ABSTRACT. The study aims at providing an analysis of the architecture and mural paintings of the chapel attached in the south-east part of the nave of St. Dimitrios Basilica from Thessaloniki. Among the most beautiful and important places in the churches of Thessaloniki Basilica Saint Dimtrios hosts a chapel painted by the great hagiographer Manuel Panselinos in 1303, according the inscription found on the north wall. In the frescoes can be seen a great number of psychological expressions on faces, then the liveliness of movements, the sense of space and volume, the skill of uniting numerous characters into a homogeneous composition, etc. The style is the same as in the frescoes of Protaton church (c. 1290) from Mount Athos and the scenes with Christ’s passion from exonarthex catholicon (1312) of Vatopedi monastery. At the same time, its art becomes more human, while the figures of the saints are deprived of some of the hieratism and nobility in Macedonian and Comnenian art, thus impressive for the striking intensity of their psychological expression.

Keywords: Architecture; Frescoes; St. Dimitrios Basilica; Euthymios chapel; Macedonian school; Panselinos