Owen Jones and Byzantium

Illustration: Byzantine Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.

Owen Jones placed the chapter on Byzantine Ornament between that of the Roman and Arabian in his 1856 book entitled The Grammar of Ornament. This chapter sequence was always important to Jones as it set out his theories of who influenced who and who followed who, both culturally and historically. He saw the decorative style of Byzantium as following on from the Roman phase and being an important element of the following Islamic decorative style.

Illustration: Byzantine Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.

To Jones Byzantine decoration was seen as a fusion of classical Roman decoration, which in turn he saw as being heavily influenced by an influx of semi-styles imported from various corners of the empire, and that of the oriental Greek world which made up most of the eastern half of the empire including important political and cultural areas such as Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine and Egypt. Jones saw this fusion as a natural progression and as a form of symbiosis whereby the two parts of the old classical Mediterranean world, that of the Roman and the Greek, came together to form the foundation of the future twin reflections of the decorative medieval world, Christianity and Islam.

Intriguingly Jones wondered whether another element outside of the Roman and Greek spheres might also have been added to the hybrid style that was Byzantium. He states that Persian artisans regularly worked within the architectural and decorative industries in Constantinople itself. He was convinced that he could recognise elements within the old city that were directly produced by, or at least inspired by those Persian workers.

Illustration: Byzantine Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.

Interestingly it was probably Islamic design that was the most effected by, and incorporated large elements of, the Byzantine style. There are very close similarities between the two cultures, at least in the early Islamic phase especially within architecture and interior decoration. The great Islamic icons that are associated with the culture, such as the dome in architecture and mosaic and ceramic tile work in decoration, owe their origin, at least in some respect, to that of Byzantium. The decorative and architectural style of Islam allowed the influence of Byzantium to spread much further than the borders of its rapidly shrinking empire. From North Africa to Central Asia and beyond, the early style of Byzantium was copied, re-ordered and re-energised to serve another religion and another culture.

Illustration: Byzantine Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.

Without Byzantium, Jones thought that the medieval Christian and Islamic decorative arts would be the poorer. He believed that the transition from the imperial Roman architectural and interior style would have been that much more difficult to achieve for two distinct but related cultures that share much more than they are sometimes willing to admit. Both are in debt to Byzantium, which today is often seen as a relatively odd, but exotic lost world that relates only vaguely to European and Islamic culture and decoration.

Further reading links:
The Grammar of Ornament: All 100 Color Plates from the Folio Edition of the Great Victorian Sourcebook of Historic Design (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
The Grammar of Ornament
Grammar of Ornament: A Monumental Work of Art
Byzantine Art (Oxford History of Art)
Art of the Byzantine Era (World of Art)
Glory of Byzantium: Arts and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era, A.D. 843-1261
Byzantine Art (Art of Century)
Early Christian & Byzantine Art: A&I (Art and Ideas)
The Art of the Byzantine Empire 312-1453: Sources and Documents (MART: The Medieval Academy Reprints for Teaching, No. 16)
Early Medieval Art (Oxford History of Art)
Heaven on Earth: Art and the Church in Byzantium
Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557)
Byzantium, 330-1453
Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture (The Yale University Press Pelican History of Art)
Byzantine Art
Early Christian and Byzantine Art
Byzantine Art and Architecture: An Introduction