received healing, and which served as a prototype of Christ ascended to the cross. 175 In Indian symbolism, the image of a cross is associated with the representation of fire and is closely related to the symbolism of the latter. We get the simplest form of a cross if we connect two oblong pieces of wood at right angles and make them rotate on an axis at the point of intersection. But this is exactly the type of device used by the ancient Hindus during religious processions in honor of fire; it reminded them of nothing more than the ancient method of making fire by rubbing two pieces of wood. The Indian priest, in the form of a cross, thus held a symbolic sign of fire, warmth, before which the crowd bowed as before the source of world life. With this meaning of the symbol of life, a cross on the chest of Egyptian mummies, images of a cross in a circle on Etruscan grave monuments, and similar symbolic combinations could appear and receive sacred use. Among the red-skinned Indians of America, the priests wore the sign of the cross on their clothes, and, according to the missionaries, they called it the tree of salvation; but, perhaps, the influence of Christianity, with which the most ancient aborigines of this country were familiar, was already felt... In view of the above, Christian apologists and ancient church writers (Justin, Tertullian, Minucius Felix and others), who found the image of the cross in many natural phenomena and human situations, were partly right when they argued that the cross was known to pre-Christian peoples and revered by them. When, by order of Theodosius the Great, the famous Church of Serapis in Alexandria was destroyed, under its ruins, some hieroglyphic signs and images in the form of a cross were found on the foundation stones. Christians referred to this find as proof that this image, shameful in the eyes of the pagans, enjoyed great respect among them and belonged to the number of sacred signs. The pagans, on the contrary, denied any connection of this sign with the Christian cross and argued that it belonged to their ancient symbols, and those knowledgeable in hieroglyphs added, for their part, that this sign expressed the thought of a future life, 176 - an explanation confirmed by the latest research regarding the Indian swastika and Assyrian symbols similar to it. But this same disagreement between Christians and pagans in the understanding of the sign shows that both sides looked at the Christian cross not from the point of view of universal human symbolism, but saw in it an image of a well-known instrument of execution, which in no way. was not the meaning of pre-Christian symbolic images of this kind. If the universal human side of this symbol had been placed in the foreground, then a more conciliatory view of the matter would likely have taken place, and the image of the cross would have received a more prominent place in early Christian art. In reality, this did not happen, and on the basis of accurate data provided by archaeological science, it can be stated positively that during the first three centuries, a direct image of the cross was not included in the range of objects of Christian art, at least it did not appear openly. 177 There is no doubt that Christians from the very first times treated the cross with reverence, as far as it was associated with the memory of Christ and His atoning sacrifice. At the end of the second and at the beginning of the third century, the celebration of the cross was so widespread that the pagans already knew about it and mocked Christians, calling them crucis religiosi, cruciolae (cross-worshippers). Christian apologists did not reject this accusation, but only tried to find out the real meaning of the cult attributed to them. 178 A curious archaeological monument in this regard is a caricature of a crucifix, found in 1856 by Father Garruci in the ruins of the Palatine Palace in Rome under the following circumstances. A three-pointed cross (T-shaped) with a human figure with a donkey's head attached to it is drawn in rough strokes on the wall of the building. Near the cross, on the left side, stands a man with his hand raised, as if about to make the sign of the cross. At the bottom of the group is the signature: “Άλεξάμενος σέβετε (instead of σέβεται) υεόν.” 179 Judging by the carelessness of the drawing and the incorrectness of the signature, one can think that this entire image was drawn ex improviso by an inept hand and the first sharp tool that came to hand, perhaps a nail. Since this wall did not belong to the main building, but to the black rooms of the people, it is very likely that some Roman minister, one of the pages of the palace, wanted to ridicule his comrade, the Christian Alexamene, in this caricature, and introduced him during the performance of religious worship. To understand the meaning of this caricature, we must recall one of those fables that were spread by pagans about the first Christians, namely the accusation that the latter idolized the donkey. The closest reason for its composition was most likely the story of Tacitus about the Jews, that they, expelled from Egypt, languishing in the desert with thirst, were led to the trail of a source by a herd of donkeys and, in gratitude for their salvation, began to consider this animal sacred. According to Diodorus, Antiochus Epiphanes, having captured Jerusalem, found in the Jerusalem temple a carved stone image of a horseman riding a donkey. The Egyptians invented this fable as a mockery of the Jews, whom they knew as nomads before settling in Egypt; They also told another myth about them, that Typhon escaped on a donkey from a battle with the gods and built Jerusalem. Since many of the pagans at first confused Christians with Jews, these very inventions were transferred to them. 180 Caricatures based on these fables began to appear very early; Tertullian says that in his time some Jew invented a new image of the Christian God with the inscription: “Deus Christianorum onokoites.” 181 The image represented a monstrous figure, dressed in a toga, with donkey ears, claws on its paws and a book in one of them. Celsus calls Christians ostracists and, as can be seen from Origen, bases this offensive nickname on some images circulated among the Ophites, who called their god Ονοηλ and depicted him όνοειδής, i.e. like a donkey. The caricature of the Palatine Palace belongs to the same category. Having isolated the historical element from this fact, only one idea of ​​veneration by Christians of the Crucified One will remain valid - an idea from which there is still no necessary transition to the existence of the images of the cross and crucifixion themselves. And indeed, the study of ancient monuments of Christian art leads to the conclusion about the extreme rarity of images, not to mention the crucifixion: it is nowhere to be found, but also the cross itself. Both of them appear after quite a long time and are significantly late before other subjects of ancient Christian art. It seems not difficult to explain why this discrepancy occurred, and why the idea of ​​the Crucified One, which lies at the basis of the Christian confession, remained for a long time outside of artistic, figurative expression. The main reason for this phenomenon lies in the special idea that was associated with the name of the cross and death on the cross as the most shameful and outrageous type of punishment. It took a long time for the image of the crucified Christ, regardless of its religious significance, to become an open symbol of Christianity and occupy a prominent place in church art; it was necessary for the impression of the recent overwhelming event to be smoothed out so much that the image of the latter no longer aroused the heavy feeling with which it was accompanied in the immediate consciousness of the early Christians. This circumstance imparted a peculiar feature to the history of images of the cross, giving rise to a special way of representing it, the so-called cruces dissimulatas, which contained a more or less understandable allusion to the cross, more or less similarity with its shape. These hidden, covered crosses represent the first, both in time and in the method of expression, experiments of Christian art in the field of staurrography. The most important and more widespread of them are, of course, monograms of the name of Christ. The system of the most important signs of this kind can be presented in the following order: I. X. This is the initial letter of the name Χριστός in its simplest graphic design and together the main form for subsequent, more complex types of monogram, a symbol and expression of the entire essence of Christianity and its beliefs. The meaning of this sign was so clear to Christians and non-Christians that Julian laconically, but at the same time characteristically and deeply correctly expressed his hostile attitude towards Christianity, calling it a struggle against X. II. The same letter crossed out in the middle with a perpendicular line, indicating the letter I, the initial one in the name Ίησους. For the first time such a sign appears in gravestone inscription (Pastor et Titiana et Marciana Marciano filio benemerenti in Ж fecerunt. Vivas inter sanctos), attributed by Russia to 268 or 269. 182 III. A new combination of the same sign with the letter p, representing the most common type of monogram. It is found on Christian monuments of the first half of the 4th century. 183 It is impossible not to see that the power of all these signs lies in the name Christ, which is presented here in various graphic combinations. As for the image of the cross, its figure has not yet been determined, so to speak, and only allows itself to be sensed and guessed in different letter combinations of the name of Christ. IV. A new step in this direction was taken by Christian art, when the monogram took the form of the letter p with a straight and long lower end crossed out horizontally. Here the outline of the cross appears more clearly, although it is neutralized by its upper part, closed in the shape of the letter p. In the catacombs, this sign is found for the first time, according to Rossi, in 355. 184 From the desire to have an image closer and more suitable to the cross, a whole long series of symbolic signs (hidden crosses) developed in early Christian art, in which the external form fought with the internal content of the sign, with its idea. 185 The image on the labarum of Constantine the Great also belongs to the same group of monogrammatic signs. Many of the writers point to the labarum as tactile proof of the idea that already at the beginning of the 4th century the image of the cross was publicly used and adopted into art. But if we analyze Eusebius’s story about labarum and trace its history, it turns out that this tactile sign does not have as much evidentiary power as is commonly thought. Eusebius says that before the battle with Maxentius, Constantine saw at noon the sign of the cross appearing in the sky in the luminous rays with the words: τούτω νίκα. The next night, Christ appeared to Constantine with the banner of the cross and ordered an image to be made from the latter as a banner and protection against enemies. The next day, Constantine called the craftsmen, described to them the sign that had appeared, and ordered them to build a banner for his army based on its model. “On the spear, overlaid with gold,” says Eusebius, describing in some detail this famous banner of Constantine, “a crossbar was placed on top, forming with it the sign of the cross. At the very top of the spear there was a golden wreath, decorated with precious stones, and in it a symbol of the saving name - two letters denoting the name of Christ, i.e. X, crossed Ρ the matter is obviously about the monogram of Christ ). The king subsequently had the custom of wearing these letters on his helmet. On the crossbar hung a thin white cloth - royal fabric, covered with various precious stones and sparkling with rays of light. Often embroidered in gold, this board seemed inexpressibly beautiful and, hanging on the crossbar, had the same latitude and longitude. On a straight spear, the lower end of which was very long, under the sign of the cross, on the very top of the described fabric hung, made of gold, a chest image of the God-loving king and his children.” 186 From this description it is clear that the crossbar that made up the middle branch of the cross had a purely mechanical meaning and was intended to support a piece of canvas representing the royal banner. Thus, the main thing that gave this banner a Christian character was the monogram of the name of Christ, and not the cross, which was not there. This saving sign, Eusebius continues, the king used in times of danger as protection, and ordered that the same banners be introduced in all troops. This banner became a marching banner under Constantine and then passed into the practice of later emperors. 187 Julian the Apostate ordered this image to be removed from the labarum, but under Jovinian, his successor, it was restored again. Since the time of the latter, the labarum has received a new addition to the monogram in the form of a cross, 188 and on one Valens coin, instead of a monogram, a four-pointed cross already appears on it. 189 From the middle of the 4th century, symbolic forms gradually begin to give way to their own image of the cross, and the victory of Christianity over paganism, like the triumph of the cross, causes an open image of the latter in everyday life, in church worship and on state relics. At the beginning of the 5th century, on many public monuments there is a proper image of the cross, without any symbolic cover. “The cross is everywhere,” Chrysostom testifies in his conversation about the Divinity of Christ, “in houses, in squares, in deserts, on roads, on hills and mountains, on ships and islands, on beds and weapons, in bridal chambers, on gold and silver vessels, on walls. For we are not ashamed of the cross; on the contrary, it is dear to us and worthy of us wherever it can be depicted.” In archaeological science, it is customary to distinguish three main types between the oldest images of a real, uncovered cross, namely: crux commissa, crux immissa and crux decussata. Crux commissa or patibulata is one of the oldest, if not the oldest form of the cross found on ancient Christian monuments. Crux commissa - three-pointed, it consists of two beams, of which the transverse one is superimposed on top of the longitudinal one, fixed vertically to the ground, so that both together represent the figure of the Greek and Latin letter T. This form of the cross, in addition to a simple, without crossbars, pillar (σκόλοψ) and a pillar or stake with bifurcations, in the form of a fork (the so-called furca), was in use even in the pre-Christian world, among the Greeks and Romans. It is clearly presented by the famous satirist Lucian of Samosata in his essay: “The Process of Letters.” In the latter, the consonants of the alphabet are displayed with various complaints about the vowels that control them, and among other things, sigma complains about tau because the latter, according to the rules of Attic pronunciation, often invades its area and imitates the pronunciation of its neighbor. At the same time, there is general indignation against the letter Tau because the tyrants used its form to construct crosses. In connection with this form, the image of a cross in the form of the letter tau appeared in Christian art. “In one letter T you have a cross,” says St. Barnabas, and Tertullian: “the Greek letter is tau, and our (Latin) T is the image of the cross.” There is an opinion that Christ was crucified on a cross of this exact form, i.e. three-pointed, shared by many archaeologists and confirmed in part by the caricature of the crucifixion and the practice of the Roman world. In order to assimilate it, the cross of Christ was greatly assisted by the memory of that mystical sign of tau, which, according to the command of Jehovah, the prophet Ezekiel (Ezekiel 9:4) was to depict on the forehead of the inhabitants of Jerusalem. “And the Lord said to him: go through the middle of the city of Jerusalem and depict tau on the faces of the men, groaning and paining over all the iniquities that are being committed among them.” The symbolic meaning of this sign is explained by Barnabas in his letter (chapter 9) and Clement of Alexandria. “Abraham,” says the first of them, “circumcised ten, and eight, and three hundred men from his house. What knowledge was given to him in this? Find out first what ten and eight are, and then what three hundred is. Ten and eight are expressed: ten - by the letter Iota (ι), eight - by the letter Ita (η), and this is the beginning of the name Jesus. And since the cross in the image of the letter tau was supposed to indicate the grace of redemption, it is said: and three hundred. So, the name Jesus is revealed in two letters, and the cross in one third.” Not without the influence, of course, of this symbolism both in catacomb art and on Christian sarcophagi, the name of the deceased is sometimes interrupted by the insertion of the letter tau, or this latter is placed before the name as a symbol of salvation and Christ. 190 Crux immissa or capitata – four-pointed; its short transverse beam is inserted into the longitudinal one so that the top of the longitudinal beam protrudes above the transverse one. This form of the cross is divided into the so-called Greek or square, in which the transverse beam is equal to the longitudinal one and thus the cross takes the form +, and Latin, in which the longitudinal beam is much longer than the transverse one, so that the cross has the shape †. The most ancient image of a cross of this kind, as noted above, is located in the catacombs of St. Luciles; another image of him was found in the catacombs, on the bottom of a glass vessel, and represents a Christian with a crux immissa, shaped like a + and depicted on his forehead. 191 From the 5th century crux immissa becomes commonly used. 192 The cross on which the Savior died, according to the prevailing tradition in the Church, was four-pointed - crux immissa or capitata. Crux decussata, otherwise oblique, represents a cross in the form of the letter X and consists of two crossbars placed obliquely one to the other. Archaeologists often call it Burgundian, or St. Andrew's, since, according to legend, St. was crucified on such a cross. Apostle Andrew the First-Called. Crux decussata is not so much a cross in the strict sense as a conventional sign, a hidden image of it. Jerome says that the Church saw in the Greek letter X an image of the cross. And since the name Χριστός began with the same letter, the letter X served as much as a sacred symbol for the name of Christ as for His cross. The turn noted above in the artistic history of the cross, could not have been better coincided with the facts of the actual appearances of the cross, of which we have three at once: the appearance to Constantine the Great during the war with Maxentius, the finding of the cross by Queen Helena in Jerusalem and its appearance in Jerusalem, seen in the sky and described by Cyril of Jerusalem in a letter to Constantius. We have already spoken about the first of these phenomena when speaking about the labarum of Constantine the Great; Now a few words about the second of them, especially important due to its decisive significance regarding the form and historical fate of the true cross of Christ. First of all, it should be noted that the story of the discovery of the cross of the Lord is conveyed by four historians closest in time: Socrates, Sozomen, Rufinus and Theodoret, but for some strange and difficult to explain circumstance, it is completely omitted by Eusebius, who speaks in detail about Helen's pilgrimage and the affairs of her religious zeal in Palestine, who himself lived not far from the place where the discovery of the cross took place, and, being in close relations with the house of Constantine the Great, could have the most accurate information about this matter. The testimonies of the four historians we have named relate more to the circumstances of the discovery of the cross than to the description of its appearance. They say that all three crosses were completely similar to each other, and there was no way to distinguish the cross of Christ between them, and that only a miraculous test proposed by Bishop Macarius resolved the question regarding the true cross of Christ. 193 They all say that the crosses were wooden, but none of the historians gives an indication of what kind of wood they were made of, and therefore the testimony of Chrysostom and other later church writers is that the cross of Christ was three-part, i.e. consisted of cedar, cypress and pego, has no basis in the authentic story of the historians mentioned above. According to Ambrose, the cross of Christ was recognized as if by the inscription on it, placed by Pilate. “Saint Helen,” he says, “sought the middle cross, but it may very well have happened that time and revolutions had changed their relative position. Then she turned to the Gospel narrative 194 and found that on the middle cross there was an inscription: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” This restored the truth and revealed the saving cross. She found the inscription and worshiped the King, and not the tree, because this is the delusion of the pagans and the vain work of the wicked.” It is not difficult to notice that this story of Ambrose is in contradiction with the instructions of Socrates, Sozomen, Rufinus and Theodoret, who do not talk about the preservation of the inscription belonging to him on the cross of Christ, but argue that the path to such a distinction was lost and it was necessary to turn to a miraculous test to distinguish the true from those found with it. However, these historians agree with Ambrose on this matter, for they say that the inscription was found - only separately from the crosses. The further fate of the cross of Christ is lost from sight; we only know that the pious mother of Constantine came to the idea of ​​dividing the cross into several parts, of which she left one in the Basilica of St. coffin in Jerusalem, another laid in the church of St. cross in Constantinople, and the third was given to Constantine for his own use. Since then, the integrity of the cross of Christ has been lost forever. Cyril of Jerusalem, who lived thirty years after the discovery of the cross, although he considers it to be tangible evidence of the resurrection of Christ, it is clear from his words that in Jerusalem at that time there was only part of this shrine, and the rest were in different places. 195 That this relic very early lost its integrity is evident from the fact that Chrysostom in Antioch, not far from the place where the very discovery of the cross took place, could publicly say in the “word about the cross and the thief” that Christ did not leave his cross on earth, but took it with Him and ascended from earth to heaven, that with it, this sign of His suffering and salvation, He will appear at the second coming for judgment. If already in the time of Chrysostom there was scant information about the Calvary cross, then it is clear that now, when particles of the latter are distributed almost throughout the world, and when almost all Christian countries have claims to the possession of this most sacred relic, there can be no question of any complete representation of its appearance. The further and together the last phase in the artistic history of the cross is represented by crucifixes or crucifixes. This latest archaeological form of the cross, in which not only the image of the instrument of the crucifixion, but also the representation of the suffering Savior found their corresponding expression, closes all the previous ones and is, as it were, their completion. From the very first times of Christianity, representatives of theological thought, in the absence of portrait images of the Savior, expressed two completely opposite views on His appearance. Some of the fathers and teachers of the Church (Justin, Clement and Cyril of Alexandria, Tertullian and others), relying on the words of the prophet Isaiah: “There is no form of Him lower than glory, and we have seen Him, and not a name of form lower than kindness, but His form is dishonorable, more humble than all the sons of men” (Is. 53: 2-3) and on the basis of a literal understanding of the words of the Apostle Paul: “I have received the form of a servant” ( Phil.2:7), expressed the idea that Jesus Christ had not only an unrepresentable, but also a positively unattractive appearance; others (Chrysostom, Jerome, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose of Milan, Theodoret, Augustine), coming from the words of the Psalmist: “more beautiful in kindness than all the sons of men, grace was poured out in Your mouth” (Ps. 45:3), considered the God-man to be a representative of the most perfect beauty. The latter opinion triumphed in early Christian art, and in accordance with it, the catacomb, ideal type of the young Christ and a whole series of images of the Last One in the bright moments of His life were developed. In the catacomb frescoes, at every step one can observe how Christ receives worship from the Magi, works miracles, is a great Teacher, solemnly enters Jerusalem and, on the contrary, not a single image is visible where He was judged, suffered, and was generally humiliated in one way or another. In the depiction of the crucifixion, Christian art had to resolve the issue of representing I. Christ at the moment of His humiliation, in that state when, according to the prophet, He had neither appearance nor kindness. This artistic theory found an excellent explanation in the following inscription on the ark of the Byzantine cross from the time of Constantine Profyrogenitus, the so-called Limburg Cross after its location. “The Lord, being crucified on the cross,” it says, “was no longer beautiful, for God suffered according to human nature. Basil Proedrus decorated the reliquary of the cross, on which the prostrate Christ drew the whole world to Himself. Christ had perfect beauty, but when he died, he lost it in order to decorate the ugly appearance given to me by sin.” Sharing the common fate of Christian art, the crucifix went through several preliminary forms before reaching full and precise expression. First of all, symbolic forms of the crucifixion appeared, in which, under the shell of a conventionally taken image, more or less clear hints were given to this image, and in this softened form it was presented to the Christian consciousness. Curious material for such symbolism was given, among other things, in the legend of Ulysses. The latter, as is known, ordered himself to be tied to the mast in order to escape the seductive singing of the sirens. For Christian art, the artistic assimilation of this picture was all the more convenient because the mast and anchor, the latter especially with the crossbar at the top, had the closest relationship to the symbolism of the cross. One Christian sarcophagus preserved a bas-relief, the plot of which was borrowed from the story of Ulysses. That the adventure of the latter was understood and explained in the meaning of the symbolism of the crucifixion is evident from one word on Good Friday of Martin of Tours (5th century), who sharply drew and outlined this parallel between Christ and Ulysses. “According to the testimony of pagan fables,” he says, “Ulysses, who for ten years was the toy of sea storms that prevented him from returning to his fatherland, was driven into one place where the sirens captivated sailors with their seductive songs. Ulysses, wanting to protect himself from this disastrous temptation, ordered his and his companions’ ears to be covered, and himself to be tied to the ship’s mast. If,” continues the preacher, “this fictitious story assures that Ulysses escaped death by tying himself to the tree of his ship, then should we not with greater right proclaim the truth that to this day the entire human race has been saved from the horrors of eternal death by the tree of the cross? So in the spiritual ship - the Church - everyone who is tied to the tree of the cross and stops his mouth with the words of Scripture will be safe from the seductive charms of the world. And so, in order to free the human race from destruction in the waves of the world, Christ deigned to lift Himself up on the cross.” It goes without saying that such symbolism could not be firmly grafted onto Christian art and count on a long future in it. The latter fate could have had an image that was more suitable and expressive and, in any case, with a biblical character, which indeed can be said about the symbolic lamb. 196 In the history of Christian art, this image goes through a number of modifications and takes on various kinds of attributes, through which it is easy to trace the very process of development of the Christian idea of the Crucified One and the various moments that it passed through in the Christian consciousness. At first they depicted one lamb, without any additional attributes, such as: monogram, halo, cross. In connection with the last sign, the lamb takes on a certain sacrificial meaning and represents Christ as “the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world.” Under this symbolic form, Christ is depicted by Pavlinus of Nolan in his description of the interior decoration of the Christian basilica. “Under the cross, painted in bloody color,” he says, “stands Christ the Lamb in the form of a snow-white lamb, so that the innocent victim may be brought to an unjust death.” 197 Sometimes the lamb is presented lying on the altar, at the foot of the cross, as a sacrifice completely prepared for the slaughter or already dead. Even further back, but still within the confines of the symbolic nebula, the lamb is depicted with a pierced side, from which blood flows. In the 6th century, a new symbolic combination appeared, coinciding with the image of the crucifixion in its own form. We mean the image of a cross with a lamb on its top or in a medallion in the middle of the cross, at the point of intersection of its branches. 198 The Council of Trulla makes it clear how widespread this symbolism was when it prohibits depicting Christ in the form of a lamb, to which the Forerunner pointed with his hand, and advises representing Him in his own form, “κατά τον άνθρώπινον χαρακτήρα.” 199 But nowhere did the use of this symbol go so far and to such inartistic diversity as on the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus. Junius Bassus belonged to a noble Roman family and in the middle of the 4th century occupied a very prominent administrative position. On his tomb, made of white marble, in the intervening spaces between the arches, Christ is depicted as a lamb, in a whole series of events from His earthly life. The symbolic lamb touches baskets filled with bread with his staff, hits the rock with it, receives baptism, performs healings with his leg, in a word, performs the very actions that, according to the meaning of the Gospel story, Christ should have performed, and is His representative everywhere. 200 At the end of the 6th century there is an attempt to shed the last shell of symbolism in relation to the crucifixion and present it in its own form. In the first experiments of this kind, strictly speaking, there is still no crucifixion, because Christ is presented separately from the cross, above it in a medallion or at its foot, with a blessing gesture, with open eyes and without any signs of suffering, while the accessories and setting of the image are borrowed from the circumstances of the crucifixion and resemble it. This is how the crucifixion is depicted at the bottom of the painted vessel in which Pope Gregory the Great († 604) sent oils from the relics in the catacombs to the Longobard queen Theodolinda. The cross here is presented in the form of a green tree, with two kneeling geniuses on either side. Above him, in a cross-shaped halo, among the personifications of the sun and moon, is the face of the Savior. There is no actual crucifixion yet, but its setting is already obvious: on the sides of the cross there are depicted two nailed thieves and immediately the Mother of God and the Evangelist John standing before Christ. But even this idealization, apparently, was not enough: the Christian artist hastens to prevent the difficult impression of the suffering and death of the Savior by placing under the crucifix an image of the resurrection of Christ with the myrrh-bearing women going to the tomb, an angel sitting near him and with the inscription on top of the tomb: “Anesti o Kristos” (ανέστη o Χριστός). 201 To the same category belongs the image of Christ with his arms outstretched horizontally, among two thieves nailed to crosses, as if standing in a position of prayer, but in such a way that the cross itself, to which the figure of the Savior belongs, is not visible and it is left to the viewer to guess what is missing. The first news about the image of the crucifixion in the proper sense comes from the east and does not go back earlier than the 6th century; The first images of crucifixes date back to the same time. The east can rightfully be considered the homeland of the latter; at least from here the oldest known type of crucifixion originated and spread. The East, as is known, for a long time, more than three and a half centuries, was the field of a lively dogmatic struggle against Arianism and various kinds of Christological heresies that degenerated from Nestorianism. The origin of one of the oldest images of the crucifixion is associated with these disputes. Around 600, the learned Greek monk Anastasius Sinaite wrote a polemical work against the acephalos, one of the many Monophysite sects, under the name: “Οδηγός sive dux viae adversus acephalos.” To this work he attached an image of the crucifixion, from which he borrows, among other things, arguments against Monophysitism. “Here,” says Anastasius, turning to the crucifix, “the Son of God hangs on the cross; this is God the Word, soul and body. Which of these three suffered death and lost his life? The heretic answers: the body of Christ. And not the soul? No". Having brought this confession to this, the author of Όδηγος says: “Why are you not ashamed to add to the song of the Trisagion: crucified for us?” He attaches such great importance to this argument that he conjures the copyists of his work, along with the text, to transmit intact the image attached to it. Whether due to this desire of the Sinaite, or due to some other reasons, only this image has been preserved to this day in the manuscript of the Vienna Library, which contains the works of the Sinaite. In the field of staurography, the cross of Anastasia Sinaita is important as the prototype of the Byzantine crucifixes, conveying the main features of Greek crucifixes. This cross has two transverse branches: one replaces a tablet or title, the hands of the Savior are nailed to the other; in addition, there is a wide foot; therefore, it is an osmic-pointed cross. Christ is represented as already dead, bowing his head crowned with a halo; a stream of blood flows from the perforated rib; both legs are nailed down; the whole figure moved to the right side; the middle of the body, up to the knees, is covered with a bandage. The inscription on the cross: Iс Хс; on the sides: Θεός λόγος, σώμα, ψυχή. 202 Another, even more ancient of the surviving images of the crucifixion, is among the miniatures of the famous Syrian gospel of Rabbulah. Its homeland is the Zagba monastery in Mesopotamia, and now it forms one of the precious treasures of the famous library of St. Lawrence in Florence. The manuscript, dating back to 586, contains several images from the life of the Savior and between them, in the foreground, His crucifixion. The latter is presented in a complex picture, with all the settings and details of the depicted event extracted from the gospel narrative and apocrypha. Christ is nailed to the cross among two thieves; He is wearing a long sleeveless tunic. On His sides are two warriors, one of whom pierces the Savior’s rib with a spear, and the other gives Him a sponge soaked in ocet. At the foot of the cross, three soldiers divide His clothing; at a distance from the cross, on the one hand - the Mother of God and the Apostle John with a look of deep sorrow, on the other - a group of women who turned their gaze to the Crucified One. Above, on the sides of the cross, the sun and moon are in a disk, and among them, above the head of the Crucified One, is the inscription: “This is the king of the Jews.” 203 If we turn from these works of the Greek brush to the contemporary Western crucifixes, then it will be impossible not to admit that Eastern art in presenting this subject went further than Western art and, earlier than the latter, resolved the issue of depicting the crucified Christ in its own form. The latter continued to idealize this plot and tried in every possible way to soften and weaken the heavy impression at the sight of the humiliated, suffering Savior. This difference in the nature of the artistic type of Western and Eastern crucifixes began to emerge especially noticeably from the 8th and 9th centuries and became the subject of controversy between the Greeks and Latins during the era of the division of churches. Cardinal Humbert, in one of his works, the so-called “Dialogus inter Romanum et Constantinopolitanum,” directed against the Greeks, blames them for the fact that they depict the crucified Christ as a man close to death. What Humbert wanted to say by this can be seen from the response to this accusation of Patriarch Michael Cerullarius. “You reproach us,” says the latter, “for not allowing the natural human appearance of Christ to be changed into an unnatural one”... It naturally follows from this that the Greeks depicted the Crucified One with all the signs of a suffering and dying person, which aroused discontent on the part of the Latins, who held to the idealized type of crucifixions and found the Byzantine type too real, not consistent with the dignity of the face of Christ. The further complication of crucifixions went hand in hand with the development of their symbolism. The latter was especially loved in the Middle Ages, to whom the credit of creating the symbolic iconography of the cross and crucifix undoubtedly belongs. We consider it not superfluous to dwell here on some of the more characteristic and ancient symbolic accessories of the crucifixion. 204 Both in the writings of the fathers and in the works of church hymnography, a desire to bring the cross closer to the “tree of life” and to draw a parallel between these significant objects begins to be felt very early. “The tree of life, planted by God in paradise,” says John of Damascus, “prefigured the cross, because just as through the tree death entered the world, so through the tree life and resurrection must be given to us.” Based on this rapprochement, a whole legend of such content was then formed. 205 When Adam became seriously ill and felt death approaching, he sent his son Seth to the gates of heaven to ask an angel for a branch from the tree of life. Seth fulfilled his father's instructions, but when he returned, he found him already dead. He buried him and planted the branch he brought on the grave; it began and grew into a huge tree, which in the time of Solomon was cut down to build the Temple of Jerusalem, but despite all the efforts of the craftsmen, it could not be used and was thrown into the Kidron stream. Here it lay unused for a long time and remained untouched until the time of Christ; then the cross of Christ was made from it. The genealogy of the tree of the cross, depicted in this legend, was adopted by art and gave rise to the depiction of the cross in the form of a green tree or a tree trunk with branches; sometimes the longitudinal and transverse beams of the cross were decorated with carvings representing living climbing plants. In the first type, the crucifixion is depicted on many monuments of Western art and, among other things, on the vessel of Theodolinda described above; the cross here is clearly represented as an arbor vitae. 206 Among the accessories of the crucifixion, the image of the sun and the moon was accepted and widespread, either in the form of their astronomical signs, or in the form of two figures, male and female, usually placed in medallions above the head of the Savior. The sun is always represented on the right side, and the moon on the left. With this personification, Christian art more or less successfully tried to depict the moment of general numbness of nature and darkness that heralded the death of the God-man (Luke 23:43–45). On some crucifixes, half-length human figures, personifying the sun and moon, are presented with drooping heads, as a sign of grief; on others, they cover their faces either with a scarf or with both their hands. Ancient art considered the sun, and with it the moon, a necessary accessory to crucifixes, and therefore images of these heavenly bodies are found in most crucifixes of both Western and Eastern origin. The symbolism of the foot of the crucifix is ​​particularly rich and varied; in its various combinations it provides material for characterizing the most dogmatic ideas characteristic of a particular era. Of the accessories of this last category, the most ancient can be considered the image of a serpent or dragon with an apple in its mouth, writhing at the foot of the cross. This symbol of the serpent (or dragon) of the tempter, trampled underfoot by the cross, was in use even under Constantine the Great; 207 then it came to life with renewed vigor in medieval art and, finally, in the works of eastern staurography it appeared in the shape of a crescent under a cross. We mostly explain the last cross attribute in the sense of a symbol of Mohammedanism defeated by Christianity. Instead of a serpent, and often in conjunction with it, under the feet of the Crucified One or at the foot of the cross, a dead head was depicted, sometimes alone, sometimes with two crosswise folded bones. The representation of a skull and crossbones under a cross is an integral part of modern crucifixions. Ancient art and church literature provide both written and artistic motifs for this symbolic detail. The skull placed under the feet of the Savior or at the foot of the cross serves as a symbol of Adam's skull, and the relationship between Adam and Christ is known. “In Adam we all die, but in Christ we live” (1 Cor. 15:21–22). In this sense, Christ is called the New Adam. Among the ancient church writers (Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian, Athanasius, Jerome, Epiphanius, Basil the Great and others) there is even an opinion that Adam was buried on Golgotha, in the very place where Christ was later crucified, and that due to the burial of the remains of this forefather there, the place itself was called the frontal. Subsequently, this opinion was given a poetic coloring, and a whole apocryphal legend arose about the burial of Adam, conveyed in the so-called Book of Adam. According to this legend, Noah, at the command of God, took Adam’s body with him into the ark and, dying, instructed Shem to bury it in the place that God Himself would appoint for this through an angel. Following this instruction, Shem and Melchizedek, so says this legend, buried the body of Adam on Golgotha ​​and on the way to the burial place they heard the following voice: “In the country where we are going, the Word of God will appear and suffer, and in the place where I will be buried, It will be crucified and water my skull with His blood. Then my redemption will be completed.” Church art took advantage of this legend and introduced it into the cycle of its representations. Following him, they began to depict at the foot of the cross either the head of Adam, or the figure of a man protruding halfway from the tomb with his gaze and hands turned to the crucified Savior. A curious monument in this respect is the 12th-century ivory carving of a crucifix taken by Professor Pieper in his Evangelical Calendar for 1861. The Savior is represented as nailed to the cross; two female weeping figures, with the signs of the sun and moon, represent personifications of the latter. At the very feet of the Savior is a cup into which flows the blood shed on the cross; under the bowl there is a writhing dragon, and even lower - a figure of a man half protruding from the ground with outstretched hands and a gaze turned to the Savior. This is Adam. The variants of this figure are very numerous, and, comparing different forms of cross images of the medieval cycle, one can notice different motives and shades in the reproduction of this additional part of the crucifixes. Although both the figure rising from the coffin and especially the skull and bones at the foot of the cross belong to later medieval art and are not found on ancient monuments, nevertheless, this symbolic detail of the crucifixion is important and remarkable in its relation to the depiction of the resurrection of Christ. It should be noted that the last subject in later iconography is depicted completely differently than on monuments of ancient Christian art. The Ancient Church, faithful to historical truth and the Gospel narrative that the resurrection of Jesus Christ took place secretly, without witnesses, did not depict the very moment of the resurrection and did not know Christ ascending or, if I may put it this way, flying out of the tomb, as it appears on modern icons. Ancient art depicted the resurrection either at the moment of the myrrh-bearing women visiting the open tomb with an angel sitting on a stone next to it, the messenger of the resurrection, or it brought this event closer to the history of the crucifixion. We have already seen a remarkable experience of such an image in the drawing at the bottom of the vessel sent to the Longobard queen Theodolinda by Gregory the Great. The following painting on a sarcophagus in the Lateran Museum should also be attributed to the same artistic cycle. The front part of the sarcophagus represents the appearance of a portal formed from columns; between the latter there is a cross surmounted by the monogram of Christ, surrounded by a palm wreath. At the foot of the cross there is a coffin and two warriors sleep near it, leaning on their shield. In this characteristic symbolic-historical picture three moments are grouped: the cross, the tomb and the resurrection of Christ. The main part of the bas-relief represents a scene at the tomb of Christ, as indicated by the figures of two warriors sitting at the entrance to it. But the picture captures a wider range of ideas and at the same time reproduces the very story of the crucifixion and resurrection. The first is indicated by the cross - the main subject of the whole picture. Above the cross, on both sides, two faces are visible: one in a radiant crown and depicts the sun, the other with a sickle and serves as the personification of the moon; and the sun and moon, as stated above, form a common accessory to crucifixes. The decoration of the cross clearly indicates the resurrection: the laurel wreath decorating the upper part of it, with the monogram of the name of Christ, constitutes the emblem of the resurrection, and the eagle soaring above the cross and dominating the entire picture, does not it also denote a symbol of the resurrection, according to the words of the prophet: “Your youth will be renewed like an eagle” (Ps. 53:5)? Thus, in this concise but richly meaningful picture, art brought together the three main events from the life of the God-man: suffering, death and victory over hell. In connection with the symbolism of the cross and on the basis of it, the widespread representation in ancient Christian art of the resurrection of Christ under the image of the descent into hell was developed. This is, so to speak, the final act of the story of the cross, immediately preceding the resurrection itself. As the Conqueror of death, Christ was depicted with a cross in his hand, standing on the ropes of hell; the latter was sometimes personified in the form of a defeated dragon or some other monster. On the sides of the triumphant Christ there is a row of open coffins with forefathers, prophets and kings rising from there. All of them, with a deep sense of tenderness, extend their eyes and hands to the Savior. All these resurrected representatives of the Old Testament world are dominated by the figure of Adam, who is on the right side of Christ and is taken out of the tomb by Him. To create this grandiose and complex picture, Christian art, no doubt, took advantage of various apocryphal legends, among which the first place should be taken by the so-called Gospel of Nicodemus, where (II part ch. 17-27) an entire religious poem appears before us, in which the event of Christ’s descent into hell is depicted in all details. Church speakers and compilers of church services drew their inspiration from this source, 208 theologians turned to it, and iconography borrowed motifs and accessories for images of the resurrection from it. “And immediately,” says the Gospel of Nicodemus, “the brass gates were broken and the iron bars were broken, and all the bound dead were released from their bonds. And the King of glory went as a man, and all the prisons of hell were illuminated... The King of glory stretched out His right hand, took and raised up the forefather Adam. Then, turning to the others, he said: here are all with Me, killed by the tree that he touched; Here I am again raising you all up with the wood of the cross. And then He began to drive everyone out, and the forefather Adam, filled with joy, said: I thank Your greatness, Lord, that You brought me out of the underworld. Likewise, all the prophets and saints said: we thank You, Christ, Savior of the world, that You have raised up our life from corruption.” 209 Comparing with these passages the details of our image, even in miniatures of the 12th–13th centuries, one cannot help but notice that it is closely related to the Gospel of Nicodemus and is completely out of its content. Both there and here the event of the resurrection of Christ is presented in connection with the descent into hell and the resurrection of the dead. What we now consider one of the closest fruits of the resurrection and an expression of triumph over death, ancient art did not separate from the act of resurrection itself. The current stichera of Great Saturday: “Today hell is crying out...”, which depicts the cry of hell being destroyed by Christ and losing its prisoners, according to the ancient Greek triodions and our ancient handwritten rules, they rely on vespers on the first day of Easter, and this shows that their content directly related to the event of the resurrection of Christ, was inextricably connected with it and in fact is nothing more than a poetic commentary on ancient images of the resurrection of Christ under the image of the descent into hell. It is easy to guess that the representation of the resurrection of Christ under the image of the descent into hell and the accessories of the crucifixion in the form of the head of Adam or his half-length figure at the foot of the cross stand with each other in a close logical and historical connection, which Christian art clearly understood and reproduced in two related iconographic subjects. By depicting the Savior under the cross or one figure of the resurrecting Adam, or surrounding Him with a whole row of dead men rising from their graves, it wanted to present the dark event of the humiliation of Christ from its bright side. Modern art has not understood these religious and aesthetic ideals of ancient Christian art and, guided by the idea of ​​a humiliated Christ, has presented the picture of the crucifixion primarily from its gloomy and heavy side. The crown of thorns with which, instead of a radiance or a royal diadem, surrounded the head of the Crucified, a body exhausted by suffering, in which all the bones can, it seems, be counted, the imprint of suffering on the entire figure and, in addition, the naked skull at the foot of the cross - all this paints the image with too dark colors. God-man and alien to the ideal motifs of ancient Christian art. From the history of the sign of the cross In connection with the issue of images of the cross on monuments of Christian art, there is the sign of the cross or the image of the cross through the movement of the hand during prayer and blessing. Despite the widespread prevalence of this sign among Christians, ancient evidence, written and preserved on monuments, leads us to a conclusion that is far from being as general and decisive as might be expected on the basis of current practice. The position of ancient Christians during prayer was different. They turned their faces to the east, prayed standing and sitting, bowed their heads and knees, made bows and prostrations, fell on their faces, and raised their hands. The most common and common of these actions was raising or raising hands (έπαρσις των χειρών, elevatio manuum). It was used by almost all ancient pre-Christian peoples and is found in the meaning of a prayer technique on Etruscan, Greek and Roman monuments. Standing or kneeling, with their eyes turned to the east and their hands raised to the sky, this is how the pagans usually prayed. Habitus orantium hic est, Apuleius testifies, 210 ut manibus extensis in coelum precemur. The Jews prayed by raising their hands to heaven, and the Psalmist, speaking of raising his hands, 211 had in mind the actual custom that accompanied prayer in his time. Pseudophilo tells of the therapists that they prayed sublatis in coelum oculis et manibus. 212 On the part of the ancient Christians, who came from Jews and pagans, it was therefore completely natural to adhere to their former prayer sign. The Holy Apostle Paul directly expressed the desire “that men in every place should say prayers, lifting up clean hands without anger or doubting” (1 Tim. 2:8). A number of testimonies from ancient church writers: Justin, Minucius Felix, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Chrysostom, Ambrose of Milan, Dionysius the Areopagite, Asterius of Amasia, Theodoret, Augustine, John Climacus, Isaac the Syrian, Cassian and others 213 not only introduces us to the existence raising of hands during prayer among Christians, but also indicates the preferable use of this prayer technique over all others. “We Christians always pray for all emperors,” writes Tertullian in his apology, “raising our eyes to heaven, stretching out our hands freely, because they are clean, with our heads naked, because we have nothing to be ashamed of, and, finally, without a veil, because our prayer comes from the heart.” In another of his works, Tertullian expresses himself even more clearly about the prayer sign of the early Christians: “The consciousness of the crimes of their fathers does not allow the Israelites to raise their hands to heaven, lest the new Isaiah exclaim to them: alas, a sinful tongue (Is. 1:4)! Or Jesus Christ Himself would not have abhorred them. But we not only raise, but also freely stretch out our hands to heaven, just as Christ stretched them out on the cross, and in this humiliated position we boldly confess our Lord.” 214 “Stretching out your hands during prayer is the usual way of praying saints,” according to St. Basil the Great. 215 Remaining for a long time in prayer with their hands raised to heaven, Christian women sometimes became so tired from tension that they had to resort to the services of strangers and force others to hold their hands up, perhaps imitating the example of Moses, to whom Aaron and Hur provided such assistance (Ex. 17:11-12). Monuments of ancient Christian art preserved in the catacombs put beyond any doubt the use by ancient Christians of raising their hands during prayer. No other prayer sign is found as often in catacomb painting as the method of prayer with raised hands. It is hardly possible to find one such chapel in the catacombs in which there would not be so-called orantes, or, what is the same, those praying with raised hands. 216 The Icon of the Sign of the Mother of God, the prototype of which dates back to ancient times and is located in the tomb of St. Agnes, 217 can give the reader a clear idea of ​​the catacomb orantes. The prayer sign we are considering survived the early Christian era, was kept in church practice throughout the Middle Ages, and exists in liturgical use to this day. Remarks found in the text of ancient liturgies and ancient Greek statutes, testifying to the practice of the X-XII and subsequent centuries, most clearly prove the antiquity of this custom. And it is remarkable that these instructions relate to such parts of the divine service that have come down from ancient times, as the customs of the primal church. For example, the Six Psalms at Matins are nothing more than a modified form of the ancient psalmody during the morning meetings of the early Christians for prayer. At this time, according to the instructions of the ancient charters, those present prayed while standing, with their hands extended upward. In the charter of Sava of Serbia, in the order of the morning service it is said that when they begin to read the prayers of light, then “all hands will be raised according to the scripture: lift up your hands into the holy one, and again: in lifting up my hand, the evening sacrifice.” 218 “Having raised our hands,” we read in the service of the Lenten Triodion, in the following Psalter of Cyprian, Metropolitan of Moscow, “let us stand praying in our thoughts, saying the prayer of St. Ephraim: Lord, Master of my life." 219 The last prayer of Lenten, according to the hitherto valid church regulations, should be performed with raised hands. Now this method of prayer has been retained in the liturgy, when the clergyman, raising his hands, prays before the throne during the Cherubic Song and before the consecration of gifts. Having at first retained the usual expression of a prayerful mood, the early Christians very early gave their meaning to the raising of hands during prayer. In Tertullian's treatise De oratione (p. XVII) we find an example of the desire to assimilate this method of prayer (raising of hands) with a special Christian meaning. Tertullian insists that Christians, when praying, should not raise their hands too much, as the pagans did, but only spread (expandere) them in a horizontal position 220... Although he condemns the first method of prayer for the fact that it allegedly expresses conceit and immodesty, but, obviously, his preference for the second method is based on its analogy with the figure of the cross of Christ and recalls, as Tertullian himself puts it, the suffering of the Lord. 221 It is clear that next to the raising of hands, the most ancient Christians could have had their own special Christian prayer sign, which at first, perhaps, was not as common and widespread as the raising of hands. From the very beginning of the existence of the church, Christians could depict on themselves and others and, at every opportunity, use the cross of Christ as a sacred reminder of the salvation and life granted through it. 222 According to St. Basil the Great, Christians undoubtedly adopted the custom of marking themselves with the sign of the cross from apostolic tradition. 223 In the apocryphal gospel of Nicodemus about the sons of Simeon the God-Receiver, Charina and Leucia, who were resurrected at the hour of Christ’s death, it is reported that before they began to tell the Sanhedrin about their resurrection, “they made an image of the cross on their faces.” 224 In later writings there are often indications that the apostles themselves marked both others and themselves with the sign of the cross. 225 Under the apostolic men, especially in the period immediately following the apostolic period, the sign of the cross became widespread and sanctified, one might say, the entire Christian life. “With every success and good fortune,” wrote Tertullian, “at every entrance and exit, when dressing and putting on shoes, starting a meal, lighting lamps, going to bed, sitting down to do any activity, we protect our forehead with the sign of the cross (signaculo crucis frontem terimus).” 226 Cyril of Jerusalem, Chrysostom, Ephraim the Syrian and others express themselves in the same sense about the sign of the cross. 227 How did the early Christians depict the sign of the cross on themselves? To do this, we now fold the fingers of our right hand in a certain way and then, placing the latter on the forehead, chest, right and left shoulders, we thus depict a cross on ourselves in large sizes. In Christian antiquity there was neither such a build, nor that wide arm span, which becomes necessary with the current method of marking oneself with a cross. True, in the caricature of the crucifixion, found during excavations in the palace of the Caesars on the Palatine Hill, there seems to be an indication that Christians from the very first times already prayed like us, raising their right hand to their faces to depict a large cross on themselves. The Christian Alexamen seems to be depicted with just such a prayerful gesture; but this image does not lead to the stated conclusion. In this image you need to see nothing more than a reproduction of a very common ancient gesture, which consisted in the fact that the Greeks and Romans, when greeting their gods, raised their right hand to their lips, as if sending a kiss. Apuleius in the famous poem “The Golden Ass” expresses himself this way about the citizens of the city who came to bow to Psyche: they, putting their right hand to their lips and placing their first finger on the outstretched index, worshiped this queen as a goddess. 228 One might think that Job had this same custom in mind when, justifying himself to his friends for some secret crimes for which he allegedly suffered, he among other things said to them: “Seeing the light of the sun, how it shines, and the moon, how it walks majestically, was I deceived in the secret of my heart, and in honor of them did my lips kiss my hand” ( Job 31:26-27 )? The ancients, instead of our large cross, used small crosses, placing them on different parts of the body separately - on the forehead, on the chest, on the lips, on the hands, on the eyes and on the shoulders. In the work of St. Hippolytus of Rome says about the Antichrist: “He will give (the Antichrist) to them (the believers) a sign on their right hand and on their forehead, so that no one can make a cross with their right hand on their forehead, but his hand will be tied, and from this he will not be able to signify his members.” The church fathers and ancient church writers urged people not to be ashamed of the cross of Christ and to openly depict it on themselves, especially on the forehead, as on the most visible part of the body. “The sign of the cross,” according to Chrysostom, “is daily inscribed on our forehead, as if on a pillar,” or, as Ambrose of Milan wrote, “the sign is placed on the forehead, as a place of shame, so that we are not ashamed to confess the crucified Christ, Who is not ashamed to call us brothers.” “Let us not be ashamed of the cross of Christ,” exhorted Cyril of Jerusalem, “even if someone conceals it, you are clearly a seal on your forehead.” “We, being Christians, will begin to evade the pagans and Jews...,” wrote Ephraim the Syrian, “we will crown our forehead with a precious and life-giving cross.” “It is not without reason,” notes Blessed Augustine, “that Christ deigned that His sign should be imprinted on our forehead, as a place of modesty; this is so that the Christian will not be ashamed of the reproach of Christ.” 229 Church archeology also provides evidence consistent with this evidence. Preserved in the catacombs, on the bottom of a glass vessel, the image of a young Christian with a small four-pointed cross painted on his forehead, and around the inscription: Liber nica, further confirms the idea that ancient Christians had the custom of depicting small crosses on the members of their bodies, mainly on the forehead. 230 Together, or, better said, simultaneously with the latter, the ancients loved to baptize their breasts - the seat of the heart. “If you notice,” says Chrysostom, 231, “that your heart begins to ignite, then σφράγισον στηφος (chest), τόν σταυρόν έπιθείς.” If by laying a cross on their forehead Christians testified to their confession, their faith in the Crucified One, then by protecting their chest or heart with the sign of the cross, they wanted to express their devotion, their love for Him. Implying this or that thought, expressing this or that feeling, they crossed their lips, eyes and shoulders. “Let us raise this sign (the cross), says Origen, 232, “let us wear the signs of victory on our shoulders and on our foreheads.” “We will wear the cross,” exhorts Ephraim the Syrian, “on our forehead, and on our eyes, and on our lips, and on our chests, and on all our members.” 233 “Knowing that we are flesh,” we read in the Cheti-Minea on the 1st of April about the Venerable Mary of Egypt, “and not a spirit, not a living ghost, sign the sign of the cross on our forehead, and eyes, and mouth, and chest.” 234 To commemorate one or another member of the body, the ancient Christians made either one cross on it, or three in a row, one after the other. According to John Moschus, St. Julian, Bishop of Bostra, when a glass of poison was given to him, “placed on the glass a threefold image of the cross with his finger and said: In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” 235 As for the question of how many and with which fingers the ancient Christians made the sign of the cross on themselves, there are no positive church decrees or instructions about this in the ancient written monuments. In the same way, monuments of ancient Christian art, providing material for distinguishing finger formations, may not have a decisive, but only statistical significance in the question posed, providing the researcher with grounds for conclusions about the greatest repeatability of certain prayer techniques, this or that finger formation. Even in the later period of Christian painting, in the so-called mosaic period, a definite model was not developed on this subject in iconography, but indifferently different methods were used, and this depended, of course, on the fact that later works of painting and mosaics were copied from the most ancient examples, where a wide variety prevailed in this regard. The ancient Christians, one can resolutely insist, did not adhere to, or, better said, did not follow one specific finger formation: they depicted the sign of the cross on themselves with one hand, and with one finger, and with fingers. In Book VIII of the Apostolic Constitutions it is noted that before the beginning of the Liturgy of the Faithful, the bishop must behave in the following way. “The bishop, praying within himself together with the priests, dressed in light clothes and standing in front of the altar, making the sign of the cross on his forehead with his hand (tropaeum crucis in fronte manu faciat..., το τρόπαιον του σταυρού κατά "Let the grace of the Almighty Father and the love of our Lord I. Christ, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all." 236 In the above words there is not a word about fingers and finger formations; from them it is only clear that the ancients were baptized with their hands. From other ancient evidence it is clear that in the first times churches most often depicted a cross with one finger (δακτύλω, digito). “When you signify yourself with a cross,” says Chrysostom, “then imagine all the significance of the cross. It should not just be depicted with a finger (δακτύλω), but it should be preceded by a heartfelt disposition and complete faith.” 237 Contemporary of Chrysostom, St. Epiphanius of Cyprus about a certain Joseph, whom he knew personally, says that he, “with his own finger, placing the seal of the cross on the vessel and calling on the name of Jesus, said: in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, let there be in this water power to destroy all witchcraft.” 238 Blessed Jerome about St. Mother Paulae testifies that before her death, “holding her finger over her lips, she made the sign of the cross on them” (In. Epit. s. Paulae). Blessed Theodoret of Cyrus about St. Marcian, who came from the city of Cyrus, writes: “The saint imagined the sign of the cross with his finger, and with his lips he blew on him (the serpent), and, like a reed from the fire, the serpent immediately disappeared,” and about the Monk Julian: “having called on the Lord and showing the victory sign with his finger, he drove away all fear.” “When the great dragon wanted to attack St. Donatus, then he, according to the historian Sozomen, with his finger depicted the sign of the cross in the air in front of him and spat; the saliva got into the beast’s mouth and he died.” 239 Gregory Dvoeslov writes about the monk Martyria: “he made the sign of the cross with his finger”..., and about the presbyter Amantius: “the man of God depicted the cross with his finger.” 240 From a whole series of evidence just cited, it follows by itself that single-fingered was an ancient, existing and significantly widespread form of finger formation for centuries. The ancients loved to depict the sign of the cross on themselves with one finger, since it was convenient when laying small crosses on each member of the body separately and clearly showed the unity of God to polytheists, and reminded them of one of the main dogmas of Christianity. 241 But on the basis of the indicated patristic passages, it cannot be decisively asserted that the single finger was in the Orthodox Church the original and oldest form of finger formation, which foreshadowed all others, as was stated in the forties and again casually repeated in the most recent times in our church historical literature. St. Cyril of Jerusalem, an elder contemporary († 386) of Chrysostom (b. 347), the first church writer who preserved for us evidence of the existence of one finger in the sign of the cross among the early Christians, in one of his catechetical teachings, delivered by him around 347, 242 said, as noted above, to those preparing for holy baptism: “Let us not be ashamed to confess the Crucified One; with boldness let us depict with our fingers (δακτύλοις) the sign of the cross on our foreheads and on everything”... 243 Thus remaining faithful to one chronological sequence of evidence, one cannot help but see that many fingers existed in the Christian Church, if not earlier than single fingers, then not later. The many-fingered and single-fingered signs of the cross could simultaneously appear and exist in the Christian church, without displacing or excluding each other. One cannot help but regret that St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who taught his contemporaries to depict the sign of the cross with their fingers, did not say about their number. From his words: “with boldness let us depict with our fingers the sign of the cross on our foreheads and on everything,” it is not clear whether he meant five fingers, three fingers, or something else. Its indefinite expression: σταυρός γννέσθω, it must be assumed, is equivalent to the above remark of the Apostolic Constitutions on this issue: τό τρόπαιον του σταυροΰ κατά του μετώπου τη χειρί ποιησάμενος… In any case, in the words of St. Cyril of Jerusalem: let us depict the sign of the cross with our fingers; looking for indications of the existence at that time of two or three fingers would be a bold attempt, absolutely not based on anything. Double-finger, according to the conclusion of our and foreign scientists who have seriously studied it, appeared in the Christian Church in connection with Christological disputes, namely, Monophysitism. When the Monophysites began to look at the single finger, hitherto used in the sign of the cross, as a symbolic, visual expression of their teaching about the one nature in Jesus Christ, then the Orthodox, contrary to the Monophysites, began to sign themselves with two fingers, thereby confessing two natures in Christ. 244 From here it naturally follows that double-fingeredness is also an ancient form of finger formation, which began at the end of the fifth century, but is later not only in comparison with multi-fingered and single-fingered, indications of the existence of which have been preserved to us since the 4th century, but also with triplicate. The latter, i.e. the existence in the Christian Church of three fingers before two fingers should be an indisputable, undeniable position in the eyes of the very defenders of the theory of a gradual, so to speak, complication of the formation of the finger for the sign of the cross in connection with the development of Christian doctrine. The appearance of the two-fingered sign of the cross, according to their completely fair words, completely consistent with historical evidence, is in close connection with the Monophysite heresy; three-fingered, expressing the doctrine of St. The Trinity, according to this theory, should have arisen during disputes about the trinity and consubstantiality of persons in the Divinity. Disputes concerning the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, as is known, preceded Christological ones, and from this it follows that the three-fingered sign of the cross should have appeared before the two-fingered sign. That this assumption is consistent with history, that triplicity actually had a connection with dogmatic disputes about St. The Trinity was already known to Christians at that time; this, to some extent, it seems to us, is confirmed by the well-known story about St. Meletia of Antioch, as it is transmitted by church historians: Theodoret, Sozomen and Nikephoros Callistus. 245 When the Orthodox asked at the Antioch Council of St. Meletia, ut compendiariam ipsis doctrinam traderet, ostensis tribus digitis ac deinde duobus compressis unoque ut erat relicto, τρεις ύποδείξας δακτόλους, είτα τους δύο συναγαγών καί τον ενα καταλιπών, memorabilem illam protulit sententiam: tria sunt, quae intelliguntur, sed tanquam unum alloquimur, Τρία τα νοούμενα, ώς ένί δε διαλεγόμεθα. 246 Saint Meletius needed to briefly and at the same time clearly express at the council, before a great multitude of people, the Orthodox teaching about the trinity and at the same time the consubstantiality of persons in the Divinity, and so he resorted to a visual symbolic sign. He first shows three fingers, and then, bending two of them, leaves one and says: We mean three, but we speak as one. These words in themselves are rather vague, this compendiaria doctrina of Meletius would not have achieved its goal, would have remained incomprehensible to many of his listeners, if it had not been accompanied by St. father with a commonly used prayer gesture, well known to everyone from early religious and ritual practice. 247 We do not undertake the difficult task of following how in the future existence the three, so to speak, main forms of sign formation that we have noted took precedence over one another, became predominant in one or another Christian country as a result of this or that phenomenon in the field of church doctrine, nor to decide the question of due to what historical reasons the prayer sign in question first, in the era of the division of churches, was modified and diversified, and then from the 13th century in the Greek East, unknown by whom, it began to be reduced to uniformity next to other church ritual actions. We will note only one feature in the literary history of the issue that interests us, namely the absence of positive instructions on the method of making a cross in liturgical monuments, 248 where it would be most natural to find an explanation of how to lay a cross on oneself during prayer. Despite the wide variety in the method of making the sign, both Greek and our liturgical books talk only about bowing or throwing, kneeling and raising hands during prayer, but do not mention anything about how to be baptized at the same time, or even whether it is necessary. In any case, it is remarkable that when it comes to throwing, the sign of the cross is completely silent, and they talk about raising the hands, the number of bows; between the latter, large and small ones are distinguished, and it is indicated in what intervals and with what prayers to put them. 249 The liturgical books thus stopped at the ancient Christian methods of prayer and did not include on their pages the later methods of prayer in the form of the sign of the cross, which was one way or another supposed. We know of only one indication in the latter sense, found in the synodal charter of the 12th century. If the monk does not arrive in time for the beginning of the service, it is noted here in the article on how to enter the church, he must make three bows in front of the church doors, then make the sign of the cross on his forehead and mark the perch, and stand in his place. How should we understand this sign of the cross between the forehead and the perseus? Do we see in it two techniques of the full sign of the cross, two swings of the arm, or does it simply mean that it was necessary to separately cross first the forehead and then the chest? In view of ancient Christian practice, one cannot help but be inclined to the latter opinion. In conclusion of our essay, we will make a few comments about the making of the finger during blessing, without going into the intricacies of this complex issue. The most ancient method of blessing was the laying of hands on the head (χειροθεσία, impositio manuum), and like the raising of hands, with which it is closely related, it was known to the pre-Christian world. The Jews were well acquainted with this custom of blessing. Blessing the sons of Joseph before his death, “Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the head of Ephraim... and his left hand on the head of Manasseh” (Gen. 48:14). Sanctified in the new testament by the example of the Savior Himself, who blessed children through the laying on of hands, 250 and the apostles, 251 the custom of blessing by laying on of hands became widespread in the ancient Christian church. As a necessary component, the laying on of hands was included in ancient times in the performance of almost all sacraments and many church rites. 252 Through the laying on of hands, priests usually blessed the laity in the ancient church. Exhorting women not to adorn their heads with other people's hair, Clement of Alexandria says: τίνα δε ευλογήσει; ού την γυναίκα την κεκοσμημένην, άλλα τάς αλλότριας τρίχας καί δι αυτών οίλλην κεφαλήν. 253 From a very early time, the now indicated method of blessing was joined in the Christian Church by the custom of baptism (σφραγίζειν), somewhat reminiscent of the blessing used by Jews on solemn occasions by raising the hand. 254 When discussing the making of the sign of the cross, we talked in some detail about what and how Christians baptized; Now let us briefly note that in almost the same way in ancient times, consecrated persons blessed the people and performed various kinds of consecrations during church services. 255 It is curious that the initial method of blessing in its development resembles much, or, better said, repeats from the history of making the sign of the cross. As far as can be judged from the later data available on this subject, in the ancient church they blessed the whole hand, and two and three fingers, individual members of the body, and the whole face of a person. The Gospel of Nicodemus tells about the Savior Himself that during His descent into hell, after His resurrection, He “blessed Adam on his forehead with the sign of the cross and did the same to the patriarchs, prophets, martyrs and forefathers.” 256 An unknown Greek of the 12th century, listing in his article the various errors of the Latins, among other things wrote the following in denunciation of their archpastors: “some somehow bless with five fingers and mark the face with a finger, like the Monothelites, while the fingers in signs should be positioned so that two natures and three faces are signified through them, as Christ showed when, ascending into heaven, he raised his hands His own and blessed his disciples.” 257 On the so-called Korsun Gate in the Novgorod St. Sophia Cathedral, the Latin Bishop Alexander is presented with a two-fingered blessing. 258 Leo IV, Pope of Rome, has the following instruction regarding the blessing of the holy gifts: “mark the cup and bread with the correct cross, i.e. not around and somehow with your fingers, as many do, but by extending two fingers and folding your thumb inward, through which the Trinity is signified, correctly try to depict this sign, + for you can only bless something.” 259 Luke, Bishop of Tudente (in Spain, †1288), makes no difference at all in the formation of the sign of the cross and blessing when he says: tribus digitis extensis, id est, pollice, indice et medio, duobus aliis plicatis, sub invocatione Deficae Trinitatis, nos et alios consignamus. 260 As for the form in which the fingers were folded for blessing in the ancient Christian church, from an archaeological point of view this question is not easily resolved, because the monuments of Christian art give us so many different types of blessing techniques that it seems impossible to bring them to one rule. A lot of coins have come down to us, for example, from the Byzantine era; On their stamps we often see images of a blessing hand, which are not at all similar to one another. On the coins of Justinian, the Savior is represented holding his right hand, apparently for a blessing: the last three fingers are clenched and bent to the palm, the index finger is extended upward, the thumb is not visible. On the coins of Mikhail Rangava, two fingers of the blessing hand, index and middle, are raised together, the other two are slightly bent, but not bent, the big one is not visible. On coins of the surname of Basil the Macedonian, the blessing hand of the Savior is not folded in the same way: on some, all the fingers are separated, on others, the last three are clenched. The last image of the finger formation is also visible on some coins of Constantine and Romanus. On the coins of the Laskaris surname, the blessing is depicted in this way: the last three fingers are pressed together and bent, the index finger is raised up, the thumb is not visible. On coin images of the Palaiologos surname, both hands of the youth Jesus are represented as blessing: the first two fingers are extended straight, the other two are bent, the thumb is placed on them. 261 Works of ancient Christian painting, sculpture and mosaics present even more variety in images of the blessing hand than coins. The difficulty of reducing diversity to unity, of drawing any scientific conclusions about the method of making a blessing sign, in addition to the poor preservation of artistic monuments in most cases, is often increased by the fact that images of Christ and saints, which are usually called blessings, do not have such a meaning in reality and originate from ancient images representing orators and philosophers. The ancients loved to accompany their words with gestures; pagan orators and philosophers, before making any speeches or expounding their teachings, usually resorted to a wide variety of body movements, as if greeting their listeners, or arousing their attention. At an evening held by a noble woman, Hypatia Burrea, one of the guests, according to Apuleius, began his story by taking the following pose: having picked up the carpet on which he was sitting near him and raised himself a little on his elbow, he raised his right hand and, following the example of the orators, skillfully formed a gesture, bending the last two fingers to the palm, and holding the rest free. 262 There is nothing more common than to encounter this or a similar gesture with images in ancient painting and plastic arts. In ancient paintings, this gesture is often supplemented by a scroll, which is held in the hands of orators, philosophers and generally learned people, and something like a tub or basket (scrinium) at their feet, with several books or scrolls. One has only to remember how many similar images are found in the catacombs when it comes to Christ as a teacher, about the apostles and prophets, as preachers, to be convinced, if not of the identity, then at least of the close connection of these historical-symbolic subjects and their attributes with the usual methods of representing rhetoricians and philosophers by classical painters and sculptors. Having arisen and grown on soil saturated with the traditions of the centuries-old life of the ancient world, young Christian art, as is now well known, took advantage of everything from classical art that was possible, starting from ordinary techniques of technology to the complete assimilation of ready-made artistic models. It did not neglect the conventional gestures of pagan orators and philosophers, applying them to its own goals and putting a new Christian into forms alien to it. VI. About the Greek iconographic original About the Greek iconographic original. Was there supervision over the activities of painters in the primary church? What caused it later? The time of appearance of the explanatory and facial scripts; the concept of them by Erminius Dionysius Furnoagrafiot, their content and character. The meaning of the original in the history of Byzantine iconography. At first, Christian art was a free profession; Anyone who had the skill and technical training to do so could do it. The religious system of the Christian community and its fearfully cautious attitude towards the art of the ancient world protected young art, if not from invasion, then at least from the dissemination of images that were alien to it in content or made with some deliberately false idea. Although such images were circulated in heretical circles of the first centuries, they were never accepted into the general church environment and were recognized as inappropriate and malicious works, along with literary works that came from the pen of private individuals or sects alienated by the church. True, the advice given by Clement to the Christians of Alexandria regarding the fact that the symbols they carved on rings and rings should be of a Christian and not pagan nature, then the not entirely flattering reviews of Irenaeus and Epiphanius about various kinds of religious works of the brush and chisel of the Gnostics show that even then there were some kind of boundaries, beyond which this or that work of art became forbidden, apocryphal. These boundaries, or better to say, this discriminating attitude towards objects of art, were expressed not in the form of prohibitive measures, not in the form of supervision by church authorities, but came from the very mood of the Christians of that time, from their religious ideals. It is hardly even possible to admit the idea that, for example, in the catacombs, where works of the brush are often distinguished by their relaxed freedom and richness of creativity, painting was performed under the supervision of church clergy. If, in modern terms, there was control, then it determined only the general requirements to which the artist had to obey in his work, and never extended to the little things and details in the sense of a ready-made frame or sample for the executed image. The ancient church did not know iconographic rules in this sense; on the contrary, she treated pictorial subjects freely, paying attention to their meaning and symbolism, and even allowed such images as Orpheus, Phoenix, Cupid and Psyche, which were either directly taken from ancient art, or were made under the influence of Greco-Roman models and technology. This was all the more convenient because at first most of the works of Christian art had a decorative value, serving, for example, in the catacombs, as decoration for coffins, crypts and various kinds of everyday objects in the family and home. If it is sometimes possible to find in the most ancient monuments of Christian art some uniformity in the setting and composition of symbolic and historical subjects, then this did not occur from the existence of any authorized and mandatory church rules, but came from the properties of the depicted subject, from the imitation of ready-made models and the existence of ordinary artistic techniques. Routine, as always, forced those ordinary masters to follow the path of imitation, who in their occupation found a means of living and were satisfied with ready-made samples that found both good sales and safe use. Over time, when art became closely related to church cult, when the number of iconographic subjects increased, and these latter became diversified in their execution, the former completely free attitude to paintings turned out to be inconvenient: it began to be accompanied by consequences that cast an unfavorable light on the religious character of paintings. As a result of this state of affairs, there was a need to protect the execution of sacred images from the arbitrariness of artists, to bring them closer to church understanding and to place them in close relation to how they were presented and developed in the Bible, tales of saints and church hymnography. The iconoclastic unrest gave a decisive, one might say, impetus for resolving the issue of supervision over the activities of icon painters and thus predetermined the question of the original. In what form the task of church control was presented here, and the position of the artist was determined, this can be expressed in one of the resolutions of the seventh ecumenical council, which clearly states that icons are created not by the invention (έψεύρεσις) of the painter, but by virtue of the inviolable law and tradition (θεσμοθεσία και παράδοσις) of the universal church, that to compose and prescribe is not the work of the painter, but of the holy fathers: these latter have the right of composition (διάταξις) of icons, and the painter has only their execution (τέκνη), the technical part, understood in the narrow sense of the word, that is, drawing, coloring, external mechanical work. And so, as if replacing the patristic theoretical system of icon painting, the icon painting original appears. From what sources did the latter take its content, and in what relation do its rules about the method of depicting this or that plot stand to the types and forms of ancient Christian art? Having said that the iconographic original was caused by the need to give unity and uniformity to iconographic images, to introduce a more ecclesiastical character into their execution, we should not at all imagine these rules as a legislative act of church authority, an order for painters to follow one or another recognized model and nothing more. No, the formation of the original cannot in any way be separated from the general history of church art. In this latter, the main principles of the later edition of iconographic types were laid and the most important elements were developed from which the code of the original was formed; and therefore, to study the foundations of the latter, one must take into account the whole mass of historically developed forms of church painting and, following the gradual changes in these latter, discover in them the very foundations of the original. For this work, the first and necessary aid is collections and photographs from monuments of church art, both Eastern and Western, and then literary sources in which descriptions of various kinds of iconographic subjects have been preserved to us. Both of these sources, taken together, provide material for the history of the formation of the original, all the more valuable since the rules regarding painting for a long time were not written down and formulated and were transmitted through practical instructions and through the study of ready-made samples. That is why, much earlier than the written presentation of the rules of the original, a remarkable uniformity had already been established in the East in the manner of depicting church subjects, and these images, with a few exceptions, coincided with the rules that were subsequently formulated in the code of the original. This shows that, despite its protective purpose, the original always stood depending on the most stable and most often repeated iconographic types and gave sanction to these latter as the best and most perfect. As an example, I will point to images of the Nativity, Resurrection and Ascension of Christ. In the later original, they were formulated in the same form and with such details as they were found several centuries earlier, in the mosaics of Roman and Ravenna churches, in various frames of diptychs of the 10th–11th centuries and in miniature painting of the entire medieval period. Another example: the general technique of depicting saints in vestments was given long before the appearance of handwritten originals, for example, in the images of saints on the mosaics of the Sophia of Constantinople, then in the miniatures of the minology of Emperor Basil, and finally, in the wall paintings of the most ancient Russian churches. In this regard, the foundations of the original were laid in the traditions of ancient Christian art and anticipated by their appearance the well-known decree of the Council of Nicaea, but they anticipated, we repeat, not in the sense of prescriptions or, even less, a disciplinary act, but in the sense of more solid and stable subjects of general art. When did the first written rules appear regarding how to depict this or that iconographic subject, or, what is also the same, at what time did an intelligent Greek original appear? The compilers of Russian originals attributed its beginning to the era of Justinian. But if this is true regarding the general foundations of Byzantine-Russian iconography, then it cannot be considered true regarding the original, as an integral theoretical system of icon painting. The time of Justinian was a time of progress and creative freedom in Byzantine art; the latter had not yet had time to develop all the necessary aspects of icon painting, while the original represents, as we will see below, the final act of creativity and already legitimizes the principle of immobility in the field of church art. The earliest example of a Greek original has survived to us in a passage “from the antiquities of church history by Ulpius the Roman about the appearance of the God-bearing fathers.” This passage, marked 993, is found in one of the manuscripts of the Moscow Synodal Library and presents descriptions of the appearance of some of the most famous church fathers, for example, Dionysius the Areopagite, Athanasius of Alexandria, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom and others. The descriptions are drawn up with the greatest detail and in many ways resemble Lentulov’s well-known description of the face of Christ, with the difference, however, that they do not contain any reviews or morals, but constitute a portrait of each face outlined to the smallest detail, where neither the size of the nose, nor the length of the beard, nor the degree of baldness, nor other subtleties of the same property are forgotten. Here is a description of Chrysostom’s appearance: “John of Antioch was very small in stature, had a large head on his shoulders, and was extremely thin. He had a long nose, wide nostrils, a pale yellow complexion, sunken, large eyes, at times glowing with friendliness, an open and large forehead, riddled with many wrinkles, large ears, a small, very sparse, adorned with gray beard.” It is clear that the description was made from life and compiled by someone shortly after the death of the saint based on his living appearance... An excerpt from the Ulpian story belongs to the category of those literary monuments where legends about the appearance of the most remarkable church figures were first collected and recorded. These legends were based partly in the biographies of saints, partly in oral stories and memories of persons who stood in close relationships with them. At first, these records did not have the systematic form with which they appeared in the original codex, but they formed a necessary part, or, better said, an addition to the biographical and historical information about a given person; but then they were collected into one composition and served as an indication for painters how and in what form to depict this or that saint. As soon as such records appeared, they began to be supplemented from time to time with facial ones, that is, drawn, picturesque, images of the mentioned persons and events. The so-called minology of the Greek Emperor Basil II, who lived at the end of the 10th and beginning of the 11th centuries, can give a clear idea of ​​this type of monuments. For each biography of a saint, which follows one after another in calendar order in this remarkable manuscript, there is a painted miniature, occupying half of the sheet not filled with text. The drawings, 430 in number, executed on a golden field by the best artistic forces of Byzantium, are precious both for the history of everyday life and church life of that time, and in terms of art. For us, in this case, the miniatures of Vasiliev’s minology are important in terms of their significance in the history of the formation of the iconographic original, since they, containing a relatively complete cycle of iconographic subjects, served for a long time as competent models for later painters. However, the images of the manuscript in question do not claim to give one or another type artistic and ecclesiastical sanction; containing all the necessary makings of a facial script, they; however, they do not constitute guides to icon painting in the strict sense of the word: the significant volume and at the same time the relative incompleteness of the content do not allow the facial minology of Emperor Basil to stand among the icon painting originals. A complete and systematically compiled code of the Greek original has reached us in a copy of a very late date, namely the 18th century, and bears the following name: ερμηνεία της ζωγραφικής or instruction in the art of painting. 263 The origin and fate of the list we named are closely connected with Athos and the local icon painting schools. Since the decline of the political life of Byzantium, Athos became the custodian of its church traditions, a closed corner where neither Western influences, nor political unrest, nor church innovations entered. It is known that the founding of communal Athonite monasteries began in the 8th–9th centuries, and soon, thanks to the rapid colonization of this secluded place, an entire monastic community with many monasteries and hermitages, churches and cells was formed on Mount Athos. Since then, strict church art, which by that time had lost much in Byzantium, found refuge in St. mountain, where back in the 11th century, according to legend, it should be noted, very vague, some famous painter Manuel Panselin lived - a semi-historical figure who left behind a very loud fame on Athos, but, unfortunately, too little information about his origin, about the circumstances of his life and his works. According to a later legend, “he, like a radiant sun, shone in Thessaloniki and, shining with the rays of pictorial art, like a certain sun and a luminous moon, surpassed and eclipsed all ancient and modern painters.” In this enthusiastic praise, one can hear, among other things, an allusion to the very name of the isographer: πανσέληνος - completely moon-shaped. The glorious painter was not left without successors; After his death, the Athonite monks with special love and great care sought out the works of Manuel’s brush and imitated them as an example of unattainable perfection, and the more talented and devoted to their work began, over time, to make known and record the iconographic traditions that Panselin and other eminent iconographers adhered to. Thus, at the beginning of the 18th century, Dionysius, a painter and hieromonk from Fourna, compiled what we called a guide to the art of painting. In order to more clearly imagine the Greek icon painting original and then more accurately evaluate its significance in the history of church painting, let us get acquainted with the content and character of Herminia Dionysius. Divided by the compiler into three parts, it begins with an introduction, depicting before us the Byzantine icon painter’s view of his profession, as an occupation sanctified by the church, as a well-known branch of religious work, venerable in its purpose. Dedicating his book to the Mother of God, Dionysius says that he imitates the Evangelist Luke, fulfills the duty of reverence for the greatness and wondrous beauty of the Mother of God, and in the end is confident that both her and the Creator of everything will be pleasing and favorable to his work. After the preface, written with humility, but not without a sense of self-worth, there follows the first part, in which instructions are given on how to prepare paints and varnishes, how to put blush on the lips of the Mother of God and saints who were not old, how to draw eyes and eyebrows, how to trim hair and beards... “In order to give a better look to the latter,” we read in Dionysius’s treatise on the latter, “stretch the hairs beyond their ends, but not too far. Then make liquid white and subtly lighten your hair with it. To shade your mustache, use pure black paint... and for your lips, use a reddish flesh color.” The caring and prudent teacher did not leave his students in the dark regarding natural painting; in his manual he gave them rules about the size of the members of the human body, borrowing them, however, as we will now see, not from observations of nature. “Know, my student,” writes Dionysius, “that the natural height of a person from forehead to sole is measured in nine eggs, or measures. First, size your head, dividing it into three parts; in the first of them place the forehead, in the second the nose, and in the third the rest of the face; write your hair beyond the line of this egg, to the measure of your nose; In addition, from the nose to the end of the beard, measure three equal parts, of which two will make up the beard, and one will make up the mouth. As for the neck, it has the measure of the nose. Then measure three equal parts from the chin to the middle of the body, and two to the knees, adding a part equal to the nose for the knees. Next, measure two more parts to the ankles and from them a part equal to the nose, to the sole, and one part to the nails. As for the eyes, their size is the same and the distance between them is as long as the eye is long. The length of the ear is equal to the length of the nose. If a person is drawn naked, then the middle of his width is determined by four noses, and if in clothes - by one and a half eggs.” This conventional character of the Greek iconographic original is no less evident in the second part of the guide to painting. Arranged by Dionysius in the order of biblical and church-historical events, it begins with the depiction of the angelic ranks and the fall of Satan, embraces the entire history of the Old and New Testaments and ends with a description of paintings of symbolic and allegorical content; in a word, in a single essay it presents a detailed list of subjects of Christian iconography and, by the nature of its content, can be called iconographic in the full sense. What method does the management follow when conveying iconographic subjects? It presents us with Greek painting in the later period of its development and in many ways deviates not only from the examples of ancient Christian painting in the catacombs, on sarcophagi and mosaics, but even differs from later miniatures. The compiler often does not start from ready-made examples of ancient painting, but stands on the basis of a historical story, supplementing it in places with apocryphal details and generally tries to present a more or less detailed picture and circumstances of a well-known event. Such additions are sometimes allowed into the biblical story in order to enliven a simple historical picture, give it a picturesque setting and lighting. It is necessary, for example, to depict the murder of Abel and the crying of Adam and Eve over their son - a new feature is added to the biblical story in the image of an angel who hovers over Adam’s head and holds a scroll with the inscription: “Do not cry, for he will rise on the last day.” In the depiction of the flight of St. families in Egypt, the picture is complemented by the view of the city and idols falling from its walls, referring to the well-known legend that the presence of Jesus Christ in Egypt was marked by the fall of idols. Traces of theological considerations are visible in places and dogmatic parallels are drawn in the spirit of church interpretation. Such, for example, is the convergence of the confusion of tongues during the pandemonium and the descent of the Holy Spirit on the apostles in the form of tongues of fire - a rapprochement carried out on the basis of the dogmatic relationship between these two events in the meaning of the church song: “whenever descended, the tongues merged” ... Thus, Moses’ vision of the burning bush is depicted in a typological sense, as a prototype of the ever-virginity of the Mother of God, which is why an image is placed in the middle of the burning bush Our Lady. There are even traces of mythological ideas and classical language, which is especially noticeable in paintings with allegorical content, such as, for example, the life of a true monk, the depiction of the ages of human life. Cupid is depicted here, angels are represented as ancient geniuses, and hell is called by the classical name of Tartarus. The same, for example, is the image of Jordan in the form of an old man who, turning his face back, looks with fear at Christ who entered the water for baptism, while he himself pours water from a vessel. This picture, according to the meaning of the original, should depict the Jordan “returning”... At the same time, one involuntarily recalls ancient frescoes and Ravenna mosaics, and even earlier, one episode from the Iliad, where the Scamander River chases one of the heroes of the epic. This convention of leadership is felt even more strongly in the department of parables, the form for which is the everyday social phenomena of later times, and the parables themselves are depicted not from the point of view of their content, but from the side of the internal meaning and the morality contained in them. Thus, in the parable of the sower, the painter does not depict before the viewer either a field, a farmer, or a crop, but depicts Christ preaching and four groups of his listeners in positions corresponding to the explanation of the tributary story. Some talk to each other and, whispered by the devil, do not listen to Christ at all; others, although they listen, but in view of the idols to which soldiers with drawn swords force them to go, leave Christ; still others sit at luxurious tables in the company of cheerful women and forget what they heard; finally, the fourth, a select circle of listeners on whom the word of Christ falls like grain on good soil, are represented in the form of monks flagellating themselves, serving priests and people praying in church. However, the image here is still clear; but now it is necessary to depict in the faces the words: “you are the light of the world,” and the leadership represents the bishop in vestments before the people in the church, and above him Christ, holding a scroll with the words that are illustrated here. In depicting the parable of the mustard seed, the author resorts to an extremely unsuccessful illustration technique, depicting a tree growing from the Savior’s mouth, on whose branches instead of birds sit the apostles, on whom the eyes of the people are turned. In view of these naive illustrations, you don’t know what to give preference to – these awkward experiments or the simple consciousness of artistic impotence in the form of a simple scroll with the words of a parable without any accessories. However, the thought that underlies this dogmatic depiction of parables also has its good side and reveals a kind of artistic tact. A tributary image, presented in outline and colors, is something other than an allegorical picture in its verbal form, in the form of a tributary story. Transfer the latter to canvas, and it will not have the transparency, ease and accessibility of understanding that it has in the parable. What will emerge is a landscape, a genre picture, a sensual appearance of an object, in which the inner meaning of the parable either escapes without explanation, or is roughly obscured by the outlines of the real object and recedes into the background. For moralizing purposes, the techniques of the original are, without any doubt, much better suited, but artistically they are very insufficient and one-sided. The third part of the manual concludes the rules regarding the placement of icons in the church, i.e. how to paint the inside of a church with wall paintings. It must be borne in mind that wherever the original speaks about church painting, it means mural painting itself, and not icons on boards, and does not mention a word about the iconostasis. This latter undoubtedly already existed then, albeit on a small scale, but is not mentioned in the original precisely because the manual for painting refers to mural painting, and then, in its foundations, the original goes back to the time when nothing was known about the iconostasis. The tiers of the latter were formed by analogy with the placement of mural paintings and began to correspond to the belts into which the wall paintings were divided from the ceiling to the floor of the church. The first images in churches began at the altar and were grouped on the altar ledge; then they began to decorate the dome and its vaults with mosaics and paints; Next to this is the painting of the church on the walls and porch. The Athonite original takes the dome as the starting point for placing icons and, gradually descending from it, thus divides the interior of the church in horizontal rows into five belts, from which each is assigned a special circle of images. The dome contains an image of Christ Pantocrator in a multi-colored halo representing a rainbow - for the symbolism of the dome in the sense of the sky, this circumstance is very remarkable; Christ is depicted with the gospel and a blessing hand; on His sides the Mother of God with the Forerunner in prayer, i.e. image of Deesis. In a neck or drum under a dome there is a row of prophets; even lower in the corners, between the pillars supporting the dome, in the so-called pandaktivs, there are four evangelists. Actually, the first row of the mural begins at the base of the dome with the altar vault or apse, on which is placed the image of the Mother of God enthroned with the infant Christ and the inscription μητηο Θεού ύψιλοτέρα των ούρσανών. Again an allusion to the symbolic meaning of the altar vault in the sense of the sky. She is even more supported by the archangels Michael and Gabriel who stand before the Mother of God. In ancient Christian murals, various images were placed above the mountain place: a cross, Christ, the Mother of God, an image of a holiday and a saint to whom the church is dedicated, but over time, in the Byzantine period, all these subjects begin to give way to the image of the Mother of God, and in Athonite painting this place becomes Her integral. From Her, on both sides of the church, the original assigns to depict the 12 main holidays, the suffering and resurrection of Christ. The second row begins from the side of the altar with the image of the Divine Liturgy; here the main images of liturgical content related to the Eucharist are concentrated. What is the divine liturgy as an iconographic plot? The Divine Liturgy is a symbolic reproduction of the great entrance to the liturgy, and the performers of this rite are Christ and the angels. But I will not convey it in my own words, but will present it as it is written in the original: “on the eastern side of the altar a canopy is drawn, and under it a throne with the gospel lying on it; On the right side of the throne stands Christ in bishop's vestments and blesses. Near Him there is a whole row of angels who form a circle near the throne, ending at the left side of the throne, where Christ is depicted a second time and removes the paten from the head of an angel dressed in a deacon's vestment. Two angels cense Christ and two hold candles; Angels in priestly robes stand right there and hold a chalice, a cross, a spear, a spoon, and a sponge.” A continuation of this image on the sides of the church are paintings from the gospel story and the miracles of Christ. The third row begins on the side of the altar with an equally original image of liturgical content, known as the distribution of the body and blood of Christ - μετάδοσης. This is nothing more than a Byzantine type of depiction of the Last Supper, very curious in terms of artistic techniques and its significance in the history of art. In catacomb painting there is no image of the Last Supper, but there are images of family tables, where the participants in the meal are represented in greater or lesser numbers. Then the ancient method began to be applied to images of Christian agapes, and at the same time allusions were made to the Last Supper of Christ. The earliest depiction of the Last Supper known to us is preserved in the 7th-century Basilica of Apollinaris Nuovo in Ravenna and in miniatures of the Rossan Codex of the Four Gospels. From here the Western image of the Last Supper was developed, an example of which is the famous image of the Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci, which passed into Eastern iconography. The Byzantine translation of this story presents the Last Supper in a liturgical picture. Christ is depicted at the moment of distributing bread and a cup to the apostles, near the throne, in two paintings on the right and left sides; on one he stands and gives the cup to the six apostles who are suitable, on the other he distributes bread to the same number of disciples. In earlier images there is neither a chalice nor a paten, but Christ is represented with bread, from which he breaks off a piece to give to a suitable apostle, and instead of a chalice, he holds in his hand either a deep cup, like the present bowl, or a jug with a handle, and from it he communes with the apostles. This is how the sacrament was taught in the ancient church, and Byzantine images of the Last Supper reproduce before us the most ancient era of church practice. As an interesting feature that took place in the official and church life of Byzantium, one can point out that the apostles approach the throne with outstretched hands, wrapped in an outer cloak. This signifies deep respect for the object being received and the person giving it; for example, courtiers received charters from the hands of the emperor and handed over some objects to him. This plot is very often depicted in the mosaics of Greek churches, and from here it came to us and is found in our ancient churches, on a mountainous place, for example, in the Kiev-Sophia and Kiev-Mikhailovsky cathedrals. The Greek original of Dionysius adds to this the following curious detail. Behind the apostles approaching the cup, Judas is represented, turning back; his mouth is twisted and a demon enters it. This figure is not present in the images known to us, and it would be extremely inconvenient to place the figure of a demon in such a place and among such a solemn atmosphere. The fourth row contains icons of various saints. The altar depicts saints, on the sides are martyrs and saints, and on the western side are pagan poets. The fifth and last row is of different saints. Having given instructions to the painter regarding the main part of the church, the painting guide leads him into the vestibule and gives instructions on how to paint this part, the meal, the fountain in the courtyard, and then shows how to paint the church when it is built in the domed or basilica style. After all that has been said about the content and nature of the instruction in the pictorial art of Dionysius Furnoagrafiot, it seems that there is no need to dwell too much on the benefits that the church authorities derived from such control over the activities of icon painters, as well as on the harmful consequences that the appearance of the original icon painting should have accompanied for church art. Suffice it to say that church painting in the east throughout the Middle Ages went hand in hand with the rules of the original, and its direction was determined under the influence of the latter. Almost at the end of the 11th century, independent development of iconography in the Byzantine Empire ceased, and everything that it produced in the following centuries was nothing more than a pale variation on an old theme. Pushed into the narrow frame of the original, limited to exclusively ecclesiastical tasks, art was satisfied with a ready-made circle of images, developed to the smallest detail, beyond which it did not go and did not want to go due to the narrow demands that were placed on it. A certain number of favorite subjects were adopted to figuratively represent the biblical text and church historical events; a number of ready-made types served to depict Christ, the apostles and saints. These are not figures in the strict sense of an artistic image, but rather their diagrams, not the human bodies themselves, but their monotonous appearances, in which the art of that time sought to convey the expression of something sublime, spiritual, unearthly. This is the feature by which the faces of saints should differ from the appearance of mere mortals, according to the meaning of the requirements of the original. The original tried to replace this lack of artistic typicality and expressiveness with conventional attributes, accepted once and for all to characterize a certain gender, age, rank and position. This is precisely the reason why, for example, the angelic face in works of Byzantine art is always distinguished by curly hair that curls over the shoulders, ceremonial clothing with accessories of courtiers and bodyguards; the saints are depicted with short, mostly gray hair on their heads, with a well-developed beard, wearing a phelonion, from under which one hand blesses, and the other holds the gospel; all pious wives are like St. Anna, and young women - to the Mother of God; the type of Joseph serves as a model for representing pious men... But remaining completely external signs, these attributes explained the matter no more than a sign or an inscription. Even the most Byzantine types have for the most part lost their positive character in icon painting and, changing under the influence of time and the tribal varieties that made up the Byzantine Empire at different times, they have adopted a conventional and monotonous imprint, which is constantly repeated, but never rises to national typicality. Its most outstanding features can be conveyed in the following features: high growth combined with an unusually thin figure, small, very flaccid extremities, a small head on a long thin neck, a wide and low forehead, a narrow nose with two deep grooves on the sides and a strongly protruding chin; large sunken eyes and an overhanging frontal bone, due to the dark orange color of the body, exhausted by the labors and deprivations of the free feat of salvation, give the face an expression of concentration and gloomy gloominess. In young faces, fullness turns into swelling, and in older ones, thinness and general dryness of the body appear, leading to asceticism. In this appearance, common to every physiognomy, we have not a tribal type, not an expression of the prevailing taste or aesthetic concepts, but a conventional combination of features that make up the ecclesiastical beauty and splendor of the face that is looked at in church and taught. VII. From the history of ancient Russian icon painting From the history of ancient Russian icon painting. Its dependence on the Byzantine. Patericon's story about the construction and decoration of the Great Pechersk Church; Reverend Alypius. The significance of Kyiv and Novgorod in the further history of our icon painting. Brief information about the first icon painters who worked in Vladimir and Moscow churches. Elder Andrei Rublev. Stroganov's letters. Russian church art is a junior branch of Byzantine art and owes both its origin and its initial direction and technique to it. The influence of the latter on the former was all the more decisive and lasting because Byzantine art of the 10th–11th centuries, when our church life began, had already developed its distinctive forms, fully defined its internal character and attitude to worship, and acted at that time as a firmly established system. Church painting in Rus' submitted to this influence almost more than other types of art, and from its very first steps it acquired that sacred character that distinguished the works of the Byzantine church style, and whose entire strength lay in the retention of ready-made iconographic types, sanctified by time and purpose. While showing more quantitative and geographical growth, our church painting for a long time retained its stationary and monotonous character. Its oldest monuments in Kyiv, Vladimir, Suzdal, Rostov, Novgorod, Pskov and Moscow repeat one motif, adhere to one conventional Greek model and follow the so-called iconographic original, in relation to which any new understanding of the iconographic plot, a new technique in its execution is an innovation, a deviation towards secular, anti-church art, a kind of profanation of it. Kyiv, the mother of Russian cities, was the cradle of our art. It served as the first soil on which the seeds of Christianity, brought from Byzantium, fell, and where they received their earliest care. The first churches were also built here, in which church painting found a place. What kind of this last one was, and from whose hands the first works of the Kyiv church brush came out - several interesting, but, unfortunately, fragmentary information has reached us about this in the Pechersk Patericon and the initial chronicle. The first tells the circumstances of the appearance of the Pechersk Monastery, the life and exploits of its first inhabitants, and, among other things, the history of the construction of the great Pechersk Church. The builders of the latter were four master architects who came from Constantinople on instructions from above. And this is exactly how the details of this case are depicted. The Mother of God, in a dream vision, summoned the craftsmen to Blachernae - a famous suburb of Constantinople, where there was a famous monastery with a school of royal icon painters that existed there, and here she not only commanded them to “reward a church for themselves” in Rus', but also gave her the relics of saints and her own icon with the words: “let that vicarious one be.” The architects arrived in Kyiv with this miraculous icon and presented it to the surprised miraculous embassy of St. Anthony and Theodosius. Ten years later, in 1083, when the great church had already been completed, but had not yet been decorated and consecrated, according to the legend of the Patericon, masters of icon painting came from the same God-protected city of Constantine to Blessed Nikon, who was then abbot of Pechersk (1078-1088), and told him that they had been invited to paint the church, but at the same time expressed indignation at the failure to fulfill one condition they had concluded with their employers. The church turns out to be much larger than the one they agreed to paint, and therefore they are ready to return the gold they received as a deposit and go back home. Of course, this statement put the abbot and all the brethren in the greatest bewilderment: they had never concluded such an agreement with anyone, and the arrival of the icon painters was a complete surprise for them. The Byzantines, in turn, presented witnesses to the agreement, described the appearance of the two elder monks who entered into a condition with them, and from this description the monastic brethren recognized those who appeared as none other than the Monks Anthony and Theodosius. But several years had already passed since they died, and, therefore, they could appear to the Byzantines only in a vision. For confirmation, the abbot brought the icon of the saints to the painters, and “having seen the image of the Greeks, he bowed down, saying, ‘These are truly true. After this, they remained in the monastery and with reverent zeal began to decorate its great church with mosaics and paintings. 264 This is the story of the Patericon of Pechersk. Whatever the attitude of the art historian to its content, he will have to come to the undoubted conclusion based on it that to paint the Pechersk Church, icon painters were hired for a certain fee in Constantinople, and they had a condition that showed the dimensions of the church and explained what and where sacred images should be placed in it. Byzantine artists, called to paint the Kiev-Pechersk Church, were among the first planters of Byzantine icon painting in the Russian land. They, according to Paterik, together with the master stone makers, died in the Pechersky Monastery and were buried there in a special vestibule. Thanks to them, a somewhat picturesque school of its own was formed here, in which natural Russians and among them the Monk Alypius of Pechersk studied icon art. In his early youth, his parents sent him to teach “icon painting” to Greek masters; As a student, he helped them decorate the great Pechersk Church with mosaics and paintings, and during the painting of the latter he studied icon painting well. Painting icons,” the biographer notes about him, “is cunning.” Tonsured as a monk, he spent all the time free from church services and cell rule in writing icons: he worked for the abbot, the brethren and his monastery, supplied third-party churches with his handicrafts, accepted orders from private individuals, and did all this not for the sake of profit and without demanding compensation for his work. He paid for the paints with his work; what he received from the lovers of Christ for the icons went to him as alms to the poor. Of course, the works that came out of the cell of a skillful and virtuous icon painter, who was also glorified by God for the gift of healing diseases during his lifetime, were highly valued. The icons of Alipiev's letter were known not only among simple lovers of Christ, but also among noble people, both in Kyiv and far beyond its region. Devoted to his handicraft with all his soul, Rev. Alypius did not stop painting icons until his death. It is not known for certain whether he had any students; but a later legend, recorded in the Russian iconographic original, about one of the Pechersk miracle workers, named Gregory, says that he “was an employee of St. Alypius" and painted many icons. The latter’s biography, the Pechersk monk Polycarp, secretly makes it clear that the authoritative voice of St. Alypius was sensitively listened to by other painters, who were already in Kyiv at that time in large numbers. 265 Rev. Alypius, as far as is known, was the first Russian painter and, perhaps, not without reason, was recognized by some as the progenitor of Russian, or rather Kyiv, icon painting. The latter was a continuation of the Byzantine, an imitation of it and, probably, did not differ significantly from the Korsun letters. At the name of the latter, everyone’s thought is involuntarily transported to Korsun, or ancient Chersonesus, where Grand Duke Vladimir was baptized and from where, together with the Greek princess Anna, he brought the Greek clergy and the relics of St. Clement of Rome and his disciple Thebes and many different church utensils. Having decided to build his famous tithe church, he “sent to bring craftsmen from the Greeks and decorate it with icons and entrusted Anastas the Korsunite and the priests of Korsun to serve in it, and gave away everything he took from Korsun: icons and vessels and crosses.” 266 What did Korsun serve for Kyiv under St. Vladimir, that is what Kyiv later became for all other Russian cities. From it, as the center of the then religious life, Christianity went to the outskirts of Russia; Together with faith, church ritual orders were transferred here, and with them church art. The first churches in Rostov, Suzdal, Novgorod and other cities were built and decorated according to the model of those in Kyiv. Frescoes, icons and mosaics are here, as there, the main means of decorating churches and are executed by the hands of the same Byzantine masters and their Russian students as in Kyiv. Unfortunately, the Polovtsian and Tatar pogroms, which dealt a blow to the well-being of our ancient capital, very early put an end to its artistic and educational influence. The destruction of the city prompted the Kyiv princes to move their princely table to the north and forced church art to look for new shelters. At the end of the 12th and 13th centuries, the latter developed in the Vladimir-Suzdal region, and, in particular, painting found particularly favorable soil in Novgorod and Pskov. Since the loss of political significance by Kiev and then Vladimir, the latter continue to remain the guardians and disseminators of Greek icon painting principles. And it is not for nothing that the Novgorod, so-called, school of icon painting is revered as one of the oldest and most famous Russian icon painting schools. 267 Quite a significant number of frescoes that have survived from the time in question in Novgorod and partly Pskov cathedrals and churches will forever remain a monument to its actual existence and undoubtedly Byzantine direction. True, frequent relations with the West on trade matters and, in general, rapprochement with the Germans, which influenced the social life of Pskov and Novgorod, left a special imprint on the works of Novgorod painting, giving it a freer character; but they did not change her being. Only over time, with the weakening of its political power, did Novgorod begin to lose its artistic significance, eventually serving with its iconographic traditions and ability, like other Russian cities, for the exaltation of Moscow. Becoming the center of state and church life, the latter gradually collected and concentrated artistic forces from different parts of the Russian land. St. Peter Metropolitan - the first saint of Moscow († on December 21, 1326), who founded the Assumption Cathedral with Prince John Danilovich, was also the first famous Moscow icon painter. Tradition associates several icons with his name, but the most revered of them are: the Dormition of the Mother of God in the lower tier of the iconostasis of the Great Assumption Cathedral and another icon of the Mother of God, deliberately called Petrovskaya, painted by St. Peter while he was living in Volyn, in the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Ratsky Monastery he founded, and presented to Metropolitan Maxim. 268 Both icons are assimilated by the saint in chronicles, ancient inventories of the Assumption Cathedral and regulations of the patriarchal service. The image of the Most Pure Mother of God that Peter the Wonderworker wrote, in the language of the above-mentioned documents, was a necessary accessory to religious processions and, in general, spiritual celebrations celebrated in the Moscow Cathedral on major holidays. Being himself a wonderful icon painter, the saint could, of course, by his personal example, incite others to the piously useful practice of painting, but there is no reason to consider him the founder of the Moscow school of icon painting. In 1343, the successor of St. Peter - Metropolitan Theognostus, a Greek by birth and education, “signed his cathedral church of the Most Pure Mother of God with Greek masters,” and Grand Duke Semyon Ioannovich decorated the Archangel Cathedral at the same time with the help of his Russian icon painters, probably summoned to Moscow from other cities. The following year, “by the order and treasury of Grand Duchess Anastasia,” the church of St. Spas on Bor, “and the masters, elders and bosses were from Rusti, and the students were Greek: Goitan, and Semyon, and Ivan, and their other students and squads.” 269 ​​Thus, the decorators of the first stone churches in Moscow, the planters of icon painting in it, were the same Greeks with the natural Russians who studied with them. The participation of the Byzantines in the beautification of the capital's churches continued for quite some time after this. At the end of the 14th century, the Greek icon painter Theophan moved from Novgorod to Moscow and here, successively, for ten years (1395–1405), he painted the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Archangel and Annunciation Cathedrals. During the painting of the first, the icon painter Simeon Cherny worked with him, and in the last, the Greek elder Prokhor from Gorodets and the monk Andrei Rublev helped him. This means that our famous iconographer also had the opportunity to closely study Byzantine icon painting and, perhaps, completed his artistic education at the school of the Greek Theophanes, who had grown gray in his craft, and it was not without reason, of course, that his contemporaries called the philosopher. Having excellently studied the art of icon painting, monk Andrei Rublev devoted himself to it with all his soul and declared himself a broad and fruitful artistic activity. Together with his teacher and friend Daniil Cherny, he painted the Assumption Cathedrals in Vladimir and the Trinity Cathedral in the Sergius Lavra and left several works of his brush in the Spaso-Andronikov Monastery. 270 In the personal life of St. Sergius of Radonezh, one miniature represents Andrei Rublev writing on the wall of the church of the last monastery the Image Not Made by Hands 271 and, therefore, assures and perpetuates his activity here with visual evidence. And we have an indication of how our icon painter looked at his handicraft in the spiritual letter of St. Joseph of Volokolamsk, who, listing the saints who lived before him in Russian monasteries, wrote the following: “Blessed Andronicus was shining with great virtues, and with him were his disciples, Savva and Alexander, and they were wonderful, notorious icon painters, Daniel and his disciple Andrei, and many others were the same and had so much virtue and so much concern for fasting and monastic life, as if they were vouchsafed divine grace and only in divine love, as they never exercise about earthly things, but always raise the mind and thought to the immaterial and divine light, and always raise the sensory eye to the hedgehog from material vaps (= colors) in the written image of the Lord Christ and the Most Pure His Mother and all the saints, as even on the very feast of the Bright Resurrection, sitting on the seats and having in front of me the all-honorable and divine icons, and steadily looking at them, I am filled with divine joy and lordship, and not just on that day I do this, but also on other days, when I do not devote myself to painting.” 272 The strength of the incomparable authority that the name of our artist enjoyed among his contemporaries and descendants lay in a deep understanding of icon painting and a religiously reverent attitude towards the subject of his constant studies. “Reverend Andrei is an icon painter of Radonezh, nicknamed Rublev, who painted many holy icons, wonderful and beautifully decorated,” it is said about him in the Klintsovsky icon painting original, and the biographer Rev. Sergius adds to this: “Andrei is an extraordinary icon painter, surpassing everyone in wisdom, and having honest gray hair.” 273 Rublev's icons and letters have always been highly valued by Russian people and recognized as exemplary. Just as the Athonite school of icon painting considered it best to imitate the notorious Manuel Panselin, whom it recognized as its head, so for the ancient Russian icon painter, all the best things that he strived for in his art merged in one name, Rublev. While not being the father of Moscow icon painting, Andrei Rublev was undoubtedly its best representative and renovator. Remaining true to the tasks of church painting, he revived the monotony of the style and introduced into icon painting that artistry of execution, which later distinguished the best works of the Moscow brush, which were in close contact with the icons of the so-called Stroganov letter. In the middle of the 16th century, under Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible, the Stroganov family of eminent people acquired important commercial, industrial and colonialist significance in the northeast of Russia. They also participated in the conquest of Siberia, took care of the settlement of our northeastern outskirts, and established schools and icon-painting workshops here. The name of the so-called Stroganov school of icon painting originates from them, the monuments of which remain numerous icons and one of our oldest facial originals. Connected with their Novgorod origins, Stroganov's letters left the first ones far behind with the perfection of their technique. With the purity and subtlety of decoration, the elegant selection of bright colors and paints and the extraordinary care in the execution of all the sometimes surprisingly miniature figures, Stroganov’s letters stand out noticeably from a number of other icon paintings and constitute the last stage in the development of Byzantine-Russian icon painting. While pleasing to the eye with their artistry, the icons of Stroganov’s writing, with the stern appearance of the faces depicted on them, did not cease at the same time to edify the religious feeling of our pious ancestors, who were very fond of church splendor. VIII. From the history of ancient Russian icon painting From the history of ancient Russian icon painting. Old Russian icon painter and the changes that occurred in his position in the 15th–16th centuries. The Stoglavy Cathedral's view of the moral and mental qualities of the icon painter and the essence of icon painting. The fire of 1547 in Moscow and iconographic innovations. Objections against them from clerk Viskovaty. Cathedral 1554; priest Sylvester's explanations. The attitude of Zinovy ​​​​of Otensky and the Venerable. Maxim the Greek to images of Western origin. Which way did the latter enter Rus'? The sixteenth century was very important in the history of ancient Russian icon painting: here for the first time the makings of a new direction were clearly identified in it, which, in contrast to the old one, which strictly adhered to the icon painting traditions and types inherited from Byzantium, allowed imitation of Western pictorial models. The resolutions of the Stoglavy Council, which explain the view of our ancestors on the icon painter and, in part, the very foundations of Russian icon painting tradition, and the famous Search in the case of clerk Viskovaty 274 will forever remain the written expression of these two different directions and the schism that began in our iconography, which later divided the Russian people into two different camps: supporters of Byzantine icon painting and Italian painting. The position of the artist everywhere and always served as the best measure of the position of art in this or that society, and the mental and moral development of the latter always had an irresistible influence on the nature of his activity and its direction. Our oldest and most remarkable icon painters: Rev. Alypius of Pechersk, Elder Andrei Rublev and friend, stood under the living influence of Byzantine masters and came out of the monasteries. This is quite natural and understandable. Old Russian monasteries were the first breeding grounds for enlightenment; From them came and developed the educational principle of all Russian life, and they were favorable soil for church art in many respects. The whole pattern of monastic life developed in the icon painter a church view of the work he served; in his soul, as in the soul of the Athonite ascetic, to whom the Russian monk always strove as the highest ideal, there was almost no place for those interests that are now commonly called aesthetic - secular: on the contrary, he fearfully distanced himself from such impressions, so as not to confuse his work with serving unworthy goals. His entire stock of mental information and interests was exhausted by reading liturgical books, lives of saints and many, many works of the fathers. Over time, with the emergence of special phenomena in our church-historical life, the conditions of icon painting in Russia and the very position of the icon painter changed. As Christianity spread in various parts of our fatherland, the demand for icons increased, and in the 15th–16th centuries in no country in the Christian world was it as great as in Russia. This caused an extensive preparation of icons, starting with miniature folding or pyadnitsa and up to large paintings of complex content, to the so-called multifaceted icons, which represented something like pictorial religious-historical poems. Many workers were now required to make icons; The art of icon painting from the Greeks and their direct students - monks and clergy - of necessity had to pass to lay people - townspeople and villagers. In the middle of the 16th century, it spread so much between them that it became the subject of handicraft production, requiring a significant number of workers, who began to form, as it were, industrial workshops. The new environment in which the ordinary icon painter now had to move, of course, differed in many ways from the previous one; it was less rich in artistic knowledge and generally spiritual content and could not respond favorably to his works. In Rus' in the 15th–16th centuries it was not easy to find people with the most modest preparation for icon painting. True, in the history of Russian icon painting of that time there are several names that still occupied a prominent place in the history of enlightenment in Rus' - these are the names of the Moscow metropolitans: Simon, Varlaam, Macarius and some other persons, but these were still monks. If we take into account the majority of ordinary icon painters not from privileged workshops, such as Stroganov’s, we will have to agree that they were very little prepared for their profession. If we further take into account what the mass of the common population demanded from the church painter, then it will be easy to see that their demands were not designed for him as an artist. Due to the nature of her spiritual interests and underdeveloped aesthetic taste and understanding, she asked the painter for not so much artistic subjects as entertaining and edifying ones, and was completely satisfied when clumsy miniatures from various kinds of collections or clumsy popular prints came to the aid of her mental and moral education. Let us add to this, in order to better understand the historical ground on which icon painting developed at that time, that in the middle of the 15th century, with the final fall of Byzantium, the artistic connection that had hitherto connected Russia with the East was completely broken, and meanwhile in the West at that time church art, having completely done away with iconographic traditions, began to imitate examples of ancient art and pursue the goals of artistic realism, leaving religious interests aside. These circumstances, in connection with various kinds of unrest in church and public life in Rus', caused the spiritual authorities to pay attention to icon painting and ensure the latter from damage and secular motifs of Western art. And indeed, the Hundred-Glavy Cathedral, whose members were well aware of the position of the icon painter in ancient Russian society, and the conditions in which he was now placed, in the form of protecting the art of icon painting from profanation, paid first of all its attention to the moral qualities of the painting master and his good behavior. “It is fitting for a painter,” the council’s definition says, “to be humble, meek, reverent, not an idle talker, not a laugher, not quarrelsome, not envious, not a drunkard, not a robber, not a murderer, and most of all, to maintain spiritual and physical purity with all fear; and whoever cannot remain like this until the end, let him marry according to the law. It is appropriate for painters to often come to their spiritual fathers, to consult with them in everything and, according to their instructions, to live in fasting, prayer and abstinence with humility, without any shame... If one of the master painters or their students begins to live not according to the rules: in drunkenness, uncleanness and any disorderly conduct, the saints consider them prohibited, and are ordered not to be excommunicated from the work of icons and not to touch it.” 275 Stoglav looked at icon painting as one of the branches of church service, and therefore treated those involved in this work as persons of the highest moral category. According to him, it was like a middle class between laymen and monks. To be recognized as an icon painter, the Stoglavy Cathedral considered it necessary for the student to have technical training in an icon painting school, namely, to acquire the ability to correctly and in accordance with church rules take photographs from the original. “If God reveals to one of the students the art of painting, the master brings him to the saint. If the saint sees that what the disciple wrote will be in the image and likeness, and that he lives in purity and piety, then, having blessed him, he teaches him to continue to live piously and adhere to this holy work with all zeal.” At the same time, the bishop was obliged to teach the master to be impartial in relation to his students - “not to fight for a brother, or a son, or a neighbor.” “If God does not give someone such handicraft, he begins to paint badly or does not live according to the rules, and the master declares him to be clever and worthy in everything and shows him the writing of something else, the saint, having searched, puts such a master under prohibition, and that disciple should not touch the icon business at all.” 276 It is impossible not to give due justice to the compilers of this decree for the fact that they were perhaps the first to pay serious attention to the improvement of icon painting in ancient Russia and subordinated the skill and mutual relations of icon painters to strict church supervision. But, requiring from each candidate the art of icon painting to first study it under the guidance of a master painter, Stoglav, unfortunately, says nothing about the mental development of these individuals and limits himself to just calculating their moral qualities. And subsequently, when the royal icon painting school was established, the masters were tested on the basis of their technical skills, and the handwritten note, which was issued in turn by those elected as paid and stern icon painters, contained only one obligation “to always be with your brethren, not to drink and not to drink, and to always be ready for the sovereign’s business, for icon painting.” 277 The council hoped to make up for the lack of mental development and theoretical knowledge by depriving people of the right to paint from people who were practically unprepared for icon painting, and found disrespectful the excuse of those who, lacking the proper skills and abilities, took up icon painting as a means of subsistence. “And those who to this day painted icons without studying, without permission and not according to the image, and exchanged those icons cheaply for ignorant villagers, are prohibited from learning from good masters; and to whom God will not give (painting handicrafts), and they will cease from such work... If they begin to say: this is how we live and eat, then do not listen to such speeches, because they speak without knowing and do not commit a sin to themselves. Not all people can be icon painters: many different handicrafts have been given to people by God for food and life, except for icon painting.” 278 The Council further tried to highlight the very personality of the icon painter and place her in a privileged position, to surround her with a certain amount of respect from society, honor from the spiritual and secular authorities. Archbishops and bishops, by virtue of this decree, had to cherish and honor painters more than ordinary people; nobles and commoners were obliged to have them in honor for their iconic imagination. The Tsar himself had to reward cunning and talented master painters. This definition, which came out of respect for icon craftsmanship as a church profession, of course, contributed to the relatively wealthy and, in its way, respectable position of those involved in icon painting; but the narrow framework within which the same council placed the activities of these individuals, and the moral point of view that prevailed in the presentation of the ideal of an icon painter, were one of the reasons why icon painting, even after the Council of the Hundred Heads, still remained with us, especially in provincial towns and villages, at the level of a craft and could not rise to the significance and requirements of art. “And about this, the saints have great care and concern for everyone in their own area,” we read in Stoglavniks, “so that great icon painters and their students paint from ancient models” or, as explained elsewhere, “in the image and likeness and in essence, looking at the image of the ancient painters.” Being, first of all, a pious person, a faithful follower of church rules, in a word, a Christian of an impeccable life, the Russian icon painter, in Stoglav’s opinion, must also be a strict guardian of ancient generally accepted examples of icon painting. For guidance and imitation, the fathers of the cathedral recommended to him the icons of Rublev’s letter and with a decisive rule they demanded “not to describe the Deities out of self-reflection, with your own guesses”; 279 in the initiative of the icon painter they saw nothing more than arbitrariness that violated the purity of the Byzantine-Russian tradition. Out of fear that secular elements might enter church painting, the icon painter was also forbidden to use his brush to depict objects that did not belong to the church-religious field. “It is not proper for him,” says one handwritten guide to painting, “to draw anything other than holy imaginations; he prefers to imagine what is to be mocked by man: neither a brutal image, nor a serpent, nor anything other than the best of deeds, as it is convenient and similar.” Church control, which so clearly stood guard over the ancient iconographic tradition, had at that time real reasons to fear the invasion of new ideas into our iconography and the appearance in it of motifs alien to generally accepted church models. This possibility was supported by the tense state of theological thought at that time, affected by the rationalistic teaching of Matvey Bashkin and Theodosius Kosoy. Their negative opinions greatly disturbed the book world of that time, raising all sorts of questions and doubts in it. If such a negative idea as non-recognition of the veneration of icons, relics and saints had already found supporters among the Russian people, then innovations could penetrate into the field of iconography all the more easily. And they really got in. In 1547, a terrible fire visited Moscow and destroyed many churches there with all their utensils and St. icons. By order of the sovereign, icons were brought from Novgorod, Smolensk, Dmitrov, Zvenigorod and many other cities and placed in the court Cathedral of the Annunciation until new ones were made. At the same time, the sovereign sent for icon painters to Novgorod, Pskov and other cities with orders for them to appear in Moscow. The icon makers gathered, and the Tsar ordered them to paint icons, each for his own purpose; some of them were ordered to sign the royal chambers. The main work had to be done by the Novgorod and Pskov icon painters: they, as more knowledgeable, were tasked with painting the largest number of icons. According to the famous priest Sylvester, with the permission of the sovereign, he ordered Novgorod and Pskov icon painters to write: “St. The Life-Giving Trinity in deeds, yes I Believe in one God the Father, yes Praise the Lord from heaven, yes Sophia the Wisdom of God, yes it is worthy to eat” from samples taken in the Trinity and Simonovsky monasteries. Both there and here, as we have seen, the icon painter Andrei Rublev was famous for his works. Pskov icon painters: Ostanya, yes Yakov, yes Mikhailo, yes Yakushko, yes Semyon the High Glagol, having asked to go home, in turn wrote there with their comrades: the Last Judgment, the Renewal of the Church of the Resurrection in Jerusalem, the Passion of the Lord and an icon with four images: “And God rests on the seventh day, the Only Begotten Son, Come, people, let us worship the three-part Deity and carnal grave." These icons were then brought to Moscow and, together with the images painted here by Novgorod icon painters, by order of the sovereign, they were placed in the Archangel and Annunciation Cathedrals and the Ascension Monastery. 280 It was against these new icons, which took the place of the old imported wonderful images in the Annunciation Cathedral, now taken out of it and released from Moscow with honor by the Tsar, Metropolitan and people, that clerk Ivan Mikhailovich Viskovaty, the famous chancellor, in today’s language, of Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible, expressed his doubts. To what extent this personality is outlined to us in her speeches and from the course of the court case caused by the protest, it is clear that Viskovaty had rare reading in theological books at that time, communicated with Bashkin and defended his Orthodox Christian faith from attacks. Not being one of his supporters, he nevertheless allowed himself to be critical of the execution of icon painting subjects and found in the icons brought from Pskov and again painted in Moscow by the Novgorodians innovations that disagreed with the theological concepts and rules of ancient Russian icon painting. Without going into the details of this protest, curious in many respects, we will only get acquainted with the main foundations on which this defender of the Old Russian church tradition rested, and with those innovations that, in his opinion, were allowed into our then iconography. Viskovaty argued that it was impossible to represent the invisible Deity and the incorporeal in outline with colors, and therefore he armed himself against the then rotating images of the Ancient of Days, the Lord of Hosts, and the Eternal Council. On the same basis he rebelled against the facial image of the first member of the creed. “It seems to me,” he said, “that I Believe in one God, the Father Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible, to write in words (not in person, but with a signature), but then I should write and imagine, according to the carnal gaze, with the icon letter of our Lord Jesus Christ and the entire symbol to the end.” How far the pictorial illustration of the text of sacred books and church songs went then, how legible it was not everywhere, can be seen from those subjects about which Viskovaty expressed his bewilderment. “He had doubts,” as he himself stated, “about the Old Formation of the Lord of Hosts and the Eternal Council; about the image of how God rested from all His works, and the Trinity Act; “Come, people, let us worship the three-part Deity, the Only Begotten Son and the fleshly tomb, all being and Adam’s creation” 281. All these names show us what a wide range of images came into use in church painting of that time, and what multifaceted icons with deeds were. Viskovaty found the image of the Crucified on the cross, covered with cherubic wings and with clenched hands, contrary to church rules, contrary to the words of the canon: He spread his hands on the cross, healing the uncontrollably outstretched hand of the primordial in Eden. He considered the clasping of hands to be the vain wisdom of those who thought that our Lord did not cleanse the sin of Adam, and he doubted the wings that covered the body of Jesus on the cross on the grounds that this was supposedly the opinion of the Latins. The inner meaning of the argument is that Western art depicted the crucifixion of Christ with many symbolic accessories and tried to idealize this pictorial subject with details that represented the glory of the Crucified One. 282 The difference in translations of the same icon also confused Viskovaty; he would like to “paint icons in the same model, so that there is no temptation, otherwise there is one icon in the porch, and another in the church, the same thing is written, and not in the same type.” He also had strong doubts about the fact that, contrary to established custom, there were no inscriptions on the new icons that would explain their meaning: “I ask anyone, and they don’t know how to tell, but there is no signature.” Finally, Viskovaty was seduced by the paintings with which the royal chambers were decorated, and he pointed with special emphasis at the dancing wife, who perhaps depicted dancing grace. “And about this, sir,” the clerk wrote to Metropolitan Macarius, “all my jealousy was that the images of the Savior, the Most Pure One and His saints were taken down and in that place they put their wisdom ... according to their own reason, and not according to divine scripture, because in the middle chamber of our sovereign the image of the Savior was painted, and right there next to him a little woman was painted, carelessly, as if dancing, and it is signed over it: fornication, and another - jealousy, and other mockery... I am embarrassed about this, sir, forgive me and guide me to the best, so that my spirit may be strengthened.” 283 Doubts about the newly painted icons, expressed orally and in writing by Metropolitan Viskovaty. Macarius, were discussed twice at the council in January 1554, by order of the king. Bishop Macarius took up the task of resolving the clerk’s perplexities, and from the very beginning noted the incongruity of his reasoning, that “he does not speak and philosophize much about holy icons, since painters of the invisible Divinity do not essentially describe, but write and imagine according to a prophetic vision and according to ancient Greek models, according to the tradition of the holy apostles and saints. father". Having received an explanation from the Metropolitan for all his objections, Viskovaty repented, asked for forgiveness for his error and even wrote a special repentant answer in which he renounced his previous opinions and recognized them as false. He was subjected to church repentance for three years and, under pain of excommunication from the Church, they demanded that he no longer keep books in his home or teach others sacred subjects, and that he himself “not experience the invisible Divinity and not reason about the incomprehensible Being, but only believe.” 284 But since the supervision of the painting of the Annunciation Cathedral was entrusted to the priest Sylvester, the interrogation of Viskovaty naturally called for clarification from the latter. In his response to some of the clerk’s accusations, Sylvester meant to show the inviolability of the iconographic tradition, which had hitherto formed the cornerstone of Russian iconography. For this purpose, he clarifies its historical origin, and groups the facts known to him into two categories, of which in the first he collects information about the activities of constructing and decorating the churches of the first Russian princes in Kyiv and Novgorod, in the second he talks about the same activities of the Novgorod rulers. Referring to the basic rule that has been followed from time immemorial in Rus' in church architecture and painting, Sylvester says that he followed it and is not guilty of any innovations. “When Grand Duke Vladimir himself was baptized in Korsun and, having arrived in Kyiv, commanded everyone to be baptized, and then the entire Russian country was baptized... And the Great Prince Vladimir Yaroslavich ordered to build a stone church of St. Sophia according to the Constantinople custom, and the icon Sophia, the Wisdom of God, Greek translation (= copy from Greek), painted at the same time; and in Pskov they erected the Life-Giving Trinity, in the Yuryev Monastery - St. George, at the Settlement - the Annunciation. All those churches were built by the great princes and they sent Greek icon painters. Yes, in many monasteries the rulers of Novgorod built stone churches with signatures and decorated them with honest icons: and in all those churches, as well as in Moscow, Vladimir, Pskov, Tver, Suzdal, Smolensk and throughout the great sovereign’s state, on the walls and icons there was Greek and Korsun writing and writing from local masters from the same images.” Turning then to his personality, Sylvester adds: “and you, sir, St. Metropolitan, and the entire consecrated cathedral, search and judge, if I have added a single line of my mind: all the icons, like the Acts of Genesis and many other parables, are from ancient tradition, as icon painters write: I myself am inviolable to any work, the icon painters all wrote from their old samples.” But, having declined responsibility for indulging in any innovations in the field of icon painting, he does not, however, defend the icons painted by Pskov and Novgorod painters from some mistakes and does not claim that they agree in everything with the icon painting types accepted in Moscow. With this latter in mind, he turns to the council of clergy with a request to subject the icons displayed in the Annunciation Cathedral to strict examination; proposes to correct them according to the divine scriptures and according to the rules of the Holy Fathers, “if anything in them is not essential or the examples are indirect.” And the consecrated cathedral, probably in the words of Sylvester himself, should have noted several such peculiar options in the new iconography of the cathedral and condemned them. “And where the image of Christ was painted on the cross, the hands are clenched and sometimes weakened,” said the chairman of the cathedral to Viskovaty, “and even then the icon painters did not paint much, not according to ancient Greek models, out of their foolishness, and we ordered those images to be rewritten”... 285 Deacon Viskovaty did not stand alone in his attacks on the icon painting of that time, and not all innovations in the latter were noted by him. We see that other strange iconographic subjects were also in circulation at that time, having their own circle of admirers and opponents, their own interpretations and, in a sense, their own theoretical foundations. Zinovy, a student of Maxim the Greek, who, like him, was then imprisoned in the Novgorod Otensky Monastery, was visited by kliros from the Old Russian Monastery, among whom was the lay icon painter Theodore. Among other perplexities, they turned to Zinovy ​​with a question: how to look at the image of God the Father that appeared then in the image of King David in conjunction with the crucifixion of Christ? “Tell us,” the clergy members said, “because the Nets do not accept this icon and worship it, but they marvel at it and praise it, as if a very wise example has been compiled.” The icon managed to attract attention, received the original name of the Godfather, and along with it a legend circulated from hand to hand, in which this apocryphal plot was described with detailed explanations. Zinovy ​​orders this legend to be read to him in advance and then analyzes it in detail and sharply condemns both the very idea and the details of this fictitious image, recognizing it in everything as disagreeing with the truth and with the views of Orthodox dogma. Finding the very name of the icon incongruous, he considers it an insult to the greatness of God to represent the beginningless and infinite God in the image of a holy man, but still His creation and servant, that is, King David. He also recognizes as completely indecent the image on the icon of God the Father with a schema on the head and an omophorion on the shoulders: 286 “the schema does not show the ruler and the king, but the slave is subjugated; The king is shown with a diadem and purple. It is the Mnisi who have the schema, not the kings.” On top of the schema on the head of Hosts was a crown with seven horns, which the legend explained in the sense of seven centuries. This accessory and its strange symbolic interpretation had, it seems to us, a Gnostic character and was adjacent to the Gnostic teaching about the eons. 287 The seven horns of the apocalyptic lamb, which meant the seven eyes or seven spirits of God, according to Zinovy, could not, in any case, justify the symbolism of the legend. The figure of God the Father, placed directly behind the cross, from behind which only its upper part protruded, while the lower part was covered with cherubic wings, had an iron glove on the hand holding the sword. In his assessment of this accessory, Zinovy ​​draws attention to the rough realism of this symbolic appendage, with which they obviously wanted to express the strength and strength of the punishing right hand of God. If, he says, such symbolic expressions found in the Old Testament were translated literally, then many absurd and anti-religious images would appear. In front of the image of God the Father, a cross was inscribed, and on it “Young Jesus sits in iron armor and a copper helmet.” This new feature takes us to the earliest period of the iconography of the cross of Christ and represents a repetition of one detail of the most ancient type of ideal crucifixes. As is known, ancient Christians for a long time did not depict the crucifixion of Christ in their own form and poeticized this plot with various kinds of combinations that replaced the direct image of the Crucified One. These combinations included the image of Christ in a medallion on the upper spur of the cross or in the middle of it, at the intersection of its transverse part with its longitudinal one; and to express the idea of ​​the triumphant Christ, they depicted Him in the ideal type - young, beardless, in adolescence, without regard to the actual years of His life. In our depiction of the Savior not crucified, but seated at the top of the cross and, moreover, young, young, one cannot help but see a repetition of both of these methods of artistic idealization of the crucifixion of Christ. But Zinovy, being undoubtedly one of the most educated Russian people of the 16th century, apparently had no idea about this aesthetic technique of ancient art and looked at the matter from a theological point of view, and therefore condemned this image for non-observance of historical truth and the artist’s willful attitude to the gospel history. “And if Jesus, wearing iron armor and a helmet of brass, should descend from the cross to hell, not a single theologian will betray him, or who is sung by his father,” just as it is not said that “the young Jesus should sit on the cross: all this is wisdom alien to the faithful and is blasphemy to the devil. “The Lord Jesus Christ,” our theologian continues, “was crucified in the 33rd year of the age of His flesh, the Gospel of the writer not sitting in armor on the cross, but crucified naked, nailed to the cross with an outstretched hand.” Moreover, he even found traces of the Manichaean heresy here: “the young Jesus sitting on the cross, and not crucified, is depicted according to the heresy of the Manichaeans, for they say that Christ was crucified in an apparition, and not in truth.” Thus, in the theological and historical exegesis of Zinovy ​​we see nothing more than a dry indication of the type of crucifixion that was finally formed in Byzantine art, which served for him both as a point of departure and as the basis for all argumentation. This is undoubtedly what Zinovy ​​had in mind when he examined the incomprehensible image of the cross on the icon of the Godfather. Under the figure of the young Jesus, a white seraph was depicted nailed to the cross, and on its transverse branches were two scarlet cherubs. According to the explanation of the legend, “the white seraphim is the soul of Jesus, the scarlet cherubim are her mind and word.” 288 As far as we know, such a replacement of the crucifixion of Christ with a seraphim does not occur in ancient Christian art; but it had, we assume, something to do with the then Christological disputes about the spiritual body of Christ, supposedly inaccessible to suffering and death, and received the right of citizenship in later Western art. This whole strange, but nevertheless interesting symbolic picture shows that, despite the poverty of mental and artistic interests we noted among the masses of the common people of that time, despite the dominance of icon-painting examples of Byzantine art, Western influence quietly crept up on us and declared itself in the field of iconography. Accepted by some, appearing sporadically, it did not pass without a trace, but gave rise to rumors, doubts, and reasoning, some of which were reflected in the theological literature of that time. But if some did not know how to look at this out-of-the-ordinary plot, and others, like Zinovy, certainly condemned it and, without further ado, associated it with various heretical sects, there were at that time people who looked at this image much more condescendingly, who saw in it an excessive and seductive work of free artistic fantasy for ordinary believers, and not a matter of heretical propaganda. This was, by the way, Maxim the Greek, the teacher of the monk Zinovy, from whose words we presented this wonderful iconographic plot. Pskov clerk Mikhailo Grigoryevich Misyur-Munekhin turned to the translator who worked under Maxim the Greek, Dimitry Gerasimov, with a question: how to look at this extraordinary image, and is it Orthodox? Dimitry Gerasimov, in turn, asked Maxim the Greek about this and reported the latter’s answer in a letter to clerk Misyur in Pskov. 289 For the genealogy of our plot, it gives several interesting explanations, from which it undoubtedly reveals that before the appearance of the icon of the Godfather in Moscow, this plot was already known and served as a subject of discussion in Novgorod under Archbishop Gennady (1484–1504), that there it aroused doubts, but the majority, with iconographers at the head, spoke in favor of it, and it remained. At that time, it was not difficult for an iconographic subject of Western origin to find its way into the workshop of a Novgorod icon painter. Just as Korsun at one time served as an intermediary between Kievan Rus and Byzantium, during the transfer of the first Christian faith and church art to the latter, Novgorod and Pskov were a kind of transfer points in relations between the heterodox West and northern Russia. Through them not only trade items and industrial products came to us, but also works of art. Vessels Rev. Anthony the Roman, who, according to legend, arrived with him from Rome; the so-called Korsun Gate of the Novgorod St. Sophia Cathedral, made at the end of the 12th century by Magdeburg masters, and many other monuments will forever remain material evidence of our long-standing relations with the West. The first appearance of carved icons in Pskov indicates, it seems to me, the same fact, that is, our relations with the West. In 1540, some passing elders from a foreign land brought two carved icons to Pskov: St. Nicholas the Wonderworker and Paraskeva Pyatnitsa. This circumstance led the Pskovites to great bewilderment, and some even began to say that the worship of icons on rezi is the same as the worship of idols. The excitement grew ever greater, and then the elders with the icons were taken and sent to Novgorod to Archbishop Macarius. The enlightened archpastor himself venerated these icons, sang a prayer service in front of them and, releasing the icons back, ordered the Pskovites to meet them in a cathedral and exchange them with the elders. The Pskovites obeyed and, in view of the favorable review of the respected ruler, placed these strange icons for them in their churches: St. Nicholas the Wonderworker and the Martyr Paraskeva. No matter how uncertain the news about this incident in the chronicle is, there remains, however, every possibility of assuming that we are talking about images that were of Western origin and were only accidentally brought to us by passing elders. The sculptural type of products, which, as is known, flourished in the West during the era of the Romanesque and especially Gothic styles, was widespread there and could easily, therefore, at that time penetrate into Rus'. True, wood carving has existed from time immemorial among our ancestors and served as an ordinary decoration for their unpretentious homes, which was often spoken of with great praise by foreigners traveling around Russia; but these carved icons are unknown in church use during the most ancient period of our history. IX. From the history of ancient Russian icon painting From the history of ancient Russian icon painting. The influence of the West on Rus' and our icon painting in the 17th century. Complaints about this by the compiler of the “Shield of Faith” and the orders of Patriarchs Nikon and Joachim. School of royal icon painters; its relation to Western pictorial models. Message from the artist Joseph; the artistic theory of the latter and its relationship to early Christian artistic views. The direction given by Ushakov to our icon painting. Church and government orders of the 17th century regarding icon painting. The 17th century was a most remarkable time in the life of Old Russian society: here Old Russian traditions met with a new strong current coming to us from the west through Lithuania, Poland and Little Russia. What had previously been delivered to Russia in fragments and by chance from across the sea, now poured into it in a whole stream, the muddy source of which lay in the depths of Latinism and Protestantism, which had degenerated from it. This trend was accompanied not only by the assimilation by our ancestors of everyday conveniences created by Western European culture, but also by the appearance from the printing presses of southern and western Russian printing houses of a long series of books and brochures (= publications) in which Latin errors were propagated, which gradually penetrated into society and gave rise to disputes in it due to Catholic doctrines: about the time of the transubstantiation of St. gifts, Filioque, unleavened bread. The Moscow spiritual and partly secular authorities took measures depending on it against the invasion of these heterodox teachings and foreign innovations, but were powerless to stop the movement of this flow. She herself, due to historical events, was more than once forced to resort to these books and rely on southern Russian scientists, who served her as translators, and teachers in the schools that were just starting up in Moscow at that time, and official preachers - in general, they occupied a prominent and active position in literature and society. The same influence made itself felt with incomparably greater force only in contrast to the previous one in the field of church painting, which now began to adopt the manner of Western painters with their real brush and began to interpret subjects that had previously either not been known at all, or carefully avoided when encountering them. Simultaneously with the newly created books, filled with the Latin custom and belonging only in name to the Eastern Church, 290 we also had “Nezia Latin disciples, young icon painters, and, moreover, the Latin and Lutheran parts themselves,” which, contrary to the traditions of Old Russian icon painting, began to declare and pursue primarily artistic goals. The Moscow Council of 1667, in an article about icon painters, probably had in mind this new direction of church painting, but, busy with polemics with schismatics, left this aspect of the matter in the shadows and limited itself to a general remark in the spirit of Stoglav: “We command that a skilled artist and a good man from the clergy rank of elders be over the icon painters, that is, a chief and a watchman, so that the ignorant will not quarrel the holy icons of Christ, the Mother of God and His saints, writing in bad and absurd writing, and let all unrighteous wisdom cease, who are in the habit of writing without evidence.” 291 We do not have such a historical document or canonical decree that in a single outline would outline the tendencies of Western icon painters and the very process of combating them; but in various articles and reviews of Russian literature of the 17th century there is no shortage of indications of particular points against which the latter was directed. Without going far, let us refer in confirmation to the spiritual testament of Patriarch Joachim, in which he with all sincerity exposed the noted turn in the field of painting and its connection with Western trends, and we will cite several passages from the famous “Shield of Faith” as an example of the then complaints about innovations creeping into church painting. Here, by the way, it is said that Latinizing and Lutheran icon painters “on their charters they write and print saints with plump and fat faces and whitened bodies and with certain parts of their bodies naked, which they wish to be covered for the sake of appearance.” In particular, “they paint the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos as a prostitute, with a revealing head, a simple hair, a holy breast and bare breasts, which has never been seen by anyone, but from Her very infancy She was covered bodily... We do not wear colorful or valuable yak clothes, but always in His entire life, humble, dark clothes, of little value. And the infant image of Christ God Himself is painted by all the Udes, even to the cold naked, without any reverence. In a similar absurd way they write the Forerunner in St. Elizabeth in the depths, in the arms of others, playing before the infant Christ, naked by all the des. And St. the apostles, instead of the prophetic formations about Christ and the fortune-telling they hold, are written with killing instruments (with the instruments of their suffering) and naked shins, legs and arms naked to the brim, and other absurdities that, in the eyes of the reverent, bring shame. Isn’t it dishonor to saints, like St. "Do the myrrh-bearing Mary Magdalene paint the icon as a harlot, the Vanirs to new captivity?" And in another place: “the current Latin and Luthorst disciples, icon painters, signify Christ as God, His divine name ο ων, and the Holy Cross. The image of the Most Pure Theotokos also preached Her incorruptible virginity, these three stars, which ceased to be written in many ways. And this is foreign to true Orthodoxy.” 292 Having expressed many more bitter complaints about the invasion of frivolous and secular motifs of the then Western painting into Russian icon painting, the compiler of the Shield comes to the conclusion that “bishops or their deputies must lead and edify what is the manner of condoning in the church... For this reason, icon painters must bring icons to the bishop for blessing, and those that are beautiful and written according to ancient tradition will be accepted, but those that are not will be prohibited.” Despite the warnings of the spiritual authorities and expressions of indignation on the part of its representatives, these free-thinking works of the church brush little by little came to us in Rus' in the form of icons made according to the Fryazhian model, paintings and especially printed or engraved sheets, which the German lands supplied us with in abundance. To the great temptation of pious people of that time, they appeared on open sale and found considerable demand. In addition to the icon row, which was an extensive market for the sale of products in this area and was located on what is now Nikolskaya Street, there were several other places in Moscow where the same works were sold. Near the Spassky Gate, on the bridge that spanned the moat that ran along the Kremlin wall, chests and benches were also set up, where the same seductive paintings were displayed to those passing by and, of course, bought up. Moscow sacrums or squares intersected by streets were also not free from the sale of German printed sheets with heretical images of saints. Being a great zealot of Greek rites and, in particular, Byzantine icon-painting traditions, His Holiness Patriarch Nikon was perhaps the first of the spiritual authorities to begin to ardently fight evil. Through his people, everywhere, even from the houses of the most distinguished Moscow dignitaries, he selected icons of the new style, ordered their eyes to be gouged out and in this form carried around the city and a royal decree was announced, threatening severe punishment to those who would dare to paint such icons in the future. Outraged by the innovations and wanting to remove them from the iconography at all costs, he decided even in 1654 publicly, in the presence of the Tsar and Patriarch Macarius of Antioch, to anathematize on the week of Orthodoxy all who would henceforth paint or keep Frankish icons in their house. 293 Even after this, evil did not decrease, but, on the contrary, intensified. By order of Patriarch Joachim, special heralds (priviuchi) were to go out into city squares and announce publicly “that icons of saints should not be printed on paper sheets and German heretical ones should not be bought in rows or sold by the sacrum; and if anyone disobeys this and begins to sell such sheets for the sake of his own gain and print in a depraved manner, he will be severely punished by the great sovereigns.” 294 But extremes always give rise to a middle, moderate direction, in which both sides converge, as if on neutral ground, and receive the right to a more durable and calm further existence. This happened with our iconography in the 17th century. The school of royal salary and stern painters, which was established at the Armory Chamber in the 60s of the 17th century by Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich and was always supported and protected by the government, took upon itself to reconcile Byzantine-Russian icon painting traditions with the beginnings of new Italian painting. Starting, perhaps, from the weak experiments of historical painting, which had hitherto found shelter in the royal chambers, boyars' huts and miniature manuscripts, and being organized from good Moscow and city masters, the new school of painting concentrated in itself everything that was then best in this area in Rus'. The famous isographer of that time, Simon Fedorovich Ushakov, came out of this school and for a long time headed it, who was far ahead of his contemporaries in the breadth and novelty of his artistic concepts. Talented, hardworking and extremely prolific, he left us many icons of his own brush, which still decorate monastery and parish churches in different parts of Russia. But the subsequent discussion will not be about the number of icons he painted, not about the structure of his school and the fate of this remarkable personality, 295 but about the direction that Ushakov tried to introduce into our icon painting of that time, about his relationship to the artistic works of the West. To characterize the best representatives of the royal icon-painting school and, in particular, those views that its head shared and pursued in his activities, in addition to the icons of Ushakov’s brush, there is also a unique letter of its kind from the isographer Joseph to Simon Ushakov, 296 aimed at protecting the latter’s painting style from attacks on it by icon painters of the old style. Without breaking ties with the traditions of ancient Russian icon painting and without becoming at odds with church views on the tasks of the latter, the iconographer Joseph nevertheless declares his decisive dissatisfaction with its artisanal nature. “Nowhere in other countries,” he writes to his contemporary and like-minded person, “can one see such outrage as we have now. Honest and wise icon art was denigrated and humiliated by the ignorant. Everywhere in the villages and villages, prasols and shchepetinniki carry icons in crumbs, and they are written so abusively that some resemble not human images, but wild people. And, what is most dishonest of all, Prasol buys them from Prasol like wood chips - hundreds and thousands at a time. The Shuyans, Kholuyans and Paleshans sell them at market places and take them around the villages and sell them individually for eggs and onions, like children’s pipes, and exchange them in large quantities for dustbins and all sorts of junk. And the common people are scrupulous, charming with their prodigal words, they say that there is no salvation from writing well; and, having heard this, the villagers do not collect good letters, but look for cheap ones.” 297 In view of this expression of noble indignation, it becomes clear why the entire message of the author, offended in his religious feelings, runs through the remarkable and at that time still so rare trait in an icon painter of sympathy for artistic examples of Western painting, which we would look in vain not only in the views of Stoglav, who armed himself against everything foreign, as filthy customs, but also in the concepts that held among us a whole century later. Polemicizing with one of his opponents, who stood on the basis of the old view, and taking Western painting under his protection, Joseph asks: “Are you really going to say that only Russians are given the right to paint icons, and only Russian icon painting should be worshiped, and icons from other lands should not be accepted or venerated? Only you are so wise, and if you want to understand, then know that in foreign lands there is such an acquisitive disposition towards philosophy, and especially to this wise depiction it is attached that not only the image of Christ or the Mother of God on the walls and on the decks is lifelike written and skilfully printed on sheets, but they do not put their earthly kings into oblivion.” 298 Our enlightened icon painter was amazed in the works of Western masters by the fact that they “depict as if they were living” biblical-historical events and faces. With the impartiality of a true artist, he pays due tribute of amazement to the successes of Western art and recommends to his opponent to use the beautiful, no matter who it belongs to. “When among foreigners we see the image of Christ or the Mother of God drawn (printed) or depicted with wise pictures, then our eyes are filled with much love and joy. We do not become like the Jews with our unbelief, we are not inflamed by envy and we do not reproach foreigners when we see their well-painted icons. We prefer such grace-filled things over all earthly things and kindly redeem them from foreigners, but we ask for others for a great gift and accept the image of Christ on sheets or boards, kindly kissing them, and according to the law we bring such icons to the priest (for consecration). 299 The above expressions require no comment: they are so transparent that the idea of ​​a rapprochement with the West that is necessary for Russian icon painters shines through them with all clarity. “You despise us from accepting icon images from foreigners,” he remarks to his antagonist, “but you yourself are touching the cunning of foreigners. Ask your father, let him tell you, let your elders tell you, that in all our Christian-Russian churches, all the sacred utensils, phelonions and omophorions, shrouds and coverings, all kinds of intricate fabric and gold weaving, expensive stones and pearls, you accept all this from foreigners, you bring it into the church, you decorate the throne and icons with it, and nothing is bad or noticeable. you’re calling me!” 300 Having arisen on the basis of Byzantine-Russian icon painting traditions, but having matured under the life-giving influence of ideas and artistic works that, as we have seen, have long been brought to us from the West, Ushakov’s painting school, strange as it may seem at first glance, relied on the sympathy of Patriarch Nikon, acted on his behalf and with his authority consolidated its sympathies and aspirations, which were strongly at odds with the general structure of thoughts of that time. “The Great Sovereign, His Holiness Patriarch Nikon,” says the iconographer Joseph, “has a kind zeal for the wise painting of holy icons, and with such splendor he especially strives to decorate the holy churches, and does not curse the art of painting, and does not praise rude and frantic icon painters, not only Latin, but also bad Russian ones, and for the greater humiliation of the Holy Church he does not accept poorly painted icons, and does not put aside ardent painting, but he frantically forbids those who paint.” 301 No matter how plausible the expressions in which the attitude of Patriarch Nikon to the matter of earnest painting is presented here, it is impossible not to notice that the introduction of the latter into ancient Russian icon painting was a kind of reform, which people who adhered to antiquity had the right to point to as a retreat or novelty, hitherto unknown, or at least unrecognized, in which it was easy to discover alien elements that went beyond the boundaries of the previous iconographic techniques. As is known, one of the prevailing motifs in late Byzantine and Old Russian icon painting was determined by the ascetic mood of the minds of that time, as a result of which almost all saints, without distinction, appeared on icons with an expression of concentration and even gloominess on their faces, with a darkish body color, exhausted by the labors and deprivations of the free feat of salvation. The very background of the image corresponded to this basic idea, usually very dark, densely painted, which is why the icon took on a completely gloomy character. The artistic sense of the best masters of the royal school, trained on examples of Western painting, was indignant at this gloomy and, moreover, monotonous coloring and wanted to bring more light, joy and life into the presentation of religious subjects. Isographer Joseph ardently defended the idea that the ascetic character with which the faces of saints are depicted without distinction on icons is far from being a common and inevitable attribute of holiness for everyone, that the emaciated state of the flesh to which Christian ascetics indulged was a temporary, transitional moment in their lives, which was ultimately resolved by a state of enlightenment, glory, spiritual triumph, and that to dwell on the time of their earthly humiliation for an artist would mean forgetting most important. “Where did you invent such an instruction, foolish lovers,” Joseph turns to the opposite side, “to paint the faces of the saints in one form, dark and dark? Was the entire human race created in one form? Were all the saints dark and skinny? If in the lives of many saints it is narrated how they humbled themselves by fasting, lying down and lack of consciousness, then after their death from bright places and blissful peace, can they not be enlightened and transform from such sorrows into joy and greatness unspeakable? 302 Darkness and desperation are befitting of the devil and, perhaps, unrepentant sinners, according to the conclusion of our eloquent iconographer. But the main thing, against which he rebels and advocates with particular force, is the ingrained custom of ancient Russian icon painters, due to the established manner and lack of technical means, of representing fresh and young faces with the same shade of dryness and senility with which they depicted the faces of other saints. To justify his artistic theory of light iconographic types, he expresses various kinds of biblical and church-historical considerations. The latter are so characteristic and serious, they go so far beyond the usual views of that time, and finally reveal such artistic development in their author, that we consider it not superfluous to cite at least some of them here verbatim. “In the depiction of the Annunciation,” writes Joseph, “arch. Gabriel stands before us, while the Blessed Virgin sits. Just as an angel usually appears in the Holy of Holies, so the archangel’s face is depicted as bright and beautiful, youthful, and not sinister and dark. The Virgin, as Chrysostom narrates, has a girl’s face, a girl’s mouth, and the rest of her disposition is a girl’s. In the depiction of the Nativity of Christ we see the Mother sitting, and the Child lying young in a manger; and if the Child is young, then how can one paint His face gloomily and darkly? On the contrary, in every possible way it behooves Him to be white and rosy, and especially molded, and not unsculpted, according to the prophet who says: The Lord reigned and was clothed with beauty... In the same way, everything else in the flesh, His existence and coming is written, as He comes in free passion, as He rides on a donkey; in his very passions he stands touched before Pilate”... Applying the same principle to other iconographic subjects, he continues: “When Moses, the great prophet among the prophets, received the law from the Lord at Sinai and came down from the mountain, holding in his hands the tablet inscribed by the finger of God, then the children of Israel could not look at the face of Moses because of the lordship that was on it. Is it possible to paint the face of Moses gloomily and darkly, out of custom and out of love for darkness and haunted faces! Susanna was beautiful in vision and many such were found in ancient times. But in our times,” Joseph addresses his opponent, “you instruct the isographers to paint dark and indecent images and, contrary to ancient scripture, you teach us to lie; for both in the ancient covenant and in the new grace many saints, male and female, were beautiful in vision. Wasn't the Christian king's mother, the noble Queen Helen, beautiful? The glorious martyr Catherine, due to the beauty and brightness of her face, was named so by the Hellenes - the namesake of the heavenly moon. And it is said about the Great Martyr Barbara that such beauty as the appearance of an angel has never existed in humans.” 303 The Russian painter of the 17th century, without noticing it himself, by simply imitating the best Western models, in his judgments about the nature of the iconographic images of the Savior, the Mother of God and the saints, seemed to be on the basis of early Christian artistic views. At the very least, bearing in mind the monuments of catacomb painting, just like the works of the early Byzantine style, one cannot help but admit that ancient Christian art shunned images of gloomy and harsh ones, that it avoided subjects that left a heavy impression on the viewer, and tried to arouse opposite feelings with its representations. Speaking in our place about the ancient methods of artistic idealization of the crucifixion of Christ, we noticed that in early Christian art there are no types of suffering and generally humiliated Christ, but that He was depicted there in the features of a fresh, blooming age, in the solemn positions of His earthly life, as a great Teacher, King and Wonderworker. The artistic views of the painting school of Ushakov and his supporters to some extent corresponded to this ideal of ancient Christian art and together constituted a protest against the extremes of that harsh, anti-artistic movement to which the clerk Viskovaty, the monk Zinovy ​​and their like-minded people belonged in Rus'. Icon painters of the old Russian school were inclined to see in the living artistic reproduction of sacred persons or events a temptation and a reason for unclean sensual ideas; the best representative of the royal school of paid and stern painters adhered to the idea that a truly Christian view of the icon makes such a temptation impossible, and that only a completely corrupted heart can open up a reason for low, sensual views in the presentation of religious subjects according to the laws of sound and living reality. The sense of beauty, which the devout icon painter of Stoglav’s time lacked, having awakened in the soul of our 17th century painter under the influence of Western ideas and works of new art, could no longer fall asleep in him. Illuminating his modest workshop with a cheerful light, having a refreshing effect on his religiously minded thoughts, it gave a different direction to his brushes. The artistic principle introduced by Ushakov into icon painting continued to operate in the works of his students and had a corresponding influence on the nature of the icon painting originals, or guidelines, which the Old Russian icon painter followed in his skill. Comparing the later, formed at the end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th centuries, original with other earlier ones, it is easy to notice that the first allows for many new pictorial details that characterize the person or historical event depicted, enlivens the overall picture of the action with details from real life, and introduces the principle of naturalness and portraiture. Not to mention all sorts of little things that reflect the desire to give each face its individual, distinctive character, the compiler of the original very often makes comments about the beauty of this or that person, which we would look in vain for in originals of earlier origin. This desire for liveliness and elegance of the image is visible even in the characteristics of Christian ascetics. The painful feeling aroused by the depiction of physical suffering or the sight of an organism exhausted by labor and deprivation is softened in the latest edition of the original by some comments that give the painter the right to give a lighter and more soothing character to the presented subject. The later editor of the original achieves this goal, by the way, by the fact that when depicting the appearance of ascetics and martyrs, he often makes additions about their external beauty and splendor in the days of their youth or even at the very time of suffering. Contrary to this aesthetic direction of the icon painting original, another edition was developed, the so-called Klintsovskaya - schismatic, in which the previous requirement to maintain uniformity of types and colors in icon painting was repeated with particular force and a strict prohibition was expressed on accepting foreign models and imitating them. The Old Believers party, holding on to the immovable antiquity, convicted Ushakov and his supporters of being partial to the West and found in the artistic direction he gave to Russian icon painting the beginnings of a falling away from the faith, Nikonianism. And she was right with her schismatic. point of view, because Ushakov’s painting principles, although motivated by the definitions of the Stoglavy Cathedral so revered by the Old Believers, went against the usual icon-painting practice of his time and were the harbingers of a new, freer movement of artistic ideas. In the works of Ushakov and his students, ancient Russian icon painting again ascended to the level of art and revealed remarkable progress in its development, the consequences of which were very sharply outlined in the new history of our church art. However, the successes of the latter were noticed in their time and appreciated by those who should. Government measures in the second half of the 17th century and the beginning of the 18th century regarding church painting, we must give them complete justice, were far from the one-sidedness with which individual hierarchical persons looked at the matter and the Old Believer Party reacted. But they all tended to protect our iconography from the extremes of the then Western painting, from the invasion of secular motifs and sensually provocative forms of the latter, and to keep our painters at the level of iconographic decency, which, of course, was then understood from the point of view of old translations or approved examples of the original. In this spirit, the decrees of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich of 1667–1669 were drawn up and the charter of the Eastern Patriarchs with our then High Hierarch Joasaph II, given on May 12, 1668 in the name of “the royal coat of the most important isographer Simon Ushakov,” is expressed. 304 The Tsar more than once ordered that honest icons be painted only “by the most skillful icon painters and the best craftsmanship, according to the tradition of the saints and God-bearing fathers, according to the necessary custom of the saints of the Eastern Church, according to the propriety of deeds and persons.” This, in fact, is the basis on which the Council of the Hundred Heads rested, but on the other hand, the royal letter prescribed: “let no absurdity and indecency be imagined, but let the cunning and goodness of great skill be preserved with all care..., so that the image of the face of some saint will not be neglected through the fault of an unskillful drawing.” The patriarchs, in their charter, and after them Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, divided painters into six categories, according to the degree of their experience in their art, and thus created a whole icon-painting school, in which students were supposed to receive gradual training and improvement. The latter were subject to the supervision and guidance of “the most skillful painters and reverent iconographers,” without whose testimony and approval they could not practice their profession. 305 “For the sake of better splendor and honor of the holy icons,” by decree of 1707, Peter the Great established a special administration for them with Metropolitan Stefan Yavorsky at its head. The body of this administration was the Chamber of Artists in Moscow, subordinate to the superintendent Ivan Petrovich Zarudny. He, as “skilled in that art,” was entrusted with ensuring that painters and iconographers painted holy icons “beautifully and conveniently according to ancient, certified originals and images,” so that from unskillful and poor writing “foreign icons of the saints would not be ridiculed or looked upon.” This control extended to the entire organization of icon painting and determined both the legal capacity of painters to practice their craft and the dignity of their works. Due to “many defects in the icon writing,” in April 1722 it was again ordered that “the icon image should be corrected according to the content of church custom,” and it was also forbidden to use carved and cast icons in the church, as well as at home, with the exception of crucifixes and small crosses and panagias, established with skillful carvings, “previously in Greek and other Orthodox countries.” carved and molded icons did not exist and are now not found, and this custom... came to Russia from non-believers, and especially from the Romans and from the Poles who followed them and were bordering us, who, as if they did not agree with our pious faith, were not fit to follow.” 306 Despite all the restraining and protective principles, Russian icon painting, as can be seen from all of the above, two and a half centuries ago showed a decisive turn towards a more lively, aesthetic direction and began to assimilate examples of Western art. Not being a matter of independent artistic development, this movement was initially an imitative phenomenon, and therefore from the point of view of our culture, our national artistic taste, it could not have much significance, like everything superficial and imitative, not based on the solid principles of internal development. For us, the most interesting and important aspect of this phenomenon is the split that divided Russian society into two camps: supporters of Byzantine icon painting and Italian painting. This discord, not limited to the Old Believer party, then spread to literature and threatens in our time to become an endless question about which one can interpret as much as one wants and not come to any agreement. This strange peculiarity in the position of this issue depends on two reasons: on the sharp difference in points of view from which the issue of normal church painting is discussed, and on the confusion of ideas about the essence of Italian and Byzantine art when it comes to applying them to church practice. The futility of reasoning comes from the fact that the disputing parties do not take the trouble to determine clearly and distinctly: what is the dignity, so to speak, of the essence of church painting, and how do Byzantine painting and our ancient icon painting originals relate to the requests or requirements of the latter? Leaving aside one-sided opinions on this matter, coming from the vicious circle of adherents of the fixed icon type - the Old Believers, we have the right to consider the contemptuous and distrustful attitude towards Byzantine painting the result of a misunderstanding and weak historical and archaeological preparation. With the name of Byzantine painting they are accustomed to connecting the concept of something stupid, rough, ugly, and they confuse icons of later Byzantine work or our old Suzdal bogomaz with works of ancient Byzantine painting, with its best experiences. Not knowing about them, they think that they do not exist; Having no idea about the flourishing time of Byzantine art, they judge the latter by the unsuccessful examples of the time of its decline. We don’t think that an objective, impartial supporter of Byzantine painting would ever say: transfer the frescoes of Athonite painters to the walls of our churches or copy the old products of our Shuyans, Kholuyans and Paleshans - this would mean turning the matter inside out. But on the other hand, only her enemy, out of prejudice or out of his own ignorance, can say: dirty up, destroy as worthless the mosaics of Thessaloniki, Sofia and Ravenna, and paint paintings by Titian or Rubens instead. If the representatives of the controversial issue continue to stand on this exclusive ground, the matter will not advance a single step, and the dispute will remain unfinished. But once history comes to the aid of those reasoning with its advice, the study of art joins in, monuments give their voice, things will appear in a different light, and the original abyss separating both camps will begin to level out more and more. Not to mention the fact that the paintings of the Byzantine and Old Russian iconographic school are imbued with religious animation and were indebted to the warm pious feeling of the devout masters of that time; aesthetic taste, artistic staging, and the ability to give life and expressiveness to the depicted person or subject are visible in them. These artistic iconographic examples belong to that time of Byzantine art, when it had not yet degenerated into lifeless schematism and stood under the life-giving influence of classical Greco-Roman art, from which it emerged and with which for some time it went hand in hand. Our iconographic original in its later established edition correctly conveys only the external, formal, but not the artistic side of these best examples of Byzantine art. He copies facial images, carries out the detailed side of a well-known drawing with all care, but neglects its artistic side and in this respect remains incomparably inferior to his prototypes. It is easy to understand how this artistic degradation occurred. Compliance with artistic conditions in any image or painting depends on the skill of the master, on the talent and skill of his brush, on how much of an artist and connoisseur of his craft he himself is at heart. Our original dates back its antiquity, as we will later learn, to the times of Justinian’s Sophia and the famous minology of Emperor Basil II (975–1025); he is not averse to being proud of the fact that he conveyed in all accuracy the essence of Byzantine iconography; but these claims are exaggerated. He managed to capture, we repeat, the external side of the matter, while the internal - artistic - remained and still remains for him a pium desiderium. Anyone who is familiar with the style of Thessaloniki and Sofia mosaics will understand quite clearly what a huge difference lies between these ancient highly artistic compositions and the iconographic subjects of our original... So, on historical and archaeological grounds, it becomes possible to reconcile the actual state of affairs with the preconceived opinion that exists about Byzantine art in the minds of the majority, and this reconciliation will take place the sooner the faster and more thoroughly we study Byzantium, and the shorter the acquaintance with its ancient artistic monuments is established. Decomposing the general requirement for the artistry of an image into its specific features, we obtain two necessary conditions for every good work of painting, namely naturalness and historical fidelity. It is from these sides that attacks on our ancient and Byzantine iconography are most often heard. These attacks, generally speaking, are fair and with a quantitative, so to speak, solution to the issue, they will have strong support for themselves in very many examples of ancient Russian icon painting. But how far can this demand for naturalness and historical fidelity be extended? Is there a boundary that separates these features from the one-sided realism to which, for example, Western church art has submitted? Or in the pursuit of artistry, i.e. naturalness and historical execution of the plot, a church painter can paint genre paintings instead of icons, portraits instead of the faces of saints? We do not see the need to explain here the difference that exists between fidelity to history and nature or naturalness, on the one hand, and naturalism and portraiture on the other - or, what is the same, to establish the boundaries between these concepts; but we consider it necessary to give a categorical answer to the question: in what relation do Byzantine art and our iconographic originals, which constitute the offspring of the same Byzantine root, stand in relation to these requirements? The oldest and best works of the Byzantine brush satisfy these conditions; our originals, with a few exceptions, do not. Therefore, to retain them completely, entirely in the current icon-painting practice, as the norm in everything, would be uncritical and completely in vain. The most energetic aspirations of our time are hardly able to resurrect completely ancient Russian icon painting, and this, of course, would be an anachronism, a forced restoration of a frozen antiquity, but in no way a natural and desirable revival of it. But abandoning the only clumsy forms of our ancient original does not mean taking the path of Western Italian or academic painting; this does not mean abandoning the foundations of our iconographic tradition, breaking all connections with Byzantine art and repeating the hobbies and mistakes of the artistic schools of the West. We have always sacrificed too much to the West, not knowing or simply not wanting to know how best to deploy our own forces, how to cope with those ready-made means that are at hand at home. So in this case, we do not need to go to the workshops of Western artists of one or another school of painting, but we only need to correct our own originals, that is, compare and harmonize them with each other, and most importantly, improve and improve their technical artistic side. Our icon painters, who lived two or more centuries ago, did not understand and sometimes did not even know at all the basic conditions for the naturalness of an image, they did not know how to put a figure in an anatomically correct position, give it a natural gesture, or comply with the requirements of perspective; but who says that today’s icon painters should stop at this pitiful stage of technical skill and copy the crude experiences of painting left over from the 16th–17th centuries in some ancient churches? As for the very motives and, so to speak, the framework of the image outlined in the brief remarks of the original, I don’t know: is there, seriously speaking, something wild, intolerant, barbaric in them, as some say? What we would call the ideality of the image - this feature, despite all the naivety of the artistic sense of our old icon painters, is carried out in the originals with remarkable consistency. The original images are not portraits, but rather iconographic types; in them there is neither sluggish Western sentimentality, nor rough realism, but there is a completely correct idea: to combine in the image of each saint both his general features as a bishop, prince, monk... and some characteristic features of his more or less real appearance. It is from this latter aspect that one should look at those small individual signs with which the original tries to distinguish the face of one saint from others belonging to the same class or face. So, for example, all bishops are depicted in our original in one common traditional form, which is usually called the saintly form; but one of them is indicated to be written with those, the other - with other features in the position of the body, in the expression of the face, in the type, color and size of the hair on the head and in the beard. And these instructions regarding the appearance of saints in most cases come from more or less reliable tradition about one or another of them. Having correctly understood and appreciated this feature, a modern artist will always be able to give the depicted face a special expression, diversify the monotonous figures of the original, revive them with historical thought, and do all this without leaving the conditions of the original itself, without treating it downward, as something childish and naive. Yes, finally, at least these are monotonous figures, because they are much closer to our national understanding, to the conditions of our historical past, to the entire structure of our national life, than those mediocre copies from covered Western originals, which our academic artists often provide us with in quasI-icons of various saints in their cabinet work. In our Orthodox Church, these cabinet studies would be as inappropriate as figures of various kinds of lords, marquises, and doges would be inappropriate when depicting the everyday life of our peasants. To flood our iconography with these pseudo-Christian types, to introduce into it this diversity of alien forms would be a violation of the simplest requirements of folk meaning and would echo the profanation of religious subjects. For people of school and the intelligentsia, for lovers and connoisseurs of art, there are art galleries, museums, theaters and many other means of aesthetic self-education; but to see in the church a justification for the demands of the school and the intelligentsia would be an illegal and unjustifiable claim about the vast majority. In addition to the general requirements now expressed, which are mandatory for each iconographic image as a work of art, there are also more specific requirements concerning the processing of the pictorial subject, the conditions and staging of its implementation. We understand the relationship of the depicted persons or events to the conditions of the time to which they belonged, and the fulfillment of these conditions in iconography. How far, however, can and should this correspondence of the iconographic plot with historical conditions extend, and in what relation do our iconographic originals stand to this principle? X. From the history of ancient Russian icon painting From the history of ancient Russian icon painting. Origin and initial composition of the Old Russian icon painting original; its further complication with the expansion of the Russian hagiological cycle. Based on what sources were the iconographic likenesses of Russian saints created? The difference between the originals and the time of their appearance in Rus'. The origin of Russian icon painting originals is closely connected with the origin and position in Rus' of church art itself. Not confined to any specific time, our originals, nevertheless, in their embryo, in their basic beginning, were given at the very first appearance of painting in our churches. The further development of this beginning of iconographic monotony, expressed by the originals, occurred under the influence of two conditions: positive and negative. By the first we mean the dependence that Orthodox Russia experienced for a long time on the part of Byzantium in the field of art; under the second - special historical circumstances that called upon our spiritual authorities to protect church and artistic traditions. The Russian icon painter of the first times, working together and under the supervision of the Greek master, naturally followed the rules that he received from his supervisor. These rules and artistic techniques, in turn, were learned by the closest students of the Russian icon painter and thus passed on from master to apprentices, from one area to another. And in this way - through oral influence and through the most iconographic examples - iconographic types became known and an iconographic style was developed. The deep historical antiquity to which our originals of the 17th–18th centuries trace their origins is an undoubted echo of the ancient legend about the primordial dependence of Russia on Byzantium in the field of church art. And although this connection in reality was broken long ago, the Russian icon painter of the 17th–18th centuries strove to build the main principles of his art to this ideal and pointed to Justinian’s Church of St. Sofia with its mosaic decorations, as the historical basis of its profession. “This book, the minologium or martyrology, that is, the list of saints in the year of the Lord,” says the introduction to some of our originals, “the Eastern Caesar Basil the Macedonian ordered to be described in written images, and then that minologium was depicted in detail by ancient Greek wise and hardworking painters. But even in the days of Justinian the Great, when he created the Great Church (Sophia), 360 thrones were built in it, as they say, for every day in the name of the saint, a church, and in it an image, also parts and relics of saints. But after many years... the destruction of beautiful and precious things, much of it all fell into oblivion. And what remains is still there, in the holy Mount Athos and in other holy places, wonderful icons of the monthly saints are painted. And from those translations (originals or originals and copies) even in the days of the great and blessed Russian princes, ancient Greek and Russian painters copied them, first in Kyiv, then in Novgorod, and to this day such images are found in holy churches. From the same monthly icons, this original was copied verbally by ancient painters on charters, which is still circulated among painters in Russia.” 307 Of course, this was only a one-sided claim, because later Russian church art drew its motifs from sources less valuable than the mosaics of the Justinian Church, and was content with copies of later origin and far from being as correct and elegant as the works of ancient Byzantine painting, which had not yet lost some of the features of its ancient origin. The gradual weakening, and with the fall of Constantinople, the complete cessation of the church-artistic influence of Byzantium on Rus', on the one hand, and the increasingly increasing demand for icons in the latter, which attracted worldly people and often not versed in it to engage in icon painting, on the other, were those special phenomena of our church-historical life that served as the second and most important condition or motive for the appearance of iconographic originals and, moreover, in the form of a written code of positive rules. The 43rd chapter of the Stoglavy Cathedral, which we have partially examined, serves as an expression of the care of the spiritual authorities about the protection of icon painting from the profanation of unskilled masters and from the secular motives of modern Western art, and at the same time constitutes the first most important document in the initial history of our icon painting original. It not only clearly and persistently expressed the idea that icon painters should be subordinated to the supervision of bishops in the practice of their craft, but also determined the nature of those particular instructions and instructions from which the complete codex of the original was subsequently compiled. The basis for the resolution was based on Stoglav’s primordial, one might say, requirement “not to describe the Deities out of self-reflection and with your own guesses; but that the great icon painters and their disciples should paint the image of our Lord Jesus Christ, His Most Pure Mother and the saints with great care, in the image and in the likeness and in essence, from ancient models, as the Greek painters painted and as Andrei Rublev and other notorious painters wrote.” 308 In these words of the Stoglavy Cathedral, expressing the essence of our iconographic original, its very composition is outlined. Embracing all the same sections as the Greek manual for painting, 309 not even excluding the technical part, the Old Russian original differed from the latter only in that it never followed its systematic book plan, but arranged its content according to the days of the church year, and therefore it included only those memories and persons that were recorded in month books, and not the entire range of biblical and church-historical subjects. Since the content of our original is presented according to the church calendar, and this calendar was transferred to us ready-made from Byzantium, the main part of the images in the original relates to the holidays and saints of the then Greek church year and repeats the typical features of the Byzantine icon painting style. But over time, our church year began to include the memory of Russian saints and holidays of Russian origin. With the expansion of the monthly language, the content of the original had to become more complex. This second component of the Russian originals, corresponding to the slow development of the Russian hagiological cycle, at first occupied only a small, additional part in it, was presented completely separately and seemed to be lost in the mass of calendar material brought to us from Greece. In this respect, the development of our original went hand in hand and was subject to the same law as the fate of our liturgical books, into which the local Russian element also penetrated only little by little, and the number of Russian saints recorded here before the 16th century is limited to a relatively insignificant number. A more complete and detailed list of Russian saints appeared only before the Stoglavy Cathedral, thanks to such a famous figure of that era, Moscow Metropolitan Macarius. According to his thoughts, a council was assembled in Moscow in 1547, at which no less than 21 of the Russian saints were canonized, and some of them were given a general celebration - throughout the Russian church, and others - local, in the area where they lived and became famous during their lifetime or after death for miracles. But since this number did not exhaust the circle of Russian saints, and information about the life and activities of many of them was made known only some time after this council, a second one was convened two years later, at which about 17 more people were canonized and services and holidays were established for them. Subsequently, this circle of saints increased as locally famous ascetics became known. But it is known that among the visible signs by which the veneration of the newly-minted saints was expressed was their depiction on an icon, the glorification of this icon in a church or chapel, and the performance of services and prayers in front of it. True, the existence of an image did not always mean recognition of a famous person as a saint, but was explained simply by the desire to have his image as a keepsake, just as we now value portraits of respected persons, and for some reason close to us. But in most cases, these similarities to the faces of those who lived holy lives meant that highest degree of moral perfection, which was sooner or later followed by the recognition of a famous person as a saint, his church honoring, in which his image also received religious significance, becoming a saint. icon. Thus, simultaneously with the inclusion of the newly canonized saint in the monthbook, a place was opened for him in the iconographic original, thanks to which this latter became more complex and developed, receiving new names and likenesses. Belonging to different times and coming from different localities, the originals naturally differ from each other in the number of Russian saints, which depended on the completeness of the local calendar. Iconographic likenesses of Russian saints, of course, did not suddenly acquire the stability, definiteness and, so to speak, stereotyping with which they appear in the originals, but they went through a certain circle of development, or, better said, little by little they moved from living and portrait images to icon-schematic ones, where, with a few exceptions, they lost their specific facial type. From this latter only the most general features remained, and even those, passing under the hand of an inept master into an icon, faded and lost their typicality. Parallel to this decolorization of the image on the canvas was its depersonalization in the original. Judging by the indications of our historical documents, it turns out that for a long time, a very long time ago, we had experiments in portrait painting, which started from a living person, reproducing and conveying its typical features. Let us recall the story of the Pechersk Patericon about the icon painters who came from Blachernae to paint the great Pechersk Church. They say that two monks came to them with an offer of a contract, and to prove the truth of their words they describe the appearance of their employers. Then the abbot brings them the icon of the saints. Antonia and Theodosius; “When the Greeks saw their image, they bowed down and said, “These are truly what they are.” The assumption that the Pechersk ascetics appeared to them in an impersonal icon likeness with the conventional attributes of a monastic image, that this impersonal likeness corresponded to the image of the saints located in the Kiev Pechersk Lavra - this assumption would not make sense: the icon painters undoubtedly knew well that it was impossible to get to a specific image using these conventional features. This means that we are talking about portrait images of saints, which were preserved in their monastery and, to a greater or lesser extent, corresponded to their actual appearance. The expression of our hagiographers that certain saints appeared in a vision “in the same way as they are written on the icon” shows that the icon, according to the concept of that time, represented the saint in a special way and conveyed his distinctive features. Our chronicles occasionally depict images of princes with their personal characteristics, and the more famous and remarkable one or another of them was, the more firmly his appearance was preserved, the better the typical features of his appearance were conveyed. Here, for example, is a portrait of Vladimir’s son St. Boris: “his body is red and tall, his face is round, his shoulders are tall, his waist is thin, his eyes are kind and cheerful, his hair is small and he has a mustache, he is still young.” The same descriptions of appearance and the same portrait likenesses compiled on the basis of them are also found in legends about the lives of saints. So, for example, the compiler of the life of Niphon of Novgorod concludes the story about his death with the following note: “the Saint was of medium body, having a long life, not great and not wide, darkness, half-grey, curled into four.” This news formed the basis for the images of this saint according to our originals. From other hagiographical tales it is known that in our monasteries there were painters who, during the lifetime or after the death of one or another abbot or a monk known for his influence, painted a portrait of him, and this latter was preserved in the monastery and served as the basis for the image of the saint on the icon. An interesting story in this regard is the story of St. Euphrosyne of Pskov - known not so much in Russian hagiology, but because of his life, compiled by the monk Vasily in order to support the use of special hallelujah and polemicize with opponents of this custom. The latter tells about himself that before writing his life, he had a night vision in which the Venerable himself appeared to him. Euphrosynus gave the instruction to “describe the mystery of the Most Holy Alleluia, in it there is living light.” Monk Vasily wanted to check the appearance of the holy elder, who called himself Euphrosynus, and said to himself: “If it is not the truth, but an apparition of the opposite, then I will go and look at the image of the venerable one.” Turning to this method of verification was all the more reliable in this case because, according to the story, “the image of St. Euphrosyne was painted on his belly in the monastery of the saint from a certain Ignatius, who lives in that monastery, a skilled painter. The same Ignatius painter depicted St. father, fairly shining in spiritual virtues, the image of St. Father Euphrosynus write on the charter and sign his name and keep it.” It is clear that strict ascetics, like all generally pious people of ancient Rus', looked unfavorably on portrait art and considered taking off their likeness an obscene matter. And this is the reason why the image of St. Euphrosyne was written otai, i.e. slowly, was kept in deep secrecy and only “in time, when the painter Ignatius died, was the image of St. Father, between the works of this master, was revealed to Pamphylius the abbot and the disciple of Blessed Euphrosynus. Pamphilius, the abbot, told the image of St. father, how he was found, and about the virtuous life of the blessed father and about the miracles that happened during his life, to Archbishop Gennady of Veliky Novagorod.” The result of these relations was that the icon painter was ordered to create an image of St. write the father on the icon and place it over the saint’s tomb. It was to this image, which had the character of a portrait likeness, that the biography writer we named, Venerable, turned to after the vision. Euphrosynus, and the examination completely convinced him of the actual appearance of the saint to him: “and in the same way I saw the appearance in a dream, as it was written on the icon.” It is told about the Monk Dionysius of the Trinity that when he was laid in the coffin, “some icon painters drew the likeness of his face on paper.” Even more often you can find examples in the lives of saints that their images were painted by icon painters long after their death from memory, recollections and oral stories of people who knew them well and for some reason were close to them during their lifetime. During the reign of Theodore Alekseevich, the monks of the Volomsky Vozdvizhensky Monastery (Vologda diocese) needed an icon of the founder of the last venerable one. Simon, and they commissioned it from the isographer Mikhail Gavrilov Chistoy, who was the saint’s roommate and knew his image: “as if he is alive in vain, the image is written.” The monks of the Kargopol Oshevensky monastery after a miraculous appearance to one of the elders, Rev. Alexander, who founded the monastery, also wished to have an icon of their hermit leader, but, unfortunately, the icon painter Simon, to whom they turned, was perplexed as to how to paint it in the same image: many years had passed since the death of the saint, none of those who lived in the monastery remembered his face, and his icon was not found anywhere. Fortunately, at that time a certain Nikifor Filippov, who personally knew St., came from Onega, from the town of Psala. Alexander, and told the icon painter that the saint was of medium height, with a dry face, and a touching image; sunken eyes, a small beard, not very thick, light brown hair, half gray. 310 An echo of these initial portrait images of Russian saints are the descriptions of their appearance in our intelligent iconographic originals. These descriptions, with all their pallor, are based on the actual features of a famous person and reproduce his individual characteristics; but in practice we would seek in vain to justify this portraiture. It is enough to take into account the helpless state of the art of painting at that time in order to abandon such hopes and come to more modest conclusions on this matter. Genuine appearance features were conveyed schematically, in an iconic manner, and soon lost that typicality, individuality that makes a well-known image a portrait. Even the facial images of our princes and kings, preserved from ancient times, are executed in this icon style and are devoid of individuality. For example, in the Izbornik of Svyatoslav, Prince Svyatoslav Yaroslavich, grandson of Vladimir, with his family is presented on the title page; but it is enough to look at this family picture to notice that all the faces, with the exception of certain external signs, are depicted in the same manner and differ from each other in height, clothing, beard and hair. 311 Thus, more or less reliable images of Russian saints served as the first basis for including them in the facial originals; but this path was not the only one and does not exhaust the full composition of the Russian calendar calendar. Other similarities were formed by analogy with ancient Greek icon painting types, and this took place in those cases when it came, for example, to the faces of saints, long forgotten by everyone (in terms of appearance), but similar in their activities, in their way of life, in their names, and finally in the legends with which they appeared in hagiology. From this internal similarity they concluded to the external, and in this way iconographic images of those Russian saints were created about whose external appearance there was no oral or written information at all. Here a phenomenon was repeated that took place in ancient Russian hagiography, in the literature of the lives of saints. Many of them, following the same descriptive techniques, do not so much convey specific, individual features from the lives of the persons described, but rather contain the same, apparently general passages, and narrate the same circumstances of their lives and activities. The reader of the Four Menaions will easily notice, for example, that in the lives of the holy fools, who labored in the same feat, there is one feature, among the bishops - another, among the saints - a third, common to each of these three types of biographies. 312 This is natural and self-explanatory. According to the same technique, icon painters were guided by well-known general signs when depicting this or that saint, judging by whether he belonged to the ranks of saints, martyrs, saints, kings, etc. Applying to this, St. Sergius was depicted identically with Cyril of Belozersky, Prince Theodore of Chernigov with Vasily of Yaroslavl; in a word, they repeated the very technique that was adopted in the Byzantine original, which pursued not a type, but a generic trait characteristic of an entire class or clique of homogeneous saints. Without going into a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of the noted iconographic technique, understandable and without deliberate speech, let us say in conclusion what exactly the iconographic originals are and to what time they belong. It is customary to distinguish between two types of scripts: obverse and explanatory. The first ones contain iconography, i.e. drawn images of saints, the latter a verbal description of their appearance, or instructions to icon painters in what features to depict this or that face. For example, “September 1 day. Memory of Rev. our father Simeon. The Monk Simeon is gray-haired, in the schema, with curled hair on his head. September 2. Holy disciple Mamant the Young, likeness of Yegoryevo, robe of cinnabar, underside of the rose. On the same day St. John the Faster Russian, brother of Basil of Caesarea, or in short, the robe is white from the cross.” The first ones, i.e. facial originals precede the latter in time and constitute the initial guide for icon painters in the form of facial calendars, i.e. images of saints arranged according to the days of the church year. Two copies of such calendars have come down to us - both from the 17th century and both in the Latin edition. 313 Both of them constitute a pure type of calendar without any comments, from which it would be clear that they were assigned to guide the painters. These obverse calendars, complicated by notes for icon painters, constitute the obverse originals. Quite a few of them have been preserved in our ancient manuscripts, but only two have been published: the so-called Stroganov and St. Anthony of Siya Monastery. All of them are no older than the 17th or late 16th century. The most ancient originals are distinguished by the brevity of the text and the conciseness of the iconographic instructions. It is clear that they joined the ready-made images as a special explanatory article, and represent the first experience of applying facial calendars to iconographic tasks. The shorter these remarks are and, so to speak, more striking, the older the original edition itself; on the contrary, the more complex and complete they are, the later the time of their origin. It can be said that those descriptions of the explanatory scripts, which consist of indicating the color of clothing and the most general features of appearance, represent the grain from which the full text of the explanatory originals then developed. The gradual complication of the latter can be traced through their various editions dating back to different times. For example, under November 24, it was noted about the Great Martyr Catherine: “St. great Catherine suffered in the summer of 5804: a robe of azure, a cormorant underneath, a cross in her right hand.” According to another later original, this description was added: “left prayer service, fingers up.” According to even later editions: “on the head there is a royal crown, the hair is simple, like a maiden’s, a robe of azure, cinnabar underside, royal mantles to the hem, and on the shoulders and on the arms; the sleeves are wide; in the right hand there is a cross, in the left there is a scroll, and in it he writes: Lord God, hear me, grant absolution to those who remember the name of Catherine... 314 These lengthy notes, obviously, would have been unnecessary in the face of the originals, where everyone could see these details from the image itself. We said that our oldest facial originals are known from manuscripts of the 17th century and not earlier than the end of the 16th century. Besides other signs, this is indicated by their very composition and the presence in them of Russian memories approved at the councils of 1547–1549, and some saints were canonized even later. Without a doubt, the basis of our originals is much older, and we can observe from iconographic monuments that saints and holidays in the 16th and 15th centuries were depicted exactly as they were usually written in the originals of the 16th–17th centuries. This means that icon images, much earlier than the written code, were cast into a known typical form, which was then accepted into the original. But this circumstance does not yet give reason to attribute the origin of facial or explanatory originals, as systematic codes for iconography, to a time much earlier than the one from which these monuments have come to us. Already from the fact that Stoglav does not mention such manuals for the icon painter, but advises painting from ancient models and points to the icons of Andrei Rublev, from this we can already conclude that in Stoglav’s time there were no such originals yet, otherwise the cathedral would have mentioned them. Stoglav, with his rules, only gave a strong impetus to the appearance of facial originals, which adhered to him as their basis, and put his definition of icon painting and icon painters at the head of their instructions. The very system in which our original appears does not allow for the possibility of an earlier appearance of this code. Our original is arranged in the order of the church year and is based on the calendar or calendar. This is evident both from their composition, and partly from the titles, from which we will derive, for example, the following: “The book is the original, that is, the description of the Lord’s holidays and all the saints, a reliable legend, how to imagine them from the month of Septembrium to the month of August, according to the statute of the Lavra of our father Savva the Sanctified.” Thus, in the original we have nothing more than the calendar, only complicated by facial images. But the calendar in the strict sense of the word appeared with us relatively early, and the most ancient of them represent an extract from the synaxarions, placed separately from the charter in which these synaxarions were recorded. Most of our calendars belong to the 16th–17th centuries, and on the basis of these latter, the originals were created. Finally, the arrangement of the memories of saints in the originals on the basis of the Jerusalem Rule leads to the same conclusion. Like Slavic liturgical books, at the head of some originals there is a remark that they are arranged according to the synaxarion of Jerusalem. But the oldest charter of the Russian church was the Studiysky, and the peculiarities of its practice determined the direction and composition of our church books. The Jerusalem Rule came into use in our country from the 14th century, and completely supplanted the Studite Rule even later. We do not see the need to talk here about the features of the Studite and Jerusalem synaxars and how deeply the distinction between both types was made in the composition of the church calendar. This difference may not be recognized, but, nevertheless, the reference to the Jerusalem, and not to the Studio Rule, in our originals serves as a positive indication of the later origin of the records themselves with this title. Gr. A. S. Uvarov, Megalithic monuments in Russia, – Antiquities. Proceedings of the Moscow Archaeological Society, VI, 270. Dolmen = dol – stone, maen – table; menhir = maen – stone, hir – long; cromlech = crom – outline, circle, lech – place. The names are compiled from words of the Celtic language by the scientist Baudin, - Antiquities. Work. Moscow Archaeological Society, VI, 271. See fig. in Müller und Mothes, Illustrirtes archäolog. Wörterbuch, 1878. s. 578; an unrestored view of it in Ranke, Man, vol. II, p. 615. Sl. Kugler, Handbuch der Kunstgeschichtc, Stuttg. 1872, I, s. 4–5. Weiss, External life of peoples, M. 1873, I, 1, 355–356; sl. Kugier, Handbuch der Kunstgeschichte, I, 308. 54 feet=16.5 m; 120 feet=36.6 m; 33 feet=10 m; 200 feet=61 m (editor's note) See Addendum to the edition of the works of St. fathers, 1884, part 34, p. 468, approx. A. There is also talk about converting another cave from housing into a church. Pal. Collection, vol. I issue. 3, p. 54. Rom.16:3-4; n. Col. 4:15; Phil.1:2 and others. In Math. XXXII: αί οίκίαι έκκλησίαι ήσαν νυνί δε ή εκκλησία οίκία γέγονε. In Epist. Ad Rom. XXX: ούτω γάρ ήσαν ευδόκιμοι, ώς καί τήν οικίαν έκκλησίαν ποιησαι. The time of writing and the author of the named work are positively unknown. In the old days, Philopatris was attributed to the famous Lucian of Samosata, but historical criticism recognizes it as composed no earlier than the 4th century and even much later. In any case, there is no reason to deny that the author of Philopatrix is ​​familiar with ancient Christian orders. For a description of Pompeian houses and the plan of one of them, see Klassovsky, Pompey and the antiquities discovered in it, pp. 65–74, 176–178. St. Petersburg, 1856. Recognize s. Clement. X, 71. Creations of St. Gregory of Nyssa in Russian translation, part VIII, pp. 159–160, 170–171. Lamprid. Vita Alexandr. Sever, cap. ХLIХ Histor. Eccles. 1. VIII from 1; Russian translation vol. I, pp. 468–469. Ibid. VIII, 2; Russian translation vol. I, pp. 470–461. De morte Persecut. cap. XII; Russian translation, part 2, page 168. News of the Russian Archaeological Institute. in Const. vol. II, 116, 175. The works of Tertullian in Russian translation, part I, pp. 122–123. Adv. Valentinian. cap. Ill: nostrae columbae domus simplex in editis semper et apertis ad lucem; amal figura Spiritus Sancti orientem Chrisli figuram; Russian translation Part IV, p. 32. Ο οίκος έστω επιμήκης κατ' ανατολάς τετραμμένος έξ έκατέρων των μερών τά παστοφόρια πρός άναιολήν, όστις έοικε νηί. Pastophoria, according to the generally accepted opinion, are the side compartments of the altar, where the deacons brought the remains of the Eucharist after communion, and where, presumably, the offerings of the believers were first folded and stored together with liturgical accessories. Constitution. Apostol. lib. VIII cap. 13; Laodice. personal right 21. Decrees of the Apostles in Russian translation, pp. 89–91, 266–268, 281 and others. Works of ancient Christian apologists in Russian translation by P.A. Preobrazhensky, pp. 317, 320, 358. M. 1867; Disputat. adv. gent. lib. VI cap. 1; Contra Celsum 1, VIII c. 9. Commentar. in Ezechielem 1. XII, cap. XI: Minge, Patrolog. ser. lat. t. XXV col. 375. P.I. Tsvetkov, Aurelius Prudentius, appendix, pp. 191–192. The future explorer of the catacombs, Antonio Bosio, was no more than three years old at that time. This brilliant antiquarian, nicknamed the Columbus of underground Rome, was a native of Malta and spent his early youth in Rome at the Collegio Romano. The discoveries made on the site of an ancient Christian cemetery deeply interested the inquisitive young man. From the age of 18, he devoted himself to the study of the sacred dungeons and continued his work for 36 years with extraordinary persistence. Armed with the solid knowledge that the literature of that time could provide him with, mainly the works of the fathers, the lives of saints, martyrologies and notes of pilgrims, he descended into the Roman dungeons and, at the direction of these leaders, at the risk of his own life, step by step mastered the thread of the historical labyrinth. Bosio himself tells about himself how one day, accompanied by several companions, he got so carried away and went so far that he lost his way to the exit and almost became a victim of carelessness. The supply of provisions and candles taken for the journey was spent, and the situation became so dangerous that, in Bosio’s own words, his poor body was destined to find its final rest among the graves and remains of the martyrs. Fortunately for science, this did not happen, and the keen researcher has since become more careful. Despite the novelty of the subject, Bosio's works were extremely fruitful. He wrote down on paper and noted everything that was remarkable along the way: he copied inscriptions, took pictures from paintings, drew plans, and sometimes with such fidelity that even later scientists, who were in more favorable conditions for research, were surprised. Bosio did not manage to publish the results of his work during his lifetime († 1629). His portfolio and notes were published in Italian in 1632 by Father Severano, thanks to Bosio's friends and patrons, especially thanks to the philanthropist of the time, Cardinal Barberini, who took a great part in this scholarly work. But it was not this publication that was destined to gain fame and introduce the learned world to the Roman catacombs, but another - published in Latin too twenty years after the death of Bosio, in 1651, in Rome under the editorship of Laolo-Aringa. Roma subterranea novissima was received in the West with the greatest respect, especially since it appeared at a time when there was heated controversy between Catholics and Protestants over the question of worship. In this remarkable work, which has not lost its fundamental significance for our days, a factual answer was given to the questions posed by time, and therefore Bosio’s research had a very lively, direct relationship to the church difficulties of that time. The business so happily begun by Bosio had its successors; but all of them, both in energy and in scientific training, stood incomparably lower than Bosio, so that in the course of almost two centuries that followed him, as much was not accomplished as was the lot of the named scientist. Only in recent times has work in this direction made great progress thanks to the research of Father Marcha and especially of his famous student, now so famous in archaeological science, the late Giovanni Battista de Poccu († 20 September 1894). He adopted the method (topographical) and techniques of Bosio’s research, took written sources on Christian Rome as the basis for his work and, thanks to these guiding data, illuminated with bright light the secrets of underground Rome and brought to the light of God the monuments of ancient Christian art and life. Of his numerous works, the most remarkable are: Imagines selectae Deiparae Virginis (Selected Images of the Virgin Mary), three volumes of Underground Christian Rome (Roma soterranea cristiana), published in 1864–1877 at the expense of Pope Pius IX; Inscriptiones christianae urbis Romae - a collection of inscriptions of Christian Rome until the 7th century and Bulletino di archeologia cristiana - a periodical in which the late “prince of archaeologists” reported the results of his research in the field of the catacombs from 1863 to the day of his death. On the works of de Rossi, see the article by Baron de Witte in the Revue de l'Art chretien for 1894, book. 6 and 1895 book. 1 and 2; in Russian articles by A.A. Dmitrievsky: “On the occasion of the festivities in Rome in honor of J. B. de-Rossi” (Tr. K. D. A. 1892, No. 6) and I. Tsvetaev: “Celebration of Christian archeology in Rome on April 20 and 25, 1892.” M. 1893. As for the name catacumbae, it does not belong to the Greco-Roman world, but was formed already in the Christian era and was first used as a local term. The earliest news where the word catacumbae is found is one ancient chronicle, in which the expression ad Catacumbas determines the location of the tomb of St. Sebastiana. In the course of time, when the original topography of Roman cemeteries was forgotten, this name began to be indifferently applied to all the underground tombs in the vicinity of Rome and elsewhere. The philological meaning of this word is explained differently. Some derive it from κατά - at and κύμβος - recess, cave; others - from κατά and tumba - τύμβος - mound, grave; the third (Marks and Rossi) from cubo, cumbo – I’m lying. However, the meaning of all these productions is the same, since they start from the thought of the grave and burial vault. More on this in Schultze, Die Katakomben, s. 39–40; Du Cange, Glossarium Latinitatis, sub voce catacumbae, torn. II pag. 232. The most ancient tombs of J.B. Rossi include the following: Domitilla in via ardeatina, Lucina in via appia, Pretextata - in the same place, Priscilla in via salaria, Agnes in via nomentana. Despite extensive research, no more than half of the Roman tombs are currently known, information about which is found in ancient writers, and only the cemeteries of Callistus and Agnes have been fully excavated. Pelliccia, De christianae ecclesiae politia t. III, Dissertatio de Coemeterio §§ 1–2, pag. 302–309 and others. Schultze, Die Katakomben, ss. 29, 42. Klassovsky, Pompeii and the antiquities discovered therein, pp. 123–124. St. Petersburg 1856. Euseb. Hist, ecclesiast. I. VII cap. XI and XIII; Russian lane vol. I, pp. 413, 420. When it comes to columbariums or tombs, it must be borne in mind that this allotment was not land, but was measured by the number of ollarum, i.e., funeral urns or pots that could fit in a certain space, that fell to the owner. The Romans' columbariums consisted of a more or less spacious room above or below ground. This room along its walls was cut with horizontal niches or recesses into which urns containing the ashes and charred bones of the deceased were inserted. The capacity of the recesses corresponded to the size of the urns, so that the latter completely went into these niches, the mouth of which was forced with a slab and covered with cement. Usually, each urn contained the ashes of one person, but it also happened that, according to the will of the deceased, the ashes and bones of two persons - spouses or friends - were placed in the same olla. Larger niches, which contained not a couple of urns, as usual, but a larger number of them, were called aediculae. Members of the funeral colleges, judging by the amount of contribution, owned more or less of these urns: two, six, there is even an indication of seven and a half. Apologeticus. cap. XXXIX. Epist. ad Pammach. de obitu uxoris: Ceteri mariti super tumulos conjugum spargunt vidas, rosas, lilia floresque purpureos et dolorem pectoris his officiis consolantur. Pammachius noster sanctam favillam ossaque veneranda eleemosynae balsamis rigat. This place was purchased for the burial of Artemisio. 1500 furs were paid to the digger Hilar, in the presence of Severus and the digger Laurentius (Latin editor's note) Russian translation pp. 209–210. Such loculi were called locus bisomus, trisomus, quadrisomus. Allard, Rome souterraine, p. 40–41 P.I. Tsvetkov, Aurelius Prudentius, app. page 192 A Guide to Etruscan and Roman Archaeology, translated by Pervov, pp. 89–91, 95–98. Mitava, 1890 Klassovsky V., Pompeii and the antiquities discovered therein, pp. 69–71, 97–98, 144–145, 159, 165–166, 169–171, 177–178, 191, 195, 203, 214, 216–219, 222, 229–230, 274, 280–283. St. Petersburg 1856. De idolatria capp. 1 and 3. “Exinde lam caput facta est idololatriae ars omnis, quae idolum quoquomodo edit. Neque enim interest, an plastes effingat, an caelator exsculpat, an phrygio detexat: quia nec de materia refert, an gypso, an coloribus, an lapide, an aere, an argento, an filo formetur idolum. Quando enim et sine idolo idololatria fiat, utique, cum adest idolum, nihil interest, quale sit, qua de materia, qua de effigie, ac qui putet id solum idolum habendum, quod humana effigie sit consecratum. Ad hoc necessaria est vocabuli interpretatio: είδος graece formam sonat; ab eo per diminutionem είδωλον deductum, aeque apud nos formulam fecit. Igitur omnis forma vel formula idolum se dici exposcit. Inde idololatria omnis circa omne idolum famulatus est servitus. Inde et omnis idoli artifex eiusdem et unius est criminis: nisi parum idololatriam populus admisit, quia simulacrum vituli, et non hominis sibi consecravit.” See Russian. translation Karneeva, part 1, pp. 118–119. De idol. cap. 8: “Sunt et aliae complurium artium species, quae, etsi non conlingunt idolorum fabricationem, tamen ea, sine quibus idola nil possunt, eodem crimine expediunt. Nec enim differt, an exstruas vel exornes, si templum, si aram, si aediculam eius instruxeris, si bracteam expresseris, aut insignia aut etiam domum fabricaveris. Maior est eiusmodi opera, quae no effigiem confert, sed auctoriatem. Russian lane Part 1, page 123. De idol. capp. 4–5; Russian translation Part 1, pp. 119–121. The Apostolic Constitutions say: “The maker of idols, having become a Christian, must renounce this work, or let him be cast out of the church.” De idol. capp. 6–8; Russian translation Part 1, pp. 122–125. De idol. capp. 10 and 15; Russian translation Part 1, pp. 128, 136. Sn. Message to his wife, in Russian. translation Part 2, page 240. Pokrovsky A.P., Philosopher Aristides and his recently discovered apology, pp. 14–15, 18–19, 27. Sergiev Posad. 1898 First Apology ch. 9; Monuments of ancient Christian writing in the Russian translation of St. Preobrazhensky, vol. III, pp. 44–45. Moscow. 1862 From what substance and through what art did those whom the Hellenes considered gods receive the image? More about this in the author of the Epistle to Diognetus, ch. 2; Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. IV, pp. 14–15. Moscow. 1863. Speech against the Hellenes, chapters 1, 3, 4, 33–35; Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. IV, pp. 135–137, 139–140, 173–175. Apology of Athenagoras, chapters 4, 6, 10, 15–18, 26; Monuments of ancient Christian writing, vol. V, pp. 16, 19, 23, 30–34, 51. Moscow. 1864. Melito's speech in Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. VII, pp. 30–31, 35–36, 39–41. Moscow. 1866. Theophilus to Autolycus, book one, chapters 2–3, 10; book 2, chapter 2; Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. VI, pp. 10–11, 18, 24–25. Moscow. 1865. Minuncia Felix Octavius, chapters VII, X, XXI, XXIII, XXIX, XXXII; Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. VII, pp. 58–59, 62–63, 79–82, 85, 96, 100–101. Stromat book. V, ch. 5, 11; book VII, ch. 5; translation N. Korsunsky, pillar. 539, 583, 808. Arnobii Disputat. adv. gent., lib. VI p. 1. Augusti, Beitr. z. Christl. Kunstgesch. I, 103–146, II, 81 ff. Contra Celsum lib. VII, p. 9; 10. Conversation on the book. Joshua Detailed speeches about this are in the article by I. S. Bachaldin: Fine arts and the holy fathers of the church of the 4th century, published in the magazine Faith and Church for 1902. Clement of Rome's first letter to the Corinthians, ch. XXV; Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. II, pp. 127–128. Moscow, 1860. Monuments of ancient Christian writing, vol. IV, pp. 20, 69; vol. V, p. 31; vol. VII, p. 72. Irenaeus of Lyons five books against heresies in Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, pp. 33, 147, 149, 181, 201. Ibid., pp. 449, 463–470, 478, 484. Exhortation to the Hellenes translated by N. Korsunsky, pp. 107–114, 120–121, 123. Yaroslavl, 1888. Stromat book. VII, ch. 5, art. 808. Stromat book. VI, ch. 17, translated by Korsunsky, art. 766. Kraus, Geschichte d. Christlichen Kunst, B. I, s. 63. Stromat book. VI, ch. 11, translated by Korsunsky, art. 712. Teacher book III chapter 11, translated by Korsunsky, art. 295–299. De pudicitia, cap. 7 and 10 Against Hermogenes ch. 1; translated by Karneev, part IV, pp. 67–68. Against heresies book. I, ch. XXIV, 5; Russian translation in Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, p. 100. Against heresies book. I, ch. XXV, 6; Russian transl., p. 105. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie d. Christl. Alterhumer, s. v. Abraxas, B. I, ss. 6–10. Antiquities. Proceedings of the Moscow Archaeological Society, vol. IV, protok. No. 79, pp. 25–26; n. Antiquities vol. VI, duct. No. 99, pp. 25–26. Geschichte d. christlich. Kunst, B. I, s. 58. Florence, who lived for twenty-six years and grew up, put his benefactor to rest forever, both himself and his family (Latin editor's note) The tomb of Amoratus, which he buys for himself (lat. editor's note) Without sharing a completely realistic school, the late Rossi seemed to be divided between a symbolic explanation and a historical one, but this hesitation, this kind of inconsistency was sometimes redeemed from him by a more correct definition of individual objects and a more versatile assessment of them. Government persecution of icons was opened by Leo the Isaurian, who in 726 issued an edict hostile to icon veneration. What motives forced him to lay his hand on a custom that was so widespread and so highly revered at that time is difficult to decide, since this edict has been lost, and we know about its contents only from references to it in the acts of the council of 754. It is believed that the emperor was moved to this drastic measure by the influence of the Jews, who saw in the veneration of icons a violation of the second commandment of the Decalogue, and the Mohammedans, who rejected painting due to religious spiritualism. It is impossible to think that this one motive, if it really took place, exhausts the essence of the iconoclastic movement, which created an entire literature and two strong parties from numerous supporters who had nothing in common with either the Jews or the Mohammedans, with whom they had nothing to do. It is impossible to see in this movement only the struggle of the imperial court party, because the dispute arose several times, and the side opposed to icon veneration acted not only with armed force, but also with the weapon of speech, through literary polemics and historical arguments. She took this question to heart as a dogmatic phenomenon, as a position to which in practice the strictly established order of things corresponded. Without completely denying the indicated motives, we, however, adhere to the idea that iconoclasm is closely connected with the direction of church painting of that time, is adjacent to a long series of previous theological disputes, and comes into contact with Eutychianism and Monophysitism - an idea that was more than once pursued by the defenders of icon veneration in the fight against their opponents. In cult and church-historical terms, iconoclasm was a strong echo of that ancient Christian trend in theology, which was to a greater or lesser extent shared by Tertullian, Epiphanius, Cyril of Alexandria and even Chrysostom, who rebelled against pagan art with its cynical and sensual character. In other words, this ancient Christian aversion to the idol, to the known foundations of the Hellenic cult, became the cherished idea of ​​theologians and in undeveloped minds was mixed with the denial of art in general, while the great writers of the 4th–5th centuries carefully distinguished between these two sides. According to Patriarch Nicephorus, Metropolitan Thomas of Sideta, a contemporary of the iconoclastic unrest, personally saw one heretical book in which the name of Epiphanius above the controversial letter was written in a scraped place, and it was still possible to discern that at first the name of Epiphanides was written there. Metropolitan Thomas openly testified to this before a council of bishops, who completely believed him and thereby exposed the real culprit. From this treatise by P. Nicephorus (Contra Epiphanidem) we learn that under the name of Epiphanius there were then several works of this kind and, very likely, forged. One of them was known under the following title: “From the words of St. Epiphany against those who, according to pagan custom, paint icons of Christ, the Mother of God, martyrs and even angels and prophets”; another - under the name: “Letter to Theodosius.” The words of Patriarch Nicephorus in defense of icon veneration, translated by Prof. I. D. Andreev and published by the Moscow Theological Academy in the 65th volume of “Creations of the Holy Fathers”. Gregorovius, Geschichte d. Stadt Rom. III, s. 52, 54. Stuttg. 1876. In the same sense, many sects were important for the history of art, forced due to persecution and political conditions to leave the places of their original settlement and emigrate to other countries. This, by the way, should be noted about the Paulicians and Bogomils. The Paulician sect formed around the middle of the 7th century within Mesopotamia and Armenia. Constantine Copronymus deported some of the Paulicians to Thrace to protect the northern border of the empire from enemy attacks. John Tzimiskes also resettled a significant colony of Paulicians from the Khalib Mountains to the valleys of Genus. Here in Thrace, Macedonia and the Danube countries, the Paulicians became close to the Slavs, and then, under the name of Kafars and Albigenses, they occupied Dalmatia and mountainous France. In connection with this movement of the Paulicians, it is not superfluous to mention the resettlement of the Armenians to the northern and western shores of the Black Sea, to the Crimea and to the mouths of the Danube and further to Poland, after the destruction of their main city of Ani by the Seljuk Turks in 1064. Was it not through this route of emigration that, among other things, the influence of Byzantine and partly Armenian art spread on the church architecture of Serbia, Wallachia and other Danube countries? (See the message of Professor Golovatsky in the Proceedings of the 1st Archaeological Congress about wooden churches in Galicia). Piper, Mythologie und Symbolik der Christlichen Kunst, B I, 1, 4–6. Weimar, 1847. So that they believe his (Christ’s) speech about the resurrection (lat. editor’s note) Constitution. Apost. lib.V, cap.7; Russian translation 140–141. Since the vast majority of symbolic subjects became known thanks to the latter, and their study actually began from Roman tombs, the opinion was formed that the original homeland of the main symbols of Christian art was the West, their kingdom was here and from here they spread to the East. In view of the little information about works of this kind from Eastern writers, such a conclusion seems to be correct, but a closer analysis of these symbolic forms, their meaning and significance can lead to almost the opposite conclusion. At least for some, there is no doubt that they originated from the east and from here they were already accepted and assimilated by catacomb art. According to Clement of Alexandria, we have listed some of these symbolic subjects much higher. From this evidence it is obvious that already in the second century the latter were current in Alexandria and had a basis in the generally accepted ideas of that time. The inscription below and explained by us on the tombstone of the Christian Askhandius, found in southern Gaul, containing a Greek hymn in honor of a symbolic fish, is marked by such a vivid character of Eastern poetry that, it seems, before getting on the gravestone of a Greek colonist, it was read on the tomb of some Christian in Syria, Egypt. Gems with images of fish and Greek inscriptions speak especially strongly for this eastern influence. So, on one of them it reads: Ίησε Χ-ε βοήθει around a symbolic fish, and there is a monogram of Christ. Widely used in the east as protective neck pendants or amulets, these gems are important for explaining the ways of ancient Christian culture and, in particular, symbolism. The East was, in all likelihood, the homeland and place of initial distribution of the symbolic lamb, which Justin Martyr already speaks of as well-known. And images such as the camel have a clearly local oriental character. Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that Christian Rome during the times of the catacombs had many Greek colonies in the east; a very large number of its inscriptions are made in Greek. Greek natives could easily carry with them the symbolism of their native land and have a strong influence on the style and character of catacomb painting. De monarch. 2; Cohort, ad. Gr. 15. Epist. I ad Corinth. cap. 25–26; Scriptures of the apostolic men in Russian. lane pp. 127–128. M. 1862. Archimandrite Christopher, Ancient Christian iconographer. page 176. Constitution. Apost. lib. V, cap. 7; Russian lane pp. 141–143. Catech. XVIII, 8; Russian translation pp. 262–263; ed. 2nd. Piper, Mythologie und Symbolik d.christl. Kunst, B. I, 1, 462. De civit. Dei lib. XXI, cap. 4; Russian translation part 6, page 271. Martigny, Dictionnaire des antiquités chrétiennes, p. 500; sl. Kraus'a Real Encyklopädie, B. II, s. 614. Ancient Christian Iconography, pp. 173–174. M. 1886. Firmia Victoria, who lived for 65 years (lat. editor's note) Tibullus, for example, has the following verse directly related to this idea: Non agnamve sinu pigeat fetumve capella. Desertum oblita matre referre domum. What shepherd (in free translation) would find it difficult to carry on his chest a lamb or a little goat left by a goat, a forgetful mother, to the sheepfold? The expression: humeris portare agnam is even more common among poets, for example, Calpurnius, an imitator of Tibullus. The teacher in Korsunsky's translation p. 341. Each letter contains many holy names (Latin editor's note) Spicilegium solesmense complectens sanctorum patrum scriptorumque ecclesiasticorum anecdota hactenus opera. Parisiis, 1855. Op. cit. t. III p. 62–63. Biblical scenes in the most ancient works of Christian art often appeared with the attributes of symbolic images. In their placement, a certain grouping was observed, the basis of which was the symbolic or typological meaning of these scenes. So, for example, it is no coincidence, of course, that we often come across in fresco painting, as well as in the sculpture of sarcophagi, and we have already noted the combination of subjects: the prophets Jonah, Daniel in the lion's den and Lazarus resurrected by the Savior. The common idea that connects these stories is the thought of the triumph of life over death. Over time, having emerged from the catacombs and freed from the symbolic setting, biblical stories develop more freely and fully, not embarrassed by parallelism with New Testament events and more and more acquiring the meaning of pictures of historical content. The allusions and hints to the names of the dead are curious. Thus, the name of Dracontia is illustrated by the image of a wriggling serpent, Turtur has the figure of a dove on its side, Lupus the youth found a double in a wolf, and what is even more curious is the image of a ham, with which the witty writer of the epitaph illustrated the female name of Perna. Such allusions are also often found on Greco-Roman pagan monuments. The inscription, running in one line along the upper edge of the front side of the sarcophagus, is as follows: “Junius Bassus, a most glorious man, who lived 42 years, two months. In the year of his appointment as prefect of Rome, he departed to God on the eighth day of the Kalends of September, under Eusebius and Hypatius as consuls" (August 23, 359) In the middle of the upper belt is Christ sitting on a throne; behind him are two bearded figures, and under his feet is the personification of heaven or the world, and in the side compartments, to the right and left, are depicted: Christ between two soldiers, Pilate washing his hands, Apostle. Peter in custody and the sacrifice of Abraham. In the middle of the lower belt is the entrance of the Lord into Jerusalem, Daniel in the lion's den, the ap. Paul in custody, the fall of Adam and Eve and Job in the dungeon. On the sides of the sarcophagus are depicted: on one - boys picking grapes, on the other - scenes of reaping and hunting. Symbolic images here seem to transform into a rural landscape and simple decoration. Contr. Celsum. VIII, 17, p. 756. Against heresies I, 25, 6 according to the Russian translation of Preobrazhensky in Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, p. 105. Moscow. 1868. De haeresibus, cap. 7; ed. Oeler, Corp. haer. I, 198. Vita Alex. Sever, cap. 29. E.v. Dobschütz, Christusbilder I, pp. 101–102 appendix. Lib. VII, c. 18; Russian translation pp. 424–425. §§ 85, 88, 100; Russian translation Preobrazhensky in Monuments of Ancient Christian Writing, vol. III, pp. 288, 296, 312. Moscow. 1862. Against Heresies III, 19.2; Russian translation p. 372. Moscow. 1868. St. Petersburg. 1900, p.293. Paedag. III, cap. 1; Russian translation N. I. Korsunsky, pp. 244–245. Yaroslavl. 1890. Stromat. II, cap. 5; III, cap. 17; VI, cap. 17; Russian translation N.I. Korsunsky, pp. 193, 195, 382, 767. Advers. Marc. 3, 17; Adv. Iudaeos, p. 14. Origen. Contra Celsum VI, 74. E's original words. v. Dobschütz, Christusbilder I, 107 app. Additions to the works of the holy fathers, part 38, pp. 25–255. From Eusebius it is known that already at the end of the 2nd century there was a church organization in Osroene, and from this we can conclude that Christianity continued to exist here. Book II 29–30: "Hanc epislolam attulit Ananus, Abgari cursor, semelque earn Salvatoris imaginem, quae in oppido Edessa extat." However, this story was not accepted with such unanimous confidence everywhere, and much earlier at the Roman Council, Pope Gelasius spoke about it with distrust and classified it as apocryphal; but popes contemporary with iconoclasm recognized it as genuine and referred to the legend of the Image Not Made by Hands in their polemics with the iconoclasts. In the superstitious literature of Byzantine legends, this message of Jesus Christ to Abgar subsequently occupied a fairly prominent place and, together with the description of Christ’s appearance, was recognized as a healing remedy against various diseases. An expression of this belief is the following afterword to this message in some Slavic manuscripts: “This is the message: if anyone is on the road, or on the battlefield, or on the sea, or burns with fire or shakes, or sharpens foam, or has inhealable passions, or anything similar to this, let all this be resolved in the Lord Jesus Christ.” The sick person had to carry a piece of paper with a message written on it, and over the dangerously ill person a special spell was read with a prayer about it by the priest. Neque enim novimus faciem Virginis Mariae, ex qua Ille a viro intacta neque in ipso partu corrupta mirabiliter natus est. Nec quibus membrorum lineamentis fuerit Lazarus, nec Bethaniam, nee sepulchrum lapidemque ilium, quern removed jussit, cum eum resuscitaret, vidimus, nee monumentum novum excisum in petra, unde Ipse resurrexit, nec montem Oliveti, unde adscendit in coelum: neque omnino scimus, quicumque ista non vidimus, au ita sint, ut ea cogitamus; inno vero probabilius existimamus non esse ita... Credimus enim Dominum Iesum Christum natum de Virgine, quae Maria vocabatur... Utrum autem illa facies Mariae fuerit, quae occurrerit animo, cum ista loquimur aut recordamur, nec novimus omnino, nec credimus. Itaque hic salva fide licet dicere, forte talem habebat faciem, forte non talem: forte autem de Virgine natus est Christus, nemo salva fide Christiana dixerit. De Trinitate lib. VIII, cap. 7. Opera August, t. VIII. col. 870. Parish's. 1688. Presenting the characteristics of the moral qualities of the Mother of God as a model for the virgins, St. the father speaks among other things about Her: Nihil torvum in oculis, nihil in verbis procax, nihil in actu inverecundum: non gestus fractior, non incessus solutior, non vox petulantior: ut ipsa corporis species simulacrum fuerit mentis, figura probitatis. De virginibus lib. II cap. 2. Oper. Ambros. t. II. col. 164. Parisiis. 1690. In the letter to Emperor Theophilus about holy icons, when describing the external appearance of the Savior, the following expressions were used: χαρακτηρίζων... σιτόχρουν τω έίδει κατά τήν μητρώαν έμφάνειαν. Oper. Damask. t. I.p. 631. Parisiis 1712. Nicephorus Callistus speaks of Christ: όλίγον ? ηθους καΐ ήμερον, καί τό καθάπαξ άόργηον. Κατά πάντα δέ ήν έμφερής τή θεια καΐ πανασπίλψ εκείνου μητρί. Ecclesiastes. Hist. lib. I cap. XL Migne, Curs. Patrol. graec. t. 145 col. 749 St. Epiphanius of Cyprus, in his work against heresies, reports interesting, but, unfortunately, very incomplete information about the sect of the Kolliridians, who brought some kind of cookie in honor of the Mother of God - kollyrid, and from this received their very name. “Some women,” he says, “having decorated a chariot or a quadrangular seat, spreading a white linen on it, on one of the holidays of the year, for several days they offer bread and offer a sacrifice in the name of Mary. Then they all partake of the bread.” Based on some expressions used by St. father in refutation of this superstitious veneration of St. Virgins, it can be assumed that the Kolliridians also had images of the Mother of God, which they, like the worshipers of Demeter, brought sacrifices to the goddess from the firstfruits of the harvest in the form of small pies, placed on a cart. Works of Epiphanius in Russian translation. Part I, pp. 10, 12; V, 173–174, 277–292, 362, 365, 393; VI, 31. Archäologische Studien über altchristliche Monumente, s. 177. Wien. 1880. Die Marienverehrung in den ersten Jahrhunderten, s. 286–331. Stuttgart. 1881. Garrucci, Storia della arte cristiana, vol. II. tav. 66, 81 Ecclesiastes. Hist. lib. II p. 23 in Migne, Curs, patol. graec. t. 145. col. 816. Manuscript collection of the Florishcheva Hermitage of the 17th century, No. 121 (695) l. 55. Due to the impossibility of reproducing the inscription due to the lack of symbols on the keyboard, we point out that in the original it is written MP DV under the title (exactly as it is written on the icons - Mary the Virgin), approx. ed. Monuments of ancient writing, 1878 XIX. No. 129; sl. Joseph's Sobornik 1642. 170 rpm – 171 and a handwritten legend about the appearance and miracles of the Tikhvin Icon of the Mother of God, belonging to the Church and Archaeological Museum at the Moscow Theological Academy. Λέγει δέ, ώς καί ή βασίλεισσα Εύδοκεία, απελθούσα εις Ιεροσόλυμα, ούκέτι υπέστρεψε... καί διι ή Εύδοκεία τη Πουλχερία τήν είκόνα της Θεομήτορος, ην ό απόστολος Λουκάς καθιστόρησεν, έξ Ιεροσολύμων άπέστειλεν. Ecclesiastes. Hist. lib. I. Migne, Curs. patr. graec. t. 86 col. 165–166. Λουκαν τον άπόστολον καί εύαγγελιστήν, άπαντες οί τότε είρήκασιν, οίκείαις ζωγραφησαι χερσίν αυτόν τε τόν σαρκωθέντα Χριστόν καί την αύτοΰ άχραντον Μητέρα καί τούτων τάς είκόνας έχειν την Ρώμην είς οίκείαν εύκλειαν, καί έν Ίεροσολύμοις δέ έπ άκριβείας κείσθαι ταύτας φασίν. Boissonade, Ανέκδοτα vol. VI ρ. 472–473. With the given testimony of St. Andrew of Crete is compared (see in Revue de Art chrétien 1894 t. V livr. 6 p. 488) the following words of St. John of Damascus, his contemporary: Κύριον καΐ την Μητέρα αύτοΰ, ων τάς είκόνας έχειν τήν Ρωμαίων διαφημίζουσι πόλιν, έν δέ τοις Ίεροσολύμοις έπ άκριβείας κείνται. De fide orthod. lib. IV p. XVI. Βλέπε μοι καί υον εύαγγελιστήν καί άπόστολον Λουκαν ουχί της καί προς Θεόφιλον έπεμψε. Damask. oper. t. I pag. 618. Parisiis. 1712. Ne longe abeam. post Christi in coelum ascensionem, mulier illa, quae sanguinis profluvio laborabat, ab eo sanitati restituta, ipsius imaginem, velut acceptum beneficium referens, exculpsit. Ac prius etiam ab ipsomet Christo, ipsissima Patris imagine, divino linteo facies ipsius inpressa est, ac toparchae Abagaro, id poslulanti, Edessam missa, Demum ab euangelista Luca picta est. Quin ab Hierosolymis quoque Virginis Deigenitricis imago missa est. Surii, De probatis sanctorum vitis, novembr. 28. pag. 635. Καί γαρ δ θεσπέσιος απόστολος καί ευαγγελιστής Λουκάς τον θείον καί σεβάσμιον χαρακτήρα της παναγίου Θεομήτορος Μαρίας, έτι έν σαρκί αυτής ξώσης έν Ιερουσαλήμ καί τάς διατριβας ποιουμένης έν τί αγία Σιών, ζωγραφικαΐς τε μίξεσι την της πανάγνου στήλην έν πινάκι διεχάραξε, καί ώς έν κατόπτρω τή μετέπειτα γενε α. έγκαταλελοιπώς καί ταύτην αυτή υποδείξαντος. Ή χάρις μου μετ αυτής έσται. Damask. oper. t. I pag. 531. Parisiis. 1712. Acta Sanctorum, octobris 18, t. VIII pag. 311. Λουκάς δ ευαγγελιστής υπήρχεν άπο Αντιοχείας της μεγάλης ίατρός τήν τέχνην καί ζωγράφος. Menologi graecor. pars prima, pag. 125. Καί Λουκάς ό γλαφυρός ευαγγελιστής την εικόνα τηζ θεομήτορος κηρω καί χρώμασιν έζωγράφησεν, έν ταΐς ίεραις ώλέναις άγκαλιζομένην τόν Κύριον, ητις έν τη μεγαλοπόλει νΰν διασώζεται. Migne. Curs, patrolog. graec. t. 132 col. 439–440. Λουκάς δέξ Αμτιοχίας είλκε το γένος, ητις κατά την Κοίλην κείται Συρίαν, τέχν, η μεν ίατρός, άκρως δέ την ζωγράφον τέχνην έξεπιστάμενος. Φασί δέ αυτόν πρώτιστον την τε Χρίστου εικόνα καί της αυτόν θεοπρεπως τεκούσης, έτι δε καί των κορυφαίων αποστόλων διά ζωγραφικής ίστορήσαι τέχνηςκ άντεϋθεν είς πασαν την οικουμένην το τοιούτον καί πάντμον έργον έξνεχθήναι. Eccles. Hist. lib. II cap. XLIII. Migne Patr. graec. t. 145. col. 876. Δεύτερος ό των Οδηγών έστιν, έν ωτήν έξ Άντιόχου σταλείσαν είκόνα της τοΰ Λόγου Μητρός άνετίθει, ήν Λουκάς ό θείος απόστολος χερσί καθιστόρει, ζώσης έτι, καί τόν τύν τύπον δρώσης καί την χάριν τη μορφή ένιείσης. Ή δή τις είκών έν τω Τριβουναλίω λεγομένω πρώτως το ές δεϋρο τελούμενον αύτη διεπράξατο έφ ω κάι κατά την τρίτην των ήμερων την παννυχίδα καί, τήν λιτήν ένομοθέτει τελείσθαι ό δή καί ές δεΰρο δραται τηρούμενον. Hist. Ecclesiastes. lib. XV cap. 14 Migne. Patrol, praec. t. 147 col. 44. Elsewhere in his history, Nicephorus Callistus says that the image of the Mother of God was sent by Eudokia from Jerusalem: ? γράφος κατέλιπεν εύτυχήσασα. τότε θείον εκείνης γάλα καί το ίερόν ατρακτον καί τα τοΰ Σωτηρος σπάργανα, έθησαύρισεν, Εύδοκείας πεμψάσης της βασιλίδος, ήνίκα δή άφΐκτο είς Ιεροσόλυμα. Hist. Eccles. lib. XIV cap. 2. Migne, Patr. gr. t. 146 col. 1061. Ducange thinks that the icon of the Mother of God, painted by the Evangelist Luke; It was first kept in Antioch, then it was transferred to Jerusalem and from here it was sent to Constantinople. Constantinople. Christ, lib. IV pag. 88. News about the Hodegetrievskaya icon and its participation in the destinies of Byzantium during the times of the Commenes and Palaiologos was collected partly from Ducange. Ibid. pag. 88–92. See Erminia Dionysius Furnoagrafiot in the Proceedings of the Kiev Theological Academy 1868 IV, 355. Monuments of ancient writing 1878 XIX No. 129; sl. manuscripts from the Church Archaeological Museum at the Moscow Theological Academy. They are carefully grouped and treated at some length in the Acta Sanctorum, octobris t. VIII, pages 296–298. See Art. Professor P.S. Kazansky “Luke the Evangelist as an Iconographer” in Antiquities of the Moscow Archaeological Society, vol. II, pp. 46–51. These in Greece are considered to be: Blachernae, Gracious on the island of Cyprus and Kykkos; in Russia: Vladimirskaya in the Moscow Assumption Cathedral, Smolenskaya in the Smolensk Assumption Cathedral, Tikhvinskaya in the Novgorod Tikhvin Monastery and some others. In Rome, the Evangelist Luke is credited with the icons of the Mother of God in the churches of Mary the Great, St. Dominika and Sixta and others, in Poland - Częstochowa. The death penalty by hanging or nailing to a cross was considered the most disgusting, most shameful and dishonorable (servile, crudelissimum, teterrimum, extremum, damnatissimum, ignominiosissimum supplicium). For drawings see Stockbauer, Kunstgeschichte d. Kreuzes, s. 91; Kraus, Real Encyklopädie d. christlich. Allerthüm. B. 2, s. 226, fig. 91–92. Münter, Sinnbilder und Kunstvorst. H. 1, s. 70; Stockbauer, Kunstgeschichte d. Kreuzes, s. 94. The only, exceptional example of a direct image of a cross (+) from the era of the 2nd–3rd centuries was found in one epitaph in the tomb of Lucila; Kraus, Real Encyklopädie. B. 2, s. 229. “As for those people, says Tertullian, for example, who accuse us of worshiping the cross, we are not ashamed of it.” At the same time, he notes that if Christians worshiped the cross as God, then in this case they would be no different from the pagans who also worship wood. “What does it matter about form when the material is the same and when it is revered as God? What is the difference between the cross and between the Athenian Pallas or the Pharos Ceres, which are nothing more than a piece of rough and ugly wood? However, while you adore trophies, the apologist concludes, you yourself adore the crosses on which the trophies are held. Your troops reverence their banners, swear by them, prefer them to all gods.” Apologeticus. cap. 16; ed. Ochler, pp. 177–179. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie, B. 2 under the word: Spottcrucifix; Becker, Das Spottcrucifix der rom. Kaiserpaläste. Tertullian, Apologeticus, p. 16. Stockbauer, Kunstgeschichte d. Kreuzes, s. 80. Tertullian, Apologeticus. cap. 16. Rossi, Inscriptiones, p. 16, paragraph 10. Ibid. Nos. 39, 48, 52, 62, 63. Drawings of these signs and comments on them can be found in Munter, Sinnbilder und Kunstvorst, ss. 33–40, 68–79; Stockbauer, Kunstgeschichte d. Kreuzes, s. 81 –133; Kraus in his Real Encyklopädie d. christlichen Alterthümer under the word: Kreuz, Monogramm Christi, Münzen; especially in the essay: De monogrammate D. N. lezu Christi et usitatis, Ejus effingendi modis. Mediolani. M. D. CCLXXIII. Vita Const. lib. 1, p. 31. For the labarum see Kruus: Real Encyklopädie. B. 2, s. 259–262; Art. P.S. Kazansky: “Labarum of Constantine the Great” in Antiquities of the Archaeological Bulletin, vol. 1, pp. 8–11. Rossi, Inscript., p. 64 n. 101. It is not superfluous to note that, although the word labarum was not used until the 4th century, the very banners in the form of a labarum, of course, with the exception of the monogram, were often found during the times of the republic and on the coins of the first emperors and were known under the name vexilla. With this form of banner in mind, Tertullian, repelling the attacks of the pagans, could expose them themselves to inconsistency and impose on them the veneration of the cross, culttim crucis. The military customs of the Romans, according to his argument, respect this sign and give it the sacred meaning of “Religio Romana,” he writes in his apology (cap. 16), “tota castrensis signa veneratur, signa omnibus diis praeponit, signa jurat Omnes illi imaginum suggestus in sugnis monilia crucum sunt. Siphara illa vexillorum et cantabrorum stolae crucum sunt. Laudo diligentiam; noluislis nudas et incultas cruces consecrare.” See Martigny, Diction, p. 185. Boldetti, Cimiteri dl Roma, p. 60. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie. B. 2, s. 229. Rufinus and Ambrose call it patibulum - a term borrowed from the Romans and generally denoting among them an instrument for tying or nailing people with outstretched arms as punishment. What a naive trait to assume that St. Elena did not previously know about such an inscription and was not informed about it by her Christian companions. Announcement IV, § 10. Περί τοϋ σιαυρον; n. 10th announcement § 19, 13th announcement. § 4. As in the Old Testament (for example, in Is. 16:1), so in the New the Redeemer is more than once called the Lamb. Ap. Peter writes: “redeemed by the blood of Christ, like a lamb, blameless and pure” (1 Pet. 1:19); and the Forerunner of Christ pointed to Him with the words: “Behold, the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:36). Kraus, Real Encyklopädie. B. 2. figg. 104–107, 99, 96. “On some honest icons, shown by the finger of the Forerunner, a lamb is depicted, which is accepted as the image of grace, through the law showing us the true Lamb, Christ our God. Honoring the ancient images and canopies, devoted to the Church, as signs and destinies of truth, we prefer grace and truth, accepting it as the fulfillment of the law. For this reason, so that through the art of painting the perfect thing may be presented to the eyes of all, we command from now on to represent the image of the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world, Christ our God, on icons according to human nature, instead of the old lamb, and through this, contemplating the humility of God the Word, we are led to remember His life in the flesh, His suffering and saving death, and thus accomplished redemption of the world" (According to the book of Rules, published in Moscow 1843, pp. 99–100, rights 82). See Kraus: Christliche Kunst, Fig. 27; Real Encyklopädie B. 2. Fig. 108. For drawing see Stockbauer, s. 145. See the picture in the same place, s. 164. See the picture in the same place, s. 165. For a list of them with detailed comments and a fairly detailed outline of the form of images of the crucifixion, see the article: “On the history of images of the cross and crucifixion” - Christian Reading, 1868, II pp. 731–765; 1860, part 1 pp. 406–436. It is placed in the collection of Lambert, a 12th-century canon, in a special legend: De Adamo et de ligno paradisi. Other examples of crucifixions of this kind are indicated in Christian Reading, 1869, part 1, pp. 408–409. Eusebius, Vita Const. lib. III, p. 3. The Gospel of Nicodemus owes its origin, for example, to the content of the services on Holy Saturday and partly to the hymnography of the Easter service. Monuments of ancient Christian writing, in Russian. translation vol. I, pp. 52, 54. Ps.87:10; 140:2 ; n. 1 Kings 8:54. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie d. christlichen Alterhumer, B. I s. 603. Testimonies of many of these writers are given in the article by L. S. Kazansky “On the raising of hands during prayer, as an ancient custom of Christians.” Soulful Reading, 1876, part III, pp. 461–468. De oratione, p. XIV: nos vero non attolimus tantum, sed etiam expandimus et de dominica passione modulati et orantes confiteraur Christo. Ed. Oehler t. 1 p.m. 666. Works of Basil the Great, vol. II pp. 59–60. Drawings of orantes can be found in large numbers in Perret, Catacombcs de Rome (volume I–IV), Garrucha, Storia della arte Christiana nei primi otto secoli della chiesa (Vol. II–VI), Crouse and many others. At the Moscow Council of 1667, in view of the traditions of ancient Christian iconography, the following definition was, among other things, established: “And the martyrs of Christ and other saints, when they are written standing and praying to Christ God or to the Most Holy Theotokos, we command them to be written precisely with outstretched hands: then true prayer is depicted; and the joining of the fingers does not represent prayer, but only a confession of faith.” Brotherly Word, 1876 book. 2 p. 251. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie. B. II fig. 207. Glasnik, part XX, p. 168. Manuscripts of the Moscow Theological Academy, No. 142 l. 268 rev. Atqui cum modestia et humililate adorantes magis commendamus deo preces nostras, ne ipsis quidem manibus sublimius elatis, sed temperate ac probe elatis, ne vultu quidem in audaciam erecto. Oehler p. 568, n. 566. Orantes in the catacombs are indeed more often found with their arms extended in a horizontal direction than with their arms raised in the strict sense or raised upward. In the writings of Barsanuphius, a question is proposed (435): is it necessary to sign oneself often with the sign of the cross? Answer: it is enough for salvation to make the sign of the cross once a day or night. If we believe that the first seal stands firm, there is no need for another. Seeking another seal means losing the first seal. Demons lead us to doubt the validity of the sign of the cross; but you can repeat it without embarrassment or doubt. Soulful Reading, 1876, III, 465–466. St. Basil the Great rule 91 from chapter 27 of the book about the Holy Spirit. Monuments of ancient Christian writing in Russian translation, vol. I p. 46 ch. 1. Chet'i-Minei, Sept. 26, Oct. 3, Nov. 14, 16; Chrysostom, In I Tim. hom. 12; Augustine, sermo 92 de diversis, sermo 28 de sanct., fragm. 8 ex serm. de quinquages. resurr; Nikephoros Callistus, lib. II p. 42. It is not known how the apostles were marked. They did not, presumably, command Christians to make one specific finger for the sign of the cross; otherwise, this finger formation would have been preserved unchanged in the primal church, and in the 4th century, as we will see below, Christians could not be baptized indifferently - with one finger, or with fingers, or with a hand in general. De corona milit. With. 3; lib. II ad uxorem p. 5; Apologet. With. 23; n. Barnabas Epistol. With. 12 and Justin Apologeticus. I p. 55. μετώπου μετά παρρησίας δακτύλοις ή σφραγίς καί έπί πάντων ό σταυρός γινέσθώ έπι αρτων βιβρωσκομένων, καί έπί ποτηριών πινομένων, έν είσοδοις, έν εξόδοις προ του υπνου κοιταζομένοις καί διανισταμένοις' όδεύουσι καί ήρεμοΰσι. Announcement 13 § 36. Chrysostom (In Matth. hom. LIV): σύμβολα... άλλ ώς στέφανον, ούτω περιφέρωμεν τόν σταυρόν τοΰ Χρίστου. Καί γάρ πάντα δί αύτοϋ τελείται τα καθ ήμας καν τραφηναι την μυστικήν έκείνην τροφην, κάν χειροτονηθηναι, καν ότιοΰν έτερον ποιησαι, πανταχού τοΰτο της νίκης ήμϊν παρίσταται σύμβολον. Δια τοΰτο καί έπί οικίας καί έπί των τοίχων, καί επί των θυρίδων, καί έπί τοϋ μετώπου καί έπί της διανοίας, μετά πολλής έπιγράφομεν αυτόν σπουδής..." Ephraim the Syrian: "Do not only place the sign of the cross on yourself with your hand, but also in your thoughts, seal with it every activity you do: your entrance, and your departure at all times, and your graying, and your uprising, and your bed, and whatever service you perform, first of all, seal it in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy. Spirit", Works of St. Ephraim, part. IV pp. 371–372, Moscow. 1850. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie, B. I s. 603. All this evidence is noted in Art. Philaret, Archbishop of Chernigov: “Divine services of the Russian Church before the Mongolian period” in Readings of General and Ancient History, 1847, No. 7 pp. 29–30; see article by Metropolitan. Macarius: “The Rule of the Stoglavy Council on double-fingered fingers from a historical point of view” in the Fraternal Word, 1875, book. VI department II pp. 30–32. Clear evidence of the early Christians depicting a cross on their foreheads, in addition to the above-mentioned church fathers, is found in the works of Cyprian, Origen, Lactantius, Eusebius, Basil the Great, Jerome, Pseudo-Justin, Prudentius, Gaudentius, in the VIII book. Apostolic Decrees and others. Boldetti, Cimiteri di Roma p. 60. Hom. 8 in divers. Evangel, loc. Christian Reading, 1831, 43 hours, page 228. And in the word about the Antichrist, he notes: “the person, like a candlestick, carries on himself a candle of light, that is, the sign of our Savior.” Basil the Great mentions the image of a cross on the face and chest (De Spir. Sanct. p. XXVII); Ambrose of Milan - about the seal on the forehead, on the heart, on the shoulders (In the Explanation of the Song of Songs VIII, 6); Gregory of Nyssa notes about St. Macrinae that she “protected her eyes, mouth and breasts with a sign” (Vita S. Macrinae). Prudentius speaks clearly about the sign of the forehead and chest: frontem locumque cordis crucis figura signet (Cathemer. VI, 129). In the Latin codices of the Gospel of Nicodemus there is a mention of the image of the sign of the cross in tongues. See Monuments of ancient Christian writing in Russian translation, vol. I, p. 46 notes. In her life it is written: Naes dicens, signo crucis signat frontem suam oculosque et labia; simulque et pectori vexillum crucis infigens... The same in the Acts of the martyr Vera and her friends. Binter. B. VII, Th. I s. 46–47. Signans ter digito suo calicem et dicens: in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Sn. Search for St. Dimitri Rost. p. 479, where it is translated “right hand,” Pratum Spirituale, p. 94. Constitution. Apost. lib. VIII p. 12. Blessed Jerome also expresses himself in the same sense (In. PS. 11): manus pingat frontem. Discourse 54 on the Gospel of Matthew. Epiphanius, Haeres. 30 § 12 p. 137. αγγει δια τοΰ ιδίου δακτύλου καί έπικαλεσάμενος το όνομα Ίησοΰ, εΐπεν. Cum draco adventum illius (Domati) sensisset et tanquam impetum in eum facturus, caput extulisset, ipse (Donatus) ex adverso ejus stans, signum crucis in aere digito depinxit, είς σταυρού σύμβολον τον αέρα τω δακτύλω κατεσημανε... Sozom 1. VII p. 26 p.m. 292 de Donato er. Gregory of Tours also mentions the image of the sign of the cross with a finger (lib. Ill miracul. s. Martin.). Rev. Macarius, Rule of the Stoglavy Council on double fingers from a historical point of view, p. 30 note. 10; Filaret of Chernigov, Divine service Russian. churches in the pre-Mongol period, p. 30 note. 4. But what finger was used to make the sign of the cross? Catholics, following the testimony of Peter Damian (XI century) and Bernard, claim that it is large (pollice), and not the index finger or anything else. Binter. ex Gretser. Denkw., B. IV Th. 1 s. 519. Schaff, Geschichte d. alt. Kirche, s. 1166. We take and compare here Chrysostom with Cyril of Jerusalem also because he is primarily referred to by researchers who recognize the single finger as “the original and oldest form of the formation of the finger” in the sign of the cross. That the two-fingered sign of the cross is in direct connection with Monophysitism, which used the hitherto used single finger among Christians to visually reinforce its heretical doctrine of the one nature in Christ, this clearly follows from the evidence of two-fingered sign that has now been sufficiently studied in Russian church-historical literature. See Eminence Philaret, “Theology of the Russian Church in the Pre-Mongol Period,” in Readings of General History and others, 1847, No. 7 pp. 31–32; His Eminence Macarius, “The Rule of the Hundred Glava Council on Diversity from a Historical Point of View” in the Fraternal Word 1875, Vol. IV, dept. II pp. 33–34 and N. Kaptereva: “Patriarch Nikon and his opponents in the matter of correcting church rites,” pp. 76–85. Theodoret, Ecclesiastical History, book. II, ch. 31 p. 192; Sozomen, Church history, book. IV, ch. 28 pp. 299; Nicephor. Callist., Eccles. Hist., lib. IX cap. 48. When it says δύο συναγαγών, it means two of the fingers shown, because it says είτα, then; and the remaining two fingers, even when three were shown, were of course clenched. Τρία νοούμενα, etc. refers no longer to fingers, but to faces; this is compendiaria doctrina For the defenders of the greater antiquity of two fingers compared to three fingers in the sign of the cross, who will no doubt find our argument weak, we consider it not superfluous to remind a very important circumstance, usually ignored by them, that the first evidence hitherto known in science for the three-fingered sign of the cross (Leo IV, Pope of Rome from 847–855) precedes the first evidence for two fingers (Elijah Geveri, non-Stoman Metropolitan of Damascus from 893). Because, of course, we know them. “At the end of the prayer: “And at all times,” we read, for example, in the Greek charter of the Empress Irene of the 12th century, “the usual genuflections follow; the stronger (of the monks) perform them without a kneerest, and the weakest do them with the help of this accessory. Fifteen bows (throwings) are combined with kneeling, of which the first three are performed more slowly, so that at each bow everyone can say three times: “God, be merciful”... Then they bow their knees and head to the ground, saying: “Those who have sinned, Lord, forgive me.” The remaining twelve bows are done quickly - so that at each bow and kneeling one can also say the prayers shown once. At the head of the brethren is the ecclesiarch or abbot, whose movements the monks must strictly follow, proportioning their bows so that everyone lowers to the ground and rises at the same time.” Mark 10:16; n. Matthew 19:13,15. Acts 6:6; 13:3; 2 Timothy 1:6. Read more about this from Kraus in Real Encyklopädie under the word Handauflegung. Paedag. 1.III p. 291, ed. Potter; Tertullian, in his treatise De baptismo, remarks: Dehinc manus imponitur, per benedictionem advocans et invitans spiritum sanctum (cap. VIII, ed. Oehler p. 626); n. August. De bapt. III, 16: manus impositio est oratio super hominem. Constitution. Apost. 1. VIII with IX not. 22 for Migne Patrol. Graec. t. I, 1083. Lev.9:22, n. Luke 24:50. Kraus, Real Encyklopädie B. II, under the word σφραγίς. Monuments of ancient Christian writing in Russian translation, vol. I p. 54 ch. 8. Quinque digitis quomodo aliqui (Latini) benedicunt, et cum polllce faciem signant, tanquam monotheletae... Blnter., Denkwürd. B.VII. Th. 2 s. 336. Rev. Macarius, based on Gretzer's research, notes that the Latins have been performing the sign of the cross and blessing for centuries - with one, two, three, and all five fingers, indifferently. Brotherly Word, 1875 book. IV, dept. II, page 37 note 20. Calicem et oblatam recta cruce signate, id est, non in circulo et variatione digitorum, ut plurimi faciunt, sed districtis duobus digitis et pollice intus recluso, per quos Trinitas annuitur, istud signum+recte facere studete, non enim aliter quidquam potestis benedicere. Binter. B.IV. Th. 1 s. 519. Brotherly Word 1875, IV department. II page 39 pr. 20. Ducange, Constantinop. Christian., pp. 168, 116, 136, 159, 218, 242 and others. In Goar's image of the Greek saint in full vestments, the blessing hand is represented: two fingers, the index and middle, raised and clenched, the ring and thumb folded crosswise, the little finger raised. On ancient Russian bishop's seals, for the most part, two fingers are raised up, two are bent and the big one is placed on the last one. Porrigit dexteram et ad instar oratorum conformat articulum, duobus infimis conclusis digitis, ceteros eminus porrigit... De aur. asin., iib. II. The gesture discussed here by Apuleius served as a model, according to the author of the artistic history of the cross, for the Latin blessing, the distinctive feature of which is three raised fingers (thumb, index and middle) and the other two (ring and little fingers) bent. Stockbauer, Kunstgeschichte d. Kreuzes, s. 278; Wed Kraus Real Encyklopädie B. I s. 601, 645. And the Greek nominal blessing, according to the assumption of the same scientist, originates from the gesture that Quintilian spoke about (Instit. orat. lib. IX p. 3); Est autem gestus ille maxime communis, quo medius digitus in pollicem contragitur explicatis tribus, and which, according to the arrangement of the fingers, was close to the letter style IC. HS. Ibid., s. 278. Published in the Proceedings of the Kiev Theological Academy for 1868, translated from Greek by A.P. Yakovlev Vlad., Monuments of Russian literature of the 12th and 13th centuries, pp. 117–118; 121–122. Buslaev F.I., General concepts of Russian icon painting, in the Collection of the Society of Old Russian Art for 1866, p. 5. Rovinsky D.A., History of Russian schools of icon painting until the end of the 17th century, in Notes of the Imperial Archaeological Society, vol. VIII, pp. 5, 28–29; Sakharov, Studies on Russian icon painting; Appendix, pp. 13–14. Rovinsky, ibid., pp. 5–6; Sakharov, ibid., pp. 12–13, book. 2. Rovinsky, ibid., p. 29. Sakharov, ibid., p. 13, book. 2. “The Life of our Venerable and God-Bearing Father Sergius of Radonezh and the Wonderworker of All Russia,” ed. in 1853 in a lithograph of the Holy Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, fol. 227. Tales of Russian and Slavic saints, extracted from the great Menaion of the Fourth, part I, pp. 257–258. St. Petersburg, 1868 Sakharov, ibid., app. page 14; Life of Rev. Sergius (lithographed), l. 226 rev. “A search or a list of blasphemous lines and doubts about the holy honest icons of Deacon Ivan Mikhailov son of Viskovaty in the summer of 7062” was published in an excerpt by the Archaeographic Expedition in volume I, No. 238, pp. 241–249, and more regularly and fully by Bodyansky in Reading General Histories and Others. Russian. for 1849, No. 3, pp. 1–23, under the title: “Moscow councils against heretics of the 16th century,” and for 1858, book. 2, pp. 1–42, under the title: Search... Stoglav chapter 43, according to ed. Kazansk., pp. 204, 207. Rovinsky, History of Russian schools of icon painting pp. 33–35. Ibid., pp. 205, 209, 210 A. A. E. vol. I No. 238, p. 247; n. Art. Bodyansky: Moscow Cathedrals, pp. 19–20. Search, pp. 2, 33–34, 36–37 and others. Ibid., pp. 7, 18–20 and others. Ibid., pp. 7, 11, 19–20, 25, 33–34 and many others. Ibid., pp. 1–3, 14, 16, 17, 23, 37–40. A. A. E. Vol. I No. 238, pp. 246–248; n. Bodyanska: Moscow Cathedrals, pp. 20–21; Search, pp. 18–19. Moscow Synodal manuscript No. 322 f. 243 vol.: in holy clothes, in a faqa (= sakkos), on the head having an osmero-shaped crown, under the crown a white miter. From here the mysterious meaning of the septenary number passed into ancient Russian symbolism and, very likely, under the influence of Bogomil views, the soil of which was Bulgaria. We know of seven serpents emerging from one head on several Gnostic gems; From this prototype, Old Russian hryvnias or amulets, on which the same apocryphal plot is repeated, probably degenerated through borrowing Monk Zinovy. Truth testimony to those who asked about the new teaching, pp. 974–976, 979–980, 982–984, 987. Kazan, 1863. I.D. Mansvetov “On the image of the crucifixion on a spoon.” in Antiquities of the Moscow Archaeological Society, vol. IV, pp. 43–44. Printed from the manuscript of the Moscow Synodal Library (No. 322, l. 250 vol.) in Additions to the works of the holy fathers for 1859, part XIII, pp. 190–192, prot. A. B. Gorsky in the article: Maxim the Greek of the Holy Mountain. “Books of new creation, the essence of Latin custom, filled with the name and word of the saints of the Eastern Church, offered to the eastern Church, the pre-memorial Trebnik, published in Kyiv, called the great, and the World called man with God and other similar ones.” Manuscripts of the Synodal Library, No. 346 l. 268. Acts of the Moscow Council of 1667. 21 rev. – 22, ed. Brotherhood of St. Peter Metropolitan; n. Stoglav p. 209, ed. Kazansk Manuscripts of the Moscow Synodal Library No. 346 pp. 183 vol., 185, etc.; n. with Questions and Answers from Russian icon painting of the 17th century, published in the Bulletin of the Society of Old Russian Art at the Rumyantsev Museum for 1874, material. pp. 19–20. His Eminence Macarius, Patriarch Nikon in the matter of correcting church books and rituals, pp. 62–65. A. A. E. IV, 200, p. 255. See about this the extensive article by G. D. Filimonov: Simon Ushakov and the contemporary era of Russian icon painting, in the Collection of the Society of Old Russian Art for 1873, pp. 3–104. It bears a somewhat florid title: “About the wise master of painters, that is, about the graceful skill of icon painters, and the chaste knowledge of true persons and the impudent false painting of violent images.” Buslaev F.I., Historical essay, volume, II p. 399. The rough release of memory, given, by decree of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, in the name of the patriarchal boyar Beklemishev in October 1667, was published in the Temporary of the Moscow Society of History and others by I. E. Zabelin, Prince. VII, pp. 83–86; the patriarchal and royal letters were published by P. P. Pekarsky in the News of the Imperial Archaeological Society, vol. V, pp. 319–329. News of the Imperial Archaeological Society, vol. V, pp. 325–327. Ibid., pp. 317–320, 330–335; n. Sakharov: Study on Russian icon painting, appendices II–IV. In connection with the prohibition of using carved and cast icons in churches and at home, the Holy Synod ordered the removal of pendants made of silver and gold coins, earrings, necklaces, ribbons, etc. from the images. At the same time, it was ordered to explain to the bringers that these offerings cause disgrace to the icons and from non-Orthodox people reproach and criticize the Holy Church. Sakharov, Study on Russian icon painting, appendix, p. 4; sn.: Buslaev, Essays, vol. II, pp. 344–345. Stoglav pp. 205, 210 and others. For the Greek iconographic original, see above. Collection of the Society of Old Russian Art for 1866, dep. II, pp. 128–129. The miniature was published in Antiquities of the Russian State, department. IV, no. 2. For more details, see prof. V. O. Klyuchevsky: Old Russian Lives of Saints, pp. 358–438. The first, the so-called Papebrochievs, named after the learned Jesuit Papebrochius who published them, were printed in the Acta Sanctorum by the Bollandists and then reprinted by Martynov in his Annus ecclesiasticus graeco-slavicus. They are of South Russian origin and were compiled in 1628 (deputized on September 23) by Pamva Berynda, a learned printer and lexicologist who worked in Lvov and Kyiv (recorded on January 13). Saints and holidays are depicted in them in cages, in the order of the memorials of the month, just as the icons known under the name of the calendar are now written. They have a very noticeable Western influence. Another copy of the same obverse calendar was published by the famous Asseman, under the name of the Kapponievs. Collection of the Society of Old Russian Art for 1866, p. 34. You might be interested in: