Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, Early Christian basilica in Ravenna, Italy.
Sant'Apollinare Nuovo is a brick basilica in Ravenna whose facade has a steep gable with two small arched openings and a large twin-arched window above a pale stone arcade of round arches. A round brick bell tower rises to its right. Inside, the central nave is twice the width of the side aisles and is flanked by twelve pairs of marble columns with simplified Corinthian capitals.
King Theodoric the Great commissioned the basilica in 505 as an Arian palace church next to his residence, originally dedicating it to the Savior. After the Byzantine conquest of Ravenna, the building was handed to the Catholic Church in 561, when all Arian references in the mosaics were removed and replaced with new representations.
The upper band holds 13 mosaics of Christ's miracles and parables on the left wall and 13 of the Passion and Resurrection on the right; the flagellation and crucifixion are absent. On the left Christ is young and beardless, on the right bearded, a contrast the Arians drew from Isaiah's "man of sorrows". The lowest band shows 22 virgins led by the Three Magi, named Balthasar, Melchior and Gaspar here, and 26 martyrs led by Saint Martin.
The 16th-century marble portico, called an àrdica locally, precedes the entrance; the round brick bell tower stands to the right of it. The nave is flanked by twelve pairs of columns, and the floor marks the outline of the 6th-century apse. The present apse is a reconstruction after World War II damage.
The mosaic work in the basilica includes a depiction of Theodoric's palace, where traces of later alterations remain visible as individual figures were removed from the image and replaced with curtains or architectural elements. Near a Last Judgment scene, there is also one of the earliest surviving depictions of a horned angel interpreted as a personification of evil.
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