THE HIDDEN SYMMETRY OF THE PICTORIAL CYCLE OF THE AKATHISTOS HYMN FOR THE VIRGIN PAINTED ON THE SOUTHERN FAÇADE OF THE CHURCH OF THE BEHEADING OF SAINT JOHN PRECURSOR IN THE VILLAGE OF ARBORE

Abstract

In the late ’20s of the last century, Paul Henry noticed signifi cant modifi cations in the order of illustrations to the second (dogmatic) part of the Akathistos Hymn for the Virgin, painted on the southern façade of the church of the Beheading of Saint John Forerunner in the village of Arbore. At that time it seemed to be a unique phenomenon, dictated by „inexplicable whim” of the medieval artist. In favour of this view showed the rest cycles of the Akathistos Hymn in Moldovan monumental painting of the 16th century, where, except for minor changes, dictated by the compositional structure of the façade or by the location of window openings, consecrated by centuries of tradition (and the output from the famous Greek alphabet acrostic!) iron order of the alternation of illustrated stanzas of the hymn remained intact. Recently, at the annual session of 17 December 2009 of the Institute of Art History „George Oprescu” of the Romanian Academy, Constanţa Costea – Romanian art historian of the Middle Ages – has established the exact order of the stanzas of Part II of the Akathistos Hymn for the Virgin of Arbore and demonstrated the twice repetition of the illustration for the 16th stanza in the same painted hymn. This stanza’s illustrations are presented in the beginning of third and fi fth row of the pictures: in the version of Christ Emmanuel surrounded by angels and in very rare version a Cross mounted on the Throne of the Hetimassia, also surrounded by angels. Except Arbore you can fi nd this second version of the illustration for 16th stanza in the painting of the church of the village of Părhăuţi. Rehabilitation of murals painting in the monastery Pherapont in Russia and disclosure of the original painting of the famous icon of Our Lady of Praise with illustrated stanzas of Akathistos of the Assumption Cathedral of Moscow Kremlin (icon no. 1065 in the Kremlin Museums), allowed to consider the violation of the order of stanzas in Akathistos cycle of the church of village Arbore in a broader context. The discovery of the fact that the sequence of illustrations for the stanzas of Akathistos Hymn may be the result of a deliberate assembly and repackaging of illustrations painted in the lateral fi elds of icons of different sizes, made the author to consider in this aspect and the cycle of Akathistos Hymn of the southern façade of the church of Arbore. Thus, he managed to fi nd a clear (almost mathematical!) explanation of the appearance of unexpected way of illustration to Akathistos Hymn’s stanzas in the church of Arbore and in the Moscow icon. Conclusions that the author of the study comes as follows: 1. Dragosh Coman and his aides knew the order of the stanzas – both fi rst and second part – of the Akathistos Hymn. To do this they had enough to make a short walk to the nearby village of Părhăuţi and consider the correct order of illustrations in the local church wall-paintings. Violation of the order of stanzas of the second part of the Akathistos Hymn was intentional. It was connected with a desire to make theological and symbolic content at these paintings, available only to initiates. 2. From the structure of the location of the upper half of the icon Our Lady of Praise with illustrated stanzas of Akathistos of the Assumption Cathedral of Moscow Kremlin we can get the location of illustrations for the stanzas of the third and fi fth row of pictorial cycle of the Akathistos Hymn for the Virgin of the southern façade of the church of Arbore. 3. A very big role – in creating a new location of illustrations for the Akathistos Hymn for the Virgin of the southern façade of the church of Arbore – has a medieval mathematical mysticism of numbers and geometrical fi gures. All sorts of combinations of geometric fi gures were close to the medieval architects and artists due to the specifi cs of their work with different kinds of drawings, models, decals and so on.