S. VITALE AND S. APOLLINARE IN CLASSE

When Belisarius entered Ravenna in 540, he apparently found more than one new building begun but not finished; of these the chief was the church of S. Vitale. This magnificent octagonal building with its narthex and atrium had, according to Agnellus , been founded by the Archbishop S. Ecclesius, that is to say, between 521 and 534. It was apparently finished and decorated later by Julius Argentarius , and was consecrated by the archbishop S. Maximianus in 547. In plan it resembles very closely the church of SS . Sergius and Bacchus in Constantinople built by Justinian about 527. As we know both Justinian and Theodora, his empress, contributed largely to the perfecting of S. Vitale, which remains certainly his most glorious monument in the West.

The plan of the church, as I have said, is octagonal, surmounted by a dome octagonal without but circular within. From one of these eight sides the sanctuary is thrust out, flanked on either side by a circular chapel with a rectangular presbytery. Standing obliquely across one of the two angles of the octagon, directly opposite this sanctuary, stretched the narthex flanked by circular towers. The great octagon is divided into two stories, each of which has three windows upon each of the eight sides, the octagonal dome being lighted by eight single windows.

Within the great octagon formed by the walls is a smaller octagon formed by an arcade of mighty piers which upholds the cupola. This arcade contains a double loggia which thus runs round the whole church with the exception of the presbytery, where it ends in lofty tribunes. It is upheld between the piers by columns of precious marble having capitals of the most marvellous beauty.

The space within this inner octagon is covered with a pavement laid down in the sixteenth century, consisting of all sorts of fragments of mosaics and marbles which that century destroyed. The upper loggia was of old the gyneceo , the place of the women. Nothing I think left to us in the world is more sumptuous and gorgeous than this interior. Everywhere are glittering mosaics, precious slabs of marble, priceless columns of beautiful marble. And where the mosaics have been destroyed or left unfinished, as in the cupola and the body of the church, baroque artists have filled the place with their paintings, paintings which in their own style are matchless and which it is now foolishly proposed should be destroyed.

In our examination of the church we turn first to the presbytery, which is entirely encrusted with most precious marbles and mosaics. In the midst of it stands the altar consisting of slabs of semi-transparent alabaster, within which of old lights were set. The marvellously lovely piece which serves for the altar stone itself is supported by four columns, and that piece which serves for frontal is carved with a great cross between two sheep. This altar had long disappeared, but piece by piece it was recovered; the beautiful altar stone itself was found behind an altar in a chapel now destroyed in this church, and was re-erected as we see it in 1899.

In the same chapel stood till then the beautiful low fretted screens that now are set across the apse behind the altar, where indeed they remained till 1700, according to Dr. Ricci. The lower part of the apse and the piers of the presbytery have been covered with fine marbles, some of which are ancient, but the vault, the lunettes , and the walls are entirely encrusted with gorgeous mosaics.

The presbytery is approached from the inner octagon of the church under a triumphal arch. In the curve of this we see amid much decorative ornament fifteen circular discs containing the head of Our Lord, the twelve Apostles, S. Gervasius, and S. Protasius. Beneath these are two monuments variously formed, Dr. Ricci tells us, in the sixteenth century. The four columns which they contain originally supported the baldacchino over the high altar here; three of them are of verde antico . Framed by these columns are two Roman reliefs from a frieze originally in the Temple of Neptune, other parts of which are in the Sala Lapidaria in the Arcivescovado here, in the Louvre, in the Uffizi , in the Castello of Milan, and in the Museo Archeologico at Venice. They are indubitably of course the oldest things in the church.

Within this triumphal arch upon either side rise the tribunes in which the upper loggia of the church itself comes to an end. These tribunes, which are exceedingly beautiful, consist of two triple arches, one above the other on either side, and the columns which support them, with their marvellous capitals, are I suppose among the most glorious left in Christendom. The arches themselves and the lunettes upon either side are encrusted with mosaics. In the lunette upon the right on either side an altar gorgeously draped, Abel offers to God the firstling of his flock and Melchizedek Bread and Wine. Upon the face of the arch we see Moses tending the sheep of Jethro, Moses upon Mount Hebron, and Moses before the burning bush. In the lunette upon the left we have the sacrifice of Abraham of his only son, and the visit of the three angels to Abraham and Sara. Upon the face of the arch we see Jeremiah the Prophet and Moses upon Mount Sinai. Above, upon the balustrades, as it were, of the upper loggia we see angels upholding a circle in which is the sign of the Cross, and above again upon the face of the arches on either side the four Evangelists and their symbols. The vault is entirely covered with ornaments in mosaic, amid which three angels rise and support with uplifted hands the central disc in which is represented the Agnus Dei .

Though these mosaics have suffered much from unforeseen disaster and from restoration they still delight us with their richness and splendour, and nothing I think can well be finer than their effect, their decorative effect as a whole. They seem to hang there like some gorgeous Eastern tapestry of Persian stuff, as Dr. Ricci says, some unfading and indestructible tapestry of the Orient left by chance or forgetfulness in the old capital of the West.

We now turn to the apse, which we enter under a second triumphal arch upon the face of which we see upon the left the city of Hierusalem and upon the left Bethlehem. A cypress stands at the gate of each, and between them two angels in flight uphold a discus or aureole having within it eight rays. Above this again are three windows about which is spread a gorgeous decoration in mosaic.

Beneath within the tribune of the apse we see Our Lord, “beautiful as Apollo,” enthroned upon the orb of the world, an angel upon either hand, while to his right stands S. Vitalis to whom He hands a crown, to His left S. Ecclesius bearing the model of this church in his hand.

Beneath upon either side stand the two great mosaic pictures, the most marvellous works of the sixth century that have come down to us and perhaps the most glorious and splendid works of art which that age was able to achieve, and it is needless to say that there is nothing like them anywhere in the world.

Upon the left we see the great emperor, perhaps the greatest of all the Caesars, Justinian, bearing in his hands a golden dish; beside him stands the archbishop of Ravenna, S. Maximianus. A little behind these two figures and on either side stand five attendant priests, and on the extreme left of the picture is a group of soldiers.

In the mosaic upon the right we see the empress Theodora, straight browed, most gorgeously arrayed, very beautiful and a little sinister, bearing a golden chalice, attended by her splendid ladies and two priests. Upon the extreme left of the picture stands a little fountain before an open doorway hung with a curtain.

What can be said of these gorgeous and astonishingly lovely works? Nothing. They speak too eloquently for themselves. Not there do we see the mere realism of Rome, the careful and often too careful arrangement that Roman art, able to speak but incapable of song, always gives us. Here we have something at once more gorgeous and more mysterious and more artistic, a symbolical and hieratic art, the gift of the Orient, of Byzantium. In the best Roman art of the best period there is always something of the street, something too close to life, too mere a transcription and a copy of actual things, a mere imitation without life of its own. But here is something outside the classical tradition, outside what imperial Rome with its philistinism and its puritanism has made of the art of Greece and thrust perhaps for ever upon Europe. Here we are free from the overwhelming common-place of Roman art, its mediocrity and respectable endeavour.

It is, however, not in the gorgeous mosaics alone that we find the delight and originality of S. Vitale. The whole church is amazingly different from anything else to be seen in Italy, for it is altogether outside the Roman tradition, an absolutely Byzantine building as well in its construction as in its decoration. It must be compared with the later S. Sophia and SS Sergius and Bacchus of Constantinople. These, however, are works more assured and more gracious than S. Vitale, and yet in its plan at least S. Vitale is a masterpiece, and altogether the one great sanctuary of Byzantine art of the time of Justinian that we have in the West. Every part of it is worthy of the strictest and most eager attention, from the ambulatory, which was covered in 1902 with old marble slabs and where there are two early Christian sarcophagi , to the restored Cappella Sancta Sanctórum with its fifth-century sarcophagus, the tomb of the exarch Isaac, and the lofty Matronaeum , the women’s gallery, from which the best view of the mosaics and the marvellously carved Byzantine capitals may be had. Nor should the narthex be forgotten, mere skeleton though it be. It is characteristic of such a church as this, and set as it is obliquely to it, is original in conception and curious.

When we have finished with S. Vitale it is well to leave Ravenna and to drive by the lofty road over the marshes to the solitary church of S. Apollinare in Classe which was built also by Giuliano Argentario for archbishop Ursicinus (535-538) and was consecrated by archbishop Maximianus in 549.

Classis, Classe , as we know, was the station or port of the Roman fleet, established and built by Augustus Cæsar. It was doubtless a great place enjoying the busy and noisy life of a great port and arsenal and possessed vast barracks for the soldiers and sailors of the imperial fleet. Later even when disasters had fallen upon that great civilisation it maintained itself, and from the fifth to the seventh centuries we hear of its churches, S. Apollinare , S. Severo, S. Probo , S. Raffaele, S. Agnese , S. Giovanni “ad Titum,” S. Sergio juxta viridarium , and the great Basilica Petriana.

It was joined to the city of Ravenna by the long suburb of the Via Caesarea, much I suppose as the Porto di Lido is joined to Venice by the Riva or as Rovezzano is joined to Florence by the Via Aretina. Of all the buildings that together made up the Castello of Classe and the suburb of Caesarea nothing remains to us but the mighty church of S. Apollinare and its great and now tottering campanile. For Classe and Cassarea seem to have been finally destroyed in the long Lombard wars, either as a precautionary measure by the people of Ravenna and the imperialists or by the attacking Lombards, while the sea which once washed the walls of Classe has retreated so far that it is only from the top of her last watch tower it may now be seen.

Nothing can be more desolate and sad than the miserable road across the empty country between Ravenna and that lonely church of S. Apollinare . In summer deep in dust that rises, under the heavy tread of the great oxen which draw the curiously painted carts of the countryside, in great clouds into the sky; in winter and after the autumn rains lost in the white curtain of mist that so often surrounds Ravenna, it is an almost impassable morass of mud and misery. Even at its best in spring time it is melancholy and curiously mean without any beauty or nobility of its own, though it commands so much of those vast spaces of flat and half desolate country which the sea has destroyed, on the verge of which stands the lonely church.

One comes to this great basilica always I think as to a ruin, to find without surprise the doors closed and only to be opened after long knocking. The round campanile that towers and seems to totter in its strange dilapidation beside the church is so beautiful that it surprises one at once by its melancholy nobility in the midst of so much meanness and desolation. It is a building of the ninth century, and may well have been used as much as a watch tower as a bell tower. Till recently it had at its base a sacristy, but this has been swept away. Of old the church too had before it a great narthex of which certain ruins are left, among them a little tower on the left.

Within we find ourselves in a vast basilica divided into three naves upheld by twenty-four marvellous columns of great size and beauty, of Greek marble, with beautiful Byzantine bases and capitals. The central nave is closed by a curved apse set high over a great crypt thrust out beyond the rest of the church. Beyond the two aisles are two chapels each with its little curved apse. The walls of the church and the walls above the arcade were undoubtedly originally covered, in the one case with splendid marbles, in the other with mosaics. The walls of the church were, however, stripped in 1449 by Sigismondo Malatesta of Rimini when he was building, or rather encasing, the church of S. Francesco in Rimini with marbles, and turning what had been a Gothic church of brick into what we know as the Tempio Malatestiano, by the hands of Alberti. We know that a great quantity of marble of different kinds was gathered by Sigismondo from all parts of Italy, not only to furnish the interior of his Tempio , but to cover the exterior also according to the design of Leon Alberti. Even the sepulchral stones from the old Franciscan convent of S. Francesco in Rimini were used and the blocks which the people of Fano had collected for their church. S. Apollinare in Classe was then in Benedictine hands. With the consent of the Abate there, very many ancient and valuable marbles were torn from the walls and carried off by Sigismondo to Rimini; so many in fact that the people of Ravenna complained to the Venetian doge Francesco Foscari, saying that Sigismondo had despoiled the church. The doge, however, seems to have cared nothing about it and Sigismondo sent to Ravenna and to the Abate two hundred gold florins , so that both declared themselves satisfied. Then the church passed to me, these three sheep belong rather to the upper part of the mosaic which, with the Cross in the midst, bearing the face of Our Lord, and on either side Moses and Elias, symbolises the Transfiguration. These three sheep would thus represent S. Peter, S. James and S. John.

Beneath between the windows we see represented four Bishops of Ravenna, S. Ursinus, S. Ursus , S. Severus, and S. Ecclesius. To the right are the sacrifices of Abel, Melchizedek, and Abraham. To the left the privileges of the church of Ravenna. In the midst we see an archbishop and the emperor who hands him a scroll on which is written privilegia . To the left are three priests bearing fire, incense, and a thurible. To the right are three other figures supporting the emperor as the three priests support the archbishop. Doubtless this mosaic records the privileges granted to the church of Ravenna by Constantinople. The archbishop is probably Reparatus who received so much from the Emperor Constantinus IV. Two of the figures who attend the emperor represent Heraclius and Tiberius. This mosaic is the latest in the church, dating from 668.

Over the arch of the tribune is a medallion bust of the Saviour holding a book in His left hand and blessing us with His right. Upon either side are symbols of the four Evangelists in the clouds of the sky. Beneath we see on either side the cities of Bethlehem and Hierusalem , from each of which issue six sheep perhaps the twelve apostles. Beneath again are two palm trees and again the archangels Gabriel and Michael and S. Luke and S. Matthew.

These mosaics have often been remade and repaired. When Crowe and Cavalcaselle examined them before 1860 they found that the whole tunic of the Moses had been repainted and half the face of the Elias had been restored. They proceed: “The head of S. Apollinare is in part damaged, the left hand and lower part of the figure destroyed. The sheep beside S. Apollinare , but particularly those on the right of that figure, are almost completely modern. A large part of the left side of the apsis is repainted, of the four bishops between the windows of the tribune the head of Ecclesius is preserved, the lower part repainted. The head of S. Ursinus is a new mosaic, and the lower half of the figure is restored. In the mosaic of the sacrifice half the head from the eyes upwards and part of the arms of Abel are repainted, the legs have become dropsical under repair. The figures of Abraham and Isaac are almost completely repainted, and the hands and feet are formless for that reason. This mosaic is repaired in two different ways with white cubes coloured over and with painted stucco. In the mosaic representing the tender of privileges the nimbi as already stated are new, but besides, the lower part of all the figures is repainted in stucco and the heads are all more or less repaired. Of the figures in the arch that of the archangel Gabriel is half ruined and half restored, and part of S. Matthew and S. Luke are new.”

Since Crowe and Cavalcaselle wrote a vast restoration has been undertaken, and this was finished in 1908. It was very carefully carried out and it is to be believed that the work as we see it is now secure.

There is much else of interest in the church: the beautiful crypt with its ancient sarcophagus of S. Apollinare and its columns; the ten great sarcophagi which stand about the church, three of which contain the relics of archbishops of Ravenna; the curious tabernacle at the end of the north aisle. But a whole morning, or for that matter a whole day, is not too much to spend in this beautiful and deserted sanctuary which bridges for us so many centuries and in which we are made one with those who helped to establish the foundations of Europe.