This collection of nine scholarly essays, edited by Sharon E. J. Gerstel, is based on papers presented at the 2003 Dumbarton Oaks Symposium, The Sacred Screen: Origins, Development, and Diffusion (May 9–11, 2003). The papers survey archaeological, artistic, and literary evidence for the screening of sacred space in different periods and religious contexts, ranging from the Jewish Temple of Herod in Jerusalem to churches of the early Byzantine period, middle and late Byzantium, late antique and medieval Christian Egypt, Gothic Western Europe, and early Renaissance Italy. Two essays, by Robert E. Taft and Nicholas P. Constas, consider issues in church liturgy and canonical thought that shed light on aspects of the Byzantine tradition.

The delineation of sacred space in the Byzantine church, and especially the form and development of the sanctuary barrier, has been a central question for architectural and art historians for some time now. The volume's authors make significant contributions to this field of inquiry. The introduction is written by Sharon E. J. Gerstel, its editor and the 2003 symposium's co-organizer, who provides a synthetic overview of the issues addressed by the volume's authors, including temporality, community (or audience), and figural programs. A more comprehensive historiographic review of publications on the Byzantine templon would have especially helped the reader new to the topic. While the majority of essays focus on Byzantine screens, three studies, representing the Jewish tradition and Latin Europe, offer select points of comparison from beyond the empire's borders. As noted by the editor, not all papers presented in 2003 appear in this final publication, and discussions of Roman religious screening, Byzantine stone templa, and Byzantine prayer books (presented at the symposium) would have made additional contributions to this final publication. The book is accompanied by many high-quality color photographs, and fine black and white views, with especially striking details opening each essay. These nicely complement the format introduced in recent Dumbarton Oaks editions, newly published by Harvard University Press. The index, not always found in such collected studies, is a helpful tool for the reader.

Early Byzantine screens are treated in the volume by Robert E. Taft, Urs Peschlow and, in part, by Elizabeth S. Bolman (writing on Egypt). Taft identifies the development of the enclosed early Byzantine sanctuary as a separate phenomenon from the decline in lay participation in the liturgy, which began at the end of the fourth century. Urs Peschlow's study of stone barriers between the nave and aisles for organizing the laity concludes that early Byzantine churches with and without dividing barriers coexisted, and that these served a wide range of communities as cathedrals, parochial churches, monastic churches, and pilgrimage churches. The presence of such stone barriers may have reflected a number of circumstances beyond a desire to condition holiness: a division of men and women; the wealth of a donor or community; the availability of stone; and aesthetic choice. Elizabeth Bolman's survey of sanctuary screens in Christian Egypt from the fourth to the fourteenth century is the first study to consider this important topic. Bolman presents evidence for the sanctuary screen's appearance from the fourth to seventh centuries in a number of forms in Egypt, and employing many different media for its decoration. In Bolman's conclusions, she summarizes the important connections found between Egyptian and contemporary Byzantine sanctuary arrangements and their decoration.

Sophia Kalopissi-Verti takes up the little-considered subject of proskynetaria icons in the middle and late Byzantine periods: in the nave, flanking the eastern templon; within the narthex, surrounding the door into the nave; and—rarely seen—on the church's façade, which she relates to three graduated areas of holiness. The author clarifies the iconographic connections among these three possible icon programs. In examining the narthex proskynetaria in particular, Kalopissi-Verti makes a major contribution to our understanding of screening and thresholds in the Byzantine church, as she is one of the first authors to consider this material in the narthex, and to connect such programs to parallel images flanking the templon.

Gerstel contributes an insightful essay on the late Byzantine sanctuary screen, focusing on its altar-side decoration and its reception, especially by clergy members standing within the apse. Sixty painted, masonry-built templa (the majority surviving in the Peloponnesos in Greece) provide the basis for her consideration; of the sixty, nearly half preserve painted decoration on their altar side, a significant corpus upon which to base the author's conclusions: that solid templon barriers are common by the end of the thirteenth century, and that their artistic programs on the altar-side aimed at promoting priestly virtue and correct ritual practice. A growing need to address this clerical audience may have contributed to the templon's increasingly closed and decorated character, as may have the influence of double-sided screens in contemporary Western Europe, especially those of the Franciscans.

Concluding the volume are two case studies on the screens of late medieval Western Europe, first in France and Germany, then Italy, which nicely complement each other and provide interesting points of comparison to the late Byzantine templon screen. Jacqueline E. Jung contributes work from her larger study of sculpted stone choir screens in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Western Europe, and lay viewing beyond the screen through its open doors. Jung clarifies that only in the second quarter of the thirteenth century did Latin churches in Europe, including cathedrals, monasteries, and collegiate churches, receive tall, permanent architectural screens separating the western nave from the eastern choir. For the case of Italy, Marcia Hall discusses the tramezzo (or rood screen) in Italian mendicant churches. Such tramezzi, supporting a characteristic, large-scale crucifix (the rood) and sometimes a lectern for sermons, screened the eastern choir; they divided male and female members of the laity, as well as monastics from the lay congregation during the monks' movement between the choir and the cloister.

The collection is highly recommended for medievalists of both East and West, and would be especially valuable in teaching courses on church architecture and its symbolism.