   #copyright

Templon

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Architecture

   A reconstruction of the templon of St. Paul's and Peter's Cathedral.
   Enlarge
   A reconstruction of the templon of St. Paul's and Peter's Cathedral.

   A templon (from Greek τέμπλον meaning "temple", plural templa) is a
   feature of Byzantine architecture that first appeared in Christian
   churches around the fifth century AD and is still found in some Eastern
   Christian churches. It eventually evolved into the modern iconostasis,
   still found in Orthodox churches today. It separates the laity in the
   nave from the priests preparing the sacraments at the altar. It is
   usually composed of carved wood or marble colonnettes supporting an
   architrave (a beam resting on top of columns). Three doors, a large
   central one and two smaller flanking ones, lead into the sanctuary. The
   templon did not originally obscure the view of the altar, but as time
   passed, icons were hung from the beams, curtains were placed in between
   the colonnettes, and the templon became more and more opaque. It is
   often covered with icons and can be very elaborate.

Origins

   A Greek proscenium (theater screen) portraying a three-doored temple
   facade, posited in the early 20th century as a possible origin for the
   design of the templon.
   Enlarge
   A Greek proscenium (theatre screen) portraying a three-doored temple
   facade, posited in the early 20th century as a possible origin for the
   design of the templon.

   The templon most likely has an independent origin from that of Latin
   chancel barriers. Classical stage architecture is one possible source.
   At certain times during Byzantine history, theatre heavily influenced
   painting and sculpture. Architects then, influenced by stage backdrops
   dating back to Sophocles, consciously imitated the classical proscenium
   (the backdrop of a classical Greek stage), copying the multiple columns
   punctuated by a large door in the middle and two smaller doors to each
   side. The statues on top of the backdrop would thus be analogous to the
   icons of the saints looking down.^ The similarities, however, are
   probably only visual. Although classical drama was performed in
   Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, during the 5th and
   6th century when the first templa appear, when Christian liturgy was
   first being developed, the plays and their architecture had lost their
   importance and could not have influenced Christian ritual.

   A more plausible theory is that the templon models in both form and
   content the decorative wall of the Torah screen in Jewish synagogues of
   the second and third centuries. These, too, had three main divisions: a
   central door leading to the altar, smaller flanking passages, and a
   distribution of parts similar to a templon. The Torah screen was
   probably not the direct prototype of the templon; it probably derives
   from the imitation of the Torah screen in the altar of a typical Syrian
   pagan temple.^

The name

   A pagan temple, in this case a recreation of the Parthenon in
   Nashville, Tennessee, the United States of America.
   Enlarge
   A pagan temple, in this case a recreation of the Parthenon in
   Nashville, Tennessee, the United States of America.

   Templon is a loan word in Greek, from the Latin templum, " temple"; how
   and why it came to have its present meaning is unclear. The most
   obvious explanation is that the form of the templon resembles a pagan
   temple. The steps up to the apse (semi-circle where the altar is
   located) are analogous to the stereobate and stylobate of the temple
   (the floor of a temple). The colonnettes arranged in the π shape
   resemble the columns that surround all four sides of a temple, the
   architrave looks like the architrave on a temple, and the carved disks
   on the architrave are analogous to the metopes on the entablature.
   However, it has also been suggested that the name templon derives not
   from the pagan temples but from the Christian idea of the shrine where
   God was worshipped, or more specifically the Temple in Jerusalem.

Early templa

   Archaeological evidence for an early templon comes from the Hagia
   Ioannes Studios in Constantinople, a basilica dedicated to John the
   Baptist, built in 463. The chancel barrier surrounded the altar in a π
   shape, with one large door facing the nave and two smaller doors on the
   other sides. Twelve piers held chancel slabs of about 1.6 meters in
   length. The height of the slabs is not known. The chancel barrier was
   not merely a low parapet (a short wall); remains of colonnettes have
   been found, suggesting that the barrier carried an architrave on top of
   the columns.^

   Though there is some architectural and archaeological evidence of early
   templa, the first and most detailed description of a templon comes from
   a poem by Paul the Silentiary, describing Hagia Sophia in
   Constantinople. It was composed near the end of Justinian I’s reign and
   was probably recited on Epiphany, January 6, AD 563, celebrating the
   reinauguration of the church after the reconstruction of the great
   dome.

   Hagia Sophia’s templon surrounded, according to Paulus, "such space as
   was reserved in the eastern arch of the great church for the bloodless
   sacrifices".^ That is, it stretched the length of the eastern semidome,
   including the apse but excluding the exedrae (half-dome recesses in a
   wall). Twelve silver-covered marble columns of approximately 4.94
   meters from base to capital were arranged on three sides of a
   rectangular ground plan around the altar. A horizontal entablature
   rested upon these. Three doors allowed entry to the apse, the central
   one larger than the other two. Though earlier scholars have proposed
   that all columns and all doors were in a single line parallel to the
   apse, modern reconstructions show the central portal facing out to the
   nave with the smaller doors each located on the other sides of the
   rectangular plan.^

   In between the columns were slabs of marble covered in silver about
   1.00 to 1.10 meters tall. On them had been carved the monograms of
   Justinian and Theodora (6th century), even though Theodora had been
   dead for several years, as well as a many-armed cross in the center. On
   the centre of the architrave was a repoussé medallion of Christ. On
   either side of Him were medallions of angels, the Prophets, the
   Apostles, and finally the Virgin Mary. The carvings on the architrave
   were deeply tied to the liturgy. Another templon roughly contemporary
   to Hagia Sophia’s is that of the church to St. John of Ephesus, rebuilt
   by Justinian as a domed crucifix.^ There was an inscription to St. John
   the Theologian over a side door, since the crypt of the saint was
   within the enclosed sanctuary. St. John the Baptist was probably carved
   over the other door of the templon of Hagia Sophia, since he features
   prominently in liturgical writings of the church.

   In any case, the majority of templa followed the same basic design.
   They were usually carved of monochrome marble, though some, like Hagia
   Sophia’s, were covered in precious metals and others used polychrome
   marbles. The slabs were often carved with vegetal or animal patterns
   and the architraves with busts of God, the Virgin, and the saints.
   Figurative decoration on the templon was mainly concentrated on the
   architrave, initially with carved busts. This continued from the time
   of Justinian into the middle Byzantine period, as shown from a
   10th-century excavation in Sebaste in Phrygia, which uncovered a marble
   templon whose epistyle is covered with busts of saints. There is
   evidence that icons were hung from the columns of the templon prior to
   iconoclasm. Nicephorus I, Patriarch of Constantinople from 806 to 815
   describes portable icons hung from columns and the gate of the templon
   in his Antirretikoi. Important portable and colossal icons were also
   placed in front of the templon, as in the 11th-century church of Saint
   Panteleimon in Nerzei.^

Evolution

   The templon gradually replaced all other forms of chancel barriers in
   Byzantine churches in the 6th, 7th, and 8th centuries except in
   Cappadocia. As late as the 10th century, a simple wooden chancel
   barrier separated the apse from the nave in the rock-cut churches,
   though by the late 11th century, the templon had become standard. This
   may have been because of the veneration and imitation of the Great
   Church Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, though the columnar form of
   chancel barrier does predate Hagia Sophia.^

   The templon began to change forms to the medieval templon with the
   attachment of icons and painted scenes to the architrave. Some of the
   best preserved of these images are from the Monastery of St. Catherine
   at Mt. Sinai. The late 12th-century templon beam shows twelve canonical
   feast scenes, with the Deesis (Christ enthroned, flanked by Mary and
   St. John the Baptist) located in the middle between the Transfiguration
   and the Raising of Lazarus, linking the scene of Lazarus with the Holy
   Week images according to liturgical practice. Several epistyles of this
   form have been excavated throughout the empire, none earlier than the
   12th century, indicating a change from busts on the architrave to
   scenic decoration. This new scenic style is representative of the
   increasing liturgification in Byzantine representational art after
   iconoclasm.^
   17th-century iconostasis of Prophet Elias church, Yaroslavl. The entire
   facade, as well as the icons placed between the columns to obscure the
   view, is a clear mirror of the templon.
   Enlarge
   17th-century iconostasis of Prophet Elias church, Yaroslavl. The entire
   facade, as well as the icons placed between the columns to obscure the
   view, is a clear mirror of the templon.

   During most of the Middle Byzantine period, the space between the
   colonnettes was not filled with icons but with curtains. Nicholaos
   Andidorum describes in his Protheoria "the shutting of the doors and
   the closing of the curtain over them".^ The most widespread image on
   the medieval templon seems to have been the Deesis. Its popularity
   arose from not only its simplicity and elegance, suggesting the
   efficacy of prayer and the threat of the Last Judgment, but also
   because it could be easily adapted to the patron’s tastes with the
   addition of secondary scenes and characters, as in the Monastery at St.
   Catherine’s where scenes from the life of St Eustratios appear on
   either side of the Deesis on a templon beam. Proskynetaria (large
   icons) also played a major part in the decoration of the medieval
   templon, either as monumental images placed on the piers flanking the
   templon or as portable images in front of the screen. Proskynetaria of
   both these types still exist in Cyprus, from Lagoudera, now in the
   Archbishop’s Palace in Nicosia, and in St Neophytos.

   Sometime between the 11th and 14th centuries, icons and proskynetaria
   began to be placed in the intercolumnar openings on the templon. After
   the reconquest in 1261, carving on the medieval templon approached
   sculpture in the round. From this period, the first wood-carved templa,
   or iconostases, were produced. They for most part had a fixed program
   of icon decoration with three levels: the Local, the Deesis, and the
   Festival tiers. The iconostasis became standard in the 15th century,
   possibly because the Orthodox clergy wanted to distinguish themselves
   from the Latin clergy as much as possible after the failure of the
   Council of Florence in 1438.^ However, the iconostasis probably owes
   more to 14th-century Hesychast mysticism and the wood-carving genius of
   the Russians than anything else; the first ceiling-high, five-leveled
   Russian iconostasis was designed by Andrey Rublyov in the cathedral of
   the Dormition in Vladimir in 1408.
   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Templon"
   This reference article is mainly selected from the English Wikipedia
   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
   Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.
