Representation of Roger II

The mosaic of Roger II in the church of La Martorana is an excellent example of the contacts between various Mediterranean civilisations.

Roger II was crowned by the antipope Anacletus II on 25 December 1130 after he had taken over southern Italy. This event attracted the hostility of Pope Innocent II and that of Holy Roman Emperor Lothar II to Roger II – a conflict that marked his entire reign. In 1135, Roger II and Anacletus II were excommunicated, but Innocent II was taken prisoner and had to recognise Roger II as king of Sicily, duke of Apulia and prince of Capua (Rex Siciliae, ducatus Apuliae et principatus Capuae) once and for all on 27 July 1139. Order and royal authority were re-established in southern Italy. In 1147 Roger and his fleet attacked the Byzantine Empire, Thebes and Corinth in Greece in particular. Roger II died in Palermo in 1154.

On the Palermo mosaic, the king of Sicily wears the garb of a Byzantine emperor: a first blue tunic with gold clavi, visible at knee level and at the cuffs, and a richly decorated shorter tunic with wide sleeves above it. This tunic is decorated with gold fleurs-de-lis; its rich gold hem features red embroidery.

Roger II also sports a crossed loros, the piece of clothing similar to a wide scarf that emperors wore over their tunics. The second end, which gradually gains in width, is tied around the waist to then slung over the left arm. Regularly spaced pearls decorate the edges of the loros. The crossed loros appeared toward the end of the seventh century; it was simplified around the second half of the ninth century to the twelfth century, and was henceforth slipped on over the head. The mosaic of Roger II is thus one of the late examples of the representation of a crossed loros. But distance from the country of origin is not the reason for this difference in chronology, as late examples of crossed loros in Constantinople may also be cited, such as, for example, on a bas-relief[1] probably depicting John II Comnenus (1088–1143) holding the labarum[2] and the orb. The fleur-de-lis motif on this garment should also be pointed out; it was found on imperial garb of the same era[3].

The king wears an open crown with many facets. A pair of stiff pendants made of pearls is attached to both its sides. While the shape of this crown is not Byzantine, the pendants are part of the traditional imperial repertory (prependoulia).

It is interesting to see the Norman Roger II, king of Sicily, wear clothing similar to those worn by the Byzantine emperors in this representation. This corresponds to the ideological will of the Normans to show themselves to be on equal footing with Byzantium, whose capital they sought in vain to conquer[4]. The real coronation mantle of Roger II is kept in Vienna: its strong Islamic influence makes it – by comparison with the representation in La Martorana – a good example the king’s cultural cosmopolitanism.

[2] A military standard that became an imperial attribute, usually bearing the Christian symbol of the cross, or an inscription evoking the victory of Constantine I at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in 312 (“in this sign thou shalt conquer”).

[3] Folio 2 of the manuscript Vat. gr. 666 (1109–11, kept in the Vatican Library) thus depicts Alexius I Comnenus. The manuscript Vat. urb. gr. 2  may also be cited; its folio 19v (1122–42) shows John II Comnenus and his son Alexius, both of whom wear tunics decorated with fleurs-de-lis similar to that of Roger II, though longer; on top of their tunics, however, John II and Alexis wear the simplified loros and not the crossed loros.

[4] The Normans did, however, set up – in the framework of the Crusades – a Norman duchy in Antioch.