ABSTRACT
The fundamental relationship between Byzantine art and rhetoric lies not so much in shared metaphors as in shared techniques of narrative and dramatization. It can be said that the rhetoric of images in Byzantium took the place that liturgical plays occupied in the west; that is, both forms of narrative introduced visual drama into the liturgy. For Symeon of Thessalonike, therefore, the only true representations of the Gospel are the holy icons that have been sanctioned by the fathers. Representations that involve actors and every-day costumes are untruthful and impious. If the Byzantines were unable to dramatize the Gospel story by means of actors, costumes, and props, they had another means at their disposal, namely the rhetoric of icons. The contrast of the present with the past, or of the present with the future, was deeply ingrained in rhetorical practice, especially in the composition of laments such as that of the Widow of Nain.
