Chora Church, The best example of the Late Byzantine Architecture and Palaiologos Renaissance

When Chora Church was opened to public after the grand renovation carried out in the beginning of the 14^th Century, people of Constantinople must have been astonished when they saw for the first time three-dimensional mosaics and wall paintings which are realistic and most importantly created with a deep sense of perspective instead of abundantly godlike icons they got used to for centuries.  Otto Demus, art historian, describes Chora Church as the place where all customary art rules of the Byzantine and Medieval Era were broken. Italian painter Giotto in Scrovegni Chapel, Italy and unknown byzantine artists in Chora Church, Constantinople started to paint scenes and faces of the Old and New Testament in a different way independent of each other and almost at the same time in contrary to flat and toneless illustrations of centuries. If they ever knew what they did was initiating the Renaissance of painting, they would have been surprised as much as people who saw their extraordinary mosaics and wall paintings.

 

Chora Church is located nearby Theodosius Walls in Edirnekapi in Historical Peninsula. It was given the name Chora which means “rural area, outside the city” in Ancient Greek as it was out of Constantinople Walls, previous borders of the city.  Once upon a time, Chora was a large monastery with various structures, however today only the Church remained.  The date it was built is questionable, but it is believed to be the 3^rd Century; the building built outside the city of the time gained importance as a religious centre when the burial chamber of the Saint Babylas who was killed by Romans in Nicaea during the Early Christianity period was moved here in the 4^th Century.

Giotto / A wall painting in Scrovegni  Chapel

Experiencing the first structural expansion during the reign of Emperor Justinian in the 6^th century, the monastery was rebuilt, repaired and added new structures many times. The monastery gained increasing importance as many patriarchs and renowned saints were buried in its cemetery. Official religious ceremonies shifted from Hagia Sophia to Church of Chora since Blakhernai Palace next to the monastery was started to be used instead of the Grand Palace in Sarayburnu which fell out of favour in the 11^th century.

Monastery complex and the Church lied in ruin as a result of Latin pillage during Latin invasion in 1204-1261 and earthquake  of 1296.

Methochites, the man with the biggest hat in history,
presents the Church to Jesus Christ.

Chora lying in ruins was rebuilt by Theodore Methochites - a great personality of the period. Methochites, who was born  in 1260 as son of George Metochites - one of the important figures of the palace of Emperor Michael VII. Palaiologos - received a good education in Constantinople and he ended up as an advisor in the palace of Emperor Andronikos II which later paved the way of prime ministry (Mega Logothetes) in time. As his father George Metochites, he was a bold defender of the idea that Orthodox and Catholic Churches should be united.  As an author, philosopher and even scientist in addition to his status as a statesman, Metochites left poems, assays on philosophy of Aristotle and Plato and astronomy books when he died. As wealthiest and the most powerful person after the emperor of his time, Methochites was a very interesting man in every respect; having managerial skills and determination allowing him to become a prime minister, Methochites was a man with unique characteristics who wrote assays on philosophy and developed calculation tables for astronomy; according to what is told about him, he worked as a statesman during the day and as a scientist at night. As it was a common practice during that period, rich aristocrats of Byzantium were also using a part of their wealth for supporting arts and science just like Italian Medicis and most of the time they had a church built with wall paintings painted by famous painters of the time. This was a sort of shriving and compensation of the power and wealth to the public. Regardless of whether the sponsor is Mediccis or the Prime Minister Methochites, whether a mosque or a church is built, it is clear that a huge wealth is never free of sin… Anyway, let`s get back to our subject, in 1328 the wind changed direction for Methochites, the new emperor seized all possessions of Methochites and exiled him since he saw him as a threat, but later he allowed him to return as a monk to Chora -the monastery he had renovated in the past. Methochites spent last years of his life in grief and melancholy and died in 1332 as a monk in the monastery that he had built with his power and wealth and had its walls decorated with mosaics progressive enough to put an end to an era and start a new one in the art of painting and beautiful enough to strike viewers by surprise. His grave is in the Church, in Paracclesion part- funeral chapel.

Although there are more than twenty mosaics illustrating important scenes from the Old and New Testament, I will try to describe three of them which I like the most and I find important with respect to arts:

Registration for population census for tax  before Cyrenius, the Governor of Syria.

This mosaic is on the left hand side of the Church`s narthex. It is one of the most beautiful mosaics of the building. The sense of depth and perspective created by the artist with buildings and trees in the background and vivid expression on faces are surprisingly good. Roman Emperor Augustos ordered population census in all Roman cities with the purpose of tax calculations, John and Mary left Nazareth to go to Bethlehem since everybody has to be present in the city they were born during population census. Mosaic illustrated Mary and John right behind her while registering for tax before Cyrenius, the Governor of Syria at that time. On the left side of the mosaic, Cyrenius sits on a golden throne and there is a Roman soldier behind him, two birth registry and tax officers taking registries in the middle and  Mary and John answer questions on the right side.

 

Wall painting in funeral chapel-Paracclesion illustrating Anastesis (judgement day)

It is the half dome on one end of the Paracclesion and it illustrates a scene when Jesus Christ wearing white breaks the gates of hell on judgement day and resurrects Adam and Eve out of their graves. The most interesting detail is  Abel standing in front of the crowd on the left side of the painting. Cain, son of Adam and Eve, was the first human born and  his brother Abel he killed because of jealousy was the first human to die.  Abel is illustrated holding a shepherd sceptre and saints standing right behind him, he looks to the back side,  young and sad expression on the face of Able who was killed by his own brother is very touchy.  When this wall painting was created in the 14^th century, there were centuries to come until Caravaggio and Rembrandt enchanted us by holding a light on objects of the painting in front of a dark background, however Jesus Christ in white placed on a background of night and stars emphasizes his presence at first glance.

 

Mother and father of Mary, Hannah and Joachim are happy with the good news that Mary will be born.

This mosaic is in narthex part since it illustrates the story of Mary. Angels give good news to Hannah and Joachim that Mary will be born. What amazes me in this mosaic is the natural and beautiful embrace of Hannah and Joachim; this is the wall painting called the conception of theotokos which was frequently illustrated in both Orthodox and Catholic churches and such realistic, close faces as if they were about to kiss cannot be seen in previous examples in the Medieval Era.

Click here for Turkish

Egypt, bread basket of the Mediterranean

I have recently mentioned that Roman people gave up their political freedom just for the sake of free “bread and entertainment” (“panem et circenses”) and told about the entertainment side of the issue; i.e. gladiator combats and chariot races offered by the state. This time, I’ll write about the “bread” … In Rome and Constantinople, distributing free bread to the public was the main condition for the rulers to remain in power, free of problems and riots. In the Ottoman period, although bread was not distributed to all citizens of the capital  but only to the poor by “imarets” (Ottoman soup kitchen), one of the most important roles of the Grand Vizier was to check the weight and price of bread and the amount of grains at depots by wandering around main markets and bazaars every week.

For two thousand years, the considerable amount of the grains of the capital city from Roman to Byzantine and from Byzantine to Ottoman periods came from Egypt, i.e., “bread basket of the Mediterranean”. The historian Peter Garnsey from Oxford University stated that around a hundred thousand tonnes of grains were sent from Egypt to Rome in the first century during the reign of Emperor Augustus. In the fourth century, around two hundred fifty thousand tonnes of grains were sent from Egypt to Constantinople to feed the half a million population of the city those times. The grains coming from Egypt by sailboats were stored in Tenedos (today’s Bozcaada), forwarded to Constantinople in parts as needed and the bread made of these grains were distributed to the people of the capital city every morning for free. During the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian, around eighty thousands loaves of bread were distributed daily in Constantinople. Distribution of free bread was over when the Arabs took Egypt from the Byzantine Empire and for the first time people of the capital city had to pay for their bread which mas mainly made of grains from Balkans. People of the capital city of the empire which lost its “bread basket” must have felt very bad when they paid money for the bread they had been eating for free for thousands of years. Speaking of emotions, maybe we shall also talk about the emotions of the Egyptians who had sent their grains for centuries to the capital city of their colonist as a tax. When the Ottomans took Egypt from Mamluk Empire in the sixteenth century, ships loaded with grains set off from Alexandria to Istanbul again but bread was not free anymore.

Egyptian mural painting / Wheat harvest

Alexandria, Egypt’s port town, became the second most important city of Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman periods both when the capital was Rome and Constantinople. As the crowded population of all three empires fed on the grains coming from Egypt, it had always been different from other provinces and ruled semi-autonomously. But its government never became local; Egypt had something so precious that it could not be left to the Egyptians itself. There were no other province around the Mediterranean Sea where the assigned administrators rebelled and declared independence so many times. When the governor of Egypt ceased sending grain ships to the capital city, usually a chain reaction occurred; the distribution of free bread, in other words, the magic wand of the government, ended within a few months, then it became difficult to find bread even for a fee and the public rebelled against the empire or sultan in the end if necessary measures are not taken immediately. Consequently, in all three empires, the governor of Egypt was the most powerful ruler after the emperor and the most risky one against the emperor, as well.

Pompeii mural painting / Bake house

In Roman period, when all other provinces were ruled by governors assigned by the senate, Alexandria’s ruler called as “praefecttus” was assigned by the emperor and had more rights than the other governors. The first riot in Egypt rose up in the period of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius; in 175, governer Avidius Cassius declared independence but the riot was suppressed. In 193, this time governor Pescennius Niger declared himself emperor and Septimius Severus, the Roman Emperor, defeated the armies of Niger (his name meant “black” due to his rather dark skin) and took Egypt back (It is an irony of fate that, as soon as Septimius Severus supressed this riot, he went to the North-western part of the empire to suppress the riot of the Britain and Spain’s governor, Claudius Albino, whose name meant “white” due to his rather white hair and skin. Another interesting story we learnt from the Roman senator and historian Casius Dio, born in Nikae (today’s Izmit) is that; with this riot, Byzantium (today’s Istanbul) experienced the greatest destruction in its history. Septimius Severus destroyed the city walls and almost all of the important buildings of the city as a punishment after he had taken over the city and killed almost half of its population, for the reason that the city had sided with Niger against the Roman Emperor, which, so to speak, “backed the wrong horse”. Palmira Empire, which was founded in the Third century after its rebellion against Rome while it had been one of the Roman provinces, took over Egypt to access grains and ceased the grain supply to Rome. Then the Roman army suppressed the riot and took Egypt back again. The grains sent to Constantinople during the Byzantine Empire whet Sassanian’s appetite in the sixth century. Though the Byzantium Emperor Heraclius managed to take Egypt back from the Sassanians, it failed to stop the Arabian invasion in 641 and Egypt changed hands for four times in the subsequent nine centuries, it was invaded by the Arabians, Fatimids, Ayyubids and Mamluks, respectively and the grain supply from Egypt to Constantinople ceased until the Ottoman Sultan, Selim I. The Ottoman Empire worked hard to protect Egypt but just like in Roman and Byzantine periods in early 1800s, they lost it to their own governor, who was Mehmet Ali Pasha of Kavala. Mehmet Ali Pasha declared his own Khediviate where the right of ruling descended from father to son and he conquered Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Jerusalem, Beirut and Syria after Egypt and founded his own empire within the Ottoman Empire in other words. Egypt Khediviate was an Ottoman province only on the paper, such that, upon a disagreement with Mahmud II. Mehmet Ali Pasha marched to Istanbul and only with the help of the Russians did Ottomans could stop Mehmet Ali Pasha’s army in Kütahya. Foreign countries mediated between the parties, Mehmet Ali Pasha returned back to Egypt and when he died, he had left a dynasty that would rule Egypt for a hundred years.

Mehmet Ali Pasha of Kavala

In the last few centuries, both the world and the needs of the developed countries for which they depend on underdeveloped countries have changed. Today, while the USA is the world’s greatest grain exporter thanks to modern agricultural techniques, Egypt, which had been the “bread basket” of the Mediterranean in the past, is the world’s greatest grain importer. Unbelievable, isn’t it? On the other hand; the top ten crude oil exporters in the world mainly consist of the Middle Eastern countries. The Middle Eastern countries which are rich of natural resources has now replaced Egypt, crude oil has replaced the grains, huge tankers have replaced the wooden sailboats but neither the direction of good flow nor the essence of the relationship between the receiver and the supplier has changed for the last two thousand years. The Roman emperor, who would lose his throne upon a riot if he fails to supply the grain for the crowded population in the capital city, wasn’t so much different from today’s President who worries about the price of oil barrel prior to elections.

Click here for Turkish

Iliad as an ethical guide

400 years after his mother put Moses into Nile River inside a basket and 1200 years before Mary gave birth to Christ in Nazareth; in Çanakkale in today’s Turkey, an Anatolian civilization, the city of Troy was destroyed by the people of Achaea, i.e. by Hellene tribes at the end of a war that lasted 10 years. 3200 years after this war, we learn its story from Iliad, which is the epic of Homer, a poet from Izmir.

For four centuries from eighth century when Homer compiled Iliad until the fourth century when the roots of modern philosophy germinated in Athens, Iliad had been the sole written work specifying the values of the Greek society around the Aegean region. This book which is a beautiful poem and an ancient epic for us today, had a totally different function at those times. Iliad was almost only written text used in education. The most important part of school education and religious education was the memorizing of Iliad. Just as most people learn their values, rights and wrongs from the holy scriptures of the religions they believe, they learnt these from Iliad back then. Until when Socrates and Plato criticized the religious system talked about in Iliad, in which gods punished and awarded the people as they wished and the ethic system in which fame and honor were only achieved by courage and skill in wars through philosophy and asked “According to what shall we live, what is right and wrong? What is ethics?. Criticizing the irresponsible gods of Homer cost Socrates his life who was accused of poisoning the youth. These two philosophers in some respects, brought an end to the polytheistic pagan religions whose holy scripture was the Iliad, and began the era which will lead to the monotheistic religions with sacred books, though this wasn’t exactly what they wanted…

Alexander the Great is ordering that Homer’s Iliad is put into the grave. - - Jean Pénicaud III – 16^th century Though his tutor was Aristotle, Alexander the Great had been raised with the memorization of Iliad. According to rumors, every night he slept with Iliad under his pillow.  

Iliad’s Language

Homer lived 400 years before this war, indeed. So I guess it would be better if we said he had compiled different pieces of oral tradition that had accumulated for centuries and formed Iliad instead of saying that he wrote the epic poem of more than fifteen thousands of lines on his own. When Homer lived, Iliad had most probably been formed already and its lines were being told by traveler bards by heart. It was probably that, he was the first to put these lines down on paper.

Homer – Bust – Hellenistic Period

Today we read the translations of these lines. Considering that translations of poems don’t give the pleasure of their originals even in best translations, one naturally can’t help wondering how good had the original poem been. Homer wrote these lines in ancient Greek language in Ion dialect. It is a weird feeling to know that only few people in this big whole world are now able to read Iliad in the language of Homer. From the link below you can listen to Iliad vocalized in Homer’ language by the ancient Greek and Latin professor Stanley Lombardo from Kansas University; it could give an idea about what the language is like. Unfortunately I don’t speak Greek but if my ears don’t fail me, it is quite different from modern Greek and has a song just like I have imagined. It is not surprising that people have liked this epic for three thousands of years.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NssnanW93fI



Achilles is dressing the wounds of his bosom friend, Patroclus – BC. 5^thCentury Greek vase pattern

Subject of the epic

It will be challenging to try to summarize the Iliad in a single paragraph but let me try anyway;

At the beginning of the story, the Greek king Agamemnon wrested the prisoner Briseis from Achilles, who were also fighting at his side, Achilles got cross with the King Agamemnon, rejected fighting and let himself into his tent.  The story ended when Achilles joined the war back upon the slaughter of his best friend Patroclus, killed the Trojan Prince Hector and gave his corpse to his father, the Trojan King Priam. On the contrary to the assumptions of many people, neither the beginning nor the end of ten year war are mentioned in the book; Homer only tells us about a period of fifty one days of the war in its ninth year. Though the epic tells about the story of the outbreak of the war, which states that it broke out from a dispute over a woman, when the Trojan Prince Paris kidnapped the Greek Princess Helen, it doesn’t mention much about the end of the war. You must read the Odyssey and other epics of the period for the Trojan Horse and other similar stories.

Though Achilles may seem to be the hero of the story, I think the secret hero is Paris’s brother Hector, indeed. Hector is the single righteous and responsible hero in the story. He tried to protect his city, newborn child and his wife in a war he had not started. His maturity in accepting the things that happened to him and his commitment to his responsibilities is amazing. Homer, who himself was from Anatolia, Izmir praised the bravery and courage of Hellenes throughout the epic but indeed he praised the civilized and intelligent Trojans between the lines. We shall keep in mind that the epic was written in a time when all Aegean was under the dominance of Hellenes, and the author had to preserve the politic balances despite the fact that he was from Ionia, i.e. Anatolia.

Hector’s corpse is being moved to Troy. –  2^nd Century B.C. – Roman relief – Louvre Museum

Now let’s get to the real story; Hellenes were tribes that came to Greece from the North and their following destination was the Anatolian city state Troy, which was attractive for its land, richness and civilization. So this was a rather pragmatic, plundering war for expansion, which was shaped by economic reasons. As the epic was written during the dominance of Hellenes, Homer tried to justify the invasion by claiming that Hellenes began this war rightfully upon the kidnapping of their Princess. The war was declared when Hellenic tribes wanted to reach the richness, trade and especially bronze in Anatolia. The Hittites, Phrygians and Lydians, who were in Anatolia at that time probably fought in the war side by side with the Trojans to protect Anatolia. Hellenes on the other hand, had an assembled army as well. The army, which was leaded by Agamemnon, was gathered from all Hellenic kingdoms, i.e., from the opposite side of the Aegean.

The Trojan War was also the starting point of Hellenic dominance in Anatolia.

Anatolian- rooted god Apollo

The Gods

Homer included the gods in his epic, it was almost that the gods sided with the humans and they fought in wars. The interesting thing here is that, in the epic we see the implicit genesis of Olympus Gods which Hellenes who came to Anatolia formed by combining their pagan gods with the ones of the Troy, Lydia, Phrygia and Hittites civilizations in Anatolia.  Throughout the epic, Hera, Athena and Poseidon sided with Hellenes whereas Apollo, Aphrodite and Artemisia sided with Trojans. This is so natural because it wasn’t the war of Anatolian and Hellenic societies anymore, it transformed into a war between of Anatolian-rooted pagan gods and Hellene-rooted pagan gods. When the war ended and Hellenes came to dominate both sides of the Aegean, Anatolian-rooted pagan gods got absorbed among Hellenic ones and I think in order to preserve the balance, a consensus between the religious beliefs of the two societies was built with the neutral leader cult (Zeus) and the Greek mythological gods we know today came to life.

Iliad as an ethical guide and a mean of training

Religious books are the written forms of the ethical values and social rules of societies which are ornamented with rituals changing from one geography to another. In this respect, the impact Iliad had over the Aegean shores for four hundred years can be seen as the impact of a religious book considering that all children were made to memorize it, it was almost the single written source about the gods of Olympus and it identified the values of the society.

The religious and ethical values Iliad presented to its reader can be summarized as the following;

-          Humans shall believe in gods and offer sacrifices to them. Gods have complete dominance over the destiny of humans.

-          Gods do not act or decide with any ethical view; One may have a perfect or a rough life as the gods desire and it has nothing to do with what one deserves. A simple example to this is that, in Iliad Zeus makes Agamemnon see a false dream to mislead him and tells a lie in this sense. Furthermore; gods of Homer sometimes fight with each other; you may imagine how a great problem it could create for humans; you have gods that have different expectations and it is inevitable to make one angry while trying to please the other. Your gods fight with each other, they got cross, they become jealous, they cheat, lie and have no concerns about your wellbeing.

-          The most significant things in life are glory and honor; these are gained or lost in war depending on how courageous and resistant you are. Your being fair, helpful, honest and hardworking are relatively insignificant.

-          Even rather unethical things can be done if “approved by gods”.

Now let’s go back to the fourth century before Christ, when philosophy as we know today originated and people asked the questions, “What is right, according to what shall we live?; Plato in ‘the Republic’ and Aristotle in ‘Poetics’ objects to having education with the memorization of Iliad. People shall decide what is good and bad on their own, it shall not always be as the gods wish. People shall mostly assume the responsibility of the things they do, especially when the gods are so irresponsible and insensitive.

Death of Socrates - Jacques-Louis David – 1787 / Socrates was executed by hemloc poison as he poisoned the youth with his questions.

Socrates tired the people of Athens by questioning their beliefs in “Socratic Methods” and paid this with his life. It also tells us a lot that, Miletus, who accused of Socrates at court represented traveler bards in Athens. Obviously when Socrates criticized the gods of Homer and Iliad, that is, the bread and butter of Miletus and his friends, they apparently wanted to get rid of him.

Socrates’s pupil Plato shaped the gods for the first time as “good” and “righteous” as we know today. Plato’s gods didn’t tell lies, cheat on their wives, get jealous or do bad things to humans anymore. He developed the concept of ‘idea’, which means that all the things we see and touch are symbols of ideas. Though we consider the world we live in as real, it is just the image of the reality, in fact.

On the other hand, Plato’s pupil Aristotle observed the philosophy Plato had carried up to the ‘sky’ empirically and ‘brought it back down on earth’ through experiments. Humanity was closing one age and starting another then. Iliad would just be an admirable epic, and leave its place to the New Testament day by day in the following centuries.

Athens School (Details)– Raphael – 1510 / While Plato on the left is indicating  ‘the sky and heaven’ with his hand; his pupil Aristotle,  who materialized philosophy through observations and experiments and brought it back down on earth, is indicating ‘the ground’.

Click here for Turkish

The Phrygian Cap

Gladiador Frigio - Jose Maria Labastida
- 1824

While visiting the National Museum of Art (Museo Nacional de Arte) in Mexico City, I saw Jose Maria Labastida’s Gladiador Frigio Statue today. That is the statue of a naked male warrior holding a sword (unfortunately, the sword doesn’t exist now, it is broken). The thing that motivated me to write this article was the Phrygian Cap on the warrior’s head. Down here in Mexico City, thousands of kilometers away from Anatolia, in the statue of a Mexican sculptor, when I saw the cap with the top pulled forward, symbolizing  “freedom” and that belonged to the Phrygians who had lived around Ankara, Eskişehir and Afyon; I thought how small the world is , and how strong the interactions among cultures are.

The Phrygian Cap

The Phrygians lived in 1200 – 700 B.C. in the Mid-West Anatolia based around  Sakarya River . The famous “Gordian Knot” story ofthe Phrygians in which Alexander the Great cut the knot with his sword instead of untying it when he came to the capital city of Gordian near Ankara. Though the history of the Phrygian Cap is not exactly known, there might be an epic interpretation  on how it came up; as the story of our childhood goes: King Midas wore this cap for the first time to hide his famous donkey ears, then his folk began to wear it to follow after the king, so there came out the conic-shaped, pulled forward, red hat which we call as the Phrygian Cap today.

The Phrygian Cap as a Symbol of "Easterner"



Paris of Troy - Antonio Canova
- 1819



We see the Phrygian cap in Anatolian God Attis and the Persian originated Roman God Mithra. When Hellenes came to Anatolia, they used the cap to describe the non-Greek Anatolian folk. For instance; Anatolian, Eastern, Trojan Paris was depicted with the Phrygian cap. The cap was also used to represent The Easterner. In the Basilica of St. Apollinare located in Ravenna, Italy, on the mosaic themed  “the three easterner magi announcing King Herod the prophecy of the birth of Jesus Christ”, which is a popular theme in various Orthodox churches, we see “the three easterner magi” with the Phrygian cap symbolizing  their being easterners. The interesting thing here is that; the same theme was depicted without the Phrygian cap on the mosaic in Chora Church in Istanbul. It seems “the Easterners” who were portrayed with the Phrygian cap in Italy, didn’t need to wear it  any more in Istanbul, i.e. in the East.

Italy, Ravenna, St. Apollinare Church, "The three easterner magi"

Turkey, Istanbul, Chora Church, "The three easterner magi"

The Phrygian Cap as a Symbol of "Freedom"

In Roman Republic, the Phrygian caps were worn by slaves who had won their freedom. This made the cap turn into a symbol of “freedom” in time. The Phrygian cap was worn by the folk during the French Revolution as a symbol of “rebellion and freedom” and even the national symbol of France, Marianne was depicted with the Phrygian Cap on her head. In 1850, it was abolished to sing the anthem of Marseille and wear the Phrygian Cap in France for about ten years as it implied revolution; then it took its place in French history as a symbol of the revolution.

The symbol of French Revolution
"Marianne"

In late eighteenth century, just as the French Revolution, it became a symbol of the liberation movements of the Unites States of America against Great Britain. Today we see the Phrygian Cap in the seal of the USA Senate and the flags of New York and New Jersey states.  

The Seal of The USA Senate

 Symbolic use of the cap is not limited to these; it has its place as a symbol of freedom in the coat of arms of several Latin American countries such as Bolivia, El Salvador, Argentina, Cuba and Paraguay today.

The coat of arms of Cuba

 Do the people of Afyon, Eskişehir and Ankara know that the cap of their ancestors, who had lived on the same lands before them, is now a symbol of freedom gained through struggle on a great land extending from the South and North American continents?

Phrygian Cap in modern times

Click here for Turkish

The origins of political parties and “partisanship”: The Blues and The Greens

The Roman poet and author Juvenal complained in one of his famous satires that he wrote in early 2^nd century that, the Romans had given up their political freedom for “bread and circuses” (“panem et circenses”). What Juvenal meant by “bread and circuses” was that, instead of solving the real problems the emperors distributed free bread to the Romans and organized entertainment at hippodrome in a populist way to create the public approval and  prevent riots.  The entertainment at hippodrome had been organized by the emperors since the foundation of the Roman Empire to keep the public busy and pleased just like the television and football clubs do today. These activities mainly consisted of gladiatorial combats at first, but with conversion to Christianity from Paganism and the Church’s prohibition of the gladiatorial combats, chariot races took their place. In Emperor Augustus’s period in the 1^st century, entertainments lasted for 77 days in a year. Though they were rather costly for the government, in Emperor Markus Aurelius’s period in early 2^nd century, they were extended to 135 days in a year. Entertainment activities had been organized at hippodrome until Constantinople was invaded by the Latin in the 13^th Century.

Chariot Races in Ancient Times – Alexander Von Wagner - 1913

The teams racing in chariot races held at hippodrome used to wear red, blue, green and white jerseys and paint their chariots in order to be distinguished from each other. Each team gained their own supporters in time, the teams began to be called as “The Blues”, “The Greens”, “The Reds” and “The Whites” and their fans began to carry flags and wear cloaks in the colors of their teams, just like today’s uniforms. “The Whites” and “The Reds” disappeared in time and as of the 4^th century there were only “The Blues” and “The Greens”.  The emperors watched the races from private loge designated for them which were called ‘kathisma’.  Hippodrome was the only place where the public met the emperors. Eventually, the supporters who  cheered for their teams began to shout about   daily issues such as taxes or military services etc inbetween.  This became a good chance for the emperors to keep finger on the pulse. The hippodrome turned into a place where the public supported or critised the emperors. . Unsurprisingly, in time, political factions among the public became materialized in teams and supporters.

Conservative, elite: rightist Blues / Rebellious, poor: leftist Greens

The Empress Theodora –

San Vitale Basilica – Mosaic –

6^th Century

Whereas The Blues formed the elite class that had the Diophysite Orthodox belief which was the official religious sect of the state upon the Chalcedon Ecumenical Council decisions, The Greens represented the lower and relatively poor classes mostly coming from the eastern parts of the empire. In this sense, according to today’s definition, The Blues and The Greens can be considered as the first political parties in history, including the Roman Republic era, where “the man in the street” was represented. The emperors heard about the demands and complaints of these two factions which had two opposite views and socio-economic conditions, and this gave them the chance to adjust their policies and practices according to these or at least take their feedbacks. Thus the hippodrome was not only a place where chariot races took place, but also a place where political parties met the government.

The emperors supported a team in accordance with their political and religious views. For instance, Emperor Justinian who was strictly bound to the Dyophysite religious sect, supported The Blues (It should be noted that, the Byzantine Empire was not ruled by a single dynasty as the Ottoman Empire. Many emperors came into power by a military coup while they weresoldiers in the army. This was the reason for the change of the religious sect or party from one emperor to another On the other hand; his wife, Empress Theodora was bound to the Monophysite religious sect and came from a rather poor family, and she supported The Greens. In this way, the emperor and the empress were able to keep finger on the pulse of both factions. The everlasting dispute between these two groups often helped the emperor sustain the balance, until the “Nika Riot” that broke out in Constantinople in 532.

The Nika Riot

On the day of Nika Riot, a first in history was experienced at hippodrome. The Greens and The Blues, which had totally opposite views and were fierce opponents of each other,  united against the Emperor Justinian about an unfair practice which both groups suffered from yet the emperor didn’t take a step back, and they shouted “Nika! (which meant ‘victory’)” all together. The emperor realized that there was a serious trouble and left the hippodrome, then The Greens and The Blues left the hippodrome as well and started a big fire in the city, which would last for days, they sieged the palace and demanded Justinian’s head. Justinian tried  to suppress the riot for days but  since he was unable , he decided to escape to save his life. The ships that would take him and his wife Theodora were waiting in the harbor. Theodora, who had started life as a belly-dancer and had never been considered to deserve the palace  since she had come from the lowest and poorest class of the public and who was even accused of prostitution by the historian Prokopius in his book named as “The Secret History of the Byzantium”, convinced Justinian to stay and keep trying to suppress the riot.  The rumor had it that: Theodora said this  historical quote to Justinian, who was  preparing to run away; “I would rather die than run away, there cannot be a cerement more beautiful than the royal clothing!” Justinian took courage from his wife and decided to stay. That night, he made a plan with his commander Belisarius to kill the rioters the next day while they gathered together at the hippodrome and they shut around forty thousand rioters at the hippodrome and slaughtered them all. Constantinople experienced one of the bloodiest days in its history. The riot was suppressed at the evening of that day and Justinian kept ruling the empire for many years until he died a natural death. The Empress Theodora, who had withheld Justinian from running away thanks to her calmness and courage that night, and came to be remembered as one of the most powerful women in history together with the British Queen Victoria and the Russian Czarina Catherina , changed the flow of history.  Back to the subject, we can say that the Nika Riot became a turning point for The Blues and The Greens, i.e., for the first political parties. Despite the fact that the riot was suppressed gorily, it underlined that it would create serious troubles for the emperors when the supporters of both political parties were unpleased, and also it was the first event as a result of which political parties formed an opinion about their powers.

Riot in Byzantium - Schnorr von Carolsfeld – 1835

“ Supporting”  a political party since The Blues and The Greens

Today, many people support their political views and political parties (if any) like a football team fan. Instead of getting proud of its trues and criticizing their faults, they support their parties to death in a blindfolded way and criticize the opponent view and party with impunity. They shout out slogans instead of talking with sense and logic. But this is not surprising when one knows the truth that today’s political parties arose from the stadiums and sports team fans of the Ancient Byzantium.

The 15. Century Byzantine immigrants and their influence on Italian Renaissance

Giorgione, Sleeping Venus, 1510

By the year 1400, due to its land losses the Byzantine Empire had turned into separate little islets in the Ottoman Empire. There was the Trabzon Greek Empire on one side, the Despotate of Morea on the other side and there was the Constantinople in between them. The rapid progress of the Ottomans made the Byzantine people realize the inevitable end waiting for them, and they gradually began to move to safer places. Italy was the best place to move for these Byzantine people who had decided to escape, both for its closeness and its historical bonds coming from the Roman Empire when the Orthodox-Catholic distinction is ignored. The Southern Italy, which had been under the rule of the Byzantine until 1071, was mainly preferred by the villagers as the integration was relatively easier; Venice, which was a commercial and marine town, was mostly preferred by the middle-class class tradesmen. As the capital city, Rome was preferred by the nobles and the ones who had political relations. Venice received the most migration. As of 1460, there had been almost 5000-6000 Byzantine immigrants in Venice.

In Italy, people started to get interested in Latin ancient philosophy since the 15th century and the intellectual aspect of the Renaissance illumination began. Before the beginning of the great immigration activity from the Byzantine, Catholic Italy was already familiar with Aristotle (especially thanks to Thomas Aquinas) though the number of texts in hand was limited, and somehow it had managed to integrate Aristotle with the Christian Catholic doctrine especially in ethics, but they had almost no Latin translation about Plato (so certainly about Socrates). The Byzantine immigrants brought not only the Greek ancient philosophy books that had been lost and forgotten by the Europeans for 6 centuries but also various ancient books from geography to history, from linguistics to theology, and far more importantly, they brought the greatest loss of Europe in the medieval age, which was the secular education. In the Byzantine Empire, higher education was not only carried out according to Orthodox doctrines but also with a secular content using the works of the ancient Greek philosophers, historians and poets. In Italy, where the Renaissance illumination had just begun, this evoked a great admiration. And they must have been astonished that; “this miserable, and due to their Orthodox identity half-heretic miserable neighbor of them, which had been defeated by the Ottomans” had delicately preserved the ancient Greek philosophy and secular education which the Europeans had lost because of the medieval age.

Raphael, School of Athens, 1510 / Plato and Aristotle in the middle and Socrates  in the left with the green  dress

The Italian poet and one of the first humanists, Petrarca, “re-discovered” Cicero’s letters in early 14th Century, shared these with the Italians of his time and initiated the intellectual illumination.

"Renaissance was above all things a revival of Cicero, and only after him and through him of the rest of Classical antiquity."
Tadeusz Zieliński

“The rest of Classical antiquity” as defined by the Polish historian Zielinski, was completed by the books brought by the Byzantine immigrants. After Cicero, reading Plato, who had had a great influence on Cicero, and realizing that education could be secular, boosted the illumination that had been initiated.

Significant People:

George of Trabzon

George of Trabzon: He was born in Crete in 1395, and he got his name from his ancestors from Trabzon. He moved to Italy in 1430. He translated the works of Plato and Aristotle into Latin. He was a great supporter of Aristotelianism and a great anti-supporter of Platonism.


Manuel Chrysoloras: He was born in Constantinople in 1355. He was a statesman. He was sent to Venice in 1390 by the Emperor Manuel the 2nd Palaeologus to carry out lobbying work against the possible attacks of the Ottomans. In 1396, he started to give Greek language and literature courses in the University of Florence. He translated the works of Plato and Homer into Latin and shared these with the Italians of his time.

Manuel Chrysoloras

Theodorus Gaza

Leonardo Bruni: He was born in Toscana in 1370. He was a statesman, a humanist and an historian. He was considered to be the first modern historian. He indeed was the first historian to divide history into three categories as the Ancient Age, Medieval Age and the Modern (New) Age. He took Greek lessons from Manuel Chrysoloras. He translated the Greek works into Latin and shared these with the Italians of his time.

Theodorus Gaza: He was born in Salonika in 1400. He escaped to Italy in 1430, when Salonika was invaded by the Ottomans. He gave Greek language and literature courses in the University of Ferrera. He translated Aristotle’s works which were not available in Latin.

Basilios Besarion

Basilios Besarion: He was born in Trabzon in 1389. He got education in Constantinople and in Morea Peninsula. He became the Nicaean Metropolitan Bishop. He participated in 1437 Ecumenical Council of Florence to represent the Byzantine Empire. He adopted Catholicism in time. He was assigned as a cardinal by the Pope Eugene the 4th and he moved to Italy in 1439. He translated the works of Plato, Aristotle and the historian, Xnephon.

Discussions on Platonist philosophy:
The re-emergence of Plato in Europe in the Medieval age especially owing to the translations of George from Trabzon and Manuel Chrysoloras brought about significant discussions. The definition of a citizen who was interested in and participated in political issues, as set forth by Cicero and Aristotle was replaced by a citizen who left politics to its “specialists” and who instead dealt with meditation by avoiding earthly issues. Plato had had a great influence on this. “Rule of educated scholars” as stated in Plato’s works were interpreted as the limited participation of a simple citizen, and attracted a great support in the humanistic environment of Renaissance. Nevertheless; there was a big obstacle before Plato’s popularity: The church and university, which were somehow able to adopt Aristotle’s ideas into Christian doctrine made it impossible to fit Plato’s ideas on reincarnation and spouse-sharing into Christian belief.
The discussion between the Aristotelians and Platonists grew more in time. There were two people just in the middle of this discussion: One of them was George of Trabzon, who was a great supporter of Aristotle, though who himself translated the works of Plato. He claimed that reading Plato had to be prohibited as it would cause religious perversion; and Cardinal Besarion, a great supporter of Plato, who was again born in Trabzon and who claimed that the Platonist philosophy wasn’t that much distant from the Catholic doctrine, indeed.

This discussion between the Platonist and Aristotelian philosophy that took place around these two Byzantines in Florence and Venice, which served as the freest discussion environment in Europe at those times, fed and improved Renaissance in intellectual aspect.

Duccio, Calling of Apostle Petrus and Andreas / We see the Byzantine influence in art in this early Renaissance painting of Duccio. The faces of Jesus and apostles are just like the mosaics in Chora Church.

El Greco, The disrobbing of Christ, 1577 / Born in Crete in 1541, emmigrated to Venice in 1566 and 11 years after, in 1577 moved to Spain and spent the rest of his life. Contributed to Spanish Renaissance with his paintings. He signed his paintings as “ Cretan”.