THE RELIGIOUS SOUNDSCAPE OF THE EARLY PALAEOLOGAN AGE: WHAT WAS IT REALLY LIKE?

Свети краљ Милутин и његово доба: историја, књижевност, уметност (2023) (стр. 397-411)

АУТОР(И) / AUTHOR(S): Alex Rodriguez Suarez

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DOI: 10.46793/6008-065-5.397RS

САЖЕТАК / ABSTRACT:

This article discusses a significant element of the religious sound- scape of the Orthodox communities in the Balkans, the call to mass. The period between the Byzantine reconquest of Constantinople (1261) and the death of the Serbian King Milutin (1282–1321) witnessed the expansion of bell ringing in churches and monasteries while the semantron, the traditional instrument of the Byzantine Church, continued to be employed. Hence, the first decades of the Palaeologan age were crucial for the formation of a new religious soundscape that included the sounds of both church bells and semantra, that is, it was eclectic. A combination of written sources and instances of material culture attest the development of this heterogeneous soundscape. The former include references from Byzantine and Serbian sources while the latter comprises two bells cast in the thirteenth and the fourteenth century. These artefacts help us to visualise the type of church bells employed in the Balkans during the reign of King Milutin. The aim of the contribution is to provide a picture -as general as possible- of the religious soundscape of the Early Palaeologan age and highlight the significant transformation that it underwent in these years.

КЉУЧНЕ РЕЧИ / KEYWORDS:

Church bells, semantra, religious soundscape, Early Palaeologan age, Late Byzantine period

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