of it rather crude, but much also is of very high quality and serves
to convey to us, if only vaguely, something of the glory that once
characterized the Church art of a whole section of the Christian
world. On the evidence of what does remain a picture of what there
was that is not wholly inaccurate can be reconstructed. It is hoped
that the illustrations in this book will provide a basis on which to
establish that reconstruction.

* * *

It is not easy to decide at what point the story with which we are
concerned should begin. The adoption of Christianity by Con-
stantine as the official religion of the Roman Empire through the
Edict of Milan in 313 marks a turning-point in ecclesiastical history,
but hardly in art, for old pagan ideas and motifs were taken over
lock, stock, and barrel, and there were few immediate changes in
style that could be attributed to the new faith rather than to the
inevitable changes which were taking place as the result of the
progress of time. The transference of the capital from Rome in Latin
Italyto Constantinople in the Hellenistic Greek world in 330 marks
another break, which was more significant as far as art was con-
cerned, for it brought the Court and the Church, the two main
sources of patronage, into the orbit of a new and distinct culture, in
part Greek and in part Eastern. The Sack of Rome by barbarian
Goths in 410 is also an important date, as is the year 476, when the
last of the independent Roman emperors ceased to rule in the West.
But more vital for art than all these was the reign of Justinian
( 527-65), for then the new Byzantine Empire was set on a sure
foundation and an art and architecture which were both wholly
Christian and also wholly new saw their first flowering. Change had,
it is true, set in before Justinian's day, for the new style was already
budding when he came to the throne, and the beginning of the sixth
century represents perhaps the true turning-point between the end
of the old world and the beginning of the new, but it was Justinian's
lavish patronage that established the new age firmly and definitely.
Our story will thus begin about that time so far as generalities are
concerned, but the illustrations and more detailed descriptions will in

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