E08568
Mosaics in the apse at the end of the south aisle of the church:
The original mosaic decoration of this apse was largely destroyed when a window was inserted in the mid-fifteenth century (as also happened in the apse at the end of the north aisle, E08567). However, the haloed heads and parts of the upper bodies of two saints survive, each being crowned from heaven by a youthful Christ. Both are clearly wearing a white pallium (a thin white band of cloth draped over the shoulders), which identifies them as senior bishops (see, for instance, the image of Apollinaris, bishop of Ravenna, in S. Apollinare in Classe, E06048), and both also have the white hair and white beards that are also normal in representations of bishops.
Their precise identification is, however, more problematic, in particular for the figure on the left.
The label of the figure on the right is still well preserved and fully legible: SEVE/RVS. He is therefore almost certainly Severus, an early-fourth-century bishop of Ravenna who is depicted (also with pallium) in the mid-sixth-century mosaics of S. Apollinare in Classe, with the label 'S(AN)C(TV)S SEVERVS' (see E06048). No other saintly Bishop Severus is known to us.
The mosaic label of the figure on the left is completely lost, except for the unhelpful initial S(AN)C(TV)S. However, he is recorded in the nineteenth century as having had a painted inscription next to him, with the name HERMACOR, and Terry and Maguire (2007, 122-123) confirm that the letters HERM can still be seen very faintly under the plaster next to the saint's head. This painted inscription perhaps accurately reproduced a damaged mosaic original, though we cannot of course know this for certain. If it does indeed reproduce the mosaic original, then the saint represented must be Hermagoras (bishop and martyr of Aquileia). The possibility (and some substantial problems) surrounding this identification are considered in the Discussion.
Source
The 'basilica of Eufrasius' is the southern, and larger, church of the palaeochristian double-cathedral of Poreč. Detailed survey and excavation reveals that Eufrasius partially reused the walls of an earlier church on the same site, but his intervention was extensive and transformational: new columns, capitals and bases in imported Proconnesian marble; mosaic floors; stucco-work; sumptuous opus sectile panels in the main apse; and the mosaics that are the subject of this and several other database entries.The precise dates of Eufrasius' episcopate are unknown, and nothing is known about him before he became bishop of Poreč - the only reference to him in textual sources is to a bishop Eufrasius, who must surely be our bishop, condemned as a defender of the Three Chapters in a letter of Pope Pelagius I of 559. Stylistic analysis of the mosaics, stucco-work and opus sectile, and comparison with very similar datable work in Ravenna (just across the north Adriatic), supports a mid-sixth-century date for Eufrasius' episcopate and his church (Terry and Maguire 2007, 59-69).
Discussion
The right-hand figure can be identified with confidence, as Severus, bishop of Ravenna, who subscribed to the acts of the Council of Serdica in 343 (the only fact that is known for certain about him). In the mid to later sixth century there is good evidence that he had begun to attract considerable cult at Ravenna and Classe, just across the Adriatic from Poreč: we have seen above how he was depicted as a saint in the mosaics of S. Apollinare in Classe (datable to the 530s or 540s); and, most tellingly, in the 570s a large new basilica was built at Classe in his name, to which his body was then translated (see E05789).The identification of the left-hand saint as Hermagoras, bishop of Aquileia would, in this context, make perfect sense: Eufrasius would be honouring an episcopal saint each from the two great sees of the upper Adriatic: Ravenna with Bishop Severus, and Aquileia with Bishop Hermagoras. The identification of the left-hand figure as Hermagoras is, however, decidedly problematic. In the eighth and ninth centuries he acquired a remarkable Martyrdom which claimed that he was the first bishop of Aquileia, a disciple of the Evangelist Mark, consecrated by St Peter himself, before being martyred under Nero alongside a deacon called Fortunatus (see the detailed discussion in Bratož 1999, 41-67). Before this, however, the only record of a Hermagoras, martyr of Aquileia, is in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum, where he appears with Fortunatus, but named second after the latter, and with no reference to his having been a bishop - see E04879 (12 July), E04927 (22 August) and E04928 (23 August). It therefore seems very likely that the elevation of Hermagoras to episcopal status, and the downgrading of Fortunatus to the status of a humbler companion, occurred only after the sixth/seventh century. If so, the painted inscription identifying the left-hand bishop in this apse at Poreč, will have been the result of a supposition by an early restorer.
Bibliography
For Eufrasius:Pietri, C. and Pietri, L., Prosopographie chrétienne du Bas-Empire, 2 Prosopographie de l'Italie chrétienne (313-604), 2 vols. (Ècole française de Rome 1999), vol. 1, 671-2, 'Eufrasius'.
For the mosaics, their state of preservation, and their identification:
Terry, A. and H. Maguire, Dynamic Splendor. The Wall Mosaics in the Cathedral of Eufrasius at Poreč, 2 vols, (Pennsylvania State University Press) 2007.
For Hermagoras:
Bratož, R., Il cristianesimo aquileiese prima di Costantino, fra Aquileia e Poetovio (Udine 1999).
Paschini, P., "Ermagora, vescovo di Aquileia, e Fortunato, diacono," in Bibliotheca Sanctorum, vol. 5 (Rome: Istituto Giovanni XXIII della Pontificia Università Lateranense, 1964) cols 10-11.
Images
Mosaic in the south side-apse of the basilica of Eufrasius at Poreč: with perhaps *Hermagoras (bishop of Aquileia), and Severus (probably the bishop of Ravenna). Photo: Maria Lidova.
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S01884 | Severus, bishop of Ravenna, earlier 4th c. | Certain | S02547 | Fortunatus and Hermagoras, martyrs of Aquileia | Uncertain |
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