John the Baptist is the last Old Testament prophet who introduced Jesus Christ as the Savior to the people of Israel. His other name – John the Forerunner – is meant to emphasize his specific role as forerunner or precursor of Jesus Christ. The narratives of his life and ministry are contained in a number of sources – in the four canonic gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, Flavius Josephus and early Christian apocripha.

The exceptional veneration of John the Baptist in the Christian countries affected the development of comprehensive and diverse iconography of the saint. The hagiographic cycle of John the Baptist in the Byzantine art developed in compliance with literary traditions of the saint’s life. The first iconographic scenes from his life in the early Byzantine art date back to the 5th – 7th centuries AD. Before the 10th century, the evolution of his hagiographic cycle went in two directions. The earliest hagiographic cycle was dedicated to John’s infancy designed as illustrations to the Protoevangelion of John. A separate passion cycle represented the saint’s martyrdom scenes (such as Herod’s Feast, The Beheading of John the Baptist, Herodias with the Head of John the Baptist). By themes and number of the scenes, the surviving monuments can be conditionally classified into an abridged cycle (2 or 4 scenes of the most important life events) and aggregate cycles, which could be composed by subjects such as infancy scenes, passion and preaching cycles dedicated to the public ministry of John the Baptist. The aggregate hagiographic cycles included the scenes of the saint’s conception through the burial or discovery of his head such as the fresco cycles in the southern apse of the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Mother of God of the St. Anthony Monastery (1125), which originally numbered 15-17 scenes; 10 scenes in the altar of the Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Savior of the Mirozhsky Monastery (ca. 1140); over 20 scenes in the vestry of the Annunciation Church on Miachin (1189); at least 9 scenes in the vestry of the Church of the Savior upon Nereditsa (1199) and others, including a Sinai icon of John the Baptist with 15 borders scenes from his life (the early 13th century). The hagiographic cycle of John the Baptist was continually complemented with new compositions, having numbered in total of more than 40 scenes by the 15th century, varying in different monuments.

The 16th – early half of the 17th century in Russia was the golden age of the saint’s hagiographic cycles. The perception of John the Baptist as forerunner of Jesus Christ was relevant in the atmosphere of eschatological expectations during the reign of Ivan the Terrible. The times of reign of Ivan the Terrible, who was baptized after John the Baptist, have left a great number of the saint’s icons; the tsar commissioned the icons, donating them to churches and monasteries. The mid-16th century saw a broad circulation of hagiographic icons of John the Baptist. The number of border scenes in the cycles varied from 4 to 24 such as the icon of John the Baptist Angel of the desert, with scenes from his life and selected saints (the first half of the 17th century, State Tretyakov Gallery) – 4 border scenes; John the Baptist with scenes from his life from the village of Nenoxa (the second half of the 16th century, the Arkhangelsk Museum of Fine Arts) – 16; an icon from the village of Balakhna (the 16th century, the Nizhny Novgorod Art Museum) – 18. The total number of the episodes of the Baptist’s cycle in Russian medieval art of the 16th – the first half of the 17th centuries accounts for 45 scenes, whereas separate monuments consisted of not more than 30. This opened great opportunities for varying the cycle’s border-scenes. The composition of the border-scenes was complemented with the scenes depicting post-mortem miracles of John the Baptist, which had no parallels in Byzantine art such as The Miracle of the Finger and The Appearance of John the Baptist to John the monk. The volatility of the cycle composition was owed to abundance of the saint’s hagiographies, varying in contents. The second half of the 17th century saw the adoption, as iconographic sources, of Western European engravings distinguishing by numerous deviations from the saint’s hagiography and references to the Old Testament stories. The icons of John the Baptist that appeared in the late 17th – 18th centuries were executed in baroque style, with new interpretation of space and compositions of the subjects depicted.

The feast day of John the Baptist is celebrated several times and is associated with different episodes from his life and veneration. July 7th (June 24th , the old style) – the Nativity of John the Baptist; September 11 (August 29th, the old style) – the Beheading of John the Baptist; October 6 (September 23rd, the old style) – the Conception of John the Baptist; January 20th (January 7th, the old style) – the Synaxis of John the Baptist; March 9th (February 24th, the old style) and June 7th (May 25th, the old style) – the Finding of John the Baptist’s Head.


Bibliography:

1. Ткаченко А. А., Э. П. А., Лисовой Н. Н., Артюхова Т. А., Королёв А. А., Турилов А. А., Устинова Ю. В., Иванова Ю. В. Иоанн Предтеча. // Православная энциклопедия. Том XХIV. М.: Церковно-научный центр «Православная энциклопедия», 2010. С. 528–577.

2. Каменнов В. Иконография Иоанна Крестителя в Восточной и Западной Церкви // ПС. 1887.

3. Лихачев Н. П. Материалы для истории русского иконописания. СПб., 1906.

4. Haring W. The Winded St. John the Baptist // The Art Bull. N. Y., 1922. Vol. 5. N 2. P. 36–40.

5. Антонова В. И., Мнёва Н. Е. Каталог древнерусской живописи XIV — начала XVII веков: Опыт историко-художественной классификации. М., 1963.

6. Антонова В. И. Древнерусское искусство в собрании П. Корина. М., 1966.

7. Смирнова Э. С., Лаурина В. К., Гордиенко Э. А. Живопись Великого Новгорода: XV век. М., 1982.

8. Малков Ю. Г. Стенопись собора Рождества Богородицы на Возмище в Волоколамске. // ДРИ. СПб., 1997. [Вып.:] Исследования и атрибуции. С. 267–284.

9. Творогов О. В. Сказания об Иоанне Предтече // СККДР. 1987. Вып. 1. C. 418–421.

10. Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery of Saint Catherine. Athens, 1990.

11. Филатов В. В. Особенности иконографии фресок Андрея Рублева в соборе Успения на Городке в Звенигороде. // Искусство Древней Руси: Проблемы иконографии. М., 1994. С. 8–10.

12. Гусева Э. К. Икона «Иоанн Предтеча – Ангел пустыни» конца XIV века. // ГТГ: Каталог собрания. М., 1995. Т. 1. C. 149–150.

13. Царевская Т. Ю. Фрески церкви Благовещения на Мячине («в Аркажах»). Новгород, 1999.

14. Бродовая Ю. В. Новооткрытая икона «Иоанн Предтеча – Ангел пустыни с житием» из собрания ГМЗ «Коломенское»: Проблемы иконографии житийного цикла // ИХМ. М., 2001. Вып. 5. С. 150–168;

15. Шалина И. А. Икона «Усекновение главы св. Иоанна Предтечи с житием» из церкви Богоявления с Запсковья и псковская живопись второй четверти XVI века. // ИХМ. М., 2007. Вып. 10. С. 318–348.

16. Бродовая Ю. В. «Усекновение главы св. Иоанна Крестителя» в древнерусском искусстве XV – первой половоне XVII в.: К проблеме сложения иконографии. // ИХМ. М., 2004. Вып. 8. С. 162–177.

17. Сарабьянов В. Д. Росписи боковых апсид собора Мирожского монастыря и истоки их иконографической программы // ИХМ. — М., 2003. Вып. 7. — С. 75–84.

18. Этингоф О. Е. Византийские иконы VI – первой половины XIII в. в России. М., 2005.

19. Брюсова В. Г. София Премудрость Божия в древнерусской литературе и искусстве. — М., 2006.

20. Бродовая Ю. В. Цикл жития св. Иоанна Крестителя в древнерусском искусстве XVI – первой половине XVII в. // Аспирантский сборник / Государственный институт искусствознания. М., 2004. Вып. 2. С. 3–30.

21. Пивоварова Н. В. Фрески церкви Спаса на Нередице в Новгороде: Иконографическая программа росписи. СПб., 2002.