...This book attempts to explain in part the key transition that occurred in Byzantine ecclesiastical architecture during what the author terms the “dark centuries,” or the period between late antiquity and the “medieval” period, roughly 700 to 900....The author has a particular goal in this study. Rather than continue the methodologies of earlier studies of the ecclesiastical architecture of these two centuries, the author chose to move away from earlier studies that have tried to explain the changes in design as perhaps reflecting changes in liturgy, rejecting the Miesian axiom of “form following function.” Specifically, the author attempts to show that rather than using designs created ex novo, these buildings represent a natural evolution of architectural design and decoration rooted in the late antique buildings that the new churches replaced.

Sabine Feist. Die byzantinische Sakralarchitektur der Dunklen Jahrhunderte. Spätantike - Frühes Christentum - Byzanz, Band 46. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2019.

From Bryn Mawr Classical Review (BMCR). Review by Mark Johnson, Brigham Young University