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162-475: This building was built to replace an earlier church here, and it is the third church to be located on the same site. It became a cathedral in 1983 when the Diocese of Møre was created. The cathedral is a double-nave basilica that has a free-standing bell tower next to the main building. The cathedral seats about 1000 people. The church building is shaped like a long "basilica", but with a central aisle and another on

324-590: A colonia , the whole city was re-planned and a new great forum-basilica complex erected, larger than any in Britain. Londinium's basilica, more than 500 feet (150 m) long, was the largest north of the Alps and a similar length to the modern St Paul's Cathedral . Only the later basilica-forum complex at Treverorum was larger, while at Rome only the 525 foot (160 m) Basilica Ulpia exceeded London's in size. It probably had arcaded, rather than trabeate , aisles, and

486-430: A 3rd-century mud-brick house at Aqaba had become a Christian church and was rebuilt as a basilica. Within was a rectangular assembly hall with frescoes and at the east end an ambo , a cathedra , and an altar. Also within the church were a catecumenon (for catechumens ), a baptistery, a diaconicon , and a prothesis : all features typical of later 4th century basilica churches. A Christian structure which included

648-782: A Christian basilica erected by Constantine was taken over by his opponents, the Donatists . After Constantine's failure to resolve the Donatist controversy by coercion between 317 and 321, he allowed the Donatists, who dominated Africa , to retain the basilica and constructed a new one for the Catholic Church . The original titular churches of Rome were those which had been private residences and which were donated to be converted to places of Christian worship. Above an originally 1st century AD villa and its later adjoining warehouse and Mithraeum ,

810-559: A basilica constructed in her honour in southern Gaul . The Basilica Hilariana (built c.  145–155 ) was designed for the use of the cult of Cybele . The largest basilica built outside Rome was that built under the Antonine dynasty on the Byrsa hill in Carthage . The basilica was built together with a forum of enormous size and was contemporary with a great complex of public baths and

972-521: A basilica's architectural plan. A number of monumental Christian basilicas were constructed during the latter reign of Constantine the Great . In the post Nicene period, basilicas became a standard model for Christian spaces for congregational worship throughout the Mediterranean and Europe . From the early 4th century, Christian basilicas, along with their associated catacombs , were used for burial of

1134-424: A cannon was fired from the heights above the church in a salute celebrating a holiday. Unfortunately, the cannonball struck the church tower, causing a fire which destroyed the church. In 1887, a wooden neo-Gothic dragestil long church was built to replace it in 1887. This building was designed by Henrik Nissen . This church burned down during the bombing of Molde on 29 April 1940 (during World War II ). After

1296-484: A citadel. Former imperial capitals such as Cologne and Trier lived on in diminished form as administrative centres of the Franks . In Britain most towns and cities had been in decline, apart from a brief period of recovery during the fourth century, well before the withdrawal of Roman governors and garrisons but the process might well have stretched well into the fifth century. Historians emphasizing urban continuities with

1458-548: A commercial function integral to their local trade routes and economies. Amphorae discovered at basilicas attest their economic uses and can reveal their position in wider networks of exchange. At Dion near Mount Olympus in Macedonia , now an Archaeological Park , the latter 5th century Cemetery Basilica , a small church, was replete with potsherds from all over the Mediterranean , evidencing extensive economic activity took place there. Likewise at Maroni Petrera on Cyprus,

1620-408: A double row of square offices on the northern side, serving as the administrative centre of the colonia , and its size and splendour probably indicate an imperial decision to change the administrative capital of Britannia to Londinium from Camulodunum ( Colchester ), as all provincial capitals were designated coloniae . In 300 Londinium's basilica was destroyed as a result of the rebellion led by

1782-531: A fashion that Pliny the Elder wrote that it was among the most beautiful buildings in the world (it was simultaneously renamed the Basilica Paulli ). Thereafter until the 4th century AD, monumental basilicas were routinely constructed at Rome by both private citizens and the emperors. These basilicas were reception halls and grand spaces in which élite persons could impress guests and visitors, and could be attached to

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1944-412: A general decline in urban populations. As a whole, the period of late antiquity was accompanied by an overall population decline in almost all Europe, and a reversion to more of a subsistence economy. Long-distance markets disappeared, and there was a reversion to a greater degree of local production and consumption, rather than webs of commerce and specialized production. Concurrently, the continuity of

2106-507: A large basilica church had been erected by 350, subsuming the earlier structures beneath it as a crypt. The basilica was the first church of San Clemente al Laterano . Similarly, at Santi Giovanni e Paolo al Celio , an entire ancient city block – a 2nd-century insula on the Caelian Hill – was buried beneath a 4th-century basilica. The site was already venerated as the martyrium of three early Christian burials beforehand, and part of

2268-507: A large country villa or an urban domus . They were simpler and smaller than were civic basilicas, and can be identified by inscriptions or their position in the archaeological context. Domitian constructed a basilica on the Palatine Hill for his imperial residential complex around 92 AD, and a palatine basilica was typical in imperial palaces throughout the imperial period. Long, rectangular basilicas with internal peristyle became

2430-659: A new Church of St Euphemia in Constantinople in 680, though Cyril Mango argued the translation never took place. Subsequently, Asterius's sermon On the Martyrdom of St Euphemia was advanced as an argument for iconodulism at the Second Council of Nicaea in 787. In the late 4th century, a large basilica church dedicated to Mary, mother of Jesus was constructed in Ephesus in the former south stoa (a commercial basilica) of

2592-605: A new aqueduct system running for 82 miles (132 km), then the longest in the Roman Empire. The basilica at Leptis Magna , built by the Septimius Severus a century later in about 216 is a notable 3rd century AD example of the traditional type, most notable among the works influenced by the Basilica Ulpia. The basilica at Leptis was built mainly of limestone ashlar , but the apses at either end were only limestone in

2754-469: A partial revival of classicism). Nearly all of these more abstracted conventions could be observed in the glittering mosaics of the era, which during this period moved from being decoration derivative from painting used on floors (and walls likely to become wet) to a major vehicle of religious art in churches. The glazed surfaces of the tesserae sparkled in the light and illuminated the basilica churches. Unlike their fresco predecessors, much more emphasis

2916-515: A period of dynamic religious experimentation and spirituality with many syncretic sects, some formed centuries earlier, such as Gnosticism or Neoplatonism and the Chaldaean oracles , some novel, such as hermeticism . Culminating in the reforms advocated by Apollonius of Tyana being adopted by Aurelian and formulated by Flavius Claudius Julianus to create an organized but short-lived pagan state religion that ensured its underground survival into

3078-502: A population of 800,000 in the beginning of the period to a population of 30,000 by the end of the period, the most precipitous drop coming with the breaking of the aqueducts during the Gothic War . A similar though less marked decline in urban population occurred later in Constantinople, which was gaining population until the outbreak of the Plague of Justinian in 541. In Europe there was also

3240-563: A process akin to baptism. In the eastern cemetery of Hierapolis the 5th century domed octagonal martyrium of Philip the Apostle was built alongside a basilica church, while at Myra the Basilica of St Nicholas was constructed at the tomb of Saint Nicholas . At Constantinople the earliest basilica churches, like the 5th century basilica at the Monastery of Stoudios , were mostly equipped with

3402-469: A proliferation of various ascetic or semi-ascetic practices. Holy Fools and Stylites counted among the more extreme forms but through such personalities like John Chrysostom , Jerome , Augustine or Gregory the Great monastic attitudes penetrated other areas of Christian life. Late antiquity marks the decline of Roman state religion , circumscribed in degrees by edicts likely inspired by Christian advisors such as Eusebius to 4th-century emperors, and

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3564-531: A quintessential element of Roman urbanism , often forming the architectural background to the city forum and used for diverse purposes. Beginning with Cato in the early second century BC, politicians of the Roman Republic competed with one another by building basilicas bearing their names in the Forum Romanum , the centre of ancient Rome . Outside the city, basilicas symbolised the influence of Rome and became

3726-602: A rare example of an Antique statue that has never been underground. According to the Liber Pontificalis , Constantine was also responsible for the rich interior decoration of the Lateran Baptistery constructed under Pope Sylvester I (r. 314–335), sited about 50 metres (160 ft). The Lateran Baptistery was the first monumental free-standing baptistery, and in subsequent centuries Christian basilica churches were often endowed with such baptisteries. At Cirta ,

3888-466: A shade exotic," observes H. R. Loyn , "owing their reason for being more to the military and administrative needs of Rome than to any economic virtue". The other institutional power centre, the Roman villa , did not survive in Britain either. Gildas lamented the destruction of the twenty-eight cities of Britain; though not all in his list can be identified with known Roman sites, Loyn finds no reason to doubt

4050-642: A shrine for the tutela . Like Roman public baths , basilicas were commonly used as venues for the display of honorific statues and other sculptures, complementing the outdoor public spaces and thoroughfares. Beside the Basilica Porcia on the Forum Romanum , the Basilica Aemilia was built in 179 BC, and the Basilica Sempronia in 169 BC. In the Republic two types of basilica were built across Italy in

4212-536: A slightly raised dais . The central aisle – the nave – tended to be wider and taller than the flanking aisles, so that light could penetrate through the clerestory windows. In the late Republican era, basilicas were increasingly monumental; Julius Caesar replaced the Basilica Sempronia with his own Basilica Julia , dedicated in 46 BC, while the Basilica Aemilia was rebuilt around 54 BC in so spectacular

4374-410: A slightly raised platform and an apse at each of the two ends, adorned with a statue perhaps of the emperor, while the entrances were from the long sides. The Roman basilica was a large public building where business or legal matters could be transacted. As early as the time of Augustus , a public basilica for transacting business had been part of any settlement that considered itself a city, used in

4536-507: A small cruciform crypt ( Ancient Greek : κρυπτή , romanized :  kryptḗ , lit.   'hidden'), a space under the church floor beneath the altar. Typically, these crypts were accessed from the apse's interior, though not always, as at the 6th century Church of St John at the Hebdomon , where access was from outside the apse. At Thessaloniki, the Roman bath where tradition held Demetrius of Thessaloniki had been martyred

4698-411: A ubiquitous fixture of Roman coloniae of the late Republic from c.  100 BC . The earliest surviving basilica is the basilica of Pompeii , built 120 BC. Basilicas were the administrative and commercial centres of major Roman settlements: the "quintessential architectural expression of Roman administration". Adjoining it there were normally various offices and rooms housing the curia and

4860-506: A vehicle for the last group of powerful pagans to resist Christianity, as in the late 4th century Symmachi–Nicomachi diptych . Extravagant hoards of silver plate are especially common from the 4th century, including the Mildenhall Treasure , Esquiline Treasure , Hoxne Hoard , and the imperial Missorium of Theodosius I . In the field of literature, late antiquity is known for the declining use of classical Greek and Latin , and

5022-564: Is Baiyara (perhaps modern Montoro ), mentioned as founded by Reccared in the 15th-century geographical account, Kitab al-Rawd al-Mitar . The arrival of a highly urbanized Islamic culture in the decade following 711 ensured the survival of cities in the Hispaniae into the Middle Ages. Beyond the Mediterranean world, the cities of Gaul withdrew within a constricted line of defense around

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5184-590: Is debated . Constantine confirmed the legalization of the religion through the so-called Edict of Milan in 313, jointly issued with his rival in the East, Licinius (r. 308–324). By the late 4th century, Emperor Theodosius the Great had made Christianity the State religion, thereby transforming the Classical Roman world, which Peter Brown characterized as "rustling with the presence of many divine spirits ." Constantine I

5346-686: Is the Great Basilica in Philippopolis ( Plovdiv , Bulgaria) from the 4th century AD. In the late 4th century the dispute between Nicene and Arian Christianity came to head at Mediolanum ( Milan ), where Ambrose was bishop. At Easter in 386 the Arian party, preferred by the Theodosian dynasty , sought to wrest the use of the basilica from the Nicene partisan Ambrose. According to Augustine of Hippo ,

5508-516: Is the end of the polis model. While there was a decline of urban life in late antiquity (especially in the West) the epoch brought with it new forms of political participation in the urban spaces as well. Especially the role of crowds and masses in cities has increased, leading to new levels of tension. In the cities the strained economies of Roman over-expansion arrested growth. Almost all new public building in late antiquity came directly or indirectly from

5670-563: The Augustus of the break-away Britannic Empire , Carausius . Remains of the great basilica and its arches were discovered during the construction of Leadenhall Market in the 1880s. At Corinth in the 1st century AD, a new basilica was constructed in on the east side of the forum. It was possibly inside the basilica that Paul the Apostle , according to the Acts of the Apostles ( Acts 18:12–17 )

5832-515: The Augustus . The later Roman Empire was in a sense a network of cities. Archaeology now supplements literary sources to document the transformation followed by collapse of cities in the Mediterranean Basin . Two diagnostic symptoms of decline—or as many historians prefer, 'transformation'—are subdivision, particularly of expansive formal spaces in both the domus and the public basilica , and encroachment, in which artisans' shops invade

5994-625: The agora (the Hellenic forum); this design was influenced by the existing tradition of long stoae in Hellenistic Asia . Provinces in the west lacked this tradition, and the basilicas the Romans commissioned there were more typically Italian, with the central nave divided from the side-aisles by an internal colonnade in regular proportions. Beginning with the Forum of Caesar (Latin: forum Iulium ) at

6156-565: The Anglo-Saxon period depend largely on the post-Roman survival of Roman toponymy . Aside from a mere handful of its continuously inhabited sites, like York and London and possibly Canterbury , however, the rapidity and thoroughness with which its urban life collapsed with the dissolution of centralized bureaucracy calls into question the extent to which Roman Britain had ever become authentically urbanized: "in Roman Britain towns appeared

6318-510: The Arab invasions marked—through conquest and the disruption of Mediterranean trade routes—the cataclysmic end of late antiquity and the beginning of the Middle Ages . On the other hand, there is a more recent thesis, associated with scholars in the tradition of Peter Brown, in which Islam is seen to be a product of the late antique world, not foreign to it. This school suggests that its origin within

6480-667: The Atrium Regium . Another early example is the basilica at Pompeii (late 2nd century BC). Inspiration may have come from prototypes like Athens 's Stoa Basileios or the hypostyle hall on Delos , but the architectural form is most derived from the audience halls in the royal palaces of the Diadochi kingdoms of the Hellenistic period . These rooms were typically a high nave flanked by colonnades. These basilicas were rectangular, typically with central nave and aisles, usually with

6642-616: The Basilica Constantiniana on the Lateran Hill. This basilica became Rome's cathedral church, known as St John Lateran , and was more richly decorated and larger than any previous Christian structure. However, because of its remote position from the Forum Romanum on the city's edge, it did not connect with the older imperial basilicas in the fora of Rome. Outside the basilica was the Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius ,

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6804-632: The Byzantine military manuals achieving great renown and influence: the most famous of which is the Strategikon attributed to Emperor Maurice , written in the 6th century. One genre of literature among Christian writers in this period was the Hexaemeron , dedicated to the composition of commentaries, homilies, and treatises concerned with the exegesis of the Genesis creation narrative . The first example of this

6966-563: The Church of Antioch . The Council of 410 stipulated that on Sunday the archdeacon would read the Gospels from the bema . Standing near the bema , the lay folk could chant responses to the reading and if positioned near the šqāqonā ("a walled floor-level pathway connecting the bema to the altar area") could try to kiss or touch the Gospel Book as it was processed from the deacons ' room to

7128-400: The Church of the East developed at typical pattern of basilica churches. Separate entrances for men and women were installed in the southern or northern wall; within, the east end of the nave was reserved for men, while women and children were stood behind. In the nave was a bema , from which Scripture could be read, and which were inspired by the equivalent in synagogues and regularised by

7290-514: The Constitution of Norway . This was Norway's first national elections. Each church parish was a constituency that elected people called "electors" who later met together in each county to elect the representatives for the assembly that was to meet in Eidsvoll later that year. In 1841–42, the church was heavily renovated and large portions being rebuilt in essentially the same style. On 17 May 1885,

7452-468: The De arithmetica , De musica , and De consolatione philosophiae of Boethius —both later key works in medieval education). The 4th and 5th centuries also saw an explosion of Christian literature , of which Greek writers such as Eusebius of Caesarea , Basil of Caesarea , Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom and Latin writers such as Ambrose of Milan , Jerome and Augustine of Hippo are only among

7614-657: The Flavian dynasty . The Basilica of the Virgin Mary was probably the venue for the 431 Council of Ephesus and the 449 Second Council of Ephesus , both convened by Theodosius II . At some point during the Christianisation of the Roman world, Christian crosses were cut into the faces of the colossal statues of Augustus and Livia that stood in the basilica- stoa of Ephesus; the crosses were perhaps intended to exorcise demons in

7776-582: The Greek East and Latin West became more pronounced. The Diocletianic Persecution of Christians in the early 4th century was ended by Galerius and under Constantine the Great , Christianity was made legal in the Empire. The 4th century Christianization of the Roman Empire was extended by the conversions of Tiridates the Great of Armenia , Mirian III of Iberia , and Ezana of Axum , who later invaded and ended

7938-465: The Holy Land and Rome, and at Milan and Constantinople. Around 310, while still a self-proclaimed augustus unrecognised at Rome, Constantine began the construction of the Basilica Constantiniana or Aula Palatina , 'palatine hall', as a reception hall for his imperial seat at Trier ( Augusta Treverorum ), capital of Belgica Prima . On the exterior, Constantine's palatine basilica

8100-555: The Kingdom of Kush . During the late 4th century reign of Theodosius I , Nicene Christianity was proclaimed the state church of the Roman Empire . The city of Constantinople became the permanent imperial residence in the East by the 5th century and superseded Rome as the largest city in the Late Roman Empire and the Mediterranean Basin . The longest Roman aqueduct system, the 250 km (160 mi)-long Aqueduct of Valens

8262-563: The Late Antique Little Ice Age ) and a disastrous pandemic (the Plague of Justinian in 541). The effects of these events in the social and political life are still under discussion. In the 7th century the disastrous Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 and the campaigns of Khosrow II and Heraclius facilitated the emergence of Islam in the Arabian Peninsula during the lifetime of Muhammad . Subsequent Muslim conquest of

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8424-451: The Ostrogoths and Visigoths saw themselves as perpetuating the "Roman" tradition. While the usage "Late Antiquity" suggests that the social and cultural priorities of classical antiquity endured throughout Europe into the Middle Ages , the usage of "Early Middle Ages" or "Early Byzantine" emphasizes a break with the classical past, and the term " Migration Period " tends to de-emphasize

8586-454: The Republican senatorial class was replaced with the silk court vestments and jewelry associated with Byzantine imperial iconography. Also indicative of the times is the fact that the imperial cabinet of advisors came to be known as the consistorium , or those who would stand in courtly attendance upon their seated emperor, as distinct from the informal set of friends and advisors surrounding

8748-617: The bema and thence to the altar . Some ten Eastern churches in eastern Syria have been investigated by thorough archaeology . A Christian basilica was constructed in the first half of the 5th century at Olympia , where the statue of Zeus by Phidias had been noted as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World ever since the 2nd century BC list compiled by Antipater of Sidon . Cultural tourism thrived at Olympia and Ancient Greek religion continued to be practised there well into

8910-401: The insula had been decorated in the style favoured by Christian communities frequenting the early Catacombs of Rome . By 350 in Serdica ( Sofia , Bulgaria ), a monumental basilica – the Church of Saint Sophia – was erected, covering earlier structures including a Christian chapel, an oratory, and a cemetery dated to c. 310. Other major basilica from this period, in this part of Europe,

9072-419: The later Roman Empire , as it was reorganized by Diocletian (r. 284–305), and the Early Middle Ages are stressed by writers who wish to emphasize that the seeds of medieval culture were already developing in the Christianized empire, and that they continued to do so in the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire at least until the coming of Islam . Concurrently, some migrating Germanic tribes such as

9234-404: The patricia and daughter of Olybrius , Anicia Juliana . Pope Vigilius fled there from Constantinople during the Three-Chapter Controversy . The basilica, which lay outside the walls of Chalcedon, was destroyed by the Persians in the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 during one of the Sasanian occupations of the city in 615 and 626. The relics of Euphemia were reportedly translated to

9396-411: The "Good Shepherd", resembling the traditional iconography of Hermes. He was increasingly given Roman elite status, and shrouded in purple robes like the emperors with orb and scepter in hand — this new type of depiction is variously thought to be derived from either the iconography of Jupiter or of classical philosophers. As for luxury arts, manuscript illumination on vellum and parchment emerged from

9558-505: The 3rd century was a major step in the development of Christian spirituality. While it initially operated outside the episcopal authority of the Church, it would become hugely successful and by the 8th century it became one of the key Christian practices. Monasticism was not the only new Christian movement to appear in late antiquity, although it had perhaps the greatest influence and it achieved unprecedented geographical spread. It influenced many aspects of Christian religious life and led to

9720-429: The 4th century. At Nicopolis in Epirus , founded by Augustus to commemorate his victory at the Battle of Actium at the end of the Last war of the Roman Republic , four early Christian basilicas were built during Late Antiquity whose remains survive to the present. In the 4th or 5th century, Nicopolis was surrounded by a new city wall. Late antiquity Late antiquity is sometimes defined as spanning from

9882-441: The 5th century, with a few manuscripts of Roman literary classics like the Vergilius Vaticanus and the Vergilius Romanus , but increasingly Christian texts, of which Quedlinburg Itala fragment (420–430) is the oldest survivor. Carved ivory diptychs were used for secular subjects, as in the imperial and consular diptychs presented to friends, as well as religious ones, both Christian and pagan – they seem to have been especially

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10044-458: The 6th century, share a common origin with the Christian basilicas in the civic basilicas and in the pre-Roman style of hypostyle halls in the Mediterranean Basin, particularly in Egypt, where pre-classical hypostyles continued to be built in the imperial period and were themselves converted into churches in the 6th century. Other influences on the evolution of Christian basilicas may have come from elements of domestic and palatial architecture during

10206-417: The Balkans and Persian destructions in Anatolia in the 620s. City life continued in Syria, Jordan and Palestine into the 8th. In the later 6th century street construction was still undertaken in Caesarea Maritima in Palestine, and Edessa was able to deflect Chosroes I with massive payments in gold in 540 and 544, before it was overrun in 609. The stylistic changes characteristic of late antique art mark

10368-455: The Balkans, 'where inhabited centres contracted and regrouped around a defensible acropolis , or were abandoned in favour of such positions elsewhere." In the western Mediterranean, the only new cities known to be founded in Europe between the 5th and 8th centuries were the four or five Visigothic "victory cities". Reccopolis in the province of Guadalajara is one: the others were Victoriacum , founded by Leovigild , which may survive as

10530-502: The Basilica of Maxentius in the Forum Romanum or more practical like the so-called Basilica of Bahira in Bosra , while the Basilica Constantiniana on the Lateran Hill was of intermediate scale. This basilica, begun in 313, was the first imperial Christian basilica. Imperial basilicas were first constructed for the Christian Eucharist liturgy in the reign of Constantine. Basilica churches were not economically inactive. Like non-Christian or civic basilicas, basilica churches had

10692-405: The Byzantine age and beyond. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India and along the Silk Road in Central Asia , while Manichaeism , a Dualist faith, arose in Mesopotamia and spread both East and West, for a time contending with Christianity in the Roman Empire. Many of the new religions relied on the emergence of the parchment codex (bound book) over the papyrus volumen (scroll),

10854-454: The Diocletianic Persecution – were housed in a martyrium accompanied by a basilica. The basilica already existed when Egeria passed through Chalcedon in 384, and in 436 Melania the Younger visited the church on her own journey to the Holy Land. From the description of Evagrius Scholasticus the church is identifiable as an aisled basilica attached to the martyrium and preceded by an atrium . The Council of Chalcedon (8–31 October 451)

11016-427: The Early Middle Ages. The Roman Empire underwent considerable social, cultural and organizational changes starting with the reign of Diocletian , who began the custom of splitting the Empire into Eastern and Western portions ruled by multiple emperors simultaneously . The Sasanian Empire supplanted the Parthian Empire and began a new phase of the Roman–Persian Wars, the Roman–Sasanian Wars . The divisions between

11178-451: The Eastern Roman Empire at Constantinople meant that the turning-point for the Greek East came later, in the 7th century, as the Eastern Roman, or Byzantine Empire centered around the Balkans , North Africa ( Egypt and Carthage ), and Asia Minor . The cities in the East were still lively stages for political participation and remained important for background for religious and political disputes. The degree and extent of discontinuity in

11340-443: The Great led to the fall of the Ostrogothic and Vandal Kingdoms, and their reincorporation into the Empire, when the city of Rome and much of Italy and North Africa returned to imperial control. Though most of Italy was soon part of the Kingdom of the Lombards , the Roman Exarchate of Ravenna endured, ensuring the so-called Byzantine Papacy . Justinian constructed the Hagia Sophia , a great example of Byzantine architecture , and

11502-510: The Great . The early churches of Rome were basilicas with an apsidal tribunal and used the same construction techniques of columns and timber roofing. At the start of the 4th century at Rome there was a change in burial and funerary practice, moving away from earlier preferences for inhumation in cemeteries – popular from the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD – to the newer practice of burial in catacombs and inhumation inside Christian basilicas themselves. Conversely, new basilicas often were erected on

11664-688: The Levant and Persia overthrew the Sasanian Empire and permanently wrested two thirds of the Eastern Roman Empire's territory from Roman control, forming the Rashidun Caliphate . The Byzantine Empire under the Heraclian dynasty began the middle Byzantine period , and together with the establishment of the later 7th century Umayyad Caliphate , generally marks the end of late antiquity. One of

11826-594: The Maeander . The Great Basilica in Antioch of Pisidia is a rare securely dated 4th century Christian basilica and was the city's cathedral church. The mosaics of the floor credit Optimus, the bishop, with its dedication. Optimus was a contemporary of Basil of Caesarea and corresponded with him c. 377. Optimus was the city's delegate at the First Council of Constantinople in 381, so the 70 m-long single-apsed basilica near

11988-803: The Mediterranean world at all evenly. Christian basilicas and martyria attributable to the 4th century are rare on the Greek mainland and on the Cyclades , while the Christian basilicas of Egypt, Cyprus , Syria , Transjordan , Hispania , and Gaul are nearly all of later date. The basilica at Ephesus's Magnesian Gate , the episcopal church at Laodicea on the Lycus , and two extramural churches at Sardis have all been considered 4th century constructions, but on weak evidence. Development of pottery chronologies for Late Antiquity had helped resolve questions of dating basilicas of

12150-604: The Temple of Hadrian Olympios . Ephesus was the centre of the Roman province of Asia , and was the site of the city's famed Temple of Artemis , one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It had also been a centre of the Roman imperial cult in Asia; Ephesus was three times declared neokoros ( lit.   ' temple-warden ' ) and had constructed a Temple of the Sebastoi to

12312-561: The Third Century the military, political and economic demands made by the Empire made the service in local government to be an onerous duty, often imposed as punishment. Harassed urban dwellers fled to the walled estates of the wealthy to avoid taxes, military service, famine and disease. In the Western Roman Empire especially, many cities destroyed by invasion or civil war in the 3rd century could not be rebuilt. Plague and famine hit

12474-611: The amphorae unearthed by archaeologists in the 5th century basilica church had been imported from North Africa, Egypt, Palestine , and the Aegean basin , as well as from neighbouring Asia Minor . According to Vegetius , writing c. 390, basilicas were convenient for drilling soldiers of the Late Roman army during inclement weather. The 4th century Basilica of Maxentius , begun by Maxentius between 306 and 312 and according to Aurelius Victor 's De Caesaribus completed by Constantine I,

12636-598: The apocalypticism of Islamic theology and in the way the Quran seems to react to contemporary religious and cultural issues shared by the late antique world at large. Further indication that Arabia (and thus the environment in which Islam first developed) was a part of the late antique world is found in the close economic and military relations between Arabia, the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanian Empire. In recent years,

12798-474: The basilica became the most prestigious style of church building, was "normative" for church buildings by the end of the 4th century, and were ubiquitous in western Asia, North Africa, and most of Europe by the close of the 7th century. Christians also continued to hold services in synagogues, houses, and gardens, and continued practising baptism in rivers, ponds, and Roman bathhouses. The development of Christian basilicas began even before Constantine's reign:

12960-540: The basilicas' tribunals, as Vitruvius recommended. Examples of such dedicatory inscriptions are known from basilicas at Lucus Feroniae and Veleia in Italy and at Cuicul in Africa Proconsolaris , and inscriptions of all kinds were visible in and around basilicas. At Ephesus the basilica- stoa had two storeys and three aisles and extended the length of the civic agora 's north side, complete with colossal statues of

13122-450: The beauty and movement of the body, but rather, hints at the spiritual reality behind its subjects . Additionally, mirroring the rise of Christianity and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, painting and freestanding sculpture gradually fell from favor in the artistic community. Replacing them were greater interests in mosaics, architecture, and relief sculpture. As the soldier emperors such as Maximinus Thrax (r. 235–238) emerged from

13284-501: The building is not architecturally a basilica. In the former Western Roman Empire almost no great buildings were constructed from the 5th century. A most outstanding example is the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna constructed c.  530 at a cost of 26,000 gold solidi or 360 Roman pounds of gold. City life in the East, though negatively affected by the plague in the 6th–7th centuries, finally collapsed due to Slavic invasions in

13446-574: The centre over the nave to admit a clerestory and lower over the side-aisles. An apse at one end, or less frequently at both ends or on the side, usually contained the raised tribunal occupied by the Roman magistrates . The basilica was centrally located in every Roman town, usually adjacent to the forum and often opposite a temple in imperial-era forums. Basilicas were also built in private residences and imperial palaces and were known as "palace basilicas". In late antiquity , church buildings were typically constructed either as martyria , or with

13608-580: The chair in the apse reserved in secular structures for the magistrate—or the Emperor himself—as the representative here and now of Christ Pantocrator , the Ruler of All, his characteristic late antique icon . These ecclesiastical basilicas (e.g., St. John Lateran and St. Peter's in Rome) were themselves outdone by Justinian's Hagia Sophia , a staggering display of later Roman/Byzantine power and architectural taste, though

13770-600: The city of Vitoria , though a 12th-century (re)foundation for this city is given in contemporary sources; Lugo id est Luceo in the Asturias , referred to by Isidore of Seville , and Ologicus (perhaps Ologitis ), founded using Basque labour in 621 by Suinthila as a fortification against the Basques, modern Olite . All of these cities were founded for military purposes and at least Reccopolis, Victoriacum, and Ologicus in celebration of victory. A possible fifth Visigothic foundation

13932-563: The city walls must have been constructed around that time. Pisidia had a number of Christian basilicas constructed in Late Antiquity, particularly in former bouleuteria , as at Sagalassos , Selge , Pednelissus , while a civic basilica was converted for Christians' use in Cremna . At Chalcedon , opposite Constantinople on the Bosporus, the relics of Euphemia – a supposed Christian martyr of

14094-415: The construction of Cato the Elder's basilica, the term came to be applied to any large covered hall, whether it was used for domestic purposes, was a commercial space, a military structure, or religious building. The plays of Plautus suggest that basilica buildings may have existed prior to Cato's building. The plays were composed between 210 and 184 BC and refer to a building that might be identified with

14256-569: The courtyard of the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline Hill , part of the Capitoline Museums . Opposite the northern apse on the southern wall, another monumental entrance was added and elaborated with a portico of porphyry columns. One of the remaining marble interior columns was removed in 1613 by Pope Paul V and set up as an honorific column outside Santa Maria Maggiore . In

14418-554: The dead. By extension, the name was later applied to Christian churches that adopted the same basic plan. It continues to be used in an architectural sense to describe rectangular buildings with a central nave and aisles , and usually a raised platform at the end opposite the door. In Europe and the Americas, the basilica remained the most common architectural style for churches of all Christian denominations, though this building plan has become less dominant in buildings constructed since

14580-481: The dispute resulted in Ambrose organising an 'orthodox' sit-in at the basilica and arranged the miraculous invention and translation of martyrs , whose hidden remains had been revealed in a vision . During the sit-in, Augustine credits Ambrose with the introduction from the "eastern regions" of antiphonal chanting, to give heart to the orthodox congregation, though in fact music was likely part of Christian ritual since

14742-619: The disruptions in the former Western Roman Empire caused by the creation of Germanic kingdoms within her borders beginning with the foedus with the Goths in Aquitania in 418. The general decline of population, technological knowledge and standards of living in Europe during this period became the archetypal example of societal collapse for writers from the Renaissance . As a result of this decline, and

14904-512: The early 4th century Eusebius used the word basilica ( Ancient Greek : βασιλική , romanized :  basilikḗ ) to refer to Christian churches; in subsequent centuries as before, the word basilica referred in Greek to the civic, non-ecclesiastical buildings, and only in rare exceptions to churches. Churches were nonetheless basilican in form, with an apse or tribunal at the end of a nave with two or more aisles typical. A narthex (sometimes with an exonarthex) or vestibule could be added to

15066-568: The emperor Augustus and his imperial family. The remains of a large subterranean Neopythagorean basilica dating from the 1st century AD were found near the Porta Maggiore in Rome in 1917, and is known as the Porta Maggiore Basilica . After its destruction in 60 AD, Londinium ( London ) was endowed with its first forum and basilica under the Flavian dynasty . The basilica delimited

15228-410: The emperors or imperial officials. Attempts were made to maintain what was already there. The supply of free grain and oil to 20% of the population of Rome remained intact the last decades of the 5th century. It was once thought that the elite and rich had withdrawn to the private luxuries of their numerous villas and town houses. Scholarly opinion has revised this. They monopolized the higher offices in

15390-607: The end of classical antiquity to the local start of the Middle Ages , from around the late 3rd century up to the 7th or 8th century in Europe and adjacent areas bordering the Mediterranean Basin depending on location. The popularisation of this periodization in English has generally been credited to historian Peter Brown , who proposed a period between 150 and 750 AD. The Oxford Centre for Late Antiquity defines it as "the period between approximately 250 and 750 AD". Precise boundaries for

15552-478: The end of classical Roman art and the beginnings of medieval art . As a complicated period bridging between Roman art and later medieval styles (such as that of the Byzantines ), the late antique period saw a transition from the classical idealized realism tradition largely influenced by ancient Greek art to the more iconic, stylized art of the Middle Ages. Unlike classical art, late antique art does not emphasize

15714-481: The end of the Roman Republic, the centre of Rome was embellished with a series of imperial fora typified by a large open space surrounded by a peristyle, honorific statues of the imperial family ( gens ), and a basilica, often accompanied by other facilities like a temple , market halls and public libraries . In the imperial period, statues of the emperors with inscribed dedications were often installed near

15876-517: The end. An old theory by Ejnar Dyggve that these were the architectural intermediary between the Christian martyrium and the classical heröon is no longer credited. The magnificence of early Christian basilicas reflected the patronage of the emperor and recalled his imperial palaces and reflected the royal associations of the basilica with the Hellenistic Kingdoms and even earlier monarchies like that of Pharaonic Egypt . Similarly,

16038-417: The entrance, together with an atrium , and the interior might have transepts , a pastophorion , and galleries , but the basic scheme with clerestory windows and a wooden truss roof remained the most typical church type until the 6th century. The nave would be kept clear for liturgical processions by the clergy, with the laity in the galleries and aisles to either side. The function of Christian churches

16200-447: The essential truth of his statement. Classical antiquity can generally be defined as an age of cities; the Greek polis and Roman municipium were locally organised, self-governing bodies of citizens governed by written constitutions. When Rome came to dominate the known world, local initiative and control were gradually subsumed by the ever-growing Imperial bureaucracy; by the Crisis of

16362-408: The expense of amphitheaters, temples, libraries, porticoes, gymnasia, concert and lecture halls, theaters and other amenities of public life. In any case, as Christianity took over, many of these buildings which were associated with pagan cults were neglected in favor of building churches and donating to the poor. The Christian basilica was copied from the civic structure with variations. The bishop took

16524-494: The far-away centralized administration (in concert with the great landowners ), and those who did not; although they were well-born and thoroughly educated, a classical education and the election by the Senate to magistracies was no longer the path to success. Room at the top of late antique society was more bureaucratic and involved increasingly intricate channels of access to the emperor; the plain toga that had identified all members of

16686-502: The first outbreak of the centuries-long first plague pandemic took place. At Ctesiphon , the Sasanians completed the Taq Kasra , the colossal iwan of which is the largest single-span vault of unreinforced brickwork in the world and the triumph of Sasanian architecture . The middle of the 6th century was characterized by extreme climate events ( the volcanic winter of 535–536 and

16848-523: The former allowing for quicker access to key materials and easier portability than the fragile scroll, thus fueling the rise of synoptic exegesis , papyrology . Notable in this regard is the topic of the Fifty Bibles of Constantine . Within the recently legitimized Christian community of the 4th century, a division could be more distinctly seen between the laity and an increasingly celibate male leadership. These men presented themselves as removed from

17010-436: The imperial administration, but they were removed from military command by the late 3rd century. Their focus turned to preserving their vast wealth rather than fighting for it. The basilica , which had functioned as a law court or for imperial reception of foreign dignitaries, became the primary public building in the 4th century. Due to the stress on civic finances, cities spent money on walls, maintaining baths and markets at

17172-463: The last civic basilica built in Rome. Inside the basilica the central nave was accessed by five doors opening from an entrance hall on the eastern side and terminated in an apse at the western end. Another, shallower apse with niches for statues was added to the centre of the north wall in a second campaign of building, while the western apse housed a colossal acrolithic statue of the emperor Constantine enthroned. Fragments of this statue are now in

17334-628: The late 20th century. The Catholic Church has come to use the term to refer to its especially historic churches, without reference to the architectural form . The Latin word basilica derives from Ancient Greek : βασιλικὴ στοά , romanized :  basilikḗ stoá , lit.   'royal stoa '. The first known basilica—the Basilica Porcia in the Roman Forum —was constructed in 184 BC by Marcus Porcius Cato (the Elder) . After

17496-465: The mainly illiterate Late Antique society. On the exterior, basilica church complexes included cemeteries, baptisteries, and fonts which "defined ritual and liturgical access to the sacred", elevated the social status of the Church hierarchy, and which complemented the development of a Christian historical landscape; Constantine and his mother Helena were patrons of basilicas in important Christian sites in

17658-530: The medieval period. Justinian rebuilt his birthplace in Illyricum , as Justiniana Prima , more in a gesture of imperium than out of an urbanistic necessity; another "city", was reputed to have been founded, according to Procopius ' panegyric on Justinian's buildings, precisely at the spot where the general Belisarius touched shore in North Africa: the miraculous spring that gushed forth to give them water and

17820-476: The mid-2nd to early 1st centuries BC: either they were nearly square as at Fanum Fortunae , designed by Vitruvius , and Cosa , with a 3:4 width-length ratio; or else they were more rectangular, as Pompeii's basilica, whose ratio is 3:7. The basilica at Ephesus is typical of the basilicas in the Roman East, which usually have a very elongated footprint and a ratio between 1:5 and 1:9, with open porticoes facing

17982-423: The more chaotic environment of the temple precinct, with the temple's façade as backdrop. In basilicas constructed for Christian uses, the interior was often decorated with frescoes , but these buildings' wooden roof often decayed and failed to preserve the fragile frescoes within. Thus was lost an important part of the early history of Christian art , which would have sought to communicate early Christian ideas to

18144-453: The most important transformations in late antiquity was the formation and evolution of the Abrahamic religions : Christianity , Rabbinic Judaism and, eventually, Islam . A milestone in the spread of Christianity was the conversion of Emperor Constantine the Great (r. 306–337) in 312, as claimed by his Christian panegyrist Eusebius of Caesarea , although the sincerity of his conversion

18306-461: The most renowned representatives. On the other hand, authors such as Ammianus Marcellinus (4th century) and Procopius of Caesarea (6th century) were able to keep the tradition of classical Hellenistic historiography alive in the Byzantine empire. Due to several factors of the era, among them the political instability and the constant military threats, treatises on war became a popular genre with

18468-676: The name and association resounded with the Christian claims of the royalty of Christ – according to the Acts of the Apostles the earliest Christians had gathered at the royal Stoa of Solomon in Jerusalem to assert Jesus's royal heritage. For early Christians, the Bible supplied evidence that the First Temple and Solomon's palace were both hypostyle halls and somewhat resembled basilicas. Hypostyle synagogues, often built with apses in Palestine by

18630-712: The nave and the main building medium was opus africanum of local stone, and spolia was infrequently used. The Church of the East's Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon was convened by the Sasanian Emperor Yazdegerd I at his capital at Ctesiphon ; according to Synodicon Orientale , the emperor ordered that the former churches in the Sasanian Empire to be restored and rebuilt, that such clerics and ascetics as had been imprisoned were to be released, and their Nestorian Christian communities allowed to circulate freely and practice openly. In eastern Syria ,

18792-449: The new style, shows the contrast especially clearly. In nearly all artistic media, simpler shapes were adopted and once natural designs were abstracted. Additionally hierarchy of scale overtook the preeminence of perspective and other classical models for representing spatial organization. From c.  300 Early Christian art began to create new public forms, which now included sculpture , previously distrusted by Christians as it

18954-477: The north side, but not on the south side. The entrance consists of two copper-clad doors surrounded by fields in natural concrete under a gable roof . The square campanile (bell tower) is at the church's southwest corner, and it is approximately 60 metres (200 ft) tall. Behind the church's main entry doors to the west, there is a spacious rectangular foyer which leads into the sanctuary . The first church in Molde

19116-457: The northern edge of the forum with typical nave, aisles, and a tribunal, but with an atypical semi-basement at the western side. Unlike in Gaul , basilica-forum complexes in Roman Britain did not usually include a temple; instead a shrine was usually inside the basilica itself. At Londinium however, there was probably no temple at all attached to the original basilica, but instead a contemporary temple

19278-408: The outer sections and built largely of rubble masonry faced with brick, with a number of decorative panels in opus reticulatum . The basilica stood in a new forum and was accompanied by a programme of Severan works at Leptis including thermae , a new harbour, and a public fountain. At Volubilis , principal city of Mauretania Tingitana , a basilica modelled on Leptis Magna's was completed during

19440-551: The period are a continuing matter of debate. In the West, its end was earlier, with the start of the Early Middle Ages typically placed in the 6th century, or even earlier on the edges of the Western Roman Empire . The term Spätantike , literally "late antiquity", has been used by German-speaking historians since its popularization by Alois Riegl in the early 20th century. It was given currency in English partly by

19602-466: The period of late antiquity has become a major focus in the fields of Quranic studies and Islamic origins. The late antique period also saw a wholesale transformation of the political and social basis of life in and around the Roman Empire . The Roman citizen elite in the 2nd and 3rd centuries, under the pressure of taxation and the ruinous cost of presenting spectacular public entertainments in

19764-468: The period. Three examples of a basilica discoperta or " hypaethral basilica" with no roof above the nave are inferred to have existed. The 6th century Anonymous pilgrim of Piacenza described a "basilica built with a quadriporticus , with the middle atrium uncovered" at Hebron , while at Pécs and near Salona two ruined 5th buildings of debated interpretation might have been either roofless basilica churches or simply courtyards with an exedra at

19926-406: The pre-Constantinian period of Christianity, including the reception hall or aula (Ancient Greek: αὐλή , romanized:  aulḗ , lit.   'courtyard') and the atria and triclinia of élite Roman dwellings. The versatility of the basilica form and its variability in size and ornament recommended itself to the early Christian Church : basilicas could be grandiose as

20088-697: The prototype of the triumphal arch at the east end of later Constantinian basilicas. Known as the Megiddo church , it was built at Kefar 'Othnay in Palestine , possibly c. 230, for or by the Roman army stationed at Legio (later Lajjun ). Its dedicatory inscriptions include the names of women who contributed to the building and were its major patrons, as well as men's names. A number of buildings previously believed to have been Constantinian or 4th century have been reassessed as dating to later periods, and certain examples of 4th century basilicas are not distributed throughout

20250-676: The provinces in the 3rd century, they brought with them their own regional influences and artistic tastes. For example, artists jettisoned the classical portrayal of the human body for one that was more rigid and frontal. This is markedly evident in the combined porphyry Portrait of the Four Tetrarchs in Venice . With these stubby figures clutching each other and their swords, all individualism , naturalism , Roman verism , and Greek idealism diminish. The Arch of Constantine in Rome, which re-used earlier classicising reliefs together with ones in

20412-449: The public thoroughfare, a transformation that was to result in the souk (marketplace). Burials within the urban precincts mark another stage in dissolution of traditional urbanistic discipline, overpowered by the attraction of saintly shrines and relics. In Roman Britain , the typical 4th- and 5th-century layer of dark earth within cities seems to be a result of increased gardening in formerly urban spaces. The city of Rome went from

20574-472: The relative scarcity of historical records from Europe in particular, the period from roughly the early fifth century until the Carolingian Renaissance (or later still) was referred to as the " Dark Ages ". This term has mostly been abandoned as a name for a historiographical epoch, being replaced by "Late Antiquity" in the periodization of the late Western Roman Empire, the early Byzantine Empire and

20736-458: The rise of Islam, two main theses prevail. On the one hand, there is the traditional view, as espoused by most historians prior to the second half of the twentieth century (and after) and by Muslim scholars. This view, the so-called "out of Arabia"-thesis, holds that Islam as a phenomenon was a new, alien element in the late antique world. Related to this is the Pirenne Thesis , according to which

20898-487: The rise of literary cultures in Syriac , Armenian , Georgian , Ethiopic , Arabic , and Coptic . It also marks a shift in literary style, with a preference for encyclopedic works in a dense and allusive style, consisting of summaries of earlier works (anthologies, epitomes) often dressed up in elaborate allegorical garb (e.g., De nuptiis Mercurii et Philologiae [The Marriage of Mercury and Philology] of Martianus Capella and

21060-719: The rural population that straightway abandoned their ploughshares for civilised life within the new walls, lend a certain taste of unreality to the project. In mainland Greece, the inhabitants of Sparta , Argos and Corinth abandoned their cities for fortified sites in nearby high places; the fortified heights of Acrocorinth are typical of Byzantine urban sites in Greece. In Italy, populations that had clustered within reach of Roman roads began to withdraw from them, as potential avenues of intrusion, and to rebuild in typically constricted fashion round an isolated fortified promontory, or rocca ; Cameron notes similar movement of populations in

21222-414: The same way as the covered market houses of late medieval northern Europe, where the meeting room, for lack of urban space, was set above the arcades, however. Although their form was variable, basilicas often contained interior colonnades that divided the space, giving aisles or arcaded spaces on one or both sides, with an apse at one end (or less often at each end), where the magistrates sat, often on

21384-584: The shared cultural horizon of the late antique world explains the character of Islam and its development. Such historians point to similarities with other late antique religions and philosophies—especially Christianity—in the prominent role and manifestations of piety in Islam, in Islamic asceticism and the role of "holy persons", in the pattern of universalist, homogeneous monotheism tied to worldly and military power, in early Islamic engagement with Greek schools of thought, in

21546-505: The short reign of Macrinus . The aisled-hall plan of the basilica was adopted by a number of religious cults in late antiquity . At Sardis , a monumental basilica housed the city's synagogue , serving the local Jewish diaspora . New religions like Christianity required space for congregational worship, and the basilica was adapted by the early Church for worship. Because they were able to hold large number of people, basilicas were adopted for Christian liturgical use after Constantine

21708-560: The site of existing early Christian cemeteries and martyria , related to the belief in Bodily Resurrection , and the cult of the sacred dead became monumentalised in basilica form. Traditional civic basilicas and bouleuteria declined in use with the weakening of the curial class (Latin: curiales ) in the 4th and 5th centuries, while their structures were well suited to the requirements of congregational liturgies. The conversion of these types of buildings into Christian basilicas

21870-554: The smaller cities of the Greek East is a moot subject among historians. The urban continuity of Constantinople is the outstanding example of the Mediterranean world; of the two great cities of lesser rank, Antioch was devastated by the Persian sack of 540, followed by the plague of Justinian (542 onwards) and completed by earthquake, while Alexandria survived its Islamic transformation, to suffer incremental decline in favour of Cairo in

22032-553: The time of the Pauline epistles . The arrival and reburial of the martyrs' uncorrupted remains in the basilica in time for the Easter celebrations was seen as powerful step towards divine approval. At Philippi , the market adjoining the 1st-century forum was demolished and replaced with a Christian basilica. Civic basilicas throughout Asia Minor became Christian places of worship; examples are known at Ephesus, Aspendos , and at Magnesia on

22194-480: The traditional cursus honorum , had found under the Antonines that security could be obtained only by combining their established roles in the local town with new ones as servants and representatives of a distant emperor and his traveling court. After Constantine centralized the government in his new capital of Constantinople (dedicated in 330), the late antique upper classes were divided among those who had access to

22356-406: The traditional Roman motivations of public and private life marked by pride, ambition and kinship solidarity, and differing from the married pagan leadership. Unlike later strictures on priestly celibacy , celibacy in late antique Christianity sometimes took the form of abstinence from sexual relations after marriage, and it came to be the expected norm for urban clergy . Celibate and detached,

22518-529: The upper clergy became an elite equal in prestige to urban notables, the potentes or dynatoi . Islam appeared in the 7th century, spurring Arab armies to invade the Eastern Roman Empire and the Sassanian Empire of Persia , destroying the latter. After conquering all of North Africa and Visigothic Spain , the Islamic invasion was halted by Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in modern France . On

22680-472: The urban class in greater proportion, and thus the people who knew how to keep civic services running. Perhaps the greatest blow came in the wake of the extreme weather events of 535–536 and subsequent Plague of Justinian , when the remaining trade networks ensured the Plague spread to the remaining commercial cities. The impact of this outbreak of plague has recently been disputed. The end of classical antiquity

22842-413: The war was over, planning for a new church began, to designs by architect Finn Bryn (1890-1975), who was awarded the contract after winning a competition for a new church in Molde in 1948. The new church would be built about 40 metres (130 ft) south of the old church site. Total costs came in about 3 million  kr . The foundation stone was laid in 1953 and it was completed in 1957. The new building

23004-533: The writings of Peter Brown , whose survey The World of Late Antiquity (1971) revised the Gibbon view of a stale and ossified Classical culture, in favour of a vibrant time of renewals and beginnings, and whose The Making of Late Antiquity offered a new paradigm of understanding the changes in Western culture of the time in order to confront Sir Richard Southern 's The Making of the Middle Ages . The continuities between

23166-508: Was consecrated on 8 December 1957. The cathedral has been the seat of the Bishop of the Diocese of Møre since its establishment in 1983. The following Bishops have served in this cathedral: Basilica In Ancient Roman architecture , a basilica (Greek Basiliké ) was a large public building with multiple functions that was typically built alongside the town's forum . The basilica

23328-577: Was a key figure in many important events in Christian history , as he convened and attended the first ecumenical council of bishops at Nicaea in 325, subsidized the building of churches and sanctuaries such as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem , and involved himself in questions such as the timing of Christ's resurrection and its relation to the Passover . The birth of Christian monasticism

23490-425: Was also of symbolic significance, asserting the dominance of Christianity and supplanting the old political function of public space and the city-centre with an emphatic Christian social statement. Traditional monumental civic amenities like gymnasia , palaestrae , and thermae were also falling into disuse, and became favoured sites for the construction of new churches, including basilicas. Under Constantine,

23652-484: Was an innovation. Earlier basilicas had mostly had wooden roofs, but this basilica dispensed with timber trusses and used instead cross-vaults made from Roman bricks and concrete to create one of the ancient world's largest covered spaces: 80 m long, 25 m wide, and 35 m high. The vertices of the cross-vaults, the largest Roman examples, were 35 m. The vault was supported on marble monolithic columns 14.5 m tall. The foundations are as much as 8 m deep. The vault

23814-407: Was built in 1662 and it was a wooden, cruciform building. The original site of the church was about 40 metres (130 ft) to the north of the present church. In 1814, this church served as an election church ( Norwegian : valgkirke ). Together with more than 300 other parish churches across Norway, it was a polling station for elections to the 1814 Norwegian Constituent Assembly which wrote

23976-484: Was constructed nearby. Later, in 79 AD, an inscription commemorated the completion of the 385 by 120 foot (117 m × 37 m) basilica at Verulamium ( St Albans ) under the governor Gnaeus Julius Agricola ; by contrast the first basilica at Londinium was only 148 by 75 feet (45 m × 23 m). The smallest known basilica in Britain was built by the Silures at Caerwent and measured 180 by 100 feet (55 m × 30 m). When Londinium became

24138-432: Was constructed to supply it with water, and the tallest Roman triumphal columns were erected there. Migrations of Germanic , Hunnic , and Slavic tribes disrupted Roman rule from the late 4th century onwards, culminating first in the Sack of Rome by the Visigoths in 410 and subsequent Sack of Rome by the Vandals in 455, part of the eventual collapse of the Empire in the West itself by 476. The Western Empire

24300-414: Was held in the basilica, which must have been large enough to accommodate the more than two hundred bishops that attended its third session, together with their translators and servants; around 350 bishops attended the Council in all. In an ekphrasis in his eleventh sermon , Asterius of Amasea described an icon in the church depicting Euphemia's martyrdom. The church was restored under the patronage of

24462-436: Was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building gave its name to the basilica architectural form . Originally, a basilica was an ancient Roman public building, where courts were held, as well as serving other official and public functions. Basilicas are typically rectangular buildings with a central nave flanked by two or more longitudinal aisles , with the roof at two levels, being higher in

24624-486: Was investigated and found innocent by the Suffect Consul Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeanus , the brother of Seneca the Younger , after charges were brought against him by members of the local Jewish diaspora . Modern tradition instead associates the incident with an open-air inscribed bema in the forum itself. The emperor Trajan constructed his own imperial forum in Rome accompanied by his Basilica Ulpia dedicated in 112. Trajan's Forum (Latin: forum Traiani )

24786-459: Was placed on demonstrating a symbolic fact rather than on rendering a realistic scene. As time progressed during the late antique period, art become more concerned with biblical themes and influenced by interactions of Christianity with the Roman state. Within this Christian subcategory of Roman art, dramatic changes were also taking place in the Depiction of Jesus . Jesus Christ had been more commonly depicted as an itinerant philosopher, teacher or as

24948-455: Was plain and utilitarian, but inside was very grandly decorated. In the reign of Constantine I, a basilica was constructed for the Pope in the former barracks of the Equites singulares Augusti , the cavalry arm of the Praetorian Guard . (Constantine had disbanded the Praetorian guard after his defeat of their emperor Maxentius and replaced them with another bodyguard, the Scholae Palatinae .) In 313 Constantine began construction of

25110-412: Was replaced by the so-called barbarian kingdoms , with the Arian Christian Ostrogothic Kingdom ruling Rome from Ravenna . The resultant cultural fusion of Greco-Roman , Germanic, and Christian traditions formed the foundations of the subsequent culture of Europe . In the 6th century, Roman imperial rule continued in the East, and the Byzantine-Sasanian wars continued. The campaigns of Justinian

25272-470: Was separated from the Temple of Trajan , the Ulpian Library , and his famous Column depicting the Dacian Wars by the Basilica. It was an especially grand example whose particular symmetrical arrangement with an apse at both ends was repeated in the provinces as a characteristic form. To improve the quality of the Roman concrete used in the Basilica Ulpia, volcanic scoria from the Bay of Naples and Mount Vesuvius were imported which, though heavier,

25434-503: Was similar to that of the civic basilicas but very different from temples in contemporary Graeco-Roman polytheism : while pagan temples were entered mainly by priests and thus had their splendour visible from without, within Christian basilicas the main ornamentation was visible to the congregants admitted inside. Christian priests did not interact with attendees during the rituals which took place at determined intervals, whereas pagan priests were required to perform individuals' sacrifices in

25596-441: Was so important in pagan worship. Sarcophagi carved in relief had already become highly elaborate, and Christian versions adopted new styles, showing a series of different tightly packed scenes rather than one overall image (usually derived from Greek history painting ) as was the norm. Soon the scenes were split into two registers, as in the Dogmatic Sarcophagus or the Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (the last of these exemplifying

25758-475: Was stronger than the pumice available closer to Rome. The Bailica Ulpia is probably an early example of tie bars to restrain the lateral thrust of the barrel vault resting on a colonnade; both tie-bars and scoria were used in contemporary work at the Baths of Trajan and later the Hadrianic domed vault of the Pantheon . In early 123, the augusta and widow of the emperor Trajan, Pompeia Plotina died. Hadrian , successor to Trajan, deified her and had

25920-414: Was subsumed beneath the 5th century basilica of Hagios Demetrios , forming a crypt. The largest and oldest basilica churches in Egypt were at Pbow , a coenobitic monastery established by Pachomius the Great in 330. The 4th century basilica was replaced by a large 5th century building (36 × 72 m) with five aisles and internal colonnades of pink granite columns and paved with limestone. This monastery

26082-456: Was supported by brick latticework ribs (Latin: bipedalis ) forming lattice ribbing, an early form of rib vault , and distributing the load evenly across the vault's span. Similar brick ribs were employed at the Baths of Maxentius on the Palatine Hill , where they supported walls on top of the vault. Also known as the Basilica Constantiniana , 'Basilica of Constantine' or Basilica Nova , 'New Basilica', it chanced to be

26244-533: Was the administrative centre of the Pachomian order where the monks would gather twice annually and whose library may have produced many surviving manuscripts of biblical, Gnostic, and other texts in Greek and Coptic . In North Africa , late antique basilicas were often built on a doubled plan. In the 5th century, basilicas with two apses, multiple aisles, and doubled churches were common, including examples respectively at Sufetula , Tipasa , and Djémila . Generally, North African basilica churches' altars were in

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