"Και έγεινε φως". Δύο μεσοβυζαντινά πολυκάνδηλα του Μουσείου Μπενάκη

Abstract

In the summer of 2008 Stylianos Liangis donated two Byzantine brass polykandela in memory of Iphigeneia Liangi. The objects had been acquired at an auction held by the art dealers Royal-Athena Galleries and Bonhams, where the two auction houses had dated the polykandela to the sixth-seventh centuries. They were incorporated into the Museum’s Byzantine Collection under the inventory numbers 44724 and 44725 respectively and transferred to the museum’s Metals Conservation Laboratory, where they were conserved prior to being displayed in the museum’s permanent exhibition. Despoina Kotzamani, head of the Metals, Glass and Bony Conservation Laboratory carried out the necessary analyses on the composition of the metal in order to ascertain the base material and the method of construction used, and to provide a dating for the objects on the basis of the alloys they used.The purpose of this study is to assign the two objects to the appropriate categories of lighting devices on the basis of their construction and decoration, using the extensive range of comparative material at our disposal.