In 330 AD, Constantine the Great transferred the capital of the Roman Empire to the city of Byzantion on the shores of the Bosporus. During the early Byzantine period (330-700), the Empire included Eastern Europe, the Roman Near East, Egypt and portions of North Africa. The Arab conquests of the seventh century would greatly reduce this area, but the Byzantine world would soon extend into areas of Russia, which were never before Romanized. With the exception of the Latin Conquests, when crusaders captured the imperial capital (1204-61), Constantinople remained as the geographic and symbolic center of this cultural and political sphere until its conquest and collapse (1453).The Byzantines thought of themselves as the heirs of the Roman Empire, Greek remained the lingua franca of their domain, for example, as it had in this area under Roman rule, and we may approach their architecture from this position. One may interpret the works of civic architecture—the great walls and gates of the capital city, the Aqueduct of Valens, the Hippodrome, cisterns, fora and royal palaces—in light of Imperial functions, rituals and symbols. The public spaces and structures of Constantinople functioned within a complex ideology finding its expression in ceremonial and architectural monumentality.But approaching any work of Byzantine architecture outside of its deep connection to religion gives us an incomplete picture of this tradition. While the Byzantines were the heirs of the Roman Empire, they turned away from the gods of antiquity to embrace Christianity.Although the Empire was religiously diverse, by the late fourth century Christianity became the official religion of the Empire, and faith would help maintain the authority and prominence of Constantinople through its decline from political significance. Much of Byzantine architecture was created to express religious experience and mediate between the believer and God. Taken in its architectural context, the iconographic program of the mosaics and frescoes of the Kariye Camii envelopes the believer within scenes of the Old Testament and the lives of Christ and Mary Mother of God. Visual expressions of faith within the context of the Eucharist and other religious ceremonies then provide layers of meaning, even the primary context, to the architectural heritage of the Byzantine world.
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