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Reflexes of Iconoclasm and Iconophilia in the Roman Wall Paintings and Mosaics of the 8th and 9th Centuries

2018; Brepols; Volume: 11; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1484/j.ikon.4.2018002

2507-041X

Gaetano Curzi,

Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History

In the first decades of the 8th century, the affirmation of Iconoclasm in the Byzantine Empire opens a rift between Rome and Constantinople that will be reconstructed only in the middle of the next century. In this long time-frame we witness the rebirth of the Western Empire with the coronation of Charlemagne, who also expressed doubts about the legitimacy of the veneration of images in his Capitulare de imaginibus, the so-called Libri carolini. However¸ the cult of icons in Rome was out of the question and, together with the cult of the martyrs and their relics, constituted one of the pillars on which the image of the Holy City was based. This paper, therefore, examines the role played by these disputes in monumental decorations commissioned by popes. In the great apse mosaics of Sts Nereo e Achilleo and St Maria in Domnica, by Leo III and Paschal I, and also in some wall paintings (e.g. in St Maria Antiqua or St Clemente), we can in fact observe a distancing from the traditional iconographic schemes arising from the early Christian age that probably reflects these religious struggles.