International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

Ida Sinkević
Lafayette College, Art Department, Easton PA, United States; 
[e-mail]
Five-Domed Churches in Byzantine Architecture: Type or Archetype
Five-domed churches have been extensively studied by Byzantine scholars. Varied in their 
esthetic and structural features, these churches were a subject of numerous discussions regarding 
their origin, symbolic meaning, as well as their complex spatial and architectural articulation.
While distinguished for sophisticated architectural techniques, these churches also provided fertile 
soil for the appearance of new iconographic elements that significantly impacted programmatic 
solutions and spatial articulation of the interior decoration.
This paper aims at furthering our understanding of the five-domed churches in Byzantium 
by examining possible models or prototypes for these monuments and the ways in which they 
were perceived by medieval beholders. Were five-domed churches a separate group of Byzantine 
buildings marked by their distinctive exterior and, as such, an architectural type, or were they based 
on a common prototype, carrying a deeper symbolic message that would distinguish them as an 
archetypal icon? In answering these questions, the author examines structural and architectural 
features of these buildings, the programmatic specificities of their decorative ensembles, and literary 
sources relevant to understanding Byzantine perception and reception of these monuments.
Jelena Bogdanović
Iowa State University, College of Design,
Department of Architecture, Ames IA, United States; 
[e-mail]
The Canopy as “Primitive Hut” in Byzantine Architecture
Can we speak of a canopy – an architectonic object of basic structural and design integrity, most 
often comprised of four columns and a roof – as a “primitive hut” in Byzantine architecture? This 
paper examines several examples of surviving canopies in Byzantine-rite churches and theological 
texts that mention canopies as a corpus for investigating the possibility that in the architectural 
theory, Byzantine canopies can be viewed as a type of the “primitive hut” - the ideal principle 
(archetype) for architecture - that was first outlined by Vitruvius in the 1
st
c BCE and later theorized 
by Laugier in the 18
th
century. A particular focus will be placed on canopies as liturgical furnishings 
and the basic structural units of the Byzantine church itself – a four-columned structural core with 
a dome and vaulted bays. The relations between these “ideal structures” understood as “primitive 
huts” of different sizes and scales and how they were materialized in Byzantine churches allow 
us to discuss canopies as basic units for the definition of various Byzantine architectural “types”.
Moreover, selected references on canopies, and more generally on concepts of space and place 

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from the philosophical and theological texts by Dionysius the Areopagite, who first introduced 
the philosophical notion of type and archetype, followed by Byzantine theologians, such as John of 
Damascus, Theodore the Studite, Maximus the Confessor, and Patriarch Germanos, may help us 
shed light on the meanings of the type and archetype in Byzantine architecture and how much they 
differed from or were similar to the “primitive hut” recognized in architectural theory.

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