© Zypern-Institut

Marietta Horster, Doria Nicolaou, Sabine Rogge (eds.), Church Building in Cyprus (Fourth to Seventh Centuries). A Mirror of Intercultural Contacts in the Eastern Mediterranean
Schriften des Instituts für Interdisziplinäre Zypern-Studien, vol. 12
(Münster – New York: 2018)

 Some hundred early Christian churches are attested on Cyprus, dating from the fourth to seventh centuries. Their architectural remains have shaped the Cypriot landscape. The peculiar evolution of the features of the Cypriot church gave rise to a scientific discussion on how to evaluate these specific local developments. In the last decade, individual research as well as conferences and workshops dedicated to late antiquity and the early Byzantine period have contributed towards a new approach and a new impulse for the study of this period in Cyprus. The volume reinforces and furthers this trend taking into consideration relevant parameters reflected on the architectural planning, such as structural knowledge and innovations, cultic behaviours, liturgical traditions, economic capacities, social and political aspirations.

 

Content
 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
  • Marietta Horster, Doria Nicolaou, Introduction: Church and Religion in Cyprus 
SECTION I.  
BUILDING THE CHRISTIAN CITYSCAPE AND LANDSCAPE
  • Georgios Deligiannakis, The Last Pagans of Cyprus: Prolegomena to a History of Transition from Polytheism to Christianity 
  • Athanasios K. Vionis, Settled and Sacred Landscapes of Cyprus: Church and Landscape in the Xeros Valley during the Early Byzantine Period 
SECTION II.  
CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES AND CHURCH BUILDING, FOUTH TO SEVENTH  CENTURIES 
  • Eleni Procopiou, New Evidence for the Early Byzantine Ecclesiastical Architecture of Cyprus 
  • Stephanos Efthymiadis, The Cult of Saints in Early Byzantine Cyprus – as Mirrored in Church Building and Epigraphy
SECTION III.  
INTERIOR ARRANGEMENT AND THEOLOGICAL CONCEPTS
  • Doria Nicolaou, Liturgical Structures of the Early Christian Basilicas of Cyprus: A Spatial Analysis
  • Rania Michail, The Early Christian Baptismal Complexes of Cyprus and Their Liturgical Arrangement
  • Chrysovalantis Kyriacou, Spirituality and Hexis: Tracing the Christian Habitus in the Basilicas of Early Byzantine Cyprus 
  • Fryni Hadjichristofi, New Evidence for the Interior Decoration of the Early Christian Basilicas of Cyprus: The Case of Mosaics 
  • Demetrios Michaelides, Mosaic Decoration in Early Christian Cyprus 
SECTION IV.  
‘INTERNATIONAL BYZANTINE STYLE’? LOCAL TRADITIONS AND ADAPTATIONS IN- AND OUTSIDE CYPRUS
  • Cäcilia Fluck, The Use of Textiles in Early Christian Churches – Evidence from Egypt (Fourth to Seventh Centuries) 
  • Ina Eichner, The Late Antique/Byzantine Churches and Houses of the Region around Seleucia on the Calycadnus in Rough Cilicia 
INDEX OF MONUMENTS AND SITES
 
 
300 pages with numerous illustrations
Paperback: € 39,90, ISBN 978-3-8309-3791-3