Hortus Artium Medievalium

The paper presents the results of a field survey in the eastern part of Mallorca (Balearic Islands, Western Mediterranean) undertaken in order to better understand settlement patterns in the Late Antique period. The results show a shift in the forms and nature of the occupation of the countryside in Late Antiquity between the Roman period and the Muslim conquest of the island at the beginning of the tenth century. An important decrease in the number of rural sites is evident in the 3rd and 4th centuries, perhaps the result of a concentration of the property. The end of the established villa settlement pattern probably occurs in the mid/late 5th century, and in the 6th century. This coincides with an increase in the number of smaller sites, creating a network of settlements, which include the reoccupation of old prehistoric and early Roman sites, the continuity of some large farms or villas and the creation of a small number of sites ex novo.

The episcopal complex of Eio, located in El Tolmo de Minateda, was built between the end of the 6th century and the beginning of the 7th century, possibly as a political decision taken by the ecclesiastical authority in the capital of the Visigothic kingdom (Toletum). With the comprehensive study of the whole complex presented below (construction cycles, furniture, decoration and location of spaces), we can interpret the function of each space in the basilica and the domus episcopi, the liturgical and general movement routes, the existence of some hierarchical environments, and specify the chronological development of the buildings. After the Arab-Berber conquest of Hispania in the early 8th century, the whole complex will experience a series of transformations that will convert the religious and monumental public area into a private, residential and industrial Islamic quarter.

The paper presents basic information about the Lobor wooden church built at the turn of the 8th into the 9th century, which was built by the Frankish missionaries from northern Italy at the beginning of the process of Christianization of Pannonian Slavs. The church has a single nave with a rectangular apse and a porch on the Facade. During research into the church, the remains of a mensa and parts of an early medieval reliquary were found (bone lining of a wooden box). The wooden church was demolished in the 10th or early 11th century.

"Île-Barbe Abbey is established in a Saône’s island that is situated in the north of the city of Lyon. It seems going back to the beginning of the Dark Ages as Gregoire de Tours suggests it in his writings. Nevertheless the remains of the medieval monastery preserved in the present houses are dated from the Xth-XIIIth centuries. They show an atypical organisation for the roman period, based on four churches scattered in the whole site. The last archaeological researches concerning Saint-André Church built on the rock in the oriental part of the island have revealed a Merovingian funeral setting organised around a possible oratory. These results are questioning the primitive monastic space: at the beginning it may have been structured by the four churches rebuilt later, as it has been seen in other sites (Marmoutiers, Lérins, jura’s monasteries). Building is developing from a single nave and a transept-shaped in the Xth century to a three apses beside in the XIIth-XIIIth centuries and to a south side aisle in the XIVth-XVth centuries. These architectural developments are closely connected with the foundation’s legends that are progressively worked out in the monastery, partly based on Longin’s coming who is buried there with Anne and many oriental saints that have probably been identified with the Merovingian tombs visible from the floor.

The sculptural works from Genoa and its territory are the subject of this paper that gathers all the evidence attributable to the transition from Late Antiquity to the early Middle Ages. Early examples are the sarcophagi of Late Roman Empire with Christian iconography, in which symbolic themes (Good Shepherd, episodes from the Old and New Testament) are used. This is followed by a discussion of sculptures that document the transition from the iconographic motifs shared with the pagan world examples implementing symbolic Christian language (chancels with cross and Chrismon). These can be compared by their technique and figurative language of the Byzantine culture of Ravenna, but with strong influences from the eastern Mediterranean world. This paper tries to deepen knowledge on the art of this period, when sculptures did not show unambiguous characteristics but rather forms of fusion between two distinct figurative designs, treated according to the principles of harmony and with refined elegance.

The 2012 campaign of the archaeological research project permitted the exhaustive excavations of the immediate surroundings of the southern nave of the abbey church of St Peter in Osor. The richness and the complexity of the discovered structures confirmed the great archaeological potential of this sector. Namely, a funeral zone that is situated south to the church is occupied by two buildings perpendicular to the church which we interpret as a mausoleum (the one on the west) and a chapel with one privileged burial (the one on the east). The great number of built tombs or simples graves confirmed that this sector had funeral function even before the XIth century and the construction of the early Romanesque church, until the early modern period. Furthermore, the primary analysis of the eastern part of the Venetian city wall and the long monastic building situated in the eastern part of the monastery was carried out.

The paper presents the amphora from Osor discovered during the research excavations in the monastery and church of St. Peter in Osor. It is an urn in the form of an amphora lacking closer comparisons in the adjacent Late Bronze and Early Iron Age cultural groups, but exhibits similarities with the urns of the continental Late Bronze Age, especially the Ruše cultural group. Due to its formal and stylistic characteristics, as well as the results of the radiometric dating, it was attributed to the beginning of the Early Iron Age in Kvarner - in to the second half of the 10th century BC. It was interpreted as the case of individual or burial of the close members of the family which, due to the circumstances buried their dead according to their traditional customs forming a burial that could be recognized as one of the elements demonstrating the growing intensity of the influences from the Urnfield culture to the area of Kvarner. Consequently the amphora from Osor could be comprehended as a symbolic subject of a specific burial rite which indubitably confirms the cognitively clearly recognizable semiotic value in the interaction of the Northern Adriatic and the territory of the continental Urnfield culture at the end of the last prehistoric millennium.

The main results of the 2012 excavations campaign on the site of Guran in south Istria are presented. These concern the fortified early medieval settlement the origin of which is dated to the Carolingian period and which was abandoned in the late Middle Ages, and the church of St Cecilia situated some few hundred meters to the north of the settlement. The presented results of the excavations and the restoration of St Cecilia shed some light on the dating of at least two of six phases prior to the existing church. Main objectives of this international project are the analysis of the origin and the architectural development of the church erected on the site of a roman villa, as well as that of the settlement, combined with the study of territorial and ecclesiastic organisation of this part of Istria during late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages.

Through the analysis of documentaries and iconographical sources, this paper investigates in a more detailed overview the Slavic presence in Apulia during the first centuries of the Middle Age, with emphasis on the Balkanic and the Apulian iconographical testimonies. The comparative study is aimed to turn out the strong influence that the Byzantine Empire had in terms of clothing style, which became very similiar during its political domination.

In 1974 a set of Medieval wall paintings was brought to light in the Romanesque church of San Millán of Segovia. Three different ensembles are to be discerned. They all are located on the very same wall, on the north end of the north transept. In this article attention is paid to the oldest one, placed on the top of the wall, inscribed by a round arch which makes it to resemble a tympanum. This mural, soon recognized as an hagiographical one probably dealing with St Millán, the patron-saint of the church, had been never analysed in depth. It is now discussed in the context of Romanesque painting in Segovia. Its arrangement and function are considered and, above all, interest is focused on how its iconographic display was created on the basis of textual and visual sources and on how it persisted in later works, mainly the tympanum of the south door of the church.

The cathedral architecture responded to specific uses that varied over the centuries. Among these functions, the liturgy is one of the most important. This article deals with the problems of interpretation of cathedral architecture from its use for liturgical purposes and of the timing of it: at different times, different uses, that supposed modifications in the architecture and its liturgical installations.

During the excavations remains of a Roman villa, Medieval cemetery and Early modern vaults were discovered inside the complex of the monastery of Servite order in Koper/Capodistria in Slovenia. In the three trenches excavated we were able to observe the development of the existing architectural complex as well to formulate assumptions about the functioning of the older phases of the Benedictine monastery and the Roman villa erected in the area before. On the edge of the medieval cemetery two inhumations of isolated human skulls were discovered.

The author analyses two medieval reliquaries from Nin and pays special attention to their iconographic programme. Each reliquary has ten repoussé figures of saints and the author notes that nine of the saints are repeated on both reliquaries. However, the repeated figures of saints were not hammered in repoussé after the same mould, nor do they share the same attributes. The arrangement of the figures of saints on both reliquaries leads to the conclusion that St Paul was given a special place and the author argues that the commissioner of these reliquaries was also named Paul. The author is putting forward the hypothesis that the person in question was ban Paul Šubić.

This paper deals with the serial production of metal processional crosses, and focuses on a group of Late Medieval artefacts made in North-East Italy and scattered among several churches within the same geographical context. Despite the fact that all these crosses are strictly related to each other and partly made with the same moulds, not every cross was made by the same workshop. Moreover, strong connections can be traced between some crosses belonging to the corpus and other liturgical objects not related to it. By means of a careful analysis of the peculiar features of these artefacts (most barely known or never published) and the relation between them all, this paper aims to shed some light on the characters and the techniques of this artistic production.