Birth, Death and Protective Imagery in a Rock-hewn Church from Tenth-century Cappadocia, lecture by Niamh Bhalla (Northeastern University - London), The Courtauld, Vernon Square Campus, November 15, 2023, 5:30 pm

Life was unpredictable, and often precarious, for the people of medieval Byzantium. Life expectancies were low and mortality rates high, particularly for young children and pregnant women. The world was perceived as a fraught dialectic between good and evil forces as Christians awaited the full implementation of Christ’s victory at the Second Coming. Securing divine protection in the meantime could determine the outcome for you and your loved ones, particularly in the face of illness and the bearing of healthy children. Very often, all that remains of the cycles of existential threat, fear and trust in God experienced by medieval people are the objects of material culture through which they sought divine protection. In this paper, Dr Niamh Bhalla will explore the image of the Nativity in the tenth-century church of Eğri Taş, in the Peristrema Valley of Cappadocia in rural Turkey, as an indexical trace of the community that once came to secure God’s protection aided by the potent imagery there. The palpable emphasis on the theme of childbearing in this funerary church that hosted many graves, including those of women and children, through an unusual and extended infancy cycle along with the inclusion of powerful elements such as prophylactic names and the SATOR palindrome within images related to Christ’s birth, will be interpreted as the employment of persuasive visual analogies in response to the struggles that families faced in the community.

Dr Niamh Bhalla is Associate Professor in Art History and Assistant Dean at Northeastern University - London.