The Classical Morphology under Late Antique Pressure: Pseudo-Ionic Capitals in Synagogues and Churches of the Northern Land of Israel (Sub-Roman or Sub-Byzantine Style)

The theme is devoted to a comparatively uninvestigated material which lacks an artistic analysis. The rich classical morphology of Ionic order was taken as a basis for the Late Antique Ionic capitals, but it was reinterpreted and changed considerably under the influence of the new tendencies of the epoch. Capitals are divided into three main groups (simple Ionic, Golan and Diagonal), as it is accepted by Israeli scholars (Hachlili, Tsafrir). But each group is submitted by a more wide row of examples from the coeval ecclesiastical architecture as well as from the previous Graeco-Roman and Near-Eastern traditions in order to show all of them as an integral phenomenon. This comparative method and detailed description enables us to make important stylistic observations and to determine interreligious tendencies, rooted in the ancient layers of local culture. The main aim is to define whether the style of these capitals was Sub-Roman or Sub-Byzantine. For the first time the spatial analysis of Ionic capitals is represented: their location in the interior or exterior was directed by certain aims and due to the original decisions of a Late Antique masters a new sacral image of a synagogue or church has appeared.