Shining in the darkness: Byzantine mosaics

As I begin to write, I’m listening to the call to prayer and the sky is darkening over my little corner of Istanbul to reveal a full moon hanging in the sky.  This sound never fails to evoke an incredible sense of otherness for me: it’s a stark reminder of how far I am from home, repeated five times daily just in case I forgot for a moment.  Beautiful, though, as since I got back to the apartment the reddish haze in the sky has gone and Levazim and Ortaköy are twinkling again.  The best thing about this flat is the view, and tonight for the first time I’m sitting with my laptop on the little glazed terrace that capitalises on it.

The key thing about this place for me has got to be the light, or more precisely the effect that minimal lighting can have.  In the same way as the vistas across the Bosphorus really become magical as the sun goes down, it’s the shadowy interiors of the remaining fragments of Byzantium that really capture the imagination.

I couldn’t write about Istanbul without talking about the Aya Sofya (Hagia Sofia or Sancta Sophia in Greek and Latin respectively), which has been dominating the skyline of Sultanahmet since the 6^th century.  It’s widely considered to be more impressive inside than out, and aside from the size this is very much down to the mosaics…

I first learned about Byzantine art during A-levels and can recall that a) it was one of the earliest forms of figurative art from the Christian church, which had survived through the centuries because b) it was all about the mosaics, and tiles don’t rot and flake like paintings in Roman catacombs.  I also recall that these mosaics were special because of their tiny tesserae (tiles, to the layman) which allowed incredible nuance of detail and shading, and abundant use of gold and lapis lazuli laid not-quite-flat to catch and reflect the light and so give the images their lustre.

… so naturally I was excited to see the Aya Sofya.  It was a big part of my agreeing to this little easterly sojourn.  On our first free day I virtually dragged my long-suffering Spanish travelling companion to the door and into the lengthy queue to get in.  Then we stepped inside and I felt, well, no more than moderately impressed. 

It grows on you though.  Once you move away from the worst of the tourist throng, it’s possible to take in the atmosphere, reflect on just how old it is and begin to see the traces of the original decorations that have variously been plastered or painted over during the building’s life as a mosque.  That’s when the impact comes: imagining the place with shimmering mosaics on every surface in its heyday, just as Justinian saw it.  And now I find myself considering stumping up the entrance fee again for a second visit….

Mosaic in the Upper Gallery

 

Section of plaster removed to reveal mosaic

The Constantinople of Constantine and his successors is hard to find in modern Istanbul, save for the one show-stopping church-turned-mosque-turned museum, so it’s necessary to leave Sultanahmet in search of it.  A reasonably well visited alternative is the Chora, the 11^th century church tucked away in the west of the city.  No period of reflection is required here to feel its impact: the domes of the narthex glow, with mosaics more stunning and complete than those of the Aya Sofya.  I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

 

 

 

The Chora is just within the Theodosian walls, which cut across the peninsula and enclosed the city – preventing its conquest for a millennium as the last vestiges of Imperial Rome withered and died quietly within the empire’s eastern outpost.  These walls are in a terrible state of repair, and being well outside the tourist centre are largely ignored.  The shell of a fortress forming part of the wall (Palace of the Sovereign or Tekfur Sarayı in Turkish) prompted further recollections from school as I contemplated the end of empire.  This time it was Year 7 English lessons, and learning the poem that most will find more familiar from the Watchmen film character and his taste in interior design.  Of all of Shelley’s lines, it’s only the pedestal inscription and the sentiment that stick in my head:

“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!”

Despair indeed, ye mighty, not at the greatness of Ozymandias but for your being destined to share in the same fate.  Somehow, for me, Rome is most poetic at its bitter end.

(I also remember thinking that Bysshe is really a very strange name)