Saint Sophia is surely one of the most-discussed buildings in the history of architecture.Contemporaries were awed by it and it astounds us today.Virtually no author of a basic ...book on Byzantine architecture would dream of leaving it out.The quantity of information about Saint Sophia is vast;how,then,is this little book different from the rest? Kleinbauer examines contemporary,as well as ancient sources in the light of his own comprehensive understanding of Byzantine architecture.
As [he]states in hi s conclusions,his aim is to demonstrate that its structure and design were sui generis rather than derivative and,in a book so clearly written that students will find it invaluable and so thoroughly researched that scholars will be unable to ignore it,he achieves that goal.
Illustrated with photographs and plans
