Term beings...

[annwfyn]

*sighs*

You can tell I'm back in Oxford.

I got back today to discover a nice package from my supervisor for this term. She wants me to write an essay and hand it in by Wednesday 19th. That, for the record, is the day after my first lecture of the course.

Does anyone out there know anything about the architecture of the early christian church?

I am apparently about to find out.

I shall be enthused! I shall view this as a challenge! And it will all be good.

Comments

[slappersire.livejournal.com]

It's made with rock?

Erm, not the sort you eat. The sort that lives underground.

Yup, definitely rock.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

OK. That's a start. Do you think I can fill an introduction with that?

I bet there were ceramics as well. Tiles, or pots, or something. Old places always have bits of pottery lurking somewhere.

[slappersire.livejournal.com]

If you go into a big discussion on the different types of rock and how they're created, probably could fill an intro.

And they definitley had pottery, possibly not tiles, bowls maybe, and badly carved wooden statues.

How early is early? I mean, are we talking back in the days when it was a wattle and daub hut (or whatever) and the locals were all still worshipping Things Wot Weren't Christ (tm) and occassionally thought about burning the priest? 'Cos if that's the case you might need to head away from rock and towards mud.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I believe it is after they stopped burning them and there was a proper church, with lots of references to Byzantium, where there were loads more beads than anywhere in the west. Oh, and amythyst. I know they had a lot of amythyst coz they exported their surplus to Britain. Any time amythyst beads show up in Britain one has to say 'ah...trade with Byzantium' in a knowing manner.

[slappersire.livejournal.com]

*looks at her favourite ring*

Ah.... trade with Byzantium.

*nods*

Can I be an archeologist now?

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Actually, on a random and disconnected level, do you know if there is anywhere in the UK where one can mine amethyst? It's something that I was always sure we had in the British Isles until I was told that amethyst always meant foreign trade.

It's been confusing me for some time.

[slappersire.livejournal.com]

For some reason I always though that Wales had amethyst mines. But I have no real proof of that.

Main things that I know we mine over here would be coal, tin and copper. After that I start getting confused and remembering things I've read in fantasy novels. *looks embarassed*

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

They mine all sorts of random things in the Lake District, but I don't think amethyst is one of them.

<googles>

OK, apparently you can get amethyst out of West Penwith mine in Cornwall. So there you go.

pots

[melsner.livejournal.com]

were the pots shaped like penises?

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

...They were built in cross shapes, pointing east? *looks slightly worried* is there a test on this later?

:P

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. There is a test. Go on. Tell me more!

On the plus side I am now accessible via e mail and LJ. I'm back in a place with actual internet access.

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

Oooh... If I had email access, I'd be so happy. Any gossip must therefore be Suitable For Public Consumption, about early churches (and amethyst only has one 'y' - sorry... *meek*), or on LJ somewhere.

Um. As for more...

If you're serious, I can happily Google lots; otherwise it's a subject you know way more about than me. :)

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

If you find early church architecture in Byzantium at all interesting then feel free to chatter with me about it. Otherwise I shall probably be fairly happy crawling down to the library in a bit and burying myself in there until I have found out Stuff (tm).

And I shall try and think of new and shiny gossip. What has happened to your e mail access btw?

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

I don't know. It sort of Went Away in an odd manner - sometimes it lets me load up my inbox and do one thing before freezing up, sometimes it doens't evne let me log in. I still can't get gmail to work...

And a) geographically whereabouts, b) historically during which periods? This is mainly because wikipedia is an entertaining and random source that sometimes throws up cool links... :) I find most stuff interesting. You're under no obligation to pander to that, though. :P

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Byzantium is the area, and time-wise I'm looking at the 6th and 7th centuries. I'm quite quite happy to encourage anyone to talk to me. It makes the entire research process loads more interesting.

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Well, if that's your time period...

Probably Istanbul's most famous landmark, the Hagia Sophia (also spelled Ayasofya) was built by the emperor Justinian I in the year 537 AD. Built in only six years, the structure was designed by the architects Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus. On May 7, 558, the dome of the church collapsed due to a December 557 earthquake, and though a new dome was quickly rebuilt, historical records tell us that it was not identical to the original.

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Christianity - see sections on the right period/place and follow the links through.

http://users.macunlimited.net/maniguide/churcharch.html - modern Eastern Orthodox Church info; possibly history in addition.

http://www.bartleby.com/65/by/ByzantinANA.html - Lecture notes for a uni course on the period/place.

It actually loks quite shiny...

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

Likewise http://historymedren.about.com/cs/byzantinestudies/a/forgotten.htm - generic Byzantine history

http://www.patriarchate.org/ecumenical_patriarchate/chapter_4/html/hagia_sophia.html - history of the Hagia Sophia, which appears to be slap bang in the middle of your period and one of the only large religious buildings created for the Greek Orthodoxy. And it has the coolest named website. I want to be part of the patriarchate.org now. :P

And since I know exactly how little help net sources can be without a reasonable amount of time, I'll stop throwing links at you. :)

*waves hand*

[hildekitten.livejournal.com]

I do.
Well I do once I've found out where my course about that has been hiding :)

on that course

[hildekitten.livejournal.com]

It's entirely in Flemish and over 300 pages.
Don't expect me to translate it entirely.
I can, however, try to find the most important bits out of it.

Re: on that course

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Oh my! That would be amazing. Of course - you're an art historian, aren't you? Are you a Byzantine person? I'm doing the art and architecture of Byzantium at the moment, and it's all a bit of a crash course. It's terribly new and I'm pretty much terrified by it.

Re: on that course

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Bad Sally.

Archaeologist, not historian! Find texts about chunks of the churches found, rather than texts about texts. Don't read, dig!

*Ben gets a shovel and a map of Istanbul out*

I'm sure no one would mind us digging up the foundations of the Hagia Sophia.

Re: on that course

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

It probably had it coming, anyway :p

Most places would be better off if someone just took a pickaxe to them.

Re: on that course

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

OK, I'll be evil archaeologist (though I'll need to find a fiendish and possibly nazi patron) and sneak off with the treasure we find whilst you can be good archaeologist and stay behind and explain to the nice Islamic people why we've just carved up their mosque.

Re: on that course

[quisalan.livejournal.com]

Don't you dare! That's one of my favourite buildings in the world, you!

*Defends the Aya Sophia against all comers with shovels*

Re: on that course

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Talk to the nice archaeologist... I'm sure she'll allay any worries... and ignore any digging noises in the background.

Re: on that course

[quisalan.livejournal.com]

*growl*

*Grabs a Crusader Sword in one hand, and a copy of Anna Komena in the other*

Re: on that course

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

*grabs a watered steel turkish scimitar and a precious statue and legs it with pilfered booty*

1204

[quisalan.livejournal.com]

Oy! As a Crusader that'd my role! ;)

Re: on that course

[hildekitten.livejournal.com]

Erm, I'm not exactly since I never managed to actually graduate.
But I do have a course on Byzantium as well.
Somewhere ...

I'll go have a look after I've had food.

Oh btw, Robin (silver_bluejp) has my book on Gothic Architecture, that if I remember correctly, babbles a bit about the early Christian buildings at the beginning of it.

[elethiomel.livejournal.com]

How early? I mean, early enough and they were just stealing other peoples churches and lying about the decor ("A sun disk? On a Christian carving? Don't be daft. It's Mithraism wot 'as sun-disks. Not us. That's... erm... a halo, yeah, that's what it is, a halo! I know it looks like a sun-disk to the untrained eye but it's different. Priest explained last week... Actually, yes, Nobby, there did used to be a temple of Mithras round 'ere somewhere, now that you mention it. Dunno wot 'appened to it, though...")

[quisalan.livejournal.com]

*giggles*

And thus, assimilation was born...

"Wot d'you mean Christ on the cross didn't have an Easter Egg? He must've got peckish, right? Nah... Spring festival? Not got one of those, Guv..."

[bringeroflight.livejournal.com]

You know, I always thought in WoD, Mithras would have had some serious issues with Christianity for nicking his Birthday for Jesus.

[ksirafai.livejournal.com]

He was too busy being eaten by Monty Coven.

Who is still far and away one of the cutest NPCs WW ever made up; him and Lambach... :P

[bringeroflight.livejournal.com]

Monty Coven was great and looked like Nigel from Stratford.

[hardwired.livejournal.com]

Architecture....*drool*

You will like this.

I can look up my old notes on Gothic Arcitercture and the Catholic Church as well as others if you want.

Major Notes:

Large Spanning Roofs.
The Buttress. and FLying Butreses.

More when i read up on stuff.

You will enjoy this, i can tell.

[ulaidhan.livejournal.com]

Ah, and there I was thinking that by Early Christian architecture you meant the earlier-surviving stuff in this country.

I'm a minor fan of Anglo Saxon church architecture, a surprising amount of which survives remarkably intact.

Define"early"

[twisted-times.livejournal.com]

If you mean up the formation of the Holy Roman Empire, then most what you're going to be talking about is Gnostic architecture in the Mediterranean region, with the climate in that area resulting in obvious design features and styles as a result of the climates and cultures they were surrounded by at that time.

Much of the early Gnostic beliefs were influenced both by Talmudic Lore and Jewish Tradition as well as Byzantian, Babylonic and Zoroastrian (http://www.avesta.org/zfaq.html) beliefs.

If you're meaning from the formation of the Holy Roman Empire onwards there's a lot of classical influences as well, along with the largely Pagan/Celtic traditions which predominated most of Britain and Europe at that time also.

[jo-english-bint.livejournal.com]

All I know is that you will find EVERY church listed and described in the series of books by Nikolaus Pevsner. It was his lifes work, and is extremely comprehesive.

Here is one on Amazon for Londons City Churches. (http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0300096550/qid=1105478320/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_2_3/202-9582316-8447010)