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II.—Recent Discoveries at the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2011

William Harvey Esq.  and
John H. Harvey Esq.
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Extract

It has for many years been disputed whether the existing structure of the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem were that built by Constantine, in the first half of the fourth century, or a later restoration or rebuilding under Justinian, some two centuries later. The documentary evidence is insufficient to decide the point, as no unequivocal description of the present church exists earlier than that of Sophronius in A. D. 635, which describes the building as τρίκογχος, triple-vaulted, or tri-apsidal. Unfortunately, this comes a century too late to decide the point at issue (pl. XIII).

Type
Research Article
Information
Archaeologia , Volume 87 , 1938 , pp. 7 - 17
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1938

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References

page 7 note 1 For statements of the problem, and divergent solutions, see Harvey, W. and others, The Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem (Byzantine Research Fund), 1910; and L. H. Vincent and F. M. Abel, Bethléem, 1914.Google Scholar

page 7 note 2 See his description in the Anacreontics, quoted by H. A. A. Cruso in W. Harvey and others, op. cit., p. 57.

page 7 note 3 Eutychii Patriarchae Alexandrini Annales, book ii, 288–90, quoted by H. A. A. Cruso as above. See also discussion on the original Arabic text in H. Vincent and F. M. Abel, op. cit., p. 119, n. 1, and Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, January 1937.Google Scholar

page 7 note 4 W. R. Lethaby in W. Harvey and others, op. cit., p. 17. It seems doubtful whether Diehl's name should have been added to that of Viollet-le-Duc.

page 7 note 5 W. Harvey and others, op. cit.

page 8 note 1 8Vincent, L. H. and Abel, F. M., Bethléem, Paris, 1914.Google Scholar

page 8 note 2 L. H. Vincent and F. M. Abel, op. cit., p. 76, fig. 29, pl. 11.

page 9 note 1 Dölger, F. J. in Antike u. Christentum, 5 (1936), 81–6, quoted in Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 1936, Heft 2, p. 518.Google Scholar

page 9 note 2 Vincent and Abel, op. cit., p. 38, n. 1.

page 10 note 1 10See O. M. Dalton in W. Harvey and others, op. cit., p. 49 and note 2.

page 10 note 2 M. Avi-Yonah in Quarterly of the Department of Antiquities in Palestine, i, 136, and iii, 73.

page 10 note 3 Nichols, History of Leicestershire, i, reproduced in V.C.H. Leicestershire, ii, 16, pl. v.

page 10 note 4 M. Avi-Yonah in Q.D.A.P., iii, 72.

page 10 note 5 Ibid., iii, 61.

page 11 note 1 11Karo, Georg, Schachtgräber von Mykenä, 1932Google Scholar, reproduced in Lechler, Jörg, Vom Hakenkreuz, Leipzig, 1934, p. 41, n. 1.Google Scholar

page 11 note 2 Wilson, in Annual Report, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 1896, reproduced in Lechler, op. cit., p. 49, n. 6.Google Scholar

page 11 note 3 Lechler, op. cit., pp. 28–36.

page 11 note 4 Clapham, A. W. in Archaeologia, lxxvii (1927), p. 219, pls. XXXI, 2; XXXII, 1.Google Scholar

page 11 note 5 Matthews, W. H., Mazes and Labyrinths, 1922, figs. 20–6.Google Scholar

page 11 note 6 Scaliger, quoted in Article ‘Dance’, Encyclopaedia Britannica, 13th ed., vol. 7, p. 796. See also Knight, W. F. J., Maze Symbolism and the Trojan Game, in Antiquity, vi, 1932.Google Scholar

page 12 note 1 E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., vi, pl. xiv, 3.

page 13 note 1 Jäger, Roland in Jahrb. d. deut. Arch. Instit., xlv, 1930, 91–115,Google Scholar quoted by Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, Jan. 1937.Google Scholar

page 13 note 2 E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., vi, no. 2, pl. XVI, 2. For the font itself, W. Harvey and others, op. cit., fig. 11 and pl. 1; L. H. Vincent and F. M. Abel, op. cit., p. 93, figs. 36 and 37.

page 13 note 3 E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., vi, no. 2, pls. XIII, XIV. For the earlier excavations in the atrium, R. W. Hamilton in Q.D.A.P., iii, no. 1.

page 14 note 1 L. H. Vincent and F. M. Abel, op. cit., pp. 96–7, and pl. x; and L. H. Vincent in Revue Biblique, Oct. 1936.

page 14 note 2 E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., vi, 64, and fig. 1.

page 14 note 3 For photographs of these capitals, see Vincent and Abel, op. cit., pl. XIII, and W. Harvey and others, op. cit., fig. 4.

page 14 note 4 Vincent and Abel, op. cit., p. 86, n. 1: ‘…à ce léger détail près, si l'on dessinait une croix sur le fleuron de ces chapiteaux on ne les discernerait plus sans une extrême attention des chapiteaux de Bethléem.’

page 14 note 5 Ebersolt, J., Monuments d'Architecture Byzantine, 1934,Google Scholar esp. pl. XLV b. For a further discussion of the question of the columns and capitals, see W. and J. H. Harvey in Journ. R.I.B.A., 6th December 1937, with one figure.

page 15 note 1 E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., vi, no. 2; Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, 1936–1937.Google Scholar

page 15 note 2 For a good reproduction, see M. van Berchem and Clouzot, Mosaïques Chrétiennes, p. 65.

page 15 note 3 Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, January 1937, p. 111, fig. 16.Google Scholar

page 15 note 4 Swift, E. H. in American Journal of Archaeology, vol. 40 (1936), pp. 397–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 16 note 1 16The chief points are: the construction of the colonnades, with timber architraves and hidden relieving arches, is exactly the same both in nave and transept, and so far as the western walls of the transept are concerned, proves them to be of the same build as the nave; the quite definitely Crusader screen walls at the entrances to the grotto are intrusive, and not accurately centred on the columns and semicircular stairs, which are of a very different material and workmanship; the existing transept and eastern arm bear no resemblance either in style or masonry to undoubted Crusader work.

page 16 note 2 Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, January 1937.Google Scholar

page 16 note 3 See also E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., v, no. 3, pl. XL, 1, 2.

page 16 note 4 M. Avi-Yonah in Q.D.A.P., iii, 63.

page 17 note 1 Eusebius's Life of Constantine, bk. iii, c. 41, 43, quoted by H. A. A. Cruso in W. Harvey and others, op. cit., p. 53.

page 17 note 2 The illustrations to the articles by E. T. Richmond in Q.D.A.P., v, no. 3, and vi, no. 2, and by Vincent, L. H. in Revue Biblique, 1936–1937Google Scholar (vol. 45, pp. 544–74; vol. 46, pp. 93–121), should be studied; also those in Harvey, William, Structural Survey of the Church of the Nativity, 1935.Google Scholar An interesting diary of the discovery of the mosaics, with six figures, was published by the Right Rev. Archbishop of Jordan in Νέα Σιών,, 1934, pp. 388–405.