Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-tn8tq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-27T14:32:58.309Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The shaping of an icon: St Luke, the artist*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 April 2016

Rebecca Raynor*
Affiliation:
University of Sussex

Abstract

This paper addresses why, in legends concerning portraits of Christ and the Virgin painted from life, Saint Luke the Evangelist is named as the artist. The paper focuses on the perceived identity of Luke in early Byzantium, arguing that his status as a Christian, Evangelist and doctor made him the most credible figure as the artist in the story and the person most likely to be accepted into the Church's history as a painter.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

The present article derives largely from my doctoral thesis, ‘In the image of Saint Luke: The Artist in Early Byzantium’ (University of Sussex 2013). I am especially grateful to Liz James, Leslie Brubaker and Michelle O'Malley for their critical discussions and support, and to the anonymous reviewers of the article for sharing their insights with me.

References

1 Andrew of Crete, De Sanctarum Imaginwn Veneratione ,ed. J.-P. Migne, PG 97 (Paris 1857-66) 1304B-C; trans, in M. Bacci, ‘With the paintbrush of the Evangelist Luke', in Vassilaki, M. (ed.), Mother of God: Representations of the Virgin in Byzantine Art (Milan 2000) 79–89 (p. 80).Google Scholar On attribution: Auzepy, M.-F., ‘La carriere d'Andre de Crete’, BZ 88/1 (1995) 1–12Google Scholar, here at 7.

2 Irenaeus, , Contra Haeresis,1, 25.6: Migne, PG 7, 685.Google Scholar

3 Salamis, Epiphanios, Panarion,1, 2, 6.9: Migne, PG 41, 373C.Google Scholar

4 Doctrine of Addai, the apostle,ed. Phillips, G. (London 1876) 5.Google Scholar

5 Acts of Thaddeaus ,eds Lipsius, R. A. and Bonnet, M., Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha, 1 (Leipzig 1891-1903) 273–78.Google Scholar On these changes to the legend, and why this interpolation occurred in relation to the general development of the veneration of images in early Byzantium and the specific religious instability of Edessa in the fifth and sixth centuries, see Runciman, S., ‘Some remarks on the Image of Edessa’, Cambridge Historical journal 3/3 (1931) 238–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Cameron, A., ‘The history of the Image of Edessa: a telling of a story’, Harvard Ukrainian Studies 7(1987) 80–94.Google Scholar Drijvers, J. J., ‘The Image of Edessa in the Syriac tradition’, in Kessler, H. and Wolf, G. (eds), The Holy Pace and the Paradox of Representation(Bologna 1998) 11–31.Google Scholar

6 Africanus, Julius (spurious), Narratio de rebus Persicis:Migne, PG 10, 108A.Google Scholar

7 Vita S.Pankratios of Taormina ,full text unpublished, extracts in Veselovskij, A. N. (ed.), Sbornik Otde-lenija Russkogo Jazyka i Slovesnosti Imperatorskoj Akademii Nauk 40/ 2 (St Petersburg 1886).Google Scholar

8 Grigg, R., ‘Byzantine credulity as an impediment to antiquarianism’, Gesta 26/1 (1987) 3–9, here at 5.Google Scholar

9 Canon eighty-two, Canons of the Quinisext Council, in Pitra, J. B., Juris Ecclesiastic! Graecorum Historia et Monumenta,II (Rome 1864-68) 62–3.Google Scholar Brubaker, L. and Haldon, J., Byzantium in the Iconoclast Erac. 680–850Google Scholar: A history(Cambridge 2011) 62-64. On the canons that related to imagery, see L. Brubaker, ‘In the beginning was the Word: art and Orthodoxy at the councils of Trullo (692) and Nicaea II (787)', in Louth, A. and Casiday, A. (eds), Byzantine Orthodoxies(Aldershot 2006) 95–101.Google Scholar

10 Kitzinger, E., ‘The cult of images in the age before Iconoclasm’, DOP 8 (1954) 83–150Google Scholar, here at 124. Dis¬ cussed further in J. Haldon, Byzantium in the Seventh Century: The Transformation of a Culture(Cambridge 1990) 281; Brubaker, and Haldon, , Byzantium in the Iconoclast Erac. 680–850Google Scholar: a history,61-4.

11 Brubaker, and Haldon, , Byzantium in the Iconoclast Era,61–4Google Scholar.

12 Novθεσiα,in Melioransky, B. M. (ed.), Georgii Kiprianin I Ioann Ierusalimlianin. Dva maliozvetsnikh borca za pravoslavie v. VIII veke (St Petersburg 1901) xxviixxix, xxxii.Google Scholar

13 John of Damascus, De Sacris imaginibus adversus Constantinum Cabalinum ,v, PG 95, 321. Hamartolos, George, Chronicon,w, 248Google Scholar: Migne, PG 110, 920. Epistola ad Theophilum Imperatorem de Sanctis et Venerandis Imaginibus: PG 95 ,345-86.

14 Part text in translation in: Dasnabedian, T., ‘L'histoire de l'icone de Hogeak’ Vank'. Une attribution a Moi'se K'ert'ol’, Handes Amsorya 107 (1993) 149–66.Google Scholar

15 Bacci, M., Il pennello dell'Evangelista: Storia delle immagini sacre attribuite a san Luca(Pisa 1998) 188.Google Scholar

16 Bacci, , Il pennello,187.Google Scholar

17 Bacci, , Il pennello,189.Google Scholar

18 Dobschutz, E. von, Christusbilder: Untersuchungen zur christlicben Legende(Leipzig 1899; repr. 2010) 26–39.Google Scholar

19 Cunningham, M., Wider than Heaven: Eighth-century homilies on the Mother of God(Crestwood, NY 2008) 42.Google Scholar

20 Bacci, , Il pennello.Google Scholar.

21 Bacci, M., ‘The legacy of the Hodegetria: holy icons and legends between East and West', in Vassilaki, M. (ed.), Images of the Mother of God,321–36.Google Scholar

22 Pentcheva, B., Icons and Power: the Mother of God in Byzantium(University Park 2006) 109–44.Google Scholar

23 References to Luke as an artist are found in numerous texts including: Novθεσiα,ed. in Melioransky, Georgii Kiprianin I loann lerusalimlianin ,v-xxxix; John of Damascus, De Sacris Imaginihus Adversus Constantinum Cabalinum ,v: MIGNE, PG 95, 321C; Anthony of Novgorod, The Pilgrim's Book ,ed. B. de Khitrowo, Itineraires Russes en Orient ,Publications de la Societe de l'Orient Latin, 5 (Geneva 1889) 99.

24 Nikephoros Kallistos Xanthopoulos, Ecclesiasticae Historiae:Migne, PG 145, 876.Google Scholar

25 Theodoros Anagnostes, Historia Ecclesiastica, I,15: MIGNE, PG 86a,173.Google Scholar

26 On authorship see: Walters, P., The Assumed Authorial Unity of Luke and Acts: a reassessment of the evidence(Cambridge 2008).Google Scholar

27 Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, and Origen name Luke as the author of the Gospel.

28 Krueger, D., Writing and Holiness: The Practice of Authorship in the Early Christian East(Philadelphia 2004) 36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29 Hamartolos, Georgios, Chronicon, iv, 248Google Scholar: MIGNE, PG 110,920. Ioannes ho Damaskenos, De Sacris lmaginibus Adversus Constantinum Cabalinum ,5: MIGNE, PG 95 ,321. Vita S. Stephen the Younger, by Stephanos Diakonos: Migne, PG 100, 1085.

30 On the concept of imagination in Byzantium, see L. James, ‘Art and lies: text, image and imagination in the medieval world', in A. Eastmond and L. James (eds), Icon and Word. The Power of Images in Byzantium: Studies presented to Robin Cormack (Aldershot 2003) 59–72.

31 I John 1.1. John 1.14. John 1.29.

32 For example, John 1.34.

33 A Lexicon, Abridged from Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon(Oxford 1891) 145, 196, 299. Bacci, ‘With the paintbrush of the Evangelist Luke', in Vassilaki (ed.), Mother of God ,81.

34 Andrew of Crete, De Sanctarum lmaginum Veneratione: Migne, PG 97 ,808B.

35 Andrew of Crete, Migne, PG 97 ,1301D.

36 Luke 1.1-4.

37 For example, it means ‘from above’ in: John 3.31, James 3.17.

38 Luke 1.1—4,12,29. 2.15,17, 30,48. 3.6.4.20. 5.2, 8,20,26-27. 6.20,41-42. 7.3,22,25-26,39. 8.10, 16, 20, 28, 34-36, 47. 9.9, 27, 32, 36, 49, 54. 10.22-23, 31, 33. 11.33-34, 38. 12.54-55. 13.12, 28, 34. 14.18. 15.20. 16.23. 17.14-15, 22-23. 18.13-15, 24, 43. 19.3-7, 37. 20.13-14, 20, 27, 30-31, 42. 21.1- 2. 22.49, 58. 23.8, 40, 47. 24.16, 23-24, 31, 37, 39.

39 Discourse on the authority of the two senses preceded Iconoclasm. Sight was the primary sense for Plato and Aristotle: Plato, Republic,vn, 514–20, ed. Shorey, P. (London 1930-35).Google Scholar Aristotle, Metaphysics,I, 1, ed. Tredennick, H. (London 1933).Google Scholar Byzantine sources on the hierarchy of the senses include Basil the Great, Homilia 17 In Barlaam Martyrem: Migne, PG 31, 489; Vita S. Spyridon ,20, by Theodoras, ed. P. van den Ven, La legende de S. Spyridon eveque de Trimithonte (Louvain 1953); Miracula S. Demetrios: Migne, PG 116, 1265; Anastasios Sinaitos, Hodegos ,11: Migne, PG 89, 198.

40 John of Damascus, Contra Imaginum Calumniators Orationes Tres ,I, 22: MIGNE, PG 94, 1341.

41 Luke 6.7. 14.1 20.20. Acts 9.24. See W. K. Hobart, The Medical Language of St. Luke; a proof from internal evidence that “The Gospel according to St. Luke” and “The acts of the apostles” were written by the same person and that the writer was a medical man (Dublin 1882) x.

42 Colossians 4.14.

43 The Miracles of St. Artemios: A collection of miracle stories by an anonymous author of seventh-century Byzantium ,ed. V. S. Crisafulli and J. W. Nesbitt (Leiden 1996). See esp. miracles 3, 4, 20, 21, 23-6, 36, 44.

44 See, for an overview, J. Haldon, ‘Supplementary essay', in The Miracles of St. Artemios ,ed. Crisafulli and Nesbitt, 33-75, here at 44-5.

45 Temkin, O., ‘Byzantine medicine: tradition and empiricism’, DOP 16 (1962) 95, 97–115Google Scholar.

46 Alexander von Tralles: Original-Text und Ubersetzung nebst einer einleitenden Abhandlung: ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Medicin,ed. by Puschmann, T., I (Vienna 1878-9) 571–73.Google Scholar Temkin, ‘Byzantine medicine', 110.

47 Prokopios, De Aedificiis ,I, 7, ed. H. B. Dewing (London 1940).

48 Pliny, Natural History,ed. Rackman, H. (London 1963) xxxv, 16Google Scholar (Cleanthes invented drawing an outline) 42 (Mico I invented black ink) 122 (Aristides invented encaustic technique). See Kris, E. and O., Kurz, Legend, myth, and magic in the image of the artist(New Haven 1979) 22Google Scholar.

49 Acts 4.3. Homilies on John 2.1.

50 Eusebios, Ecclesiastical History ,in, 24.2.

51 Exodus 34.

52 Vita S. Stephen the Younger ,by Stephen the Deacon: Migne, PG 100, 1067-186; ed. Auzepy, M.-F., La Vie d'Etienne la Jeune par Étienne la Diacre, introduction, edition et traduction ,Birmingham Byzantine and Ottoman Monographs, 3 (Aldershot 1997).Google Scholar

53 Nicholas Maniacutius, De sacra imagine SS. Salvatoris (repr. in G. Wolf, Salus Populi Romani: Die Geschichte römischer Kultbilder im Mittelalter (Weinheim 1990) 321–25); Gregory of Kykkos, Description of the Kykkos monastery ,edn in K. Chatzipsaltis, ‘, Kypriakai Spoudai 14 (1950) 39–69, here at 51-2.

54 Schibille, N., ‘The profession of the architect in Late Antique Byzantium’, B 79 (2009) 360–79.Google Scholar

55 Procopius, De Aedificiis, l, 1.68.