Un miniatore nella bottega degli Astrapas? Alcune osservazioni attorno alle immagini del Tolomeo Marciano gr. Z. 516 (904)

Between the end of the thirteenth century and the beginning of the fourteenth, Thessaloniki was a flourishing and cosmopolitan city: in this context was realized the Ptolemy Marc. gr. Z. 516 (904), then belonging to cardinal Basilios Bessarion and today preserved in the Marciana Library of Venice. Copied in Greek by a Frank named Andrea Teluntàs, the manuscript contained also a cryptic cycle of illumination that once Italo Furlan defined as an ethic and philosophical Christian Weltanschauung. The paper focuses on the illuminated cycle contained in the Ptolemy Marc. gr. Z. 516 (904), analyzing its artistic and literary sources and providing also a stylistic reading of it

Short-Term Physiological Effects of a Very Low-Calorie Ketogenic Diet: Effects on Adiponectin Levels and Inflammatory States

Adipose tissue is a multifunctional organ involved in many physiological and metabolic processes through the production of adipokines and, in particular, adiponectin. Caloric restriction is one of the most important strategies against obesity today. The very low-calorie ketogenic diet (VLCKD) represents a type of caloric restriction with very or extremely low daily food energy consumption. This study aimed to investigate the physiological effects of a VLCKD on anthropometric and biochemical parameters such as adiponectin levels, as well as analyzing oligomeric profiles and cytokine serum levels in obese subjects before and after a VLCKD. Twenty obese subjects were enrolled. At baseline and after eight weeks of intervention, anthropometric and biochemical parameters, such as adiponectin levels, were recorded. Our findings showed a significant change in the anthropometric and biochemical parameters of these obese subjects before and after a VLCKD. We found a negative correlation between adiponectin and lipid profile, visceral adipose tissue (VAT), C-reactive protein (CRP), and pro-inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor-a (TNF-a), which confirmed the important involvement of adiponectin in metabolic and inflammatory diseases. We demonstrated the beneficial short-term effects of a VLCKD not only in the treatment of obesity but also in the establishment of obesity-correlated diseases

Considerazioni sopra due manoscritti della Biblioteca Marciana di Venezia ( Homerus Venetus А

La famosa miniatura del Liber ad honorem Augusti, con la cittadinanza in lutto per la morte di Guglielmo II, ben descrive la Palermo del XII secolo, una città cosmopolita in cui convivevano lingue, culture e religioni diverse. Gli Altavilla, e in particolare re Ruggero II, promossero un programma culturale che rispecchiasse questa koiné mediterranea. La scelta retorica di utilizzare artisti arabi per creare l'immagine di una corte lussuosa e cosmopolita, mentre l'arte bizantina sottolineava il ruolo di pius rex christianus di Ruggero, sostenne e legittimò le sue aspirazioni politiche. Muovendo dal pannello a mosaico della chiesa di Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio, in cui il sovrano è rappresentato mentre viene incoronato da Cristo con il loros bizantino, e attraverso l’analisi di due manoscritti conservati presso la Biblioteca nazionale marciana di Venezia - l'Homerus Venetus A (Marc. gr. Z. 454) e il Vangelo greco-arabo (Marc. gr. Z. 539) - l’articolo indaga l'uso politico dell'arte durante il regno di Ruggero II e le motivazioni ideologiche che influenzarono la politica artistica del sovrano

Bisanzio fuori Bisanzio. Le illustrazioni dei manoscritti greci di origine provinciale conservati alla Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana

The aim of the essay is to analyze the production of greek manuscripts in the peripheral areas of the byzantine empire, providing an art-historical perspective to one of the most debated issues in studies. Moving from the extraordinary heritage of the Biblioteca Marciana of Venice, were selected fifteen decorated manuscripts, emblematic of a production often underestimated. After an introduction dedicated to the constitution and development of the collection, from Bessarion to the eighteenth-century collectors, the essay will firstly focus on greek manuscripts made in Southern Italy and Sicily between the tenth and fourteenth centuries. The study of ornamentation between the tenth and eleventh century is conducted through the analysis of the decorative repertoire that developed in Calabria, Campania and Lazio as a result of the intensification of relations between greek monasticism and Benedictine monasticism; then it goes to the study of cultural policy of Norman rulers in Sicily during the twelfth century, and its effects on the byzantine miniature in Sicily. A further chapter is finally devoted to the Salento of the fourteenth century, deepening the illustrations of Glycas Marc. gr. Z. 402 (1031). The second section of the essay focuses on oriental provinces and Greece between X and XIV century. Moving from paleographic and codicological studies, the first chapter of the section is intended to provide an art-historical perspective on manuscript production in the peripheral areas of Constantinople, tying some "eccentric" details to the ornamental repertoire of certain provinces, from Cappadocia to Bithynia, to Greece. Finally, the last chapter deepens the book decoration in Thessalonica at the beginning of the fourteenth century, studying its relations with the monumental art in Macedonia and in Serbia under Stephen Uroš II Milutin.L’elaborato intende affrontare criticamente la produzione di manoscritti greci nelle aree periferiche dell’impero bizantino, fornendo un punto di vista storico-artistico ad una delle problematiche più dibattute dagli studi contemporanei. Muovendo dallo straordinario patrimonio della Biblioteca Marciana di Venezia, sono stati selezionati quindici codici che, per la loro decorazione, sono emblematici di una produzione spesso sottovalutata. Dopo un’introduzione dedicata alla nascita e allo sviluppo della collezione marciana, da Bessarione fino ai collezionisti del Settecento, nella prima parte del lavoro l’attenzione è posta sui codici greci realizzati in Italia meridionale e in Sicilia fra il X e il XIV secolo. Dallo studio dell’ornamentazione fra X e XI secolo, attraverso l’analisi del repertorio decorativo che si sviluppò fra Calabria, Campania e Lazio quale conseguenza dell’intensificarsi dei rapporti fra monachesimo greco e monachesimo benedettino, si passa quindi ad analizzare la politica culturale della dinastia Altaville nel XII secolo, e dei suoi riflessi sulla miniatura bizantina nell’isola. Un ulteriore capitolo è poi dedicato al Salento del XIV secolo, approfondendo le illustrazioni del Glycas Marc. gr. Z. 402 (1031). La seconda sezione dell’elaborato si concentra invece sulle provincie orientali e la Grecia fra X e XIV secolo. Muovendo da studi paleografici e codicologici, il primo capitolo della sezione intende offrire un punto di vista storico-artistico sulla produzione manoscritta nelle aree periferiche di Costantinopoli, legando alcuni dettagli “eccentrici” del repertorio ornamentale a determinate provincie, dalla Cappadocia alla Bitinia, alla Grecia continentale.Conclude il lavoro un approfondimento sulla decorazione libraria a Tessalonica all’inizio del Trecento, e sui suoi rapporti con l’arte monumentale in Macedonia e nella Serbia di Stefano II Uroš Milutin

The Illustrations of Michael Glycas’ Βίβλος χρονική in the Marcianus gr. 402

Manuscript gr. Z. 402 (1031) in the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice contains a rare copy of Βίβλος χρονική, a historiographical work compiled by Michael Glycas in the second half of the 12th century. The manuscript was transcribed by a scribe named Giorgio for Barda Tromarchopoulo around the year 1290 in an otrantine baroque minuscule. The cycle of images, although the Chronicles of Glycas were virtually unknown outside Constantinople, also seems closely linked to the Salentine milieu. The essay analyses the illustrated repertoire of the manuscript, reconstructing its origins and relations with the koiné of the Greek communities under Norman and Swabian domination in Apulia and southern Italy

Southern Caucasus in Perspective. The Scholarly Debate through the Pages of Seminarium Kondakovianum and Skythika (1927-1938)

In the interwar period more than ever, humanities were strongly affected by the political and social environment: art history and archaeology so played a central role in the construction and reinforcement of national identities. This is true even for a “peripheral” region such as the Caucasus, that in those years became an imaginary theatre of conflict for patriotic claims (the Georgian Georgij Čubinašvili against the Austrian Josef Strzygowski, the Polish Stefan Przeworski against the German Gustaf Kossinna) and nostalgia for the ancien régime (the Russian émigré Michail Rostovtzeff). Through a historiographical analysis of the articles published on Seminarium Kondakovianum and its series Skytika, the article seeks to understand the pioneering role this journal had in discovering a region almost completely neglected in Western literature, and how the Caucasus was perceived in the scholarly debate of the 1920s and 1930s

Byzantium on Display. Scholars, collectors and dealers at the Exposition d'art byzantin

In the early twentieth century, art dealers tailored their activities to the demands of a new generation of collectors who had turned to Byzantine art. The attention paid to Byzantium reached its peak with the Exposition Internationale d’Art Byzantin, at which more than 800 artefacts were displayed in the Pavillon de Marsan at the Musée du Louvre in 1931. This paper aims to investigate the role of private lenders to the exhibition, and particularly that of art dealers, who were instrumental in the founding of many collections of medieval and Byzantine pieces, selecting and importing from the Mediterranean basin fine objects for American and European collectors. The Exposition thus represented for them a prime occasion for the display of goods in a formal and officially recognized environment, and an opportunity to expand their network of clients