Ms. AN I 8 in the University Library of Basel contains the second part of the Commentary on the so-called "unread" orations of Saint Gregory of Nazianzus composed by Elias the metropolitan of Crete presumably around 1120, a text that was rarely copied in Byzantium. This essay examines the hitherto little-studied miniatures that were added to the codex, two author portraits and fourteen illustrative frontispieces. Stylistic and especially iconographic evidence suggests that the book's miniatures were commissioned during the reign of Emperor Manuel I Comnenus (1143-1180), most likely in or after 1166 when Manuel assembled a Church Council in the Great Palace of Constantinople which dealt with the interpretation of Christ's phrase "My Father is greater than I" (John 14:28). The essay presents the first detailed analysis of the iconography of the miniatures in light of the theological writings contained in the volume. Painted at a time of intense doctrinal debates, I argue that these images first and foremost serve to celebrate Gregory as a religious leader and teacher of lasting authority in matters of Byzantine Orthodox theology. Codicological analysis reveals a complex production scenario and suggests that at least the frontispieces were added to the book as an afterthought; furthermore, it can be demonstrated that these paintings were not originally intended for the present volume but likely for another copy of the same text. Yet it seems that all sixteen miniatures were created within a short period of time by one and the same workshop comprising a large number of painters, who collaborated on what appears to have been a commission of highly unusual character. complete collection, i.e., the full set of his forty-four orations (plus select further writings) 20 , and over seventy additional manuscripts contain the collection of the "unread" orations 21 . Importantly, the latter works include Gregory's esteemed Theological Orations, delivered at Constantinople in 380, which by the Early Byzantine period had earned him the honorary title "the Theologian." 22 They are found in the Basel codex as well, at the very beginning.Commentaries on Gregory's "unread" orations earlier than that of Elias do exist, and many manuscripts are equipped with abundant marginal scholia 23 . In addition, details about Gregory's life and the historical circumstances in which his writings originated were known from other writings, especially his lengthy autobiographical poem and the Vita drawn up by Gregory the Presbyter in the seventh century 24 . In Elias' Commentary, the text of Gregory's discourses is split up into sections (lemmata), so that citations from the homilies alternate with sections of the commentary, which are significantly longer. In ms. Basil. AN I 8, the lemmata are written in vermillion red ink, while the commentary sections are rendered in black ink.Given the paucity of surviving manuscripts containing Elias' expositions, it is very unlikely that the text circulated widely in Byzantium. What is now the Basel codex thu...

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Bis heute ist der Tesoro von San Marco reicha np rachtvollenA rtefakten aus Byzanz und stellt damit weltweit eine der größten sowie qualitativ bedeutendsten Sammlungen byzantinischerKunst dar. 1 In Ermangelung plausibler Alternativensieht die Forschung es als wahrscheinlich an, dass die Mehrzahl dieser Artefakte-liturgische Gefäße, Ikonen und dergleichen-a ls Beutestücked er Ve nezianer aus der Zeit der Lateinerherrschaft in Konstantinopel (1204-1261) in die Dogenkirche gelangt sind. 2 Gemessen an der großen Menge von Kunsterzeugnissen aus Byzanz in San Marco nimmt sich die Zahl der Reliquien gleicher Herkunft bescheiden aus: Nur für eine kleine Handvoll von nicht mehr als fünf Reliquien deklarieren die mittelalterlichen Quellen ausdrücklich eine Herkunft aus Konstantinopel als Teil der venezianischen Beute aus dem Jahre 1204. Diese Reliquien aus Byzanz und die frühe Geschichte ihrer Ve rehrung im venezianischen Spätmittelalter stehen im Mittelpunkt des folgenden Beitrags. 3 Es mutet angesichts der Fülle an Fachliteratur zu San Marco einerseits und der vergleichsweise günstigen mittelalterlichen Quellenlage andererseits beinahe merkwürdig an, dass das Heiltum aus Konstantinopel bislang nur selten im Mittelpunkt von For-*D ie folgende Studie ging aus den laufenden Forschungen für meine Habilitationsschrift hervor,i n der viele Aspekte, die im Rahmen eines Aufsatzes lediglich skizziert werden können, ausführlicher behandelt werden. Ich danke den Ve ranstaltern des Workshops ‚Aspekte interkulturellen Zusammenlebens im Mittelmeerraum des Spätmittelalters' sehr herzlich für die Gelegenheit, meine Forschungen dort sowie im vorliegenden Beitrag zur Diskussion stellen zu dürfen. 1D as wichtigste Referenzwerk ist nach wie vor die monumentale Publikation von Hans R. Hahnloser (Hrsg.), Il tesoro di San Marco. Bd. 2: Il tesoro ei lm useo. Florenz 1971 (nachfolgend zitiert als Il tesoro di San Marco). Damit keinesfalls entbehrlich geworden ist der älteste umfassende Katalog von

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In this volume, Karin Krause examines conceptions of divine inspiration and authenticity in the religious literature and visual arts of Byzantium. During antiquity and the medieval era, “inspiration” encompassed a range of ideas regarding the divine contribution to the creation of holy texts, icons, and other material objects by human beings. Krause traces the origins of the notion of divine inspiration in the Jewish and polytheistic cultures of the ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern worlds and their reception in Byzantine religious culture. Exploring how conceptions of authenticity are employed in Eastern Orthodox Christianity to claim religious authority, she analyzes texts in a range of genres, as well as images in different media, including manuscript illumination, icons, and mosaics. Her interdisciplinary study demonstrates the pivotal role that claims to the divine inspiration of religious literature and art played in the construction of Byzantine cultural identity.