In this third volume of collected studies printed by Ashgate, Anthony Cutler turns his attention to a comparison of image making in Byzantium and the ‘East’ (the Sasanian and the medieval Islamic world). He is concerned with cultural identity and the use of images across cultures. His thirteen studies include examples of integration as well as of rejection of images across cultures, and instances of the use of images that are deliberately created as hybrids to reflect both cross-cultural appropriation and manipulation of visual matter.

Cutler’s approach blends traditional art-historical methods with theory concerning contemporary visual readings of images. In order to make clear his point, on occasion he provides contemporary parallels. For example, in Study 2 on ‘Silver across the Euphrates’, he refers to contemporary ‘interaction through conflict theory’ and provides an analogy between the cross-cultural comments of the early Russian ballet and its influence abroad and the forms of cultural exchange between Sasanian Persia and the late Roman Empire. It is characteristic of the author also to admit that on occasion his reflections may be classed as ‘speculative’, as for instance in Study 2. He refers to methods across archaeology, social history and anthropology, although he does not specifically admit to integrating approaches from these disciplines into his own method.

The opening study, ‘Visual communities in Byzantium and medieval Islam’, explores the theme of art as an exponent of societies across cultures. Here Cutler looks at the borrowing of images between Byzantium and Islam, regardless of religious persuasion, and also the question of the appropriation of materials to serve specific political, religious or secular ends. He speaks of ‘purposeful hybridity’ as the gesture of communities reaching out to each other over cultural divides against the interpretation of ‘hybridity’ in contemporary ‘post-colonialist historiography’ as a mechanism for deformation and the weakening of ‘established authority’. In Study 2, Cutler outlines four forms of artistic exchange – tribute, booty, gifts, trade – and argues that the first was predominant. He stresses that elements could be adopted for remodelling beyond recognition, or there could be integration of recognizable elements into native compositions. It was not simply a matter of direct copying. Also, there were parallels in composition across cultures, which have yet to be examined.

Study 3, ‘Constantinople and Cordoba: cultural exchange and cultural difference in the ninth to tenth century’, deals with the need to examine what is meant by cross-cultural ‘influence’ not only on the level of the ‘means of influence’, but also as regards the motives behind those who are being influenced. He concludes that inheritance, belief and practice are distinct between Byzantium and Spain, but inter-action is possible because they ‘played by some of the same cultural rules’. The fourth study, ‘Ivory working in Umayyad Cordoba: techniques and implications’, acts as a valuable empirical guide to the techniques of ivory cutting that distinguish Byzantine from Spanish work. Study 5, ‘A Christian ewer with Islamic imagery and the question of Arab Gastarbeiter in Byzantium’, addresses questions of ‘hybridity’ and the possibility of exchanges of craftsmen between Byzantium and the Arabs among prisoners of war. Study 6, ‘The image of the word in Byzantium and Islam: an essay in art-historical geodesy’, discusses the verbal and the iconic sign in relation to ‘historical and epistemological distance’. The seventh study, ‘Gifts and gift exchange as aspects of the Byzantine, Arab and related economies’, raises the question of what is and what is not to be classified as trade. Cutler suggests that gifts may have whetted the appetite for further acquisition of objects through trade as a spur to further consumption. Study 8, ‘Everywhere and nowhere: the invisible Muslim and Christian self-fashioning in the culture of the Outremer’, concludes that mixed Byzantine and Islamic iconographies were present. The ninth study, ‘The emperor’s old clothes: actual and virtual vesting and the transmission of power in Byzantium and Islam’, contrasts the lavish Islamic recording of the practice with the restrained Byzantine documentation of the ceremonial passing on of clothing. Does this indicate a cultural difference of response, Cutler enquires?

Study 10, ‘The parallel universes of Arab and Byzantine art (with special reference to the Fatimid era)’, attempts to argue that the Byzantine and the Islamic civilizations stood not that far apart in some cultural respects. In particular they enjoyed a shared mentality of ‘court ceremonial’. Study 11, ‘Tiles and tribulations: a community of clay across Byzantium and its adversaries’, considers the continuation of cultural exchange even at times of political turmoil between Byzantium and her foes. The penultimate study, ‘Imagination and documentation: eagle silks in Byzantium, the Latin West and Abbasid Baghdad’, represents Cutler’s attempt, as a non-textile specialist, to assign provenance to the Odense eagle silk. The final study, ‘Reuse or use? Theoretical and practical attitudes towards objects in the Early Middle Ages’, enquires about the process of transition from individual idea to cultural choice in relation to the use of objects. Cutler distinguishes between the art-historical practice of seeking origins for object types and the attitude of social historians and anthropologists who concentrate rather on what is done with the object. He speaks of the medieval mentality towards objects, and about a ‘mutability of objects’. He argues that the artefact was not so much regarded as a ‘changeless work of art’ (in later times to be valued for its antiquity), but as an item capable of being put to reuse or even of being used in a different way across time, without detriment to the status of the artefact itself.

This volume is valuable for drawing attention to the need for cross-cultural research in relation to Byzantine studies. It is also welcome as an addition to the small available body of literature on Byzantine material culture. In addition, the book has the merit of attempting to broaden the horizons of traditional Byzantine studies research by way of references to approaches from other disciplines, and a consideration of the relevance of contemporary theory. The publication suffers from discontinuous pagination between studies, from very poor illustrations in many cases and from the omission of illustrations referred to in the text in some studies. The quality of the illustrations does not allow the reader to make the stylistic comparisons being described by the author in many cases, and the varied system of note distribution (sometimes within the text and at other times at the end) is distracting. The very brief list of addenda and corrigenda added for only eight of the thirteen studies is ill-advised as it highlights the lack of an up-to-date bibliography for several of the studies. It also suggests that some recent and important publications on Byzantine material culture, including Byzantine ceramic and textile studies, remain unknown to the author, and inevitably this will render some of the conclusions open to question.