How and why does vernacular art become foreign? What does ‘Greek manner’ mean in regions far beyond the Mediterranean? What stories do images need? How do narratives shape pictures? The study addresses these questions in Byzantine paintings from the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania, contextualized with evidence from Poland, Serbia, Russia, and Italy. The research follows developments in artistic practices and the reception of these images, as well as distinguishing between the Greek manner – based on visual qualities – and the style favoured by the devout, sustained by cults and altered through stories. Following the reception of Byzantine and pseudo-Byzantine art in Lithuania and Poland from the late fourteenth through the early eighteenth centuries, Maniera Greca in Europe’s Catholic East argues that tradition is repetitive order achieved through reduction and oblivion, and concludes that the sole persistent understanding of the Greek image has been stereotyped as the icon of the Mother of God.
- Cover
- Table of Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction; or an eye in the debris
- 1. Silence
- Beyond confessions: Byzantine paintings in Lithuanian castles
- Along the bulwark of Christianity: Moravan masters and Lithuanian patrons?
- Catholic supervision: the Crucifixion in Vilnius Cathedral
- Bibliography
- 2. Negotiations
- From home to house: Jagiellonian commissions of Byzantine paintings in Poland
- Interlude of the ‘schismatic queen’
- Greekness venerated, known, obsolete
- On hands that paint
- Bibliography
- 3. Translations
- Church turned eastwards, minds directed westwards
- Truth: displayed, seen, known, performed
- Bibliography
- Conclusions: the Greek image within temporal and semantic loops
- Index of personal names
- Index of geographical names
- List of Illustrations
- 1. The castle and vicinities of Kreva (16 July 1917). During the First World War, the castle was turned into a German army stronghold and its surroundings ravaged by war; in a month after these photographs were taken, the entire site, together with the c
- 2. Jan Bułhak, Tower of the castle of Kreva (1912/14). The vaults of the residential tower collapsed well before the twentieth century, turning most of the murals into debris; although remnants of wall paintings were still preserved in the window niches,
- 3. Fragment with painted ornament excavated in 1988. Various shades of ochre – the so-called earth colours – suggests that paints were made of locally produced pigments.
- 4. Fragment with painted ornament excavated in 1988. Meanders composed of brushstrokes of ochre and whites defined the compositional segments of the murals.
- 5. Fragments with painted plaited ornaments excavated in 2012. Plaits usually form bands that are typical markers of architectural borders and divisions.
- 6. Fragments with painted ornament excavated in 2012. Thick dots of white paint added upon completion of paintings are considered particular feature of the Pskov School; the finds in Kreva as well as in Medininkai (Fig. 12) expand the area in which this
- 7. Fragment with remnant of face excavated in 2012 testifies to human figures within the decoration.
- 8. Fragment with remnant of human eye excavated in 2012 – another testimony to figurative compositions within the interior decoration.
- 9. Reconstruction of the face after the excavated fragment in Fig. 7 indicates the size of losses and helps approximating the height of the figure to 110–120 cm.
- 10. Reconstruction of the face after the excavated fragment in Fig. 8 fits the eye into a head turned by two-thirds, thus suggesting narrative potential of the figurative compositions.
- 11. Tyburcyj Chodzko, Medininkai Castle (early twentieth century). The ruins in the distance with remains of the residential tower rising above the trees resonate with historical knowledge about the castle: its existence is a fact, yet there is almost no
- 12. Fragment with painted ornament excavated 1994 – bears remnants of the finishing dots of thick white paint traditionally considered particular feature of the Pskov School.
- 13. Fragments of paintings excavated in 1994 attest to locally produced ochre pigments and wide brushstrokes to form ornaments.
- 14. Fragments of paintings excavated in 1994 reveal that colour palette and ornamental vocabulary of decoration was very similar to those of Kreva.
- 15. Fragment of a face excavated in 1994 attests to figurative composition; distinctive strokes of white suggest expressive character of the rendering.
- 16. Fragment with human hair (?) excavated in 1994. If the piece is identified correctly, it belonged to a portrait of a bareheaded man.
- 17. Reconstruction of the face after the excavated fragment in Fig. 15 attests to the portrait en face and allows approximating the height of the figure to 100–110 cm.
- 18. The Lower Castle of Vilnius: fragment with human palm excavated in 1987. Green background, deep ochres, and nuanced rendering of fingers tells of skilled master working with imported pigments. The height of the figure to which this hand belonged must
- 19. Trakai Island Castle is among major architectural symbols of medieval Lithuania. Situated within the lake it has been popular among visitors since the nineteenth century.
- 20. Wincenty Smokowski, Fragments of wall paintings in the palace of the Trakai Island Castle. In 1841, almost twenty years after he had sketched the paintings, the artist arranged them in a sequence of scenes when preparing the drawing for a lithograph
- 21. Wincenty Smokowski, Wall paintings in the south-western window niche of the Trakai Island Castle (1822). The sketch captures haloed figures situated on both sides of the window niche, their location marked as a) and b).
- 22. Unknown female saint, this surviving remnant of Byzantine wall paintings surviving by the south-western window niche corresponds to the female figure drawn by Smokowski (Fig. 21, lower part of scene b).
- 23. Southern wing of the palace of Trakai Island Castle (1893). This interior view of the ruins is a rare testimony to the paintings still extant at the end of the nineteenth century. An anonymous person sitting on a window niche with a piece of paper in
- 24. Stanisław Filibert Fleury, Wall paintings in the reception hall of the palace of the Trakai Island Castle (1888). The most popular view of the murals was also disseminated as postcards.
- 25. Head of the unknown saint, painting on the southern wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). This face is strikingly similar to representation of St Theodosius in Kalenić (Fig. 26).
- 26. Fragment of the figure of St Theodosius, wall painting in the church of
Kalenić monastery (c. 1420).
- 27. Fragment of a figure of a warrior saint painted on the southern wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). Dressed in imaginary Roman armour according to the Thessalonian pattern, the warrior holds sword (?) in his right hand, unnaturally pressed to the ch
- 28. Sts Theodore Stratilates, George, Theodore Tyrone painted in the church of Ravanica monastery (c. 1388).
- 29. Fragment of draperies painted on the western wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). Dense folds indicate ‘abundance’ of cloth to adorn the church, while patterns of ‘hems’ and, especially, ‘embroidery’ resembling vines with decorative buds echoes the o
- 30. Draperies in the apse of the church of Nova Pavlica (c. 1391).
- 31. Patriarch Jacob, western wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). The Old Testament patriarch is shown seated under imaginary vining tree and holding souls of the righteous in his bosom.
- 32. Tree of paradise, northern wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). The vining tree, which simultaneously blooms and bears fruit, is indicative of paradise. A similar tree painted above Jacob in Fig. 31 suggests that the scene occupied the north-western
- 33. Procession of the elect, northern wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). The group of saints painted by the north-western window march in the direction of Patriarch Jacob and the tree of paradise. Evidently, the window substituted the doors of paradise
- 34. Faces of souls of the righteous held by Patriarch Jacob (Fig. 31), western wall of the Trakai church (c. 1419). Nine almost identical faces seen painted on Jacob’s chest show the equality of the souls of the righteous waiting for reunification with t
- 35. Reconstructed inscription identifying Patriarch Jacob (Fig. 31) translates as Righteous Jacob, the form of the title widespread in Serbia.
- 36. The surviving paintings displayed on the reconstructed southern wall of the Trakai church in 1419 show waving height of the first register and figures within it.
- 37. The surviving paintings displayed on the reconstructed western wall of the Trakai church in 1419.
- 38. Murals on the eastern wall of the south choir in the Church of Transfiguration in Sisojevac (after 1389) show the dropping height of the first register and figures within it.
- 39. Limbo of the patriarchs, narthex of Church of the Presentation of the Virgin in Veluće (1377/8). The composition of rare iconography features the Virgin Mary siting on a bench together with Patriarch Isaac and Good Thief standing with the cross at th
- 40. The ground-plans of Trakai church: the engraved contour marks the reconstructed plan of the first church building; the thin contour line under the southern apse shows the shape of unearthed foundations; dots indicate locations of the Byzantine wall p
- 41. Reconstruction of the exterior of the first building of the Trakai church. The red-brick Gothic hall church shows simple architecture and minimal decoration, the hall was covered with timber ceiling raised on four pillars.
- 42. Crucifixion with the Virgin Mary and St John the Evangelist, wall painting, Vilnius Cathedral (c. 1400). This composition on the northern wall of a crypt was meant as a sign to the deceased, as his or her body resurrects at the end of time, to be rem
- 43. Feet of the Crucified. The detail shows both Christ’s feet stretched along the pole of the cross, suggesting that they were nailed with a single nail.
- 44. Figure of the Crucified. Sharpened characters ‘ω’ and ‘и’, traceable on the horizontal rays of the cruciform nimbus, betray Orthodox background of the painter.
- 45. Wall paintings in the apse of the church of Wiślica (c. 1400). The figure of St Demetrios captioned in Greek and Cyrillic.
- 46. Wall paintings in the church of Wiślica (c. 1400). The Mocking of Christ captioned in Latin.
- 47. Five saint bishops, southern wall of the apse of the Cathedral of Sandomierz (1402–1416). Sts Nicholas and Basil the Great are shown dressed in ‘Greek’ while three anonymous bishops in ‘Latin’ liturgical vestments. Most likely all of them represent b
- 48. Heraldic frieze, northern wall of the apse of the Cathedral of Sandomierz (1402–1416). The frieze juxtaposes the row of bishops on the opposite wall and in addition to providing unique evidence on heraldry attests to ‘alien’ visual patterns copied by
- 49. The parish church of Trakai viewed from south-east (c. 1600). The picture captures the second building of the church distinct for the huge apse attached on the eastern side of the nave around 1500.
- 50. Bottom part of the painted drapery in the apse of the Trakai church (c. 1500). The only fragment of the decoration associated with the newly built apse is too small to betray stylistic features; yet in 1645 Mankiewicz noted that at the time of writin
- 51. X-ray of the central part of the panel Our Lady of Trakai (1994) reveals the Virgin’s open forehead and her loose hair held by a wreath of flowers.
- 52. Our Lady of Trakai (c. 1500, 1630s) shows the current view of the panel, which the painting acquired after its bottom part was cut-off and the figures and entire background repainted, turning the image into a pastiche of an icon. The entire reworking
- 53. Our Lady of Trakai (?). This woodcut was printed twice in Mankiewicz’s History of the Trakai Church (1645) and is the sole figurative illustration within the book providing the first register of the miracles worked through the panel. The content of t
- 54. The apse of the Trakai church shows the bricked-up eastern window and the three-step basis of the post-Tridentine high altar, the retable of which exposed the ‘adjusted’ image of Our Lady.
- 55. The high altar of the Trakai church (c. 1935) shows the altarpiece covered with curtains, the usage of which is traceable back to 1630 inventory.
- 56. The high altar of the Trakai church. The altarpiece of Our Lady is covered with gilded revetment (1723–1724) by Johann Friedrich Shömnick, the crown above the retable dates to the festival held upon the coronation of the image in September 1718.
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