Ravenna

 

Sarah Turner

 

 

          Located in northeast Italy in the Emilia-Romagna region and the capital of the province bearing its name, Ravenna is internationally celebrated for its stunning ancient mosaics and rich history.  Ravenna’s prosperous past is evident in its wealth of still-standing examples of Byzantine art and architecture.  Positioned near the Adriatic Sea on a marshy plain, Ravenna has served as a strategic “capital three times:  of the western Roman Empire, of Theodoric King of the Goths, and of the Byzantine Empire in Europe” (History, par. 1).  By delving into Ravenna’s history, as well as its remarkable artistic achievements, the reasoning behind its popularity in tourism becomes clear.

          Ravenna was formed by the buildup of centuries of silt deposits from the annual flooding of the Po River branches.  The floods repeatedly pushed back the waterline of the Adriatic Sea to the point where Ravenna now lies, about five miles from the coast (Benigni, par. 1).  The exact origin of this ancient city is uncertain as a multitude of legends lay claim to its beginnings.  The Greek historian Dionysius of Hilicarnassus stated that the city was founded seven generations prior to the Trojan War; however, a fellow Grecian, Strabo, claimed that the Thessalonians were the founders.  Tradition, according to Bovini, grants the title of earliest inhabitants to the Etruscans due to the typically Etruscan suffix, ‘enna’, as well as the discovery of Etruscan artifacts while historiographers insist that the Umbrians were the first established people (7). 

          Little is known about Ravenna’s history until the end of the third century BC when it fell completely under the influence of Rome.  Though the city lacked the agricultural strength that normally drew the attention of the Romans, Ravenna’s strategic location was the basis of its appeal.  Its close proximity to the sea allowed for direct access to both necessities and reinforcements.  The surrounding marshes provided a natural line of defense and its location at the crossroads of the northern and southern peninsula made it exceptionally challenging to capture.  These were all influences in its allure as a bastion of control. 

          The exact date of Roman control remains a mystery, as much of Ravenna’s past, although the first record of a Roman fleet to reach the city was in 82 BC.  Caesar chose Ravenna as his headquarters while negotiating with the Senate and later as his base when launching various military campaigns on surrounding areas.  While there, he is thought to have begun construction on the port of Classe (initially known as Classis), which served as the catalyst for Ravenna’s first rise to greatness.  Emperor Octavius Augustus oversaw the port’s completion and, realizing its strategic location, made the port the principal base for a fleet, 250 ships strong, to defend the “Adriatic Sea and the waters of the near eastern Mediterranean” (History, par. 9).  Augustus also created a canal, known as the Fossa Augusta, linking the port to the southern branch of the Po.  This canal permitted waters to flow around the city walls to fortify Ravenna’s defense and through the center of the town to facilitate transport and commerce.  With the port as the focus of the city, Ravenna flourished as a town of trade and industry (especially ship building).  Though the port’s value waned by the sixth century AD, its lasting presence is chronicled in a mosaic at the Sant’ Apollinare Nuovo.  Ravenna gradually assumed the typical quadrangular ground plan outlined by high walls and gated by two cylindrical towers – one of which survives. 

          As the population burgeoned, Ravenna began make improvements; for example, the city initiated a beautification plan with sculptures, generally by foreign artists.  Bovini notes that “at the beginning of the second century AD, Trajan ordered an aqueduct to be built for the city” to provide proper drinking water (9).  Soon after, Christianity came to Ravenna by way of Apollinaris of Antioch, purportedly consecrated bishop by Saint Peter to spread the Word to the port of Classe.  Emperor Honorius made Ravenna the “imperial capital of the West[ern Roman Empire], and as such the city was embellished with magnificent monuments” in 402 AD, once again because of its defensive location (Ravenna 9:  958).  Great religious and civil buildings arose including the Church of St. John the Evangelist, the Mausoleum of Galla Placida, the Basilica of Ursus, the Church of Santa Croce, and the Church of San Francesco.  Under Honorius and subsequent rulers, the city walls expanded. 

With the fall of the Roman Empire in 476, Odoacer, the first of the Barbarian kings in Italy, chose Ravenna as his seat.  Around 490, the Ostrogoth Theodoric marched on Ravenna and after three years of sieges, gave himself the title of Dominus and later Rex.  Bovini maintains that Theodoric “proved a wise and enlightened monarch and encouraged new building, launched major projects to reclaim the marshlands around his capital, and restored Trajan’s aqueduct” (10).  In addition, his court contributed to an enlightened society.  His court secretary and official spokesman, Cassiodorus, was the first to insist that monks should include intellectual labor in their duties, thus preserving the ancient literature of Greece and Rome as well as simultaneously making Ravenna the center of literary activity (Book, par. 23).  During Theodoric’s reign, Ravenna witnessed the construction of his residence, the Palatium, as well as the Anastasis Gothorum (now the church of Spirito Santo) and, beside it, a basilica dedicated to the Savior (now known as Sant’ Apollinare Nuovo).  Theodoric and his people were Arians and built the basilica and the church specifically for worship.  The Arians believed in the teachings of Arius, condemned by the Roman Church as heretical, saying that “only God was not generated and that Christ, the ‘logos’, who would have been different and dissimilar to God, is God only by adoption and not by nature” (History, par. 22).  Despite these differences, there was little discord between the Arians and the Catholics until the end of Theodoric’s reign when he held Pope John I as prisoner until death in 526.  Theodoric died shortly after and rests in a mausoleum he built for himself externally simple though internally intricate with mosaic design. 

Soon after Theodoric’s death the general of Emperor Justinian I, Belisarius, entered Ravenna in 540 and occupied the city, making it the capital of Byzantine Italy in 544.  All Arian property was transferred to the Catholic Church, thus changing the names of many of Theodoric’s buildings.  Under Byzantine rule, the octagonal San Vitale was completed in 548, including the mosaic portraits of Justinian I and his Empress, as well as Sant’ Apollinare in Classe which featured the namesake, a bishop, looking down from the rounded nave.  Ravenna’s official website avers that Byzantines initially brought the return of extravagance, customary in the East, illustrated by the imported marble adoring many buildings and the mosaics completed by artists probably trained in Byzantium (par. 29).  This artistic movement was only momentary as a state of disrepair began to characterize the port of Classe, diminishing both trade and traffic.  Due to poor governing by Imperial Governors for nearly two hundred years, by 751, Ravenna “was beyond saving” (Bovini 11). 

In the tenth century, under the Ottonians, Ravenna regained some prestige and soon became “one of the first cities in Italy to form itself into a commune”.  A studio, similar to a university, and a school of ars notoria, a training school for scribes were established.  After the municipality, families took control of the government, such as the da Polenta family.  The da Polentas are remembered for Guido Novello’s extension of hospitality in the fourteenth century to the exiled Florentine poet Dante Alighieri, later buried in Ravenna. 

During and after the fifteenth century, Ravenna has undergone numerous periods of domination.  From 1441 to 1509, the Venetian Republic had direct rule over the city but by 1509, the Papal States gained control.  The Battle of Ravenna in 1512 turned the city over to the French who pillaged and sacked the city; “from this time a tumultuous period of civil conflicts followed, pursued by the Rasponi family who had dominion of the city in their sights.  This was followed by a short period of Venetian control” and in 1530, Ravenna returned to the Church (History, pars. 36-37).  In 1716, the Lombards seized and plundered Classe, leaving it in ruins.  Simultaneously, the Franks captured Ravenna and gave it to the Pope in 1754 who placed the city under the control of the Roman archbishops.  The French, Austrians, and English enjoyed dominance in intervals from 1796 through 1813 when Papal hegemony resumed.  Ravenna became a part of the United Provinces in 1831 and joined the Roman Republic in 1839.  Then, in 1859, Ravenna “proclaimed its union with the kingdom of Sardinia, which became the kingdom of Italy in 1861” where it remains to this day (Ravenna 9:  958). 

Despite a tumultuous history, Ravenna’s mosaics have been fortunate enough to survive centuries of upheaval and change.  Sherrill hails Ravenna as “one of the four most important centres for mosaics” (3).  Hollister and Bennett maintain that Ravenna’s examples of Byzantine art, especially the mosaics, explore elements of “imperial majesty as well as Christ’s divinity (54).  Broad, flat, and plain walls characterize the exteriors of the fifth and sixth century edifices, completely disguising the bright and intricate beauty of the mosaic walls within.  Typically, the mosaics are made of thousands of tiny pieces of colored glass enamels, stone, marble, or mother-of-pearl.  Because of their remarkable durability, the mosaics have survived centuries without fading or degeneration.  Ravenna’s mosaics, unlike most, are integrated into the architecture, conforming to the curves and angles of each respective surface.  This allows for the effect “that when the light strikes them it is not reflected in a continuous beams as in a mirror but is refracted and broken up prismatically into as many chromatic units as there are tiny cubes of mosaic (…) mak[ing] these mosaic surfaces seem to quiver with life, to be ever varied and infinitely changeable” (Bovini 12). 

Neither the names of the artists who designed these breathtaking pieces nor the workers who set the tiles have been recorded.  Nevertheless, these mosaicists were revolutionary in their approach to the art form.  Unlike the Romans who “used mosaic almost exclusively for floors (…) the mosaicists of the fifth century did not want their images to be walked on [as] they were sacred images” and therefore, Wernick imparts, moved the mosaics to the walls and ceilings (1).  As “the culmination of the evolution of wall and vault mosaic,” the ornamentations “were meant to seize the worshipper and transport him to a new and better world” (Ling 111; Wernick 2).  Ravenna’s mosaics and architectural splendor are commonly recognized as “perhaps the greatest surviving monuments of the early period of Christian art, which not only culminates but ends with them” (Von Simson vii).  UNESCO has declared the following treasured buildings patrimony of humanity:  the Archiepiscopal Chapel, the Arian Baptistery, the Basilica of San Vitale, the Cathedral Baptistery, the Mausoleum of Galla Placida, Sant’ Apollinare in Classe, Sant’ Apollinare Nuovo, and Theodoric’s Mausoleum.  The city itself simply represents “the citadel of the finest technical tradition” (Fischer 69). 

With a population of 134,631 as recorded on October 21, 2001, Ravenna is once again relying on its ready access to the Adriatic Sea and is currently both an agricultural and industrial center with its “principal enterprises includ[ing] petroleum and natural gas refining, the production of fertilizers and synthetic rubber, and the processing of oil seeds” (Brinkhoff sec. 3; Ravenna 9:  958).  Astonishingly, despite Ravenna’s desultory history, the city has survived as a concentration of one of the world’s most beautiful displays of art. 


Works Cited

 

“Book and Bookmaking.”  Britannica Student Encyclopedia.  2003.  Encyclopaedia

          Britannica Online.  23 Sep, 2003 <http://search.eb.com/ebi/article?eu=295071>. 

 

Benigni, U.  “Ravenna:  Archdiocese of Ravenna (Ravennatensis).”  The Catholic

          Encyclopedia.  2003.  23 Sep, 2003 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/

          12662b.htm>. 

 

Bovini, Giuseppe.  Ravenna.  New York:  Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1971. 

 

Brinkhoff, Thomas.  “Emilia-Romagna Region.”  City Population.  2003.  25 Nov, 2003

          <http://www.citypopulation.de/Italien-EmiliaRomagna.html>.

 

Fischer, Peter.  Mosaic:  History and Technique.  New York:  McGraw-Hill, 1971. 

 

“The History of Ravenna.”  Official Site – Tourism in Ravenna.  2003.  23 Sep, 2003

          <http://www.turismo.ravenna.it/eng/frame_citta.htm>.

 

Hollister, C. Warren and Judith M. Bennett.  Medieval Europe: A Short History.

          Boston:  McGraw-Hill, 2002. 

 

Ling, Roger.  Ancient Mosaics.  Princeton:  Princeton UP, 1998. 

 

“Ravenna.”  Encyclopaedia Britannica.  15th ed.  1990. 

 

Sherrill, Charles Hitchcock.  Mosaics.  London:  John Lane the Bodley Head Ltd., 1933.

 

Von Simson, Otto G.  Sacred Fortress:  Byzantine Art and Statecraft in Ravenna.

          Princeton:  Princeton UP, 1987. 

 

Wernick, Robert.  “Fifteen centuries later, Ravenna’s Mosaics Still Glow.”  Smithsonian.        Jan.  1990:  54-66. 

 

Graphics

 

1.  Official Site – Tourism in Ravenna.  2003.  23 Sep, 2003

<http://www.turismo.ravenna.it/eng/>.

 

2.  “Ravenna:  The City of Mosaic.”  Mosaic Art School.  2003.  24 Nov, 2003

          <http://www.sira.it/mosaic/courses.htm>.

 

 

Appendix

Description of UNESCO Monuments

The Archiepiscopal Chapel was created as a private chapel during the reign of Theodoric (around 500 AD), an Arian.  The chapel is the sole Orthodox monument built during his reign and strangely reflects a strong anti-Arian sentiment in the mosaics of the depiction of various martyrs and of the glorification of Christ.

 The octagonal Arian Baptistery was also erected during Theodoric’s reign after the official religion of his Court was declared Arian.  The decorations which once covered the walls are now gone save the nude image of Christ (nakedness represents the humanity of Christ); however, embellishments from the transferal of the cathedral to the Catholics in the middle of the sixth century have survived beautifully.  A mosaic of the baptism of Christ and his apostles adorns the dome. 

The Basilica of San Vitale was “founded by Giulianus Argentarius, commissioned by Bishop Ecclesius and consecrated by the Archbishop Maximian in 548” (History par. 41).  Probably the most famous of all Byzantine mosaics, the octagonal plan and the cupola are clear indications of the Eastern influence.  The dome ceiling was bare until 1780, when artists from Bologna and the Veneto came to paint the vast space.  The maze on one side of the floor in front of the altar is a symbol of rebirth and purification from sin. With completion of the labyrinth, the eyes will be drawn towards the altar and presents the perfect position to contemplate some of the most beautiful mosaics ever created.

The ancient Neonian Baptistery dates back to the end of the fourth century.  Also octagonal, its doors are buried from hundreds of years of existence – the original level is around three meters below the current level.  Decorated by bishop Neone in 450, Hellenic-Roman mosaics adorn the walls.  Marble and stucco-works still remain.  The octagonal font located in the center was modified in the 16th century yet still possesses pieces of the original. 

Of course famous for the splendor of its mosaics, the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia was built by Emperor Honorius around 425-450 and named after his sister.  Shaped like a Latin cross, the unimaginative exterior contradicts the breathtaking mosaic interior, the oldest in the city, which covers the cupola, lunettes, and the walls of the vault.  The iconographic themes “represent the victory of life over death” (par. 45). 

Built on behalf of Archbishop Ursicinus during the first half of the sixth century by Giuliano Argentario, the Basilica of Sant’ Apollinare in Classe is perhaps best known for the tombs of archbishops that line the naves, its mosaics, and its structure.  Though originally built on the coast for use by the Roman fleet in Classe, the earth has shifted in a way that it now lies two to three kilometers from the ocean

Theodoric’s sixth century Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo was originally intended for Arians as their own palatinate church.  With a 16th century portico made of marble, a cylindrical bell tower from the 9th or 10th century, and mosaics with an astounding surface area, this edifice is a remarkable glimpse into Ravenna’s history.  The mosaics representing the processions Virgins and Martyrs are typical examples of Byzantine style. 

In 520, Theodoric built this structure as his tomb.  The Mausoleum of Theodoric most likely held his remains in the upper floor until their removal during Byzantine rule.  The structure is made of Istria stone, the roof being one single block, and is “divided in two decagonal orders one above the other (par. 52).