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Apostolic Monasticism at Tokalı Kilise in Cappadocia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Anthony Cutler
Anthony Cutler
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
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Extract

At least as early as the day, nearly eighty years ago, when Hans Rott gained access to “Doghalikilise” through an entrance reduced to a narrow cleft by heaps of rubble and alluvial soil, the monument has been recognized as the largest and most important in Göreme. Many of the wall-paintings of both the Old and the New Church at Tokalı were published by Jerphanion who correctly appreciated the relative chronology of these successive phases. This pioneering and still fundamental survey was supplemented by the excellent photographs of Jeannine Le Brun in Restle's corpus of 1967. In the same year, Cormack suggested on stylistic and iconographic grounds a probable date of ca. 913–920 for the decoration of the Old Church, a period little less than half a century before its relatively gigantic successor was cut transversely across its eastern end. Now, within a year or two, Tokalı Kilise will receive the ultimate accolade of monographic treatment by Ann Wharton Epstein in a book which treats the church as a cultural whole and finally recognizes the frescoes in the New Church as the supreme achievement of Byzantine wall-painting to survive from the tenth century.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anatolian Studies , Volume 35 , December 1985 , pp. 57 - 65
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute at Ankara 1985

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References

1 Rott, H., Kleinasiatische Denkmäler aus Pisidien, Pamphylien, Kappadokien und Lydien, 1908, 224Google Scholar.

2 de Jerphanion, G., Une nouvelle province de l'art byzantin. Les églises rupestres de Cappadoce, I, i, 1925, 262–94Google Scholar; I, ii, 1932, 297–376. The relevant photographs in the plate volumes (1925) are on Pls. 61–94.

3 Restle, M., Die byzantinische Wandmalerei in Kappadokien, 3 vols., 1967Google Scholar. Photographs of Tokalı: II, Pls. 61–123. Restle's less satisfying textual account of the decoration, which he divides into at least seven phases, is to be found in I, 23–37 and 111–16. So complex a series of paintings, if true, would make of Tokalı the most re-decorated church in the history of Byzantine art.

4 Cormack, R., “Byzantine Cappadocia: The Archaic Group of Wall Paintings,” JBAA XXX, 1967, 19–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cormack's dating of the Old Church was based upon the epigraphic evidence provided by N., and Thierry, M., “Ayvalı Kilise ou pigeonnier de Gülli Dere. Église inédite de Cappadoce,” Cahiers archéologiques, XV, 1965, 97–144Google Scholar. Thierry, N. (Bulletin de la Societé Nationale des Antiquaires de France, 1971, 170–78Google Scholar) then consolidated the argument that the same atelier worked in the Old Church as at Ayvalı Kilise.

5 Jerphanion, , “La date des peintures de Toqale Kilissé en Cappadoce,” RArch, XX, 1912, 236–54Google Scholar. This view has frequently and vainly been challenged: Epstein includes a virtually complete bibliographical survey.

6 Tokalı Kilise. Tenth Century Metropolitan Art in Byzantine Cappadocia (in press). I am grateful to Dr. Epstein for allowing me to read her manuscript, for the photographs that appear as Pl. VI a and VII a in this article, and not least for her expert company in Cappadocia in 1975. Pl. VI b is due to the kindness of Dr. Judith Cave and VII b to that of Madame Nicole Thierry. My journey was made possible by a fellowship from the Institute for the Arts and Humanistic Studies of the Pennsylvania State University whose support I happily, if belatedly, acknowledge.

7 Schwartzbaum's report will appear as Appendix A in Epstein's book.

8 Tokalı Kilise lies on the edge of the much-trafficked road from Avcılar to Ürgüp.

9 Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, Planches, IGoogle Scholar, Pl. 9.3. More or less pretentious façades, many of them lost today, were a feature of Çavuşin and numerous other churches in the region. For these aspects in happier days, see ibid., Pls. 20, 21, and Kostof, S. K., Caves of God, 1972, 65–75Google Scholar.

10 Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, I, 1, 262Google Scholar.

11 This area was cleared and restored by H. Gurçay in 1959.

11a The omission of the epithet Prodromos is occasionally found elsewhere in Cappadocia (Thierry, N., Nouvelles églises rupestres de Cappadoce. Région du Hasan Daǧı, 1963, 133, 146, 166Google Scholar).

12 Jerphanion, , Eglises rupestres, I, 1, 265Google Scholar.

13 Note 1, supra.

14 Thierry, “Ayvalı Kilisse,” Figs. 25–9.

15 Restle, , Byzantinische Wandmalerei, III, Pl. 404Google Scholar.

16 Ibid., II, Pl. 115 (one slope of the vault); line-drawings of both slopes in Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, Planches, II, Pl. 81, 1 and 2Google Scholar.

17 Cutler, A., Transfigurations. Studies in the Dynamics of Byzantine Iconography, 1975, Fig. 21Google Scholar.

18 Ibid., Figs. 22–4.

19 Transfigurations, 5–52. Cf. Cormack, R., DOP, XXXI, 177, 242Google Scholar; Grabar, A., Journal des Savants, Janv.-Mars 1979, 65–6Google Scholar; Matthews, J. T., Art Bulletin, LIX, 1977, 425–6Google Scholar.

20 Examples that I missed include the “half-lyre-back” of the Virgin's throne in chapel 9 at Göreme (Restle, , Byzantinische Wandmalerei, II, Pl. 125Google Scholar; for its early 10th century date see Thierry, N., REB, XXVI, 1968, 363Google Scholar) and the 11th century (?) apsidal Virgin between an archangel and St. Basil at Hallaç Manastir, near Ortahisar (Rodley, L., Jahrbuch der österreichischen Byzantinistik, XXXII, 1982, 425–34Google Scholar).

21 St. John Damascene is shown on such a chair in the ninth century Paris, B.N. gr. 923, fol. 378v (Weitzmann, K., The Miniatures of the Sacra Parallela, 1979, Fig. 7Google Scholar). Vladimir Svjatoslavich, grand prince of Kiev who married the sister of the emperor Basil II in 989, appears similarly enthroned on his silver coinage (Ganina, O. D., Kievskij muzej istoričeskich dragocennostej, 1974, no. 173)Google Scholar.

22 Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, I, i, 265Google Scholar; Restle, , Byzantinische Wandmalarei, II, no. XGoogle Scholar; Kostof, , Caves of God, 191–2Google Scholar.

23 Notes 14 and 15, supra. The Pentecost also appears in the narthex of the Great Pigeon-House at Çavuşin (Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, Planches, IIGoogle Scholar, Pl. 139, 3).

24 Thus, concerning the account of the Pentecost set up after the earthquake of 869 in the church of the Virgin at Pêgê (Acta Sanctorum, Nov. III, 882BGoogle Scholar), Demus, O. (Cahiers archéologiques, xxv, 1976, 108Google Scholar) has questioned the assumption that the painting was in the main dome, suggesting that more likely it was in a vault above the entrance to the bema.

25 Mango, C., Materials for the Study of the Mosaics of St. Sophia at Istanbul, 1962, 35–8Google Scholar and Figs. 29–35. Essentially the same scheme appears in the Paris Homilies of Gregory Nazianzos (B.N. gr. 510, fol. 301r) of 880–3 (Omont, H., Miniatures des plus anciens manuscrits grecs de la Bibliothèque Nationale du VIe au XIVe siècle, 1929, Pl. XLIVGoogle Scholar).

26 Jerphanion, , Églises rupestres, Planches, I, Pl. 52Google Scholar; Restle, , Byzantinische Wandmalerei II, Pl. 275Google Scholar. Grabar, A. (Cahiers archéologiques XXII, 1972, 244Google Scholar) suggested that this scheme depended ultimately upon the form of the synthronon in early Christian basilicas.

27 Note 15, supra.

28 Weitzmann, K., The Monastery of Saint Catherine at Mount Sinai, The Icons I, 1976, no. B.45Google Scholar, a panel representing the Nativity, the Presentation, the Ascension and the Pentecost in descending rows. Seven apostles are preserved in the lowest register, with Peter and Paul at what would have been the centre of the total scheme. Weitzmann points to the slight rise in the ground-line upon which the apostles are seated (no chairs or benches are shown) and connects this with the centrifugal composition in the Paris Gregory, calling the composition the “projection of a cupola onto a two-dimensional plane.”

29 Jerphanion, (Églises rupestres, I, 1, 265Google Scholar) used the imperfect tense—probably because of the condition of the figures—to record the position of Paul and to suggest that “Pierre était en face de lui, à droite.” For his identification of the coryphaei in the New Church, where none of the apostles are identified by inscription, see ibid., I, 2, 353.

30 While the Hetoimasia is frequently shown as the source in both mosaics and miniatures (note 25, supra), on ivories the fiery tongues spring from an arc of heaven (Goldschmidt, A. and Weitzmann, K., Die byzantinischen Elfenbeinskulpturen des Ẋ. bis XIII. Jahrhunderts, II, 1934, nos. 122, 216, 221Google Scholar).

31 Thierry, , Nouvelles églises, 93–8, 138Google Scholar, Fig. 22 and Pl. 44.

32 Brenk, B., Tradition und Neuerung in der christlichen Kunst des ersten Jahrtausends, 1966, 80–2Google Scholar and Pls. 20–1; Epstein, A. W., “Middle Byzantine Churches of Kastoria: Dates and Implications,” Art Bulletin, LXII, 1980, 190–2CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

33 For a dated (1028) monumental example, see K. Papadopoulos, Die Wandmalereien des XI. Jahrhunderts in der Kirche Panagia tôn Chalkeôn in Thessaloniki, 1966, 57–67.

34 Broader variations are found in Western medieval art. Even in developed representations of the Last Judgement, such as the Anglo-Saxon ivory in the Victoria and Albert Museum (Dodwell, C. R., Anglo-Saxon Art, A New Perspective, 1983, 88 and Pl. 17Google Scholar), the ranks of both apostles and angels are omitted.

35 Thus at the Panagia tôn Chalkeôn (Papadopoulos, 61–2) and other examples cited by Brenk, , Tradition und Neuerung 82–90Google Scholar, Figs. 22–4.

36 The point has been made most succinctly by Mango, C. in Kähler, H., Hagia Sophia, 1967, 54Google Scholar: “It is characteristic of Byzantine sacred iconography that it should admit various overtones of interpretation … for every particular there are alternative explanations. The altar table signifies Christ's tomb, but it also signifies his cradle. And why not? Everything in Christian doctrine is interconnected.”

37 A. Cutler, “The Byzantine Deêsis and the Problem of Representativeness in Medieval Art” (in press).

38 Thus E. Dinkler von Schubert on Ayvalı Kilise, reviewing Brenk, , Tradition und Neuerung, in BZ, LXII, 1969, 371Google Scholar.

39 Thierry, N. and Tenenbaum, A., “Le Cénacle apostolique à Kokar Kilise et Ayvalı Kilise en Cappadoce,” Journal des Savants, Oct.–Dec. 1963, 229–41Google Scholar.

40 Thierry, , Nouvelles églises, 128–33Google Scholar, Pls. 63–4 and colour Pl. IV.

41 Note 4, supra.

42 Thierry, , “Ayvalı Kilise,” 134Google Scholar and Fig. 26. For the eschatological content of the Pentecost and its sometime interchangeability with the Judgement, see Kitzinger, E., “The Mosaics of the Cappella Palatina at Palermo,” Art Bulletin, XXXI, 1969, 278Google Scholar.

43 P. 59, supra.

44 Both Peter and Paul are separated from the Deêsis by a triad of angels. But no such celestial creatures stand behind the apostles either here or in the vestibule of Old Tokalı. The conventions according to which Paul was incorporated in representations of the Ascension and Pentecost at which, of course, he was not present according to the text, are analysed by Jerphanion, , “Quels sont les douze apôtres dans l'iconographie chrétienne?” La voix des monuments I, 1930, 189–200Google Scholar.

45 For some general principles underlying various sequences of the apostles, see Mango, , Materials, 38Google Scholar.

46 Rott, , Kleinasiatische Denkmäler, 225Google Scholar.

47 Note 39, supra.

48 Églises rupestres I, 1, 265Google Scholar.

49 Ibid., 263, note 1. These cuttings are clearly shown in Planches I, Pl. 67, 2.

50 The cutting from east to west correponds to the order of painting noted by Epstein, who observes that the westernmost medallion at the vault's apex is smaller than its counterparts. The decoration of a church customarily proceeded from east to west: Mango, , Materials, 94Google Scholar.

51 Both Restle, , Byzantinische Wandmalerei I, 113Google Scholar, and Epstein argue, contra Jerphanion, that the vestibule was painted later—though probably not much later—than the church proper. However, they differ on the relative chronology of the phases of decoration involving the church, the vestibule and the arch that connects them. Restle, for example, distinguished even between the narrative scenes in the barrel vault of the Old Church and the saints on the wall below them.

52 Églises rupestres I, 1, 263–4Google Scholar.

53 Hippolytus, , Refutatio omnium haeresium, III, 2Google Scholar = P.G. 16, 3020 CGoogle Scholar.

54 οὖτοι μόνοι τὸν ἑαυτῶν βίον ἐκμαγεῖον τῆς ἀποστολικῆς ἐποιήσαντο ἀρετῆς (De monastica exercitatione, IV). The entire passage is available in P.G. 79, 721D–724A. For the views of the Cappadocian fathers on monks as vehicles of God's charismata and as his athletes and champions, see Mathew, G. in Cambridge Medieval History, IV, 1, 1966, 57–8Google Scholar.