Deconstructing the Myth of Byzantine Crown: The Head Reliquary of Saint Blaise in Dubrovnik

Abstract

The head reliquary of Saint Blaise in Dubrovnik, made in 1694 by the Venetian goldsmith Francesco Ferro, has long been thought to replicate an earlier version that was mentioned in the 1335 inventory of Dubrovnik cathedral. The article examines the history of the head relic and the assumption that it may have replicated or connoted a shape of the Byzantine imperial crown, a kamelaukion. From the available evidence such reading has been rejected. Instead, it is proposed that it resembled the dome-shaped reliquary such as that of Saint James in Zadar dated to the end of the eleventh or beginning of the twelfth century. Furthermore, it is proposed that group I enamels that adorn the reliquary were not made in Constantinople, but in Dubrovnik between 1164 and 1180, given that they show a number of non-Byzantine stylistic and iconographical features and inscriptions in Beneventan script incompatible with enamel production in Constantinople.