DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.55207#0050
40 THE IMPERIAL PORTRAITS OF THE SOUTH GALLERY
TTpOTOTUirov eIkovq, accomplished . . . hetoc iraoris aKpiJBsiocs, which presents for succeeding copyists
an exact, 2uaKpi[3oo|JEvr)v, image’ (Migne, P.G., t. 50, col. 589). Cf, later on, the expressions used by
the Patriarch Nicephoros when speaking of the imperial portraits: ‘similitude, oijoiottis, the very exact
likeness, aKpipEUTOTri spcpEpeioc, &c.’ (Migne, P.G., t. 50, col. 589. Texts of the same kind for the
portraits of private persons: G. Millet, ‘Portraits byzantins’, Revue de VArt Chretien, 1911, pp. 445 fF.;
add to Millet’s examples of marriages with an exchange of portraits: Patriarch Nicephoros, Historia,
Bonn, p. 18). Thus the theory appears to be inexact, according to which the Byzantine emperor
‘n’existe guere en tant que theme de 1’art portraitique’ (Grabar, op. cit., pp. 8 ff.; cf. W. de Griineisen,
Le Portrait, tradition hellenique et influences orientales, Rome, 1911, pp. 79 ff. For criticism of this theory
see G. Millet, op. cit.). Some exceptions are only possible in the case of portraits of princesses, as is
evident, e.g. from the recently uncovered representations of the wife and of the daughters of the
Grand-Duke Jaroslav at St. Sophia of Kiev (1037-67), which are obviously idealized. But if in the
‘original portraits’ of emperors of which St. John Chrysostomos speaks there was an element of
idealization, it was rather in the expression and in the majestic attitude of the personages than in
the features (see above, Note 54, and cf. the distinction which the Byzantines made between the
physical, human nature of the emperor and the divine dignity of his power: e.g. Anthony Melissa,
Maximes. (Migne, P.G., t. 136, col. 1012)).
TTpOTOTUirov eIkovq, accomplished . . . hetoc iraoris aKpiJBsiocs, which presents for succeeding copyists
an exact, 2uaKpi[3oo|JEvr)v, image’ (Migne, P.G., t. 50, col. 589). Cf, later on, the expressions used by
the Patriarch Nicephoros when speaking of the imperial portraits: ‘similitude, oijoiottis, the very exact
likeness, aKpipEUTOTri spcpEpeioc, &c.’ (Migne, P.G., t. 50, col. 589. Texts of the same kind for the
portraits of private persons: G. Millet, ‘Portraits byzantins’, Revue de VArt Chretien, 1911, pp. 445 fF.;
add to Millet’s examples of marriages with an exchange of portraits: Patriarch Nicephoros, Historia,
Bonn, p. 18). Thus the theory appears to be inexact, according to which the Byzantine emperor
‘n’existe guere en tant que theme de 1’art portraitique’ (Grabar, op. cit., pp. 8 ff.; cf. W. de Griineisen,
Le Portrait, tradition hellenique et influences orientales, Rome, 1911, pp. 79 ff. For criticism of this theory
see G. Millet, op. cit.). Some exceptions are only possible in the case of portraits of princesses, as is
evident, e.g. from the recently uncovered representations of the wife and of the daughters of the
Grand-Duke Jaroslav at St. Sophia of Kiev (1037-67), which are obviously idealized. But if in the
‘original portraits’ of emperors of which St. John Chrysostomos speaks there was an element of
idealization, it was rather in the expression and in the majestic attitude of the personages than in
the features (see above, Note 54, and cf. the distinction which the Byzantines made between the
physical, human nature of the emperor and the divine dignity of his power: e.g. Anthony Melissa,
Maximes. (Migne, P.G., t. 136, col. 1012)).