The Byzantine Empire

1000-1100 AD
 ARCHITECTURAL FEATURES
DOMES

• Church within a square, with a dome over its centre, usually four
cross- like arms either square ended or apsidal ended.

• Emphasis on its vertical axis

• Non- figural motifs covered all the vault surfaces.
• Large windows flooded the interior with light that
caused the marble and mosaic to glow with
radiance
PLANNING & CONSTRUCTION

• Centralized type of plan.

• Independence of component parts.
• Domes made by means of spherical pendentives.
• Constructed by bricks or of light porous stone (pumice)
or pottery.
• Constructed without temporary supports (centering).

• Windows in lower portion.

• Grouping of domes.
• Great height.
• Exterior design pattern in brick work.
• Interior covering with marble mosaics and fresco.
• Concrete made from lime sand with crushed tiles and
bricks.
• Use of columns for decoration and structurally to support
the galleries and semi- circular arches.
• Mouldings were rare.
PENDENTIVES
• It is a curved support
shaped like an inverted
triangle.
• It is used to hold a dome.
• Using pendentives, Byzantine
architects could build a
higher and wider dome.
SQUINCH
• It is used to provide a
transition from square to
polygon.
CHURCHES
 S. S. SERGIUS, ISTANBUL(527A.D.)
• Built by Justinian.
• Plan 33m x 28m.
•4 colonnaded exedrae and dome supported on
spherical pendentives 15.8 mt. dia. 22 mt. high
 S. SOPHIA, ISTANBUL (HAGIA
SOPHIA)
However, the building's present
external aspects are much
changed from the original
appearance; the first dome
collapsed in 558 and was
replaced by the present one,
greater in height and stability.
Huge buttresses were added
to the Justinianic design, and
four Turkish minarets were
constructed after the Ottoman
conquest of 1453, when Hagia
Sophia became an Islamic
mosque.
• Built for Justinian by
the architects
authemius &
isodorus.
• Atrium triple portal-
outer narthex double
storey main narthex
(200 feet x 30 feet).
• Centre space 32.6
mts. Square.
• 4 semi circular
arches which rest the
dome 32.6 mt. dia
and 54.8 mts. above
ground.
• 4 massive stone piers
7.6mt x 18.3 mts.

PLAN
• E & w of central space hemi
cycles, covered with semi-
domes. Thus enclosed great
oval nave 68.6 mt. x 32.6 mt.
• Hemi-cycles are flanked by
exedra covered with semi
domes that act as buttresses to
the central dome.
• Lead is used as cement to bind
the stones together.
• The forty windows create the
illusion that the dome is resting
on the light that comes through
them--like a "floating dome of
heaven."