Documents on early Christian and Byzantine architecture

Abstract

There are many models in the entire history of architecture which have travelled across the world, from one to another part of the big world. For various reasons, very frequently not at all scientific or professional, in our part of the world, be it Serbian or Yugoslav, or south Slav, some like to remain silent, when it comes to the transition of a Byzantine model, which by nature is rooted in the Orthodox Christian faith at the south east of Europe and the outmost west of Asia, to their areas, pervaded to a great extent by the Roman Catholic Christian belief, or Islam. There are numerous evidences of the transition of a model, one of many which found their new home on the west-European soil after the fall of Byzantium, mostly after the Crusades, when looters, but also scientists and artists in Italy, came by new wealth, and new knowledge, in the capital of the fallen Empire, observing its magnificent edifices, and taking its parts to their boats and shipping them to Venice and other cities in Italy and placing them on their buildings and squares, as they have done with the columns of the Augusteion of Constantinople, the square dedicated to Justinian's mother Augusta, which now decorate the square near the famous Venetian church of Saint Marco. Some other, also numerous accounts, explain how the Ottoman Turkish architecture in almost the same way, adopted its mosque construction model at the same place, in the same manner, retaining the actual structures but changing the religious insignia, or by copying this Byzantine model in building the new mosques.Mnogo je obrazaca koji su u celokupnoj povesti arhitekture prelazili sa jedne na drugu stranu, iz jednog u drugi deo velikog nam sveta. Iz razlicitih razloga, vrlo cesto nimalo naucnih i strucnih, u nasem delu sveta, srpskom ili jugoslovenskom, ili juznoslovenskom, ponegde neki jako vole da cute kada se radi o prenosu jednog, vizantijskog obrasca, po njegovoj prirodi utemeljenog u pravoslavnoj hriscanskoj veri na jugoistoku Evrope i krajnjem zapadu Azije, a ka danas njihovim predelima, natopljenim u velikoj meri rimokatolickom hriscanskom verom, odnosno islamom. Mnogo je dokaza o prenosu jednog obrasca, jednog od mnogih koji su posle Vizantije svoje novo tle pronasli na evropskom zapadu, uglavnom po zavrsetku Krstaskih ratova, kada su pljackasi, ali i naucnici i umetnici u Italiji, dosli do novih blaga i do novih spoznaja, na licu mesta, uglavnom u glavnom gradu tog Carstva, posmatrajuci njegove velelepne gradjevine, uzimajuci cak njihove delove na svoje brodove kako bi ih prevezli do Venecije i drugih italijanskih gradova i tamo postavili na svoja zdanja i trgove, kao sto su uradili sa stubovima konstantinopoljskog Avgustejona, trga posvecenog Justinijanovoj majci Avgusti, stubovima koji sada krase trg uz poznatu venecijansku crkvu Svetog Marka. Neke druge price, kojih takodje mnogo ima, lako objasnjavaju kako je, recimo, osmanska turska arhitektura svoj obrazac u gradnji dzamija preuzela na istom mestu, na gotovo isti nacin, zadrzavajuci same gradjevine i samo im menjajuci verska odredjenja, ili pak gradeci nove, ali u potpunosti po istom ovom vizantijskom obrascu.