| In his seminal 1942 article, "Introduction to an 'Iconography of Medieval Architecture'," Richard Krautheimer argued that medieval architects transferred the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the West in the form of architectural "copies," translating not only the meaning of the structure, but the locus sanctus of Jerusalem as well. Building on Krautheimer's conclusions, this dissertation addresses the non-architectural movement of place in the Middle Ages, instead tracing its translation through portable media. Though the objects under consideration employ different evocational strategies, all relate to the cult of relics, all have strong site-specific affinities, and all translate place into visual form. The chronology extends from Late Antiquity through the Middle Byzantine period, straddling Iconoclasm, and offering a diachronic analysis of tactics for the imaging and incarnation of surrogate places in different periods.;Krautheimer observed that the Holy Sepulchre was reproduced in Europe through the dissolution of the original structure into its constituent units and their reorganization in multiple, serial surrogates. Taking this process of transfer as a structural model, this dissertation is organized under three thematics: Part one addresses objects that enact the replication of place through serialization, part two, those that facilitate the fragmentation and dispersion of place, and part three, those that codify place through small-scale architectural mimesis. Practically, these categories translate into three case studies: early Byzantine pilgrimage paraphernalia associated with Syrian stylites, fragments and reliquaries of the True Cross from the period around Iconoclasm, and Middle Byzantine micro-architectural reliquaries relating to Saint Demetrios of Thessaloniki.;Despite their differences, these objects lend themselves well to an expanded art historical conception of place in the Middle Ages. The project draws the so-called minor arts into dialogue with geography, architecture, and the broader network of medieval power relations. By delving into questions of function, it views these artifacts as active agents in the development of notions of what a holy place was and how it operated. Ultimately, it aims to understand how these objects enacted surrogate loci through circulation and in the discourse on place beginning from an analysis of concrete objects rather than abstract theoretical models. |
