2013IV serie - anno III, 2013 Spedizione postale gruppo IV 70%

SilvanaEditoriale

IV serie - anno III, 2013

IV serie - anno III, 2013

SilvanaEditoriale

DistribuzioneSilvana EditorialeVia Margherita De Vizzi, 8620092 Cinisello Balsamo, MilanoTel. 02 6172464 / 02 66046005Fax 02 6172464www.silvanaeditoriale.it

Direzione editorialeDario Cimorelli

Coordinamento e graficaPiero Giussani

Riproduzioni, stampa e rilegaturaArti Grafiche Amilcare Pizzi SpA, 20092 Cinisello Balsamo, Milano

Finito di stampare nel dicembre 2013

Arte medievalePeriodico annualeIV serie - anno III, 2013© Sapienza Università di Roma

Direttore responsabileMarina Righetti

Direzione, RedazioneDipartimento di Storia dell’arte e SpettacoloSapienza Università di RomaP.le Aldo Moro, 5 - 00185 RomaTel. 0039 06 49913409-49913949e-mail: artemedievale@uniroma1.itwww.artemedievale.it

I testi proposti per la pubblicazione dovranno essere redatti secondo le norme adot-tate nella rivista e consultabili nel suo sito. Essi dovranno essere inviati, completi dicorredo illustrativo (immagini in .tif o .jpg ad alta risoluzione di 300 dpi in un for-mato adatto alla leggibilità) e riassunto, per essere sottoposti all’approvazione delComitato Scientifico al seguente indirizzo: artemedievale@uniroma1.itLa rivista, impegnandosi a garantire in ogni fase il principio di terzietà della valuta-zione, adotta le vigenti procedure internazionali di peer review, con l’invio di cia-scun contributo pervenuto, in forma anonima, a due revisori anch’essi anonimi.Il collegio stabile dei revisori scientifici della rivista, che si avvale di studiosi interna-zionali esperti nei diversi ambiti della storia dell’arte medievale, può essere di voltain volta integrato con ulteriori valutatori qualora ciò sia ritenuto utile o necessarioper la revisione di contributi di argomento o taglio particolare. La Direzione dellarivista conserva, sotto garanzia di assoluta riservatezza, la documentazione relativa alprocesso di valutazione, e si impegna a pubblicare con cadenza regolare sulla rivistastessa l’elenco dei valutatori che hanno collaborato nel biennio precedente.

Valutatori del biennio 2012-2013:Rosa Alcoy, Universitat de BarcelonaCaroline A. Bruzelius, Duke University, DurhamGaetano Curzi, Università degli Studi ‘G. d’Annunzio’, ChietiClario Di Fabio, Università degli Studi di GenovaEnrica Neri, Università degli Studi di PerugiaFrancesco Noci, Sapienza Università di RomaGiulia Orofino, Università degli Studi di Cassino e del Lazio MeridionaleSilvia Pasi (†), Alma Mater Studiorum, Università di Bologna

Autorizzazione Tribunale di Roma n. 241/2002 del 23/05/2002

In copertina: Fossanova, Polo medievale del MuseoArcheologico di Priverno, frammento di repositoriomarmoreo con iscrizione.

Comitato promotore

F. Avril, B. Brenk, F. Bucher, A. Cadei, W. Cahn, V.H. Elbern,H. Fillitz, M.M. Gauthier, C. Gnudi, L. Grodecki, J. Hubert, E. Kitzinger,

L. Pressouyre, A.M. Romanini, W. Sauerländer, L. Seidel,P. Skubiszewski, H. Torp, J. White, D. Whitehouse

Comitato direttivo

M. Righetti, A.M. D’Achille, A. Iacobini, A. Tomei

Comitato scientifico

M. Andaloro, F. Avril, X. Barral i Altet, M. Bonfioli, G. Bonsanti, B. Brenk, S. Casartelli Novelli,A.M. D’Achille, M. D’Onofrio, V.H. Elbern, F. Gandolfo, A. Guiglia, A. Iacobini, H.L. Kessler,

A. Peroni, P.F. Pistilli, P. Piva, F. Pomarici, A.C. Quintavalle, R. Recht,M. Righetti, S. Romano, A. Segagni, A. Tomei, H. Torp, G. Wolf

Redazione

R. Cerone, A. Cosma, C. D’Alberto, B. Forti, M.T. Gigliozzi, F. Manzari,S. Moretti, M.R. Rinaldi, E. Scungio

Questo numero è dedicato – a un anno dalla scomparsa –al ricordo di Giovanni Lorenzoni (1931-2012),

membro sin dalla fondazione del Comitato direttivoe autore di uno dei contributi del primo volume della prima serie

SOMMARIO

CRITICA

9 Das ikonographische Programm von Lagurka. Überlegungenzu der symbolischen Verbindung der dargestellten SzenenMarina Kevkhishvili

25 L’abbazia di S. Giovanni in Venere attraversola documentazione dell’Archivio della Congregazionedell’Oratorio di S. Filippo Neri di RomaMaria Cristina Rossi

43 Il trittico perduto e ritrovato di Amaseno. Un contributoper la pittura del XIII secolo nel Lazio meridionaleLorenzo Riccardi

73 Corpus vero Domini defertur in turribus:il repositorio di FossanovaMarina Righetti

87 Studio ricostruttivo del repositorio di FossanovaAntonio Leopardi

91 La policromia del repositorio di Fossanova:studio tecnico e ipotesi ricostruttiveEliana Billi

99 Un anonimo minimus [frater?] nell’abbazia di Fossanova.Artista o committente?Stefano Riccioni

105 Tra Roma e Napoli: gli affreschi di S. Giovanni a maree S. Angelo dei Marzi a GaetaEleonora Chinappi

121 Il Maestro del Coro Scrovegni e il suo corpusMarco D’Attanasio

145 Concerning Lippo Memmi’s Late ShopJoseph Polzer

169 Más sobre Rafael Destorrents: el Liber de Angelisde Ramón Llull conservado en la BayerischeStaatsbibliothek de MunichJosefina Planas

MATERIALI

XXIIE CONGRÈS INTERNATIONAL DES ÉTUDES BYZANTINES,SOFIA 22-27 AOÛT 2011

TABLE RONDE:LE MOSAÏQUE BYZANTINE ET SA DIFFUSION (XIE-XIIE SIÈCLES):TRAVAIL, TECHNIQUES ET MATÉRIAUX, RESTAURATION

185 IntroduzioneAntonio Iacobini

193 The Mosaics of Venice and the Venetian Lagoon:Thirty-five Years of Research at TorcelloIrina Andreescu-Treadgold

207 The Study and Restoration of Kyiv Mosaics(11th-12th Centuries))Nelia Kukovalska - Anatolii Ostapchuk

223 La mosaïque de GuélatiLeila Khuskivadzé

237 I volti delle botteghe bizantine. Nuove osservazioni e conclusioni sulle tecniche dei mosaicisti nella Cappella Palatina di PalermoBeat Brenk

257 Crusader Wall Mosaics in the Holy Land.Gustav Kühnel’s Work in the Church of the Nativity in BethlehemAnastasia Keshman

271 Le chantier du décor en mosaïques de la cathédrale de MonrealeSulamith Brodbeck

287 Les icônes à mosaïque médiobyzantinesItalo Furlan

299 Restauro musivo e documentazione archivistica (1700-1900): il caso dell’ItaliaAndrea Paribeni

257

This paper describes the personal contri-bution of the late Professor GustavKühnel (4.3.1942-10.7.2009) to the

study of the Crusader wall paintings andmosaics in the church of the Nativity inBethlehem. Professor Kühnel’s study and hispublications on the subject are indispensable tothe field and attest to his deep and continuingendeavor concerning the complex questionsposed by the Nativity church.

INTRODUCTION – THE HISTORY OF THE CHURCH

The Bethlehem basilica of the Nativity is one ofthe earliest churches ever built [1]. It was erect-ed over the grotto of the Nativity at the time ofConstantine the Great. The major body of thebuilding still stands today, keeping the outlinesof the basilica as it was built in the early fourthcentury with fifth or sixth century changes.2

From the time of its construction until the pres-ent, the building has been in continuous useboth for liturgical and pilgrimage purposes. Asin the case of other major Christian shrines in theHoly Land, the church was divided between dif-ferent Christian denominations: Greek Ortho-dox, Franciscans (the Roman Catholic monasticorder that functions as the custodian of the holyplaces in the Holy Land) and Armenians. Thepresent terms of use of the church are regulatedby a nineteenth century status quo agreement(issued by the Turkish Sultan in imperialdecrees, firmans, of 1852 and 1853 and con-firmed by the British Mandate in 1929).3 The sta-tus quo means that no change in the order of theliturgical routine, cleaning, or repair of the struc-ture or its decoration is allowed without theagreement of all three parties.4

In view of the difficulty in reaching any agree-ment, as well as the continuous flow of pil-

grims, it is almost impossible to excavate orrestore any part of the church. The most signif-icant excavations were made during the BritishMandate, when in spite of the status quo, the‘Orthodox wall’ in front of the triconch wasremoved and the early Christian floor mosaicswere revealed [2].5 A second stage of excava-tions was made by the Franciscan friar, FatherBellarmino Bagatti, in the years 1949-1950under Jordanian jurisdiction.6 Since 1994, thebasilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem is withinthe Territory of the Palestinian Authority,which means that no Israeli citizen is allowed tovisit the place without special permission fromthe Israeli and Palestinian police. To this, oneshould add that Bethlehem is no longer a citywith a Christian majority: more than 70% of itspopulation is Muslim and the Christian popula-tion is constantly declining. At the same timethe number of pilgrims is constantly increasing.

THE CRUSADER CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY –THE ICONOGRAPHIC SCHEME OF THE INTERIORDECORATION

The Nativity church in Bethlehem was used bythe Crusaders as their coronation church priorto 1131 and, accordingly, they invested consid-erable artistic efforts to embellish the buildingduring the medieval period. However, unlikethe church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Nativitychurch was not rebuilt by the Crusaders, butpreserved in its early Christian shape. However,much effort was invested in its interior decora-tion. As attested by the fifteenth century pil-grim Felix Fabri, the result was magnificent.«This wall [of the Nativity church], from thecolumns as far as the windows, is not painted,but inlaid, being adorned with mosaic workwith wondrous art on either side, like the

CRUSADER WALL MOSAICS IN THE HOLY LAND.GUSTAV KÜHNEL’S WORK IN THE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY

IN BETHLEHEM

Anastasia Keshman

«Oh, had anyone then beheld the church of Bethlehemwith all its adornments, he would have been astoundedat its magnificence!»1

church of St. Mark at Venice, with figures fromthe New Testament, and corresponding figuresfrom the Old Testament, and the whole churchin all its walls is either cased with white pol-ished marble, or adorned with mosaic work».7

Thus despite the significant deterioration of themosaics and wall paintings and their poor stateof preservation, it is still true that «the mosaicsand wall paintings in Bethlehem constitute thelargest cycle of monumental decoration in theHoly Land still in existence, albeit fragmen-tary».8 Two major artistic works from this peri-od can be distinguished in the church – the tworesearch foci of Gustav Kühnel – the columnpaintings and the wall mosaics. According toKühnel, all the decorative components createone unified iconographic program.The Crusader iconographic program of thechurch of the Nativity, as reconstructed byGustav Kühnel9 on the basis of existingremains, as well as written and visual evidence10

– the existing fragments are marked with (*) –comprised the following scenes and motifs:

Triconch area:The central apse was decorated in mosaics withthe Virgin, Theotokos Platytera or BlachernitissaEpiskepsis, flanked by the figures of Abrahamand King David, and the Annunciation on the

apse’s arch. On the northern wall between thecentral and the northern apses the Pentecostappeared, while on the parallel southern wallthe Koimesis and the Presentation at theTemple were depicted. Just below the Presen-tation at the Temple, the main dedication in-scription (*) is still preserved,11 written in Greekand Latin (the Latin part is almost entirelyruined).In the southern apse, the Nativity was por-trayed, with the Adoration of Magi on its arch.On the eastern wall was the Entry to Jerusalem(*) and the Transfiguration (*) (preserved onlypartially, namely the figure of the apostleJames). Higher on this wall was the Samaritanwoman at the well, possibly between the win-dows, as well as the seated figure of John theEvangelist (another three evangelists were mostprobably depicted somewhere in the ‘transept’area). The Arrest of Christ was represented onthe western wall, and the figure of Anna wasdepicted south of the window, most probablycorresponding to Joachim, positioned on theopposite wall (near John the Evangelist).In the northern apse the Anastasis presumablyappeared. On the eastern wall of this apseappeared the scenes of the Doubting Thomas(*) and the Ascension (*) (only the lower partwith Mary, two angels and the Apostles is pre-

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1. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, groundplan, 333 and5th or 6th century(from KÜHNEL, WallPainting, fig. 1).

served). According to Kühnel’s reconstruction,scenes from Christ’s Passion – the Washing ofthe Apostles’ Feet, the Last Supper and theCrucifixion – were most probably depicted onthe western wall.

Nave:The walls of the nave covered with themosaics and the painted columns constituteda unified iconographic program comprised offour levels.12

(1) The uppermost, first, level interspersed withthe windows depicts rows of angels (*), pro-ceeding eastward towards the main apse (sixangels survived on the northern wall).(1a) Below the first level a foliated populatedscroll frieze separates the angel row from the sec-ond level. The frieze consists of acanthus leavespopulated with various motifs, includingdiadems, masks, birds, quadrupeds, and hybrids.(2) The second highest level comprises represen-tations of the Church Councils. On the southernwall seven Ecumenical Councils were depicted:First Council of Nicaea (325) (*), First Councilof Constantinople (381) (*), Ephesus (431) (*),Chalcedon (451) (*), Second Council ofConstantinople (553), Third Council of Con-stantinople (680) (*), and the Second Council ofNicaea (787). On the northern wall, parallel tothem, six Provincial Councils appeared:Antiochia (*), Sardika (*), Ankyra (*) (fragmen-tary), Gangara (*) (fragmentary), Karthago, andLaodikeia. The ‘missing’ seventh place on thenorthern wall, in the center of the composition,was filled with an immense decorated crux gem-mata flanked by two trees (*) (the lower part isdamaged). The Councils are depicted as archi-tectural frames, containing altars, Gospel booksand inscriptions of the Council’s decisions (inGreek, only the Second Council of Nicaea was inLatin). All the councils are separated from oneanother by tree-shaped candelabra and vegeta-tive motives.(3) The third level was adorned with rows ofChrist’s ancestors. On the northern wall thisgenealogy was based on Luke 3: 23-28, on thesouthern wall on Matthew 1: 1-16 (*). Some ofthe ancestral figures on the southern wall arestill preserved, identified by names: Azor,Zadok, Achim, Eleazar, Matthan and Jacob.The mosaic on the corresponding level of thewestern wall (the entrance wall) had a depictionof the Tree of Jesse, showing Christ’s descentfrom the House of David.

(4) The column painting presents the fourth,lowest, level of decoration. It consists of repre-sentations of saints (*). Twenty-nine saints arepainted on twenty-seven of the forty-fourcolumns in the basilical part of the church:James the Greater, Bartholomew, TheotokosGlykophylusa, Blasius, Anne-Nikopoia, Leo,Marina (Margaret II), Theotokos Hodegetria,Theodosius, Sabas, Stephen, Knute, Olaf,Vincent, John the Baptist, Elijah, Onuphrius,Fusca, Marina (Margaret I), Macarius, Anthony,Euthymius, George, Leonard, Cosmas, Damian,Catald, Theotokos Galaktotrophusa, John theEvangelist and probably the Crucifixion scene.13

The column paintings combine clearly Easternand Western iconography and style.

Grotto:There is also a mosaic in the apse in the grottoof the Nativity in the crypt, depicting the sceneof the Nativity (*), mainly damaged in its upperpart, but still clearly visible. The mosaic visual-izes the sacred event that took place, accordingto Christian belief, at this very place.

All components in the Crusader decoration pro-gram – the triconch, the nave and the grotto, thewall mosaics and the column paintings – shouldbe seen as part of a common decorative plan, anadaptation of the ‘classical’ Byzantine scheme14 tothe early Christian basilica, to the specific locussanctus and to a unique political situation in theCrusader state.15 This program embodies simulta-neously the commemoration of the birthplace ofChrist and the genealogy of the Messiah, the

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2. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, BritishMandateexcavations (Greekwall removed, floormosaic discoveredAugust 1934)(photo Libraryof Congress, Prints& PhotographsDivision [LC-DIG-matpc-03152]).

glorification of the Theotokos and the ChristianChurch as an institution, and it also expressesand urge towards the unification of the Easternand Western Christianity under Crusader rule.

GUSTAV KÜHNEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO THE

STUDY OF THE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY

IN BETHLEHEM

Stages of WorkDuring research for his PhD thesis, GustavKühnel managed to gain permission from allthree denominations to study the Crusaderpaintings in the church.16 His work was con-ducted in three phases:17 (1) first, in 1979, heconcentrated on the column paintings. At thisstage, Gustav Kühnel, not yet a PhD, wasallowed to bring a spotlight and a ladder intothe basilica, in order to obtain high quality pho-tographs. He worked mainly during the night,when no pilgrims were present. The results ofhis research on the Crusader decoration of the

Nativity basilica were submitted to Tel-AvivUniversity as a PhD dissertation in 1980(accepted with summa cum laude).18 The nexttwo stages were devoted to the wall mosaics: (2)during 1981 and (3) in June-July 1983.19 The lasttwo campaigns were supported by theDeutsches Archäologisches Institut and theGörres-Gesellschaft.20 Unprecedentedly, GustavKühnel was granted permission to build 15-meter moving scaffolds, lent by the GermanSociety of the Holy Land [3].21

During the second stage of work on the mosaicshe had the possibility to wash, study and photo-graph the Councils’ representations in the sec-ond zone of the nave and the mosaics in the tri-conch area. The third stage concentrated on thehighest register in the nave: the figures of theangels between the windows of the north walland the foliated frieze underneath. For that pur-pose an additional stepladder was put on top ofthe 15-meter high-scaffolding.22 He cleaned themosaic with great care, ‘only water and tooth-brushes were used’, no restorations were made.23

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3. Bethlehem,June-July 1983,Gustav Kühnel onthe scaffolding inthe church of theNativity (fromKÜHNEL, WallPainting, Pl. I).

Results of the Work – New Discoveriesand UnderstandingPreviously to Gustav Kühnel’s work in theNativity basilica, research was based on blackand white photographs of dirty mosaics. Afterthe painful work invested in cleaning and pho-tographing them, the mosaics were revealedfrom under the dirt and oblivion [4-5]. It nowbecame possible to study and to understandthem as never before.

1) Dating of the MosaicsIn the 1930s Henri Stern dated most of themosaics of the northern wall of the nave (espe-cially the representations of the Councils andthe candelabras in between) to around the year700, based on the stylistic parallel betweenthem and the mosaics of the Dome of theRock.24 After the cleaning, many unknown ele-ments – crowns, masks, birds, animals, and allkinds of fictional creatures – came to light,

CRUSADER WALL MOSAICS IN THE HOLY LAND. GUSTAV KÜHNEL’S WORK IN THE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY IN BETHLEHEM

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4. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, nave, northwall, the BasiliusAngel, beforeand after cleaning(a. photo IsraelAntiquitiesAuthority, b. photoGustav KühnelArchive).

broadening the basis for comparison.25 Thesenew elements differ greatly from the Umayyadmosaics of the Dome of the Rock. They alsooffered opportunities for closer comparisons,indicating affinities with the Western Europeanart of the twelfth century.26

A close examination made it possible to furthernote that:a. there are no seams (or stitches) between dif-ferent parts of the mosaics;27

b. all tesserae are made in the same manner;28

c. there are no differences in the color palettesof the different zones;29

d. there are no stylistic differences that couldnot be explained by a change of hands;

e. and finally no signs of restoration of theCouncils mosaic panels were detected.30

While according to Stern, not all the mosaicswere made at the same time (some belonging tothe late seventh-early eighth century, others to

ANASTASIA KESHMAN

5. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, southernapse east wall,Apostle James fromthe Transfigurationscene, before (leftpage) and during(right page) thecleaning(a.b. photo GustavKühnel Archive).

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the Crusader period), Gustav Kühnel was ableto demonstrate that there are no significanttime gaps between the northern and the south-ern walls, and all the mosaics were made duringthe Crusader period.31

On stylistic and historical grounds GustavKühnel argued that the mosaics in the churchwere made between mid 1150s (most probably1156 when Ralph became bishop of Bethle-hem) and the late 1160s.32 This dating fits well

the span between the two dates attested byinscriptions in the church itself:33 1130 (on oneof the columns)34 and 1169 (on the main dedi-catory inscription in the central apse right ofthe present-day iconostasis). This last inscrip-tion mentions the Byzantine emperor ManuelComnenus, the king of Jerusalem Amalrich(Amaury), the bishop of Bethlehem Raoul(Ralph), and an artist with the name of Ephremthe Monk.35

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2) The MosaicistsGustav Kühnel showed that the stylistic differ-ence between the south and the north walls,attributed by Stern to a gap of five hundredyears in time, is mainly due to the fact that thestate of preservation of the southern wall is farworse than that of the northern one, and that,as a result, the tesserae there were damagedmore from dust and rain. No other significantdifference was detected between the two walls,neither in type and colors of materials used, norin the manner of attaching the tesserae, northeir inclination angle on the wall.In addition to the artist mentioned in the maininscription at the bema (Ephrem the Monk),Gustav Kühnel was able to outline the identityof the second artist, who worked on the south-ern wall. During the last campaign, a Syriacinscription was discovered under the nine-teenth century layer of plaster at the right-handside of the ‘Basilius-Angel’, near the Latininscription Basilius pictor which was knownpreviously [4]. This inscription reads from topto bottom: «sar Basil msm» (painted [by] Basil[the] deacon).36 Thus, it appears that a numberof mosaicists (or workshops led by them)worked simultaneously in the church.37 The dif-ference in style should be explained by the dif-ferent hands (of artists or workshops) that laidthe mosaics simultaneously on two parallelwalls of the church and possibly used differentmodels.38

3) The Foundation of a New Field of StudyAfter conducting comprehensive studies of allthe known Crusader paintings and mosaics inBethlehem, Abu-Gosh and elsewhere, GustavKühnel was able to define a new field of study:monumental Crusader wall painting in theHoly Land.39 Before him, Crusader researchwas limited to architecture, sculpture andminiature illumination and did not includemonumental painting. The study of theBethlehem column paintings and wall mosaicspaved the way to a systematic study of otherpaintings and mosaics executed during thetwelfth century in the Holy Land. Inner stylis-tic chronology of the corpus of Crusader mon-umental painting made it possible to attributeand to date fragmented Crusader paintings,such as the image of Christ from theAscension mosaic in the Golgotha chapel, orthe detail of an angel head found inGethsemane.40 Gustav Kühnel’s personal ded-

ication and determination changed not onlythe way the wall mosaics of the Bethlehembasilica of the Nativity are understood, butalso Crusader art in general. Crusader art wasoften seen as an export of Western Europeantaste to the Levant. Comprising monumentalpainting in the study of the Crusader art con-siderably emphasized the Byzantine and localelements in it as well.41

In 1988 Gustav Kühnel published his bookWall Painting in the Latin Kingdom ofJerusalem. In this book he promised to publishthe mosaics in a second volume. This secondvolume never appeared. Some of his conclu-sions were published in different articles inGerman, which are, regrettably, little known tothe wide scientific community.42 CurrentlyBianca Kühnel is finishing the edition of histext, completing the manuscript and preparingit for publication. We all hope to see this bookin print soon.

THE NATIVITY CHURCH TODAY

In the years which followed Gustav Kühnel’swork, some changes occurred in the Nativitychurch. First, it passed from the jurisdiction ofthe State of Israel to that of the PalestinianAuthority. In the year 2002 armed Palestiniansentered the church with a group of hostages.After a tense period of thirty-eight days ofsiege, the armed men were forced to leave.According to the church authorities, no seriousdamage was done, except for leaving thechurch very dirty.In the late 1990s, following an initiative of G.Kühnel, a group of German experts, engineersand architects, headed by Professor FritzWenzel from the Faculty of Architecture at theTechnical University of Karlsruhe, examinedthe roof of the Nativity basilica. They wrote aworried report (published in 1997): «The lifeexpectancy of lead roofs is generally around150 years. The existing covering originates, forthe most part, from the late fifteenth century.The service life of this roof is thus exceededmore than threefold». The conclusions of theexperts were definite: «Urgent repair work isrequired in order to protect the remainingparts of the interior [including the mosaics andwall paintings], the wooden roof structurefrom the fifteenth century and to ensure thesafety of visitors to the church».43

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After eleven more years, in 2008, the basilicawas placed in the ‘Watch List of the 100 MostEndangered Sites’ by the World MonumentsFund of UNESCO. As a direct consequence, inSeptember 2010, thirteen years after theGerman report, a historical agreementbetween the three church denominations wasreached to repair the roof. The agreement onthe restoration of the roof was signed by thethree ‘joint landlords’: the Custos of the HolyLand, Father Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the GreekOrthodox Patriarch Theophilos III and therepresentative of the Armenian PatriarchTorkom II Manoogian. The ceremony tookplace in the presence of the Palestinian PrimeMinister, Mr. Salam Fayyad, and Mr. Ziad AlBandak, advisor to the President MahmoudAbbas for Christian Affairs and also chairmanof the committee. Massive scaffolding was builtand a team of experts (including a mosaicexpert) was able to examine the roof, the wallsand the mosaics from close up. One of theexperts was Prof. Michele Bacci from theUniversity of Siena, to whom I wish to expressmy gratitude who readily and generouslyagreed to share his personal materials, photo-graphs and knowledge of the present state ofthe mosaics in Bethlehem.Comparing the original slides made by GustavKühnel with the fresh digital photos of Michele

Bacci taken in 2010, it can be noticed that thestate of preservation of the mosaics today is vis-ibly worse than after the cleaning in the early1980s [6-7]. Almost thirty years of dirt, sootand rain leaking through the roof during thewinter months have damaged the mosaics con-siderably.Today the basilica is facing a new stage ofrestoration initiated by the PalestinianAuthority, to be carried out by an Italian team.However, a visitor to the church today knowsabout the restoration only through the massivesignboard over the façade. In spite of all thepromises, nothing has yet been done. At thepresent, the roof, some of the walls and themosaics are in a very bad state and still deterio-rating. As Raymond Cohen accurately stated,«maintenance of the roof and mosaics, so sus-ceptible to decay, has been a recurrent problemfrom that day [the day the church of theNativity in Bethlehem was erected] to this».44

For now one can only repeat the words of thefifteenth century pilgrim Felix Fabri, describ-ing the terrible state of the church of theNativity in Bethlehem at the time of his visit:«The precious pictures are dropping from thewalls, and there is no one to restore them. Yetwe are thankful that the body of the church isstill standing».45

Recently, by the end of June, 2012, some good

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6. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, south wall,Jacob from the rowof Christ’s ancestors:comparison of thephotographs madeby Gustav Kühnelin the 1983 (left)and Michele Bacciin 2010 (right)(a. photo GustavKühnel Archive,b. photo courtesyof Michele Bacci).

news arrived: the church of the Nativity inBethlehem was declared a UNESCO culturaltreasure, being the first Palestinian site on theUNESCO World Heritage List.46 Hopefully,this will facilitate the much needed restorationof the building and the mosaics.In conclusion I would like to stress, thatalthough Gustav Kühnel cleaned and studiedthe mosaics, he did not restore them in anyway.47 Only in one place did he carefully scrapeaway the plaster in order to reveal the Syriacinscription with the name of the artist. Newexaminations based on modern technologyscans, shared with me generously by Prof.Bacci, showed that more tesserae are hiddenbeneath the plaster in the church.48

APPENDIX

Still, one more argument should be added tothis discussion. The Russian abbot Daniel, whovisited the Holy Land in the early twelfth cen-tury (1107-1108) left a description in OldRussian of the church of the Nativity inBethlehem:«And near here is the place of the Nativity ofChrist (…). Here above this holy cave a greatchurch has been built in the form of a cross andits roof is raised up on arches and the church is

covered with tin and is decorated with mosaics.It has eight round marble columns and is pavedwith white marble slabs. (…) The cave and themanger where Christ’s nativity took place arebeneath the great altar like a great cavern, beau-tifully made. (…) These places, the Nativity andthe manger (…) are in the same cave, and thiscave is decorated with mosaic and beautifullypaved».49

Thus, Daniel related that there were mosaics inthe church of the Nativity before the Crusaderwork was done (in the original Russian version,the passage about the mosaics is even more dra-matic, as it says «the church is all decorated withmosaics»).50 I am convinced, this testimonyapplies to the fifth century floor mosaics (thatwere hidden behind the present stone pavementin the eighteenth century), while the ‘pavement’with white marble slabs refers to the wall cover-ings, removed from the walls by the Turks.51

However, one should not completely reject thepossibility that there were some wall mosaicsbefore the Crusaders. The problem withDaniel’s testimony is that it is not clear wherethe mosaics to which he referred were set. As hedescribes the church ‘in the form of a cross’ that‘has eight round marble columns’, while in real-ity the church has fifty columns altogether:52

forty-four columns in the basilical part (fourrows of the eleven columns each), four in the tri-

ANASTASIA KESHMAN

7. Bethlehem,church of theNativity, north wall,angels, detail:comparison of thephotographs madeby Gustav Kühnelin the 1983 (left)and Michele Bacciin 2010 (right)(a. photo GustavKühnel Archive,b. photo courtesyof Michele Bacci).

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conch area, and two more positioned in themain apse at the entrances to the grotto of theNativity. Moreover, the central four columns ofthe triconch area are not round, but are heart-shaped in cross-section. Assuming that Daniel’saccount is accurate in all that relates to architec-tural details, measurements and proportions, Iwould like to make a cautious suggestion. The‘Orthodox wall’ built in the nineteenth centuryseparated the triconch structure from the nave.The forty-four column hall became in a way anextraordinarily large ‘narthex’ leading to the‘shortened’ church, a centralized shape of amoderate size more suitable for GreekOrthodox liturgical needs. The triconch wascalled the Katholikon (i.e. the main church) inthe Cust memorandum in the early twentieth

NOTES

This paper was prepared with the collaboration of Prof.Bianca Kühnel, my teacher and mentor, to whom I wish toexpress my deepest gratitude for imbuing in me her passionfor medieval art and for the years in which she shared herwisdom, open, exploring mind, and indulgent patience withme. An early version of this paper, dedicated to the memoryof Prof. Gustav Kühnel, was presented at the round table Lamosaïque byzantine et sa diffusion (XIe-XIIe siècles): tra-vail, technique et matériaux, restauration at the 22nd

International Congress of Byzantine Studies, Sofia, Bulgaria,22-27 August 2011.

1 The Book of the Wanderings of Brother Felix Fabri (circa1480-1483 A.D.) («Palestine Pilgrims’ Text Society», 20),translated by A. Stewart, London 1896, I, part II, p. 180a.2 It was first attested by the Pilgrim from Bordeaux in theyear 333. The edifice underwent considerable reconstruc-tion of its eastern part when the octagonal ‘mausoleum’above the cave was replaced by a triconchal structure. Inaddition, the main corpus of the basilica was prolonged tothe west: one span of columns was added and the narthexreplaced the great atrium. The date of this importantchange is not entirely clear. Usually it is dated to theJustinian period, but it is likely that it took place earlier,already in the fifth century. The floor mosaics (that are hid-den today beneath the eighteenth century pavement) areusually dated to the fifth century based on stylisticgrounds. See: W. HARVEY ET ALII, The Church of theNativity in Bethlehem, Oxford 1910; L.-H. VINCENT, F.-M.ABEL, Bethléem: le sanctuaire de la Nativité, Paris 1914; L.-H. VINCENT, Bethléem: le sanctuaire de la Nativité d’aprèsles fouilles récentes, «Revue Biblique», XLV (1936), pp.551-574 and XLVI (1937), pp. 93-121; R.W. HAMILTON,The Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem: A Guide, Jerusalem1947; B. BAGATTI, Gli antichi edifici sacri di Betlemme inseguito agli scavi e restauri praticati dalla Custodia di TerraSanta (1948-51) («Pubblicazioni dello Studium BiblicumFranciscanum, Collectio Maior», 9), Jerusalem 1952; ID.,The Church from the gentiles in Palestine; history andarchaeology («Pubblicazioni dello Studium BiblicumFranciscanum, Collectio Minor», 4), Jerusalem 1971; D.CHEN, The Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem: The Designof Justinian’s Plan, «Liber Annuus», XXXIX (1979), pp.

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century,53 while the nave was used as a market.54

So it seems Daniel referred only to the centralarea of the triconch, the ‘transept’, even thoughnot all of its columns are round. There is, admit-tedly, no evidence of any kind of a separation inthe medieval basilica of the Nativity, so this mustremain speculation. Gustav Kühnel neverargued that there were no earlier wall mosaics inthe church prior to the Crusader decorationprogram (from the early Christian times or evenlater), even though they were never attested,except for the fifth century floor mosaic pave-ments. One way or another, the presently exist-ing mosaic evidence, so Gustav Kühnel arguedvery unambiguously after his own rigorousresearch, have no traces of any earlier stages ofwork on the walls.

PUBLICATIONS OF GUSTAV KÜHNEL

ON BETHLEHEM MOSAICS AND PAINTINGS,AND RELATED SUBJECTS

– The Column Paintings of the Nativity Church atBethlehem and their Place in the Crusader DecorativeProgramme of the Church, PhD Thesis, Tel-Aviv University,1980 (in Hebrew with English summary).– Die Mosaiken und Säulenmalereien der Geburtskirche inBethlehem: Ein byzantinisches Ausschmückungsprogrammder Kreuzfahrzeit, in «XVI. Internationaler Byzantinisten-kongress, Wien, 4.-9. Oktober 1981», Wien 1981, p. 259.– Neue Forschungen zur Ausmalung der Geburtsbasilika inBethlehem, «Sitzungsberichte: Kunstgeschichtliche Ge-sellschaft zu Berlin», XXXII (1983-1984), pp. 14-16.– Neue Feldarbeiten zur musivischen und malerischenAusstattung der Geburtsbasilika in Bethlehem, «Kunst-chronik», XII (1984), pp. 503-513.– Das Ausschmückungsprogramm der Geburtsbasilika inBethlehem. Byzanz und Abendland im Königreich Jeru-salem, «Boreas», X (1987), pp. 133-149.– Wall Painting in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem(«Frankfurter Forschungen zur Kunst», 14), Berlin 1988.– The Twelfth-Century Decoration of the Church of theNativity: Eastern and Western Concord, in Ancient ChurchesRevealed, ed. by Y. Tsafrir, Jerusalem 1993, pp. 197-203.– Die Konzilsdarstellungen in der Geburtskirche in Be-thlehem: Ihre kunsthistorische Tradition und ihr kirchenpoli-tisch-historischer Hintergrund, «Byzantinische Zeitschrift»,LXXXVI-LXXXVII (1993-1994), pp. 86-107.–Kunstgeschichtliche Überlegungen zu einem neuen Kreuz fürdie Grabeskirche, «Das Münster: Zeitschrift für christlicheKunst und Kunstwissenschaft», L (1997), 3, pp. 238-253.– Between Jerusalem and Bethlehem: The dating of a NewlyRecovered Tessera of Crusader Mosaic Decoration, «JewishArt», XXIII-XXIV (1997-1998) (The Real and IdealJerusalem in Jewish, Christian and Islamic Art, edited byBianca Kühnel), pp. 151-157.– Crusader Monumental Painting and Mosaic, in Knights ofthe Holy Land: The Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, editedby S. Rozenberg, Jerusalem 1999, pp. 202-215.– Palestinian Monasticism and Political Iconography, in TheSabaite Heritage in the Orthodox Church from the FifthCentury to the Present, edited by J. Patrich, Louvain 2001,pp. 353-362.

270-275; R. KRAUTHEIMER, Early Christian and ByzantineArchitecture, Harmondsworth 1986, pp. 59-60, 462 n. 44and pp. 266-267, 491-492 n. 15; Y. TSAFRIR, TheDevelopment of Ecclesiastical Architecture in Palestine, inAncient Churches Revealed, edited by Id., Jerusalem 1993,pp. 1-16; G. KÜHNEL,Wall Painting in the Latin Kingdomof Jerusalem («Frankfurter Forschungen zur Kunst», 14),Berlin 1988, pp. 1-5; ID., The Twelfth-Century Decorationof the Church of the Nativity: Eastern and Western Concord,in Ancient Churches, pp. 197-203: 197-198.3 R. COHEN, Conflict and Neglect: Between Ruin andPreservation at the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, inTowards World Heritage, edited by M. Hall, Farnham 2011,pp. 91-108: 95-97. The British detailed description of thestatus quo, which till the present day often serves as the ulti-mate authority concerning the rights in the holy places ofthe Holy Land was published in a booklet by LionelGeorge Arche Cust, then the district Officer in Jerusalem,entitled The Status Quo in the Holy Places, also known asthe Cust memorandum: L.G.A. CUST, The Status Quo in theHoly Places, facs. ed., Jerusalem 1980, pp. 36-43 (TheChurch of the Nativity at Bethlehem). According to Cohen,the status quo was never a voluntarily accepted agreement,since it was imposed on all the sides, and each and everyone of them was convinced that they were victims of aninjustice: COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 96. On the statusquo in the Nativity church in Bethlehem see also: D. BALDI,The Question of the Holy Places: The Holy Sepulchre,Nativity, Assumption, Jerusalem 1955; R. COHEN, Savingthe Holy Sepulchre: How Rival Christians Came Together toRescue Their Holiest Shrine, Oxford-New York, 2008, pp.22-23 and 87; COHEN, Conflict and Neglect.4 The history of the church under the status quo agreement,i.e. during the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuryunder Ottoman and British Empires, is described in detailby Raymond Cohen. This is a long and painful saga on dis-agreements and even violence between the three denomi-nations, which not only did not help to preserve the churchand its artifacts, but rather led to their gradual dilapida-tion: COHEN, Conflict and Neglect.5 According to the Cust memorandum, the wall was erect-ed in 1842 (CUST, The Status Quo, p. 39), this is also thedate according to COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 95.However an engraving made by William Radclyffe afterThomas Allom shows that the wall was already therebefore 1838 (published in J. CARNE, Syria, The Holy Land,Asia Minor, &c. Illustrated, III, London 1838, p. 83; repro-duced in COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 94). CUST, TheStatus Quo, p. 39: «An unsightly wall built across the eastend by the Orthodox in 1842 was removed at the instiga-tion of the Military Governor in 1919, thereby restoringthe symmetry of the building». For the photos of the wallsee VINCENT, ABEL, Bethléem, pl. III. According to Cohen,the wall was removed in 1918: COHEN, Conflict andNeglect, pp. 95, 103.6 BAGATTI, Gli antichi edifici sacri di Betlemme.7 The Book of the Wanderings of Brother Felix Fabri, I, partII, p. 178b. The wall mosaics in Bethlehem Nativity churchwere attributed by Felix Fabri to Saint Helena, i.e. earlyfourth century.8 KÜHNEL, Twelfth-Century Decoration, p. 199. This is nodoubt the largest medieval mosaic cycle in the Holy Land.The second cycle is preserved in the wall paintings in theCrusader church in Abu-Gosh, see: ID.,Wall Painting, pp.149-180.9 The reconstruction of the original decoration programwas described in detail in G. KÜHNEL, Das Aussch-mückungsprogramm der Geburtsbasilika in Bethlehem:Byzanz und Abendland im Königreich Jerusalem, «Boreas»,X (1987), pp. 133-149: 137-146 and figs. 2-6; ID., Twelfth-

Century Decoration, pp. 199-203 (pp. 199-201: icono-graphic program of the wall mosaic decorations; pp. 201-203: column paintings; p. 203: inscriptions); G. KÜHNEL,Die Konzilsdarstellungen in der Geburtskirche in Bethle-hem: Ihre kunsthistorische Tradition und ihr kirchenpoli-tisch-historischer Hintergrund, «Byzantinische Zeitschrift»,LXXXVI-LXXXVII (1993-1994), pp. 86-107.10 The reconstruction of the Crusader decoration programwas based on number of sources. The major source is thetestimony of Fransiscus Quaresimus from the second quar-ter of the seventeenth century: FRANCISCUS QUARESIMUS,Historica theologica et moralis Terrae Sanctae elucidatio,Antverpiae 1639, II, ch. 6, pp. 592-677. Quaresimusdescribed the church and its wall mosaics as he saw them inthe year 1626: ibid., p. 645. Other sources that helped to fillthe missing gaps are: NICCOLÒ DA POGGIBONSI, Librod’Oltramare («Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, CollectioMaior», 2), edited by B. Bagatti, translated by A. Bacchi(Italian) and T. Bellorini and E. Hoade (English), Jerusalem1945; NICOLAS DE MARTONI, Liber Peregrinationis ad LocaSancta (1394-1395), «Revue de l’Orient Latin», III (1895),pp. 566-669: 611. Another important visual source is theengraving published by Giovanni Giustino Ciampini,depicting the mosaics of the northern wall of the nave: G.G.CIAMPINI, De sacris aedificiis a Constantino Magno construc-tis, Roma 1693, folding plate between pp. 150 and 151.11 Today it can be seen on the southern wall of the mainapse, in front of the present day iconostasis.12 The names of the levels and their division were made byGustav Kühnel, the numbers are mine [A. Keshman].13 For the full explanation of the iconography and style ofthe column paintings, as well as the scheme of saints on thecolumns and their position within the church, see:KÜHNEL,Wall Painting, pp. 5-128 and fig. 3.14 According to Otto Demus’ definition: O. DEMUS, Byzan-tine Mosaic Decoration: Aspects of Monumental Art inByzantium, London 1948.15 KÜHNEL, Twelfth-Century Decoration, p. 199.16 Cleaning and repairing some part of the church, accord-ing to the status quo, means to possess it. For the very dra-matic history of rivalry between parties during the nine-teenth and the twentieth centuries, including cleaning andrestorations see: COHEN, Conflict and Neglect. Against thisbackground, the permission to clean the mosaics gained byGustav Kühnel, an Israeli student and then a teacher atTel-Aviv University, seems nothing short of miraculous.17 G. KÜHNEL, Neue Feldarbeiten zur musivischen undmalerischen Ausstattung der Geburtsbasilika in Bethlehem,«Kunstchronik», XII (1984), pp. 503-513: 510; ID.,Ausschmückungsprogramm, pp. 137-138.18 ID., The Column Paintings of the Nativity Church atBethlehem and their Place in the Crusader DecorativeProgramme of the Church, PhD Thesis, Tel-Aviv University,1980 (Hebrew with English summary).19 The dates are according to ID., Feldarbeiten, pp. 510-511; ID., Ausschmückungsprogramm, pp. 137-138.20 ID., Feldarbeiten, pp. 510-511.21 As Bianca Kühnel recalls: «In spite of the permission, nota single day (and I mean literally: not a single day) passed,without someone coming to Gustav and saying: ‘What areyou doing here?Who gave you permission?!’ It was an every-day struggle to continue the work on the mosaics. Everythingwas gained in very little steps: at the beginning a general per-mission to study the paintings was granted, then he wasallowed to bring in a lamp, then to make photographs, thento build the scaffolds, then to clean themosaics, then to bringa professional photographer. Every step was Gustav’s per-sonal achievement. So much effort he put in creating mutualrelationship of trust with the authorities and with the clergy!Countless cups of coffee and tea had to be shared in order to

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build mutual faith and good working relationships with eachand every one of them. But, also, lifetime friendships wereformed during these months».22 «He was obsessed with these mosaics, – Bianca Kühnelremarks –, simply obsessed!».23 KÜHNEL, Feldarbeiten, p. 512.24 H. STERN, Les Représentations des Conciles dans l'Églisede la Nativité à Bethléem (part 1), «Byzantion», XI (1936),pp. 101-152; ID., Les Représentations des Conciles dansl’Église de la Nativité à Bethléem (part 2), ibid., XIII(1938), pp. 415-459; ID., Nouvelles récherches sur lesimages des Conciles dans l’Église de la Nativité à Bethléem,«Cahiers Archéologiques», III (1948), pp. 82-105; ID.,Encore les mosaiques de l’Église de la Nativité à Bethléem,ibid., IX (1957), pp. 141-145.25 KÜHNEL, Feldarbeiten, p. 511.26 This discovery fits the dating of the angel figures, attributedaccording to stylistic comparisons with Byzantine provincialpainting, to the second half of the twelfth century.27 ID., Twelfth-Century Decoration, p. 200: «This frieze[between the row of angels and the Councils] is of majorimportance in the controversy regarding the dating if thetwo levels, as approached, for example, by the art historianHenri Stern, and is one of the most widely debated questionsin the research of the basilica’s wall decoration. This beingthe case, the intermediary frieze was closely examined on siteand in the photographs for traces of later adaptations, deter-mining categorically that the tesserae are continuously set.No interruption or alteration is visible between the wall’suppermost level and the level of the provincial Councils».28 Ibid., p. 201.29 Ibid., p. 201.30 As argued by Stern, see KÜHNEL, Feldarbeiten, p. 511.31 Ibid., p. 511; KÜHNEL, Twelfth-Century Decoration, pp.200-201.32 On dating of the Crusader decoration in the church ofthe Nativity in Bethlehem, according to stylistic analysis,see: ID.,Wall Painting, pp. 128-147.33 On the inscriptions see: ID., Twelfth-Century Decoration,p. 203; ID.,Wall Painting, pp. 4-5 and 146.34 Ibid., pp. 18 and 138. See also A. CUTLER, Ephraïm,Mosaicist of Bethlehem: The Evidence from Jerusalem,«Jewish Art», XII-XIII (1986-1987), pp. 179-183.35 KÜHNEL, Feldarbeiten; ID., Ausschmückungsprogramm,pp. 146-147, n. 44. In the Latin inscription, the CrusaderKing is mentioned first and the Byzantine emperor second,while in the Greek inscription it is the other way around.36 This translation (diaconos) ibid., pp. 148-149, n. 47.Earlier Gustav Kühnel thought msm stood for the prove-nance of the artist in Syria (contraction for name of the vil-lage Moschem in Syria, the provenance of the artist): ID.,Feldarbeiten, p. 512.37 One led by Basilius a ‘Byzantine’ artist, the second byEphrem the ‘local’ one: ID., Between Jerusalem andBethlehem: The dating of a Newly Recovered Tessera ofCrusader Mosaic Decoration, «Jewish Art», XIII-XIV (1997-1998) (The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian andIslamic Art, edited by Bianca Kühnel), pp. 151-157: 155.«They [the stylistic differences between the northern andsouthern walls] should be considered as the result of differ-ent artists or groups of artists consciously using a variety ofmodes of expression, thus creating the stylistic diversity thatis characteristic of the Crusader decoration in the Church ofthe Nativity»: ID., Twelfth-Century Decoration, p. 201. Onegroup used Macedonian and other the Comnenian models.The same thing is also true about the mosaics of the tri-conch’s southern and northern apses: Doubting Thomas vs.Entrance to Jerusalem. The same difference also can be seenon the column-paintings: ID., Feldarbeiten, p. 511; ID.,Ausschmückungsprogramm, pp. 142-143.

38 See Appendix.39 ID.,Wall Painting.40 ID., Between Jerusalem and Bethlehem; ID., CrusaderMonumental Painting and Mosaic, in Knights of the HolyLand: The Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, edited by S.Rozenberg, Jerusalem 1999, pp. 202-215.41 A number of publications by other scholars were madepossible by Gustav Kühnel’s discoveries: L.-A. HUNT, Artand Colonialism: The Mosaics of the Church of the Nativityin Bethlehem (1169) and the Problem of ‘Crusader Art’,«Dumbarton Oaks Papers», XLV (1991), pp. 69-85; A.JOTISCHKY, Manuel Comnenus and the Reunion of theChurches: The Evidence of the Conciliar Mosaics in theChurch of the Nativity in Bethlehem, «Levant», XXVI(1994), pp. 207-223.42 Thus, for example, in a recently published article EricaCruikshank Dodd based her argument on Henri Stern’sdating of the Council depictions «just before or during theIconoclast Controversy», contemporary to the mosaics ofthe Dome of the Rock: E. CRUIKSHANK DODD, The Imageof the Word: Notes on the Religious Iconography of Islam, inLate Antique and Medieval Art of the Mediterranean World(«Blackwell Anthologies in Art History», 5), edited by E.R.Hoffman, Oxford 2007, pp. 185-212: 195-199.43 F. WENZEL, S. SZAKTILLA, H. PLIETT, The Roof of theChurch of Nativity in Bethlehem, Paris 2000 (UNESCO) –after the original German report: ID., Geburtskirche zuBethlehem – Gutachten zum Zustand der Dachkonstruktion,May 1997.44 COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 91.45 The Book of the Wanderings of Brother Felix Fabri, I, partII, p. 182b.46 Church of the Nativity and the Pilgrimage Route inBethlehem, Palestine, inscribed on UNESCO WorldHeritage List along with sites from Israel, Palau, Indonesiaand Morocco, in United Nations Educational, Scientificand Cultural Organization Official Site, 29 June 2012,<http://whc.unesco.org/en/news/896>, last accessed 4August 2012.47 According to Gustav Kühnel himself, one of the mostimportant impacts of his work in the basilica was that thelocal clergy ceased to use petroleum for ‘cleaning’ the oldand fading Crusader painting before the great feasts at thechurch: KÜHNEL, Feldarbeiten, p. 510.48 The white plaster was used during the restoration in thechurch after the earthquake in the year 1842. The plasterreplaced the marble plates removed by the Turks from thewalls of the side aisles of the basilica and framed themosaics of the nave. According to Cohen, during thiswhitewashing, made by the Greek Orthodox, Latininscriptions were covered with plaster. On the 1842restorations see: COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, pp. 94-95.49 DANIEL THE ABBOT, The Life and Journey of Daniel,Abbot of the Russian Land, 46-48. See Jerusalem Pilgri-mage, 1099-1185, edited by J. Wilkinson, J. Hill and W.F.Ryan, London 1988, p. 143.50 ‘HoŸenie’ igumena Daniila v Svåtu¥ Zeml¥ vnaxale HÍÍ v. (Drevnerusskie skazaniå o dostopamåt-nyh l¥dåh, mestah i sobytiåh), red. G.M. Prohorov,Sankt-Peterburg 2007, p. 67.51 According to Cohen, the marble slabs were removed bythe Turks for the decoration of Muslim buildings, includ-ing the Haram es-Sharif in Jerusalem, so by the mid-seven-teenth century little of the marble facing of the wallsremained in place: COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 94.52 Indeed, some of the copies of Daniel pilgrimage accountcorrect his erroneous eight to fifty: Jerusalem Pilgrimage,p. 143, n. 6.53 CUST, The Status Quo, p. 40.54 COHEN, Conflict and Neglect, p. 97.

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Questo articolo descrive il contributo persona-le del defunto professor Gustav Kühnel (4marzo 1942-10 luglio 2009) allo studio deidipinti murali e dei mosaici crociati nella chie-sa della Natività a Betlemme. Lo studio delprofessor Kühnel e le sue pubblicazioni sull’ar-gomento sono fondamentali e attestano il suoprofondo e continuo impegno sulle complessequestioni poste dalla chiesa della Natività. Lapulizia e la documentazione dei mosaici crocia-ti sono state intraprese dal compianto profes-sore nel 1981 e nel 1983. Senza precedenti, aKühnel è stato concesso il permesso di lavare,studiare e fotografare i mosaici murali. A segui-to della pulizia, sono state avanzate molteimportanti conclusioni, relative alla datazionedei mosaici, all’organizzazione del lavoro e

MOSAICI PARIETALI CROCIATI IN TERRA SANTA.L’ATTIVITÀ DI GUSTAV KÜHNEL NELLA CHIESA DELLA NATIVITÀ A BETLEMME

Anastasia Keshman

all’identificazione dei mosaicisti. Inoltre, dopoaver condotto studi approfonditi sui dipinti esui mosaici crociati a Betlemme, Abu-Gosh ealtrove, Gustav Kühnel ha individuato unnuovo campo di studio – la pittura monumen-tale crociata in Terra Santa – e ha stabilito lasua cronologia relativa.Nel 2008 la basilica della Natività a Betlemme èstata inserita nella Watch List of the 100 MostEndangered Sites da parte del World Monu-ments Fund. Recentemente, nel 2012, la chiesadella Natività a Betlemme è stata dichiaratapatrimonio dell’umanità dall’UNESCO. Oggila basilica si trova ad affrontare una nuova fasedi restauro avviata dall’Autorità palestinese,che si spera prenda in considerazione anche imosaici di età crociata.