The Cult of the Emperor in Middle Byzantine Art, lecture by Lynn Jones (Florida State University), ANAMED, Koç University, May 25, 2018, 6:00 pm

In her forthcoming book, The Cult of the Emperor in Middle Byzantine Art, Lynn Jones examines the imperial cult in the Middle Byzantine period (843-1204) as documented in texts and art. She demonstrates the ways in which images of St. Constantine were used to shape and define imperial ideology in the 9-10th centuries. Then she builds the case for the development of a sustained, popular cult of Nikephoros I Phokas (r. 963-69).

In her talk, she will focus on the ways in which one prominent presentation of Constantine, the vestibule mosaic in Hagia Sophia, deviates from this standard. Professor Jones argues  that it reflects official Church opposition to the imperial cults, privileging Constantine’s historic role as founder of the Christian Empire over his saintly status.  

Lynn Jones specializes in the art of the medieval East: the Empire of Byzantium, the kingdoms of Armenia and Georgia and the Islamic Caliphates. Issues of medieval identity have informed much of her work. Her first book, Between Islam and Byzantium: Aght`amar and the Visual Construction of Medieval Armenian Rulership, was published in 2008. She is editor of, and contributed to, a festschrift published in 2014, Byzantine Images and Their Afterlives: Essays in Honor of Annmarie Weyl Carr.