Procopius and the language of buildings

《普罗科皮乌斯与建筑的语言》一书聚焦于公元6世纪的希腊语著作《阿迪菲斯》。这篇文章对于理解早期拜占庭帝国的物质文化至关重要。一个由历史学家、语言学家和考古学家组成的团队将分析文本，识别其叙事模式，说明给定的结构，并阐明文本对个别建筑和整个地区的意义和局限性。申请者理所当然地认为，就像图像、建筑和材料及其视觉信息呈现并宣传统治的特征一样，写作和谈论建筑也具有类似的潜力。该项目并没有将查士丁尼皇帝(527-565年)的权力集中在建筑和艺术上，而是专注于一篇文本，其目的恰恰是创造和模仿物质文化的符号效应。通过他关于建筑的文字，普罗科普乌斯几乎进入了与建筑本身的竞争，设定了高标准：他展示了大量的建筑措施，他描述了涉及的技术专长和创新，他强调查士丁尼建筑的坚固、美观和创造力。他创造性地运用了传统的文学策略和新的表现手段来把握这些主题。这种“建筑的语言”很容易表达罗马皇帝的力量，罗马帝国的力量和耐久性，并说服读者这些担忧。普罗科普斯为他的文本选择的建筑和他让它们说话的方式将从文化、历史和考古的角度进行调查。在早期建筑的背景下，考虑到普罗科皮乌斯虚拟(或真实)图书馆的许多文本，“建筑物的语言”项目将有助于破译古代末拜占庭文化开始时的这一材料和文学鼎盛时期，并将有助于加深对这一时期的理解。它将讨论普罗科皮乌斯所援引的国家神话在多大程度上是基于建筑和图像的坚实世界，这似乎构成了稳定的重要因素，将查士丁尼的(建造的)世界视觉化地建立在神圣秩序的基础上。除了艺术史、建筑和文化方面的任务，大型建筑项目的组织和建筑法的实施需要详细的(重新)审查，以及中央文本本身需要比晚些时候(例如，公元前7-12)进行的更多的文献学调查。文本的插入和转换。就在最近(也是第一次)，我们的同事F.Montinaro编辑了权威的早期简短文本版本De Aedifis，他是我们项目的合作伙伴之一。简而言之：该项目的目标是创建一个创新和引领潮流的普罗科普乌斯建筑的历史和考古评论。

“Procopius and the language of buildings" focuses on the 6th century Greek book De Aedificiis. This text is crucial for the understanding of the material culture of the early Byzantine Empire. A team of historians, philologists and archaeologists will analyze the text, recognize its narrative patterns, illustrate given structures, and illuminate the significance and limitations of the text for individual buildings and for entire regions. The applicants take for granted that just as images, buildings and materials with their visual messages present and promote the character of a reign, writing and talking about buildings has a similar potential. The project doesn’t center emperor Justinian’s (527-565) power as visualized in buildings and art but focuses on a text whose aim was precisely to create and imitate in words the signaling effect of material culture. With his text about the buildings Procopius almost enters into competition with the buildings themselves, setting high standards: he presents the enormous number of building measures, he describes the technical expertise and innovations involved, he emphasizes the soundness, beauty and creativity of Justinianic building. He grasps these topics with a creative use of traditional literary strategies and with new means of representation. This “language of buildings” is apt to express the power of the Roman emperor, the strength and durability of the Roman Empire, and to convince the reader of these concerns.The buildings Procopius selected for his text and the way in which he made them speak will be investigated in cultural, historical and archaeological terms. Against the background of the earlier constructions as well as in view of the many texts of Procopius virtual (or real) library, the “language of the Buildings”-project will help to decipher this material and literary heyday at the end of antiquity and the beginning of Byzantine culture and will contribute to a deeper understanding of this period. It will be discussed to what extent Procopius’ invoked state myth is based on the solid world of constructions and images, which, as it seems constitutes an important element of stability “visualizing” Justinian’s (built) world as based on divine order. In addition to the art-historical, architectural and cultural tasks, the organization of large-scale construction projects and the implementation of building law are in need of a detailed (re)examination as well as the central text itself needs more philological investigation than has been done e.g. on later (7th-12th c.) insertions and transformations of the text. Only recently (and for the first time), the authoritative early short text-version of De Aedificiis was edited by our colleague F. Montinaro, who is among the co-operation partners of our projects. In short: the goal of the project is to create an innovative and trend-setting historical and archaeological commentary of Procopius Buildings.