The Major Icons and Types

The received iconographic types of the tradition: the icons of Christ — the Pantocrator, the “Not-Made-by-Hands” (the Mandylion / Image of Edessa), and the Deesis; and the icons of the Theotokos and the saints — the Marian types (Hodegetria, Eleousa, Oranta), the festal icons, and the images of the saints. This section treats the images themselves, pinning the legendary origin-traditions (the Mandylion, the icons ascribed to St. Luke) to their attestation.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox

This section turns from theory and craft to the images that actually fill the Orthodox world. The first file, the-icons-of-christ.md, treats the depiction of Christ — the theology of showing His face, the great type of the Pantocrator, the “not-made-by-hands” image and its disputed tradition, and the Deesis. The second file, the-icons-of-the-theotokos-and-the-saints.md, treats the Marian types and the tradition (apocryphal) that St. Luke painted the first icon, the festal icons that make the feasts present, and the icons of the saints.

Contents

File	Description
the-icons-of-christ.md	The Pantocrator, the Not-Made-by-Hands (Mandylion), the Deesis; the theology of depicting Christ
the-icons-of-the-theotokos-and-the-saints.md	The Marian types (Hodegetria, Eleousa, Oranta); the “St. Luke” tradition; the festal icons; the saints

See Also

• Holy Icons (master README)
• The Language of the Icon — the visual grammar these types embody
• The Icon in Worship and Life — how these icons are venerated and processed
• St. the Theotokos: The Icons of the Theotokos and The Twelve Great Feasts — sibling treatments of the Marian and festal icons
• Orthodoxy: Icons and Iconoclasm — the hub essay this collection expands