Part 20

We turn now to the church of S. Giovanni Battista which was founded by a certain Baduarius, according to Agnellus, and consecrated by S. Peter Chrysologus. It is possible that Baduarius was the mere builder, and that he built by order of Galla Placidia. Nothing, however, is left of the old church, which was entirely rebuilt in 1683, except the apse as it is seen from the outside, the round campanile in its first story and the beautiful columns sixteen in number, four of bigio antico, two of pavonazzetto, one of cipollino, and the rest of greco venato, according to Dr. Ricci.

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There remains to be considered what is, when all is said, I suppose the noblest monument of the fifth century left to us in Italy or in Europe--the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia.

Agnellus tells us that the Augusta built close to her palace a great church in the shape of a Latin cross. This she dedicated in honour of the Holy Cross which it will be remembered her predecessor S. Helena had discovered in Jerusalem. Of this church, though it has long since disappeared--the "western" part of it having been destroyed in 1602 and what remained restored out of all recognition in 1716--we know a good deal. According to Agnellus it was covered with most precious stones (? marbles) and apparently with mosaics and was full of splendid ornaments. It had, too, a great narthex, and at the end of this Galla Placidia presently built a cruciform oratory for her own mausoleum, where she was to lie between her brother Honorius and her son Valentinian.

The Mausoleum of Galla Placidia is the oldest complete building left to us in Ravenna, for it dates from well within the first half of the fifth century, whereas the baptistery, altered and transformed as it was by S. Neon, is as we see it a work of the first years of the second half of that century. Simple as it is, without, a cruciform building of plain brick, within it is so sumptuously and splendidly adorned that not an inch anywhere remains that is not encrusted with mosaic or precious marbles. These mosaics were, before their radical "restoration," perhaps finer and more classical than those of the baptistery. It might seem, indeed, that they were perhaps the finest and subtlest work done in the Roman realistic tradition, nor was there perhaps anywhere to be found so noble a representation of the Good Shepherd as that which adorned this great monument. It is, however, impossible to speak with any confidence of what we see there now, for all has been restored again and again, and is now little better than a rifacimento of our own time, a copy, faithful perhaps, but still a copy, of the work of the fifth century.

Nevertheless, the impression of the whole is very splendid and solemn. The roofs and dome are covered with mosaics of a wonderful and indescribable night blue, powdered with stars. In the cupola is a cross and at the four angles are set the symbols of the four Evangelists, glorious heraldic figures.

Above the door we see Christ the Good Shepherd, youthful, classic in form and repose, very noble and Roman, seated on a rock in a broken hilly landscape, a cross in His left hand, caressing His sheep with His right. This figure even after "restoration" gives us more than a glimpse of what it once was. Nowhere had Christian art produced so majestic a representation of its Lord; nor had the subject of the Good Shepherd been anywhere more splendidly treated than here.

Over the great sarcophagus, opposite the entrance, we see a very different scene. Here is no longer a youthful Christ, with the hair and the noble aspect of Apollo, but a bearded and majestic figure in the fullness of manhood, His eyes full of anger, His draperies flying about Him, moving swiftly, the cross on His shoulders, in His left hand an heretical, probably Arian, book which he is about to cast into the furnace in the midst. Upon the extreme left is a case or cupboard in which we see the books of the four Gospels. In the other lunettes we see very gorgeous decorative work of arabesques and stags at a fountain and two doves drinking from a vase. Above in the spandrils of the arches are figures of apostles or saints. Nothing in the world is more solemnly gorgeous in effect than this beautiful rich interior. The pavement is composed of fragments of the same precious marbles as those which line the lower parts of the walls.

Under the mosaic of the burning of the heretical books we see the mighty sarcophagus of plain Greek marble which once held the body of the Augusta. This, of old, was richly adorned with carved marbles and perhaps with silver or mosaic; and we know that in the fourteenth century certainly it was possible to see within the figure of a woman richly dressed seated in a chair of cedar and this was believed to be the mummy of the Augusta Galla Placidia. However, we hear nothing of it before the fourteenth century, and Dr. Ricci suggests that it may have been an imposture of about that time. It is possible, but perhaps unlikely, for the Augusta was not a saint, and what reason could men have in the thirteenth century, when the very meaning of the empire was about to be forgotten, for such an imposture? However this may be, the figure remained there seated in its chair during the fourteenth, fifteenth, and the greater part of the sixteenth centuries. And indeed, it might have been there still but that in 1577 some children, curious about it and anxious to see a thing so wonderful, thrust a lighted taper into the tomb through one of the holes in the marble, when mummy, vestments, chair and all were consumed, and in a moment nothing remained but a handful of dust.

The sarcophagi under the arches on either side, according to various authorities, hold the dust of the emperor Honorius, the brother of the Augusta, and of Constantius her husband, or of the emperor Valentinian III. her son. It is impossible to decide at this late day exactly who does and who does not lie in these great Christian tombs.

The Mausoleum of the Augusta was long known, though not from its origin, as the sanctuary of SS. Nazaro e Celso. When it was so dedicated I am ignorant, but it was not in the time of the Augusta. Then, in the fifteenth century, when so much was remembered and so much more was forgotten, it bore the title of SS. Gervasio e Protasio, and this name remained to it till the seventeenth century, when the old title was revived. To-day although it retains its name of SS. Nazaro and Celso, it is more rightly and universally known as the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia.

XII

THE ARIAN CHURCHES OF THE SIXTH CENTURY

THE PALACE OF THEODORIC, S. APOLLINARE NUOVO, S. SPIRITO, S. MARIA IN COSMEDIN, THE MAUSOLEUM OF THEODORIC

It was, as we have seen, upon March 5, 493, that Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, entered Ravenna as the representative of the emperor at Constantinople. One of his first acts seems to have been the erection of a palace designed for his habitation and that of his successors. Why this should have been so we do not know. It might seem more reasonable to find the Gothic king taking possession of the imperial palace, close to which the Augusta Galla Placidia had erected the church of S. Croce and her tomb. Perhaps this had been destroyed in the revolution or series of revolutions in which the empire in the West had fallen, perhaps it had been ruined in the Gothic siege which endured for some three years. Whatever had befallen it, it was not occupied, restored, or rebuilt by Theodoric. He chose a situation upon the other side of the city and there he built a new palace and beside it a great Arian church, for both he and his Goths were of that sect. We call the church to-day S. Apollinare Nuovo.

The palace, of which nothing actually remains to us, though certain additions made to it during the exarchate are still standing, was, according to the various chroniclers whose works remain to us, surrounded by porticoes, such as Theodoric built in many places, and was carved with precious marbles and mosaics. It was of considerable size, set in the midst of a park or gardens. Something of what it was we may gather from the mosaics of S. Apollinare Nuovo in which it is conventionally represented. It came to owe much to Amalasuntha who lived there during her brief reign, and more to the exarchs who made it their official residence.

In 751 when Ravenna fell into the hands of the Lombards Aistulf established himself there, but it might seem that the place had suffered grievously in the wars, and it was probably little more than a mighty ruin when, in 784, Charlemagne obtained permission from the pope to strip it of its marbles and its ornaments and to carry them off to Aix-la-Chapelle. Among these was an equestrian statue in gilded bronze, according to Agnellus a portrait of the great Gothic king, but as Dr Ricci suggests a statue of the Emperor Zeno. This too in the time of Leo III. Charlemagne carried away. According to the same authority the back of the palace was not then very far from the sea, and this was so even in 1098. Nothing I think can give us a better idea of the change that has come over the contado of Ravenna than an examination of its situation to-day, more than four miles from the sea coast.

The only memorial we have left to us in situ of that palace of the Gothic king is a half-ruined building, really a mere facade with round-arched blind arcades and a central niche in the upper story, a colonnade in two stories, and the bases of two round towers with a vast debris of ruined foundations, walls, and brickwork, scarcely anything of which, in so far as it may be said to be still standing, would seem to have been a part of the palace Theodoric built. Indeed the ruined facade would seem to belong to a guard house built in the time of the exarchs in the seventh or eighth century. If we seek then for some memory of Theodoric in this place we shall be disappointed.

Far otherwise is it with the great church, the noblest in Ravenna, of S. Apollinare Nuovo. This was built about the same time as the palace, in the first twenty years of the sixth century, as the Arian cathedral by the Gothic king. It was the chief temple in Ravenna of that heresy, and it remained in Arian hands till with the re-establishment of the imperial power in Italy it was consecrated, in 560, for Catholic use by the archbishop S. Agnellus. It consists of a basilica divided into three naves by twenty-four columns of Greek marble with Romano-Byzantine capitals. Of old it had an atrium, but this was removed in the sixteenth century, as was the ancient apse in the eighteenth. The original apse, however, was ruined in an earthquake, as Agnellus tells in his life of S. Agnellus, in the sixth century, and of the atrium only a single column remains in situ before the church. The campanile, a noble great round tower, dates from the ninth century for the most part, its base is, however, new. The portico before the church is a work of the sixteenth century, as is the facade, which nevertheless contains certain ancient marbles, among which are two inscribed stones, one of the fourth century and the other of the eleventh.

When Theodoric built this great and glorious church he dedicated it to Jesus Christ. It seems to have been dedicated in honour of S. Martin in 560 by the archbishop S. Agnellus who consecrated it for Catholic worship, and finally in the middle of the ninth century to have been given the title of S. Apollinare by the archbishop John, who asserted that he had brought hither the relics of the first archbishop of the see from S. Apollinare in Classe when that church was threatened by the Saracens.

The oldest name by which the church was generally known, however, is that of Coelum Aureum. Agnellus in his life of the archbishop S. Agnellus says, speaking of the Catholic consecration of the church, "Then the most blessed Agnellus the bishop reconciled within this city the church of S. Martin Confessor, which Theodoric the king founded, and which was called Coelum Aureum...." And he goes on to say that it was found from an inscription that "King Theodoric made this church from its foundations in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ." It got the name of Coelum Aureum perhaps from its glorious roof of gold. This, however, was destroyed in 1611.

The church has indeed suffered very much in the course of the fourteen hundred years of its existence, and yet in many ways it is the best preserved church in Ravenna. In the sixteenth century, for instance, it was fast sinking into ruin; the floor of the church and the bases of the columns were then more than a metre and a half beneath the level of the soil, and it was decided that something must be done if the building was to be saved. In 1514 this work was undertaken; the columns were raised and the arches cut and thus the church and its great mosaics were preserved. It is, however, still sinking; the new pavement of the sixteenth century has disappeared, and that of 1873 which was brought from the suppressed church of S. Niccolo covers the bases of the columns.

If S. Apollinare Nuovo had been allowed to fall, nothing that we possess in the world would have compensated us for its loss. For not only have we here a beautiful interior very largely of the sixth century, but the great mosaics of the nave which cover the walls above the arcade under the windows are, I suppose, at once the largest and the most remarkable works of that time which ever existed. They are also of an extraordinary and exceptional beauty. They represent upon both sides, through the whole length of the nave, as it were two long processions of saints. Upon the Epistle side are the martyrs issuing out of the city of Ravenna to lay their crowns at the feet of Our Lord on His throne, guarded by four angels. Upon the Gospel side are the virgins headed by the three kings, who offer gifts to Our Lord in his Mother's arms enthroned between four angels. There is nothing in Christendom to compare with these mosaics. They are unique and, as I like to think, in their wonderful significance are the key to a mystery that has for long remained unsolved. For these long processions of saints, representing that great crowd of witnesses of which S. Paul speaks, stand there above the arcade and under the clerestory where in a Gothic church the triforium is set. But the triforium is the one inexplicable and seemingly useless feature of a Gothic building. It seems to us, in our ignorance of the mind of the Middle Age, of what it took for granted, to be there simply for the sake of beauty, to have no use at all. But what if this church in Ravenna, the work indeed of a very different school and time, but springing out of the same spiritual tradition, should hold the key? What if the triforium of a Gothic church should have been built as it were for a great crowd of witnesses--the invisible witnesses of the Everlasting Sacrifice, the sacrifice of Calvary, the sacrifice of the Mass? It is not only in the presence of the living, devout or half indifferent, that that great sacrifice is offered through the world, yesterday, to-day, and for ever, but be sure in the midst of the chivalry of heaven, a multitude that no man can number, none the less real because invisible, among whom one day we too are to be numbered. Not for the living only, but for the whole Church men offer that sacrifice pro redemptione animarum suarum, pro spe salutis et incolumitatis suae. Memento etiam Domine famulorum famularumque tuarum qui nos praecesserunt cum signo fidei et dormiunt in somno pacis.... Here in S. Apollinare at any rate for ever they await the renewal of that moment.

Those marvellous figures that appear in ghostly procession upon the walls of S. Apollinare here in Ravenna are really indescribable, they must be seen if the lovely significance of their beauty is to be understood. What can one say of them?

Upon the Epistle side we see as it were a procession of twenty-five figures all in white with palms in the right hands and crowns in their left. They are the martyrs SS. Clement, Sixtus, Laurence, Cyprian, Paul, Vitalis, Gervasius, Protasius, Hippolytus, Cornelius, Cassianus, John, Ursinus, Namor, Felix, Apollinaris, Demetrius, Polycarp, Vincent, Pancras, Chrysogonus, Protus, Jovenius, and Sabinus, and their names are written in a long line over them; each is aureoled, and each upon his white robe bears a letter the significance of which is hidden from us. This procession comes out of the city of Ravenna which is magnificently represented, occupying indeed a fifth of the whole length of the mosaic.

In the foreground is the palace of Theodoric, the whole facade of it, the triple arched peristyle in the midst flanked on either side by two triple arched loggias, each having a second story of five arches. In the spandrils of the arches are figures of Victories, and of old in the tympanum we might have seen Theodoric on horseback. Within, the arches are hung with curtains. On the extreme right is the great gate of the palace in the wall of the city, flanked on either side by towers. In the lunette over the gateway we see three small figures of Christ with the cross between two Apostles, and within the gate, I think, a great figure, seated. Over the facade of the palace we look into the city and see four churches, which Dr. Ricci suggests may be, on the right, this very church with its baptistery, now destroyed, together with the church of S. Teodoro (now S. Spirito) and the Arian baptistery: they are altogether Byzantine in type. Out of this city come the martyrs; there are twenty-five of them all in white, as I have said, and they are led by S. Martin Confessor, who bears of course no palm, is robed in purple, and bears his crown in both his hands. He leads the procession along a way strewn with flowers to the throne where Christ sits guarded by four angels.

Above this great scene, between the windows, above each of which there is an ornamental mosaic, we see sixteen figures of Prophets or perhaps Fathers. Over these are twenty-seven compartments each filled with a mosaic. Those over the heads of the prophets are, except in the case of him who stands, at each end, last but one, filled with a sort of recessed throne in mosaic, over which in each case are set two doors. But the eleven compartments over the windows and the two over the two figures last but one at either end are filled with thirteen scenes from the New Testament, beginning on the left as follows: (1) The Last Supper, (2) The Agony in the Garden, (3) The Kiss of Judas, (4) Christ taken, (5) Christ before the High Priest, (6) Christ before Herod, (7) The Denial of Peter, (8) Judas trying to restore the money to the priests, (9) Christ before Pilate, (10) The Via Crucis, (n) The Maries at the Sepulchre, (12) The way to Emmaus, (13) The Incredulity of S. Thomas.

Turning now to the Gospel side of the church, we find a similar procession over the arcade, but of twenty-one virgin martyrs bearing palms and crowns richly dressed with precious ornaments and jewels. They bear the following names: SS. Pelagia, Agatha, Eulalia, Cecilia, Lucia, Crispina, Valeria, Vincentia, Agnes with her lamb, Perpetua, Felicitas, Justina, Anastasia, Daria, Paulina, Victoria, Anatolia, Christina, Savona, Eugenia. They issue out of the towered gate of the Castello of Classis, whose wall stretches before us to the great sea gate through which we look upon the port with three ships on the water, one of which is sailing in or out. Within the castello over the wall of it we see buildings of a distinctly Roman type.