Venetian group of tetrarchs

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The group of tetrarchs at St. Mark's Basilica in Venice

The Venetian Tetrarchengruppe consists of two related, including life-size sculptures of porphyry that of in a corner of the exterior facade of St. Mark's Basilica at the Porta della Carta in Venice are built. It originated around the year 300 in Egypt or Asia Minor . Shown are the tetrarchs , four Roman emperors who ruled the Roman Empire together at that time . Their similar appearance and their intimate embrace should symbolize the harmony and solidarity among them.

description

The approximately 1.30 meter high group of tetrarchs is made of porphyry , which was often used in the 3rd century for the portraits and sarcophagi of emperors: purple was the color of the emperors . The figures are made in full relief, only the backs merge into the wall or the columns to which they were originally attached. The group of tetrarchs is largely preserved, only one figure is missing the right third of the body with the right leg, the other figure of the same group of two the left foot and parts of the right leg as well as the upper part of the headgear; all portraits lack the nose. The headgear has holes over the forehead. Two pairs of almost identically dressed men are shown embracing each other with one hand and laying the other on a long sword ( spathe ). The men wear muscle armor , paludamentum , a long-sleeved tunic with a skirt reinforced with leather strips , and campagi , half-open shoes with straps crossed over the back of the foot. Shoes and the scabbard of the sword are adorned with precious stones, as are the belts of a pair of tetrarchs - a novelty in the self-representation of Roman rulers, because jewel-adorned clothing was a hallmark of oriental rulers in the Roman Empire. The markedly simple headgear stands in clear contrast to this magnificence: the pilleus pannonicus was a simple field cap originally from Illyria , which was introduced into the Roman army during the time of the Tetrarch emperors . This was intended to show both the Tetrarchs' claim to rule and their ties to the Illyrian troops, in particular, on which their rule was based.

The artist was not interested in portraits with high recognition value, but rather in depicting the tetrarchy as a concept: not only the posture and clothing of the four tetrarchs are identical, the mimic faces are also barely (apart from subsequently scratched beards on two of them) a distinction too. The naturalism and the emphasis on the individual traits of the depicted people, which were essential for the sculptural art of antiquity since around 500 BC. Were typical have been overcome. It is therefore difficult to identify the people portrayed: According to the Byzantinist Arne Effenberger, these are the emperors of the first tetrarchy : Augusti Diocletian and Maximian in the originally left - but in the current placement on the right - and the Caesares Constantius I. Chlorus and Galerius in the other group of tetrarchs. The archaeologist Hans Peter Laubscher and the ancient historian Klaus Rosen , on the other hand, consider it possible that the emperors of the second tetrarchy are meant, i.e. Augusti Galerius and Constantius Chlorus as well as Caesares Severus and Maximinus Daia .

Historical background

The Roman tetrarchy was introduced by Emperor Diocletian in 293: From now on one Augustus was responsible for the western and eastern halves of the empire, each was assigned a Caesar and a presumptive successor. The close bond between the two was secured by Caesar's marriage to one of Augustus' daughters , for which Caesar had to divorce himself beforehand. This system got into a crisis after the death of Constantius I in 306. It was finally ended with the rise of Emperor Constantine the Great to sole ruler in 324.

Compared with the previous era of the soldier emperors, the ancient sources consider the tetrarchy to be an epoch of stability, prosperity and happiness. Even a Christian author like Orosius attested to Diocletian, the otherwise detested Christian persecutor, that such a system for the general good of wisely divided rule, as he established, was "hitherto unknown to the human race". The unity of the four rulers, their concordia, was generally considered to be the condition of their success . It is therefore the central element of the tetrarchical portraits of rulers and thus also of the Venetian group: through the embrace, the same clothing and the de-individualized facial features, the artist wanted the unity and similarity of all ( concordia or similitudo ) as well as brotherly love and solidarity of the respective ranks (fraternitas) to express.

Work history

detail
Lost heel of a group of tetrarchs, now in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum

It is unclear where the tetrarch figures originated. Due to the origin of the porphyry, Laubscher suspects that they were made on the occasion of the rise of the Tetrarchs in Egypt in 293. Effenberger, on the other hand, thinks that they were created in Diocletian's residence city of Nicomedia , where they could then have been set up in the notches of two columns about seven meters high. Apparently similar groups of tetrarchs were produced in series on behalf of the state, because a similar, albeit significantly smaller sculpture is in the Vatican Museums in Rome , fragments of other groups were found in Niš, Serbia, and in Istanbul .

After Constantinople was elevated to imperial capital, the group of tetrarchs was transferred there and set up in two columns at the Philadelphion . It is uncertain whether this happened under Constantine, under his sons or under Theodosius and his sons. The sculpture was changed and reinterpreted. In the sources, among other things, the sons of Constantine the Great Constantine II , Constantius II , Constans are named. Fourth is Crispus , or, since he fell to the damnatio in 326 , Constantine's nephew Dalmatius . This interpretation could explain the name of the square on which they stood, because in Greek  Φιλαδελφῖα Philadelphia means brotherly love. Since it was also no longer clear why important emperors should wear simple soldier's hats, the Byzantines finally drilled the holes mentioned after 800 in order to attach valuable crowns, so-called stemmata. The faces of the figures were also changed by roughly scratching a beard into the left one, which stylized the sitter into the older one. In addition, the fibulae on the tunics were replaced by more valuable pieces.

In order to set up the group of tetrarchs elsewhere in the city, the Byzantines sawed them out of their columns. A figure was damaged in the process. The heel that was severed in the process was found in 1963 by the German archaeologist Rudolf Naumann near the Istanbul Bodrum Mosque and is now exhibited in the local Archaeological Museum . This refuted the previously widespread view that the tetrarch group did not come from Constantinople, but from Akko . It goes back to a note from Marco Polo's travelogues .

When Constantinople was sacked by the Crusaders in 1204, the sculptures were broken again from their location and, like numerous other art treasures, were also brought to Venice. There they were built into a corner of St. Mark's Basilica. The group of tetrarchs is considered to be the most important piece of the Constantinople booty , along with the horses of San Marco . Like the entire “Veneto-Byzantine style” of the 13th century, in which, in addition to St. Mark's Basilica and Square, several palaces on the Grand Canal , Venice's historical and aesthetic self-definition were used, these trophies were used . In later centuries the knowledge of the origin of the tetrarch group was lost. The unusual gesture was now misinterpreted as a conspiratorial council of war with simultaneous mutual intent to murder. This gave rise to the legend , which continued into the 18th century, that the four were Greeks , Albanians or Moors who had killed each other in a dispute over a treasure, and that treasure has since been located directly behind them in the treasury of St. Mark's Basilica.

literature

Web links

Commons : Statues of the Tetrarchs (Venice)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The Emperors of the Tetrarchy . Virtual Museum of Antiquities of the Archaeological Institute of the University of Göttingen , accessed on January 28, 2017.
  2. ^ Fred S. Kleiner: Gardner's art through the ages. The western perspective . 13th Edition, Vol. 1, Cengage Learning, Boston 2010, p. 201.
  3. ^ Arne Effenberger: On the reuse of the Venetian tetrarch groups in Constantinople . in: Millennium 10, Heft 1 (2013), p. 216 (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  4. ↑ Hans Peter Laubscher: Observations on tetrarchical portraits of emperors made of porphyry. In: Yearbook of the German Archaeological Institute 44 (1999), p. 242; Klaus Rosen: Constantine the Great. Emperor between power politics and religion . Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2013, p. IX f.
  5. ↑ "res praeterea humano generi hucusque incognita". Orosius: Historiarum adversum paganos liber VII, 26, 5, quoted from Frank Kolb : Diocletian and the first tetrarchy. Improvisation or experiment in monarchical rule? De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1987, ISBN 978-3-11-084650-8 , p. 1 (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  6. ^ Arne Effenberger: On the reuse of the Venetian tetrarch groups in Constantinople . in: Millennium 10, Heft 1 (2013), p. 216 (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  7. ↑ Hans Peter Laubscher: Observations on tetrarchical portraits of emperors made of porphyry. In: Yearbook of the German Archaeological Institute 44 (1999), p. 227 f.
  8. ^ Arne Effenberger: On the reuse of the Venetian tetrarch groups in Constantinople . In: Millennium 10, Heft 1 (2013), p. 217 f. (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  9. ↑ Hans Peter Laubscher: Observations on tetrarchical portraits of emperors made of porphyry. In: Yearbook of the German Archaeological Institute 44 (1999), p. 208 f.
  10. ^ Franz Alto Bauer : City, Square and Monument in Spatantike. Investigations into the design of public space in the late ancient cities of Rome, Constantinople and Ephesus . Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 1996, p. 233, and Arne Effenberger : On the reuse of the Venetian tetrarch groups in Constantinople . In: Millennium 10, Heft 1 (2013), p. 236.
  11. ^ Arne Effenberger: On the reuse of the Venetian tetrarch groups in Constantinople . In: Millennium 10, Heft 1 (2013), pp. 216–266 (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  12. ↑ L'Enigma dei Tetrarchi - The Riddle of the Tetrarchs , on H-Soz-Kult , October 10, 2010, accessed on January 29, 2017.
  13. ↑ Cf. Oskar Mothes : History of Architecture and Sculpture Venice . Friedrich Voigt, Leipzig 1859, p. 125 f .; Hans Peter Laubscher: Observations on tetrarchical portraits of the emperors made of porphyry. In: Yearbook of the German Archaeological Institute 44 (1999), p. 224.
  14. ↑ L'Enigma dei Tetrarchi - The Riddle of the Tetrarchs , on H-Soz-Kult, October 10, 2010, accessed on January 29, 2017.
  15. ^ Antje Middeldorf Kosegarten : Local legislation, building planning and urban aesthetics in medieval Venice. In: Michael Stolleis and Ruth Wolff (eds.): La bellezza della città. City law and urban design in Italy in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance . Max Niemeyer Verlag, Tübingen 2004, ISBN 978-3-11-094598-0 , p. 131 f. (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  16. ^ Marilyn Perry: Saint Mark's Trophies. Legend, Superstition, and Archeology in Renaissance Venice. In: Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 40 (1977), pp. 42-47.