Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

Byzantium and the Crusades

Education, learning, literature, and art 

Page 14

In the epoch of the Comneni, the dull Byzantine chronicle has also several representatives who began their narrative with the creation of the world. George Cedrenus, who lived under Alexius Comnenus, brought his history down to the beginning of the rule of Isaac Comnenus, in 1057; his narration of the period from 811 on is almost identical with the text of the chronicler of the second half of the eleventh century, John Scylitzes, whose Greek original has not yet been published. John Zonaras wrote in the twelfth century not the usual dry chronicle but a manual of world history evidently intended for higher requirements, which rested upon reliable sources; he brought his history down to the accession to the throne of John Comnenus in 1118. The chronicle of Constantine Manasses, written in the first half of the twelfth century in political verses, and dedicated to the enlightened sister-in-law of Manuel, Irene, carries the history down to the ascension to the throne of Alexius Comnenus in 1081. Some years ago a continuation of Manasses Chronicle was published. It contains seventy-nine verses, covering briefly the time from John Comnenus to the first Latin Emperor in Constantinople, Baldwin; almost half deals with Andronicus I. Manasses also wrote an iambic poem probably entitled (Itinerarium), dealing with contemporary events, which was published in 1904. Finally, Michael Glycas wrote in the twelfth century a world chronicle of events down to the death of Alexius Comnenus in 1118.

As far as Byzantine art is concerned, the epoch of the Comneni and Angeli was the continuation of the second Golden Age, the beginning of which many-scholars ascribe to the middle of the ninth century, i.e., from the accession of the Macedonian dynasty. Of course, the troubled period in the eleventh century, just before the accession of the Comnenian Dynasty, interrupted for a short time the splendor of artistic achievements under the Macedonian Emperors. But with the new dynasty of the Comneni, the Empire regained some of its former glory and prosperity, and Byzantine art seemed able to continue the brilliant tradition of the Macedonian epoch. But a kind of formalism and immobility may be marked under the Comneni. In the eleventh century we already mark a decline in the feeling for the antique; natural freedom gives place to formalism; the theological intention becomes more obviously the end for which the work is undertaken. The elaborate iconographical system belongs to this period. In another book Dalton said, The springs of progress dried up; there was no longer any power of organic growth As the Comnenian period advanced, sacred art became itself a kind of ritual, memorized and performed with an almost unconscious direction of the faculties. It no longer had fire or fervor; it moved insensibly towards formalism.

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