habitat rupestre.pdf - Società Friulana di Archeologia

THE ART IN RUPESTRIAN CULTURECRHIMA-CINP projectstraight out and the feet together, is linked to the representationof Christ and to the calculation for the building of aRomanic church. The square Romanic church, and especiallythe Cistercian churches, recalled the measures of Man as amicrocosm that is the square man. He was represented as a45 degrees rotated square, crossed by two diagonals: this isfound in rupestrian churches of Puglia and Libya. In manypopular traditions, the Square has the function and the meaningof the Magic Square: important evidences can be found inthe Islamic tradition, where it is linked to the names of God.In its most simple form, it is divided into nine cells containingthe first nine numbers: the total sum on every row, columnand diagonal is 15. In the western world, the 25 cells MagicSquare was very common: it contained the Late Latin palindromesentence sator arepo tenet opera rotas (“the ploughingpeasant superintends work”).The Eagle fighting the SnakeThe fight between Eagle and Snake is a very ancient myth, acommon topic in the Euroasian mythology: it represents therising year and the dying year, the struggle between Light andDark, the Sun and the Underworld principles.The Eagle is a solar bird, and it represents sun, fire, heightand depth. The Eagle has the power to rejuvenate: it burns itswings with the sun, and then it dives in the water, to gatheryouth again.On the other hand, the Snake (or Drake) is the prototype, thespirit of original water, one of the most important archetypesof Soul. It is the incarnation of lunar and night values, whichdoes not mean “negative” values. In fact it also representslife and libido: Chaldeans had the same word for “life” and“snake”. Eagle and Snake are the symbols of the eighth Astrologicalsign, Scorpio. This is the sign of the cycle life – death –rebirth: thus, Eagle and Snake are entwined in the alternationof sun and moon.In the Toltec (8th to 12th century) and the following Aztec iconographies,the Eagle clutches with its talons the Snake (Quetzalcoatl,representing the planet Venus): the Snake’s blood willbe used to create the new man. The struggle between Eagleand Snake is a “sacrifice”: the Snake dies to come to life againand to attack the Eagle, the eternal struggle between Life andDeath.This struggle may also signify the antithesis between Patriarchyand Matriarchy: the Eagle has solar/male attributes; theSnake has lunar/female attributes (Jung considered the Eagleas a paternal symbol, and the Snake is the Lord of Women andof Fertility in many traditions).In the Christian world, this is the symbol of the struggle betweenGood and Evil: a graffito of this symbol was engravedin the rupestrian church of Santa Lucia in Mottola (Taranto).The PeacockThe Peacock is the symbol of resurrection and eternal life.This is due because it renews its feathers in spring. In ancientRome, it is linked to the myth of Juno. In a pagan legend, thePeacock flesh does not decompose. Some engraved Peacockshave been found in a cave of the ruined rupestrian village ofSan Giovanni (Taranto) and in some rupestrian churches inCappadocia.Anyway, symbolic graffiti and engravings are less diffusedthan chronicle images. There are horses and horsemen, whichwere carved especially in paintings of the Odegitria: they werepropitiatory signs for a journey, or ex voto. There are alsomany images of ships, probably ex voto for avoided wrecks,or exactly riproduced prison hulks, as a thanksgiving for freedomfrom slavery.Graffiti with faces in the Early Medieval church of San Marco(Massafra) are similar to faces on Lombard rings or on the socalled Triumph of Agilulf, and so they have been dated from7th to 8th century.There are thousands inscriptions, but there is not a single corpusthat contains them. Some historian of art has formulateda recent wrong theory (accepted by some archaeologist butrejected by epigraphists) that considers all the inscriptions asfunerary inscriptions. Funerary inscriptions are greatly differentfrom others inscriptions: the Greek formula for funeraryinscriptions is entàde kìte ‘here lies”, the Latin formula ishic requiescit ‘here rests’, while the other inscriptions can beas “Lord, remember your servant, his wife and his house”, or“Lord, help your servant”.L’ARTE NELLA CULTURA RUPESTRE1. SculturaPoco rappresentata è la scultura nelle chiese e nei siti rupestri mediterranei,anche perché ogni cavità artificiale è essa stessa un’opera discultura, di maggiore o di minore impegno, ma comunque un’operadi scultura in negativo.Tuttavia non mancano manifestazioni scultoree in chiese rupestri diCappadocia, di Armenia o di Puglia, anche se ridotte alla rappresentazionedi animali simbolici, come pavoni o colombe (più spesso raffiguratiin graffiti o incisioni) o di croci di varie forme e dimensione,sovente particolarmente elaborate, come in Armenia, sulla facciatadi chiese o all’interno di esse, dove sono excise soprattutto (particolarmentein Puglia) in cupole simboliche, al centro di cerchi concentricicostituiti generalmente da tre ghiere alludenti alla Trinità.Nel soffitto di numerose chiese, specialmente cappadocesi, è riprodottoa rilievo il monogramma Phòs Stauròs in lettere greche, colsignificato di ‘La Croce è luce’ o ‘Cristo è luce’.Seppure rarissime, si conoscono anche sculture iconiche in bassorilievo,come nella chiesa rupestre di Filigheddu 1 a Sassari, inSardegna, dove, sull’arco che precede l’abside, sono ingenuamenterappresentati tre volti, interpretati come immagini della Trinità edatati all’Alto Medioevo, o come in quella di Santa Maria di Costantinopolidi Castellaneta (Taranto) dove, nel parecclesion, si vedonoi resti molto deperiti di un altorilievo rappresentante il volto di unpersonaggio incappucciato. Nella stessa chiesa di Castellaneta sonorozzamente riprodotti capitelli di tipo bizantino a foglie di acantospinoso, come in altre chiese rupestri pugliesi, dove però sono piùcomuni i semplici capitelli a dado o a libro, soprattutto nelle chiesemeno antiche, che sono però pur essi opera scultorea.Come rozze sculture in bassissimo stiacciato di tradizione altomedievalesono da interpretare alcune figure delineate da un notevolevolumeRicerca_OK_2012-11-15.indd 60 16/11/2012 15:01:15