„Stony Stuff”: 12th century Breccia fragments from the Cathedral of Zadar

After the reconstruction of Zadar Cathedral in 1153, a new stone was used very programmatically on the façade and in the interior: red breccia. The island of Rab, less than 150 km away by land, now fell under the political control of Zadar, which also took possession of the quarrying area for the red breccia. It now played a central role: the ambo, presumably the entire altar screen of the cathedral, as well as the cathedra, apse and baptismal font - and parts of the pietra dura star mosaic in the middle of the former presbytery - were created in the last third of the 12th century from this reddish stone, which has a highly conglomerate visual structure. The fragments still preserved today also include two depictions of St. Anastasia (Sv. Stošja), the patron saint of the cathedral, as well as the legs of an angel, a wing fragment and several smaller architectural elements. In my presentation, I would like to show that the newly accessible red breccia, which was used in specific places, served on the one hand as a marker of territorial expansion, and on the other as a reflective surface for the tension between the conspicuous visible structure of the stone and the iconography that overlaps with it.
Unlike the mimetic function of veined marble, for example in the cladding of sculpture or as a highly decorative surface in architecture, in the breccia fragments from Zadar the depiction interacts with the material and the carrier medium. Natural material properties, processing and iconography challenge the eye to engage with the various media levels. While the imaginative power of ornamental stone and man-made iconography compete, they still also interlock with each other and are the focus of my interest in the proposed conference paper.