And now, if even a poor writer of travels may be allowed to invoke
his Muse, I do most certainly invoke mine with bent knee and clasped
hands, for, verily my mind grows bewildered, “_in faccia al nobile
subbietto_,” and the majestic outlines of the great Byzantine basilica
tremble before my vision like images reflected in the water. May the
Muse inspire me, St. Sophia illumine me, and the emperor Justinian
pardon me!
[Illustration: Entrance to St. Sophia.]
It was a fine morning in October when we at last set forth, accompanied
by a Turkish _cavas_ from the Italian consulate and a Greek dragoman,
to visit the terrestrial Paradise, second firmament, car of the
cherubim, throne of the glory of God, wonder of the world, the greatest
temple on earth after St. Peter’s. This last expression, as my friends
of Burgos, Cologne, Milan, and Florence must know, is of course not
my own, nor would I ever dare to make it so: I merely quote it among
the rest as one of the many terms consecrated by the enthusiasm of
the Greeks which our dragoman repeated to us as we passed along the
streets. We had purposely supplemented him by the old Turkish cavas
in the hope--and we were not disappointed--that their two accounts
might bring vividly before us the struggle between the two religions,
histories, and nations, the legends and explanations of one magnifying
the Church, those of the other the Mosque, in such a manner as to make
us see St. Sophia as she should be seen; that is to say, with one eye
Christian and the other Turkish.
My expectations were very great and my curiosity was all on fire,
and yet I realized then, as I do now, that the actual sight of
a world-renowned object, no matter how fully it may justify its
reputation, never quite comes up to the keen enjoyment one experiences
when on his way to see it. If I could live over again one hour out
of each of those days on which I saw some great sight for the first
time, I would unhesitatingly choose the one which intervenes between
the moment of saying, “Now let us start,” and that in which the goal
is reached. Those are the traveller’s most blissful hours. As you walk
along you can feel your soul expand, preparing, as it were, to receive
the streams of enthusiasm and delight soon to well up in it. You
recall your boyhood’s dreams, which then seemed so hopelessly far from
realization; you remember how a certain old professor of geography,
after pointing out Constantinople on the map of Europe, traced the
outline of the great basilica in the air, a pinch of snuff between
his thumb and fore finger; you see that room, that hearth, in front
of which, during the coming winter, you will describe to a circle
of wondering and attentive faces the famous building; you hear that
name, St. Sophia, ringing in your head, your heart, your ears like the
voice of a living person who calls, and awaits your coming to reveal
some mighty secret: you see above your head dim, prodigious outlines
of arch and pilaster and column, mighty buildings which reach to the
heavens, and when, at last, but a few steps more are wanted to bring
you face to face with the reality, you linger to examine a pebble,
watch the passage of a lizard, tell some trifling anecdote--anything
that may serve to postpone, if but for a few seconds, that moment to
which for twenty years you have been looking forward, and which you
will remember for the rest of your life. And, truly, if you take away
what goes before and what follows after, not so very much remains of
the much-talked-of joys of seeing and admiring. It is almost always a
delusion, followed by a slight awakening, after which we obstinately
delude ourselves again.
[Illustration: Fountain of Ahmed.]
The mosque of St. Sophia stands opposite the main entrance of the old
Seraglio. On reaching, however, the open square which lies between the
two, the first object to attract attention is, not the mosque, but
the famous fountain of Sultan Ahmed III., one of the richest and most
characteristic examples of Turkish art. This exquisite little building
is not so much a monument as a caress in marble imprinted in a moment
of passionate adoration by an enamored sultan upon the forehead of his
beloved Stambul. I doubt if any but a woman’s pen can do it justice:
mine, I feel convinced, is far too coarse and heavy to trace those
delicate outlines. At first sight it hardly looks like a fountain at
all, being in the form of a little square temple with a Chinese roof,
whose undulating rim extends for some distance beyond the walls, and
lends to the whole something of the character of a pagoda. At each
corner rises a round tower furnished with small screened windows, or,
rather, they are more like four charming kiosks, corresponding to the
graceful cupolas on the roof which encircle the main central cupola.
In each of the four walls are two niches, flanking a pointed arch,
beneath which the water flows from a spout into a small basin. Around
the edifice there runs an inscription which reads as follows: “This
fountain speaks to you in the following verse by Sultan Ahmed: Turn
the key of this pure and tranquil spring and call upon the name of
God; drink of these inexhaustible and limpid waters and pray for the
Sultan.” The little building is composed entirely of white marble,
which, however, is almost hidden beneath the mass of ornamentation
with which its walls are covered--arches, niches, tiny columns, roses,
polygons, garlands, fretwork, gilding on a background of blue. Carving
around the cupolas, inlaid-work below the roof, mosaics of a hundred
different combinations of color, arabesques of every conceivable
form,--all seem to vie with one another to attract attention and arouse
admiration, until one’s powers of seeing and admiring are well-nigh
exhausted. Not so much as a hand’s breadth of space is left free
from carving, painting, gilding, or ornament of some sort. It is a
prodigy of richness, beauty, and patience, which should, by rights, be
preserved under a glass case; and, as though it were too perfect to
delight but one sense alone, you are tempted to break off a piece and
put it in your mouth, feeling that it must taste good as well--a casket
designed, as one would suppose, to guard some priceless treasure, and
you long to open it and find the--what? Infant goddess, magic ring, or
fabulous pearl. Time has to some extent faded the brilliant colors,
dimmed the gilding, and darkened the marble; think, then, what this
colossal jewel must have been when first unveiled, all fresh and
sparkling, before the eyes of the Solomon of the Bosphorus a hundred
and sixty years ago! But, old and faded as it is, it undoubtedly
occupies the first place among the lesser wonders of Constantinople,
and is, moreover, an object so distinctively Turkish that, once seen,
it claims a prominent position among that certain number of others
which will dwell for ever in one’s memory, ready to rise up at the
sound of the word “Stambul;” the background for all time against which
will be thrown out one’s dreams and visions of the Orient.
Looking across from the fountain, St. Sophia can be seen occupying one
side of the intervening square. About the exterior there is nothing
especially noteworthy. The only points which attract the eye are the
lofty white minarets, which rise at the four corners from pedestals
each the size of a house. The celebrated dome looks small, and it
seems impossible that this can be the same as that which we are wont
to see, from the Bosphorus and Sea of Marmora and the hillsides of
Asia, rearing its mighty form like the head of some Titan against the
blue heavens. It is a flattened dome overlaid with lead, flanked by
two semi-domes, and pierced at the base by a row of small windows.
The four walls which support it are painted in broad bands of white
and red and strengthened by enormous masses of masonry. A number of
mean-looking buildings, baths, schools, hospitals, mausoleums, and
soup-kitchens, crowd around the base and effectually conceal the
ancient architectural form of the basilica. Nothing can be seen but a
heavy, irregular edifice, faded and bare as a fortress, and apparently
totally inadequate to embrace the mighty expanse of St. Sophia’s great
nave. Of the original basilica only the dome is visible, and even that
has been despoiled of the silver splendor which, according to the
Greeks, could once be seen from the summit of the Olympus. All the
rest is Mussulman: one minaret was erected by Muhammad the Conqueror,
another by Selim II., the two others by the Third Murad, the same
who toward the close of the sixteenth century added the buttresses
to strengthen the walls shaken by an earthquake, and placed the huge
bronze crescent on the summit of the dome, the gilding alone of which
cost fifty thousand ducats. The ancient atrium has disappeared, and
the baptistry has been converted into a mausoleum where are interred
the remains of Mustafa I. and Ibrahim, while nearly every one of the
other small buildings which adjoined the Greek church have been either
destroyed outright or else, by the erection of new walls or some other
alteration, changed past recognition: on all sides the mosque crowds,
pushes, and bears down upon the church, of which the head alone remains
free, and even around that the imperial minarets mount guard like
four gigantic sentinels. On the east side there is a doorway flanked
by six marble and porphyry columns; another on the south leads into a
courtyard surrounded by low, irregular buildings, in the midst of which
a fountain for ablutions plays beneath a little arched canopy supported
on eight, small columns. Viewed from the outside, there is nothing to
distinguish St. Sophia from the other great mosques of Stambul, except
that it is heavier and dingier; far less would it ever enter one’s
head to name it “the greatest temple on earth after St. Peter’s.”
[Illustration: Mosque of St. Sophia.]
Our guides conducted us by a narrow street skirting the northern wall
of the edifice to a bronze door, which, swinging slowly back on its
hinges, admitted us to the eso-narthex. This is a very long and lofty
hall lined with marbles, and still glowing here and there with ancient
mosaics. Nine doors on the eastern side give access to the body of the
church, opposite which five others formerly led to the exo-narthex,
which, in turn, communicated by thirteen doors with the atrium. We had
barely crossed the threshold when a turbaned sacristan demanded our
firmans, and then, after donning slippers, at a sign from the guides we
approached the middle door on the eastern side, which stood half open
to receive us. The first effect is certainly quite overpowering, and
for some moments we remained stunned and speechless. In a single glance
one is confronted by an enormous space and a bold architecture of
semi-domes which seem to hang suspended in the air, enormous pilasters,
mighty arches, gigantic columns, galleries, tribunes, arcades, over
which floods of light are poured from a thousand great windows--a
something I hardly know how to define of theatrical and regal rather
than sacred; an ostentation of size and strength; a look of worldly
pomp; a mixture of the classic, barbarous, fanciful, arrogant, and
magnificent; a stupendous harmony in which, with the formidable and
thunderous notes of the pilasters and cyclopean arches, recalling
the cathedrals of the North, there mingle soft, subdued strains of
some Oriental air, the noisy music of the revels of Justinian and
Heraclitus, echoes of pagan chants, the choked voice of an effeminate
and wornout race, and distant cries of Goth, of Vandal, and of Avar;
a mighty defaced majesty, a sinister nakedness, a profound peace--St.
Peter’s shrunken and plastered over, St. Mark’s enlarged and abandoned;
a quite indescribable mingling of church, mosque, and temple, severe
in aspect, puerile in adornment--of things old and new, faded colors,
and curious, unfamiliar accessories: a sight, in short, so bewildering,
so awe-inspiring, and at the same time so full of melancholy, that
for a time the mind cannot grasp its full meaning, but gropes about
uncertainly, trying to find first what it is, and then words in which
to express it.
The plan of the edifice nearly approaches an equilateral rectangle,
over the centre of which rises the great dome, supported on four
mighty arches resting upon massive pilasters: these form, as it were,
the skeleton of the entire building. From the arches on the right and
left of the entrance there rise, before and beyond the great dome,
two semi-domes, the three covering the entire nave, these semi-domes
have six exedræ, of which the four on the sides are also covered
with semi-domes, making four small circular temples enclosed in the
large one. Between the two exedræ at the east end of the building is
the apse, which projects beyond the external wall, and is likewise
covered with a domed roof. Thus seven semi-domes encircle the main one,
two just beyond it and five more beyond these, all of them without
any apparent support, and presenting an extraordinary impression of
lightness, as though they actually were, as a Greek poet once said,
suspended by seven cords from the roof of the sky. All these domes
are lighted by large windows arched and symmetrical. Between the four
great pilasters, which form a square in the centre of the basilica,
there rise to the right and left of the entrance eight wonderful
columns of green marble, from which spring graceful arches richly
carved with foliage, forming charming porticos on either side of the
nave, and supporting at a great height two vast galleries, where are
to be seen two other lines of columns and sculptured arches. A third
gallery, communicating with the first two, runs above the narthex, and
opens out on the nave by means of three enormous arches supported on
double columns. Other smaller galleries, resting upon porphyry columns,
intersect the four small temples at the extremities of the nave, and
from them rise other columns supporting tribunes.
Such is the basilica. The mosque is, so to speak, spread over its
surface and hung upon its walls. The _mihrab_--that is, the niche
which indicates the direction in which Mecca lies--is hollowed out of
one of the pilasters of the apse; to the right of it, high up on the
wall, hangs one of the four prayer-carpets of the Prophet. In the angle
of the apse nearest to the mihrab, reached by a steep little flight
of stairs whose marble balustrade is carved with the most marvellous
delicacy of workmanship, is the pulpit, surmounted by a queer conical
roof and hung on either side with victorious banners of Muhammad II.
Here the _rhatib_ ascends to read the Koran,[H] and carries in his hand
a drawn simeter, to signify that St. Sophia is a mosque acquired by the
force of arms. Opposite the pulpit is the Sultan’s tribune enclosed
within a gilded grating. Other pulpits or species of balconies, having
railings of open-work carving, and supported on small marble columns
and arabesqued arches, protrude here and there along the walls or
toward the centre of the nave. On either side of the entrance stand two
huge alabaster jars, found among the ruins of Pergamum and brought to
Constantinople by Murad III. Enormous green disks, bearing inscriptions
from the Koran[I] in letters of gold, are hung below the pendentives,
beneath which great mural slabs of porphyry bear the names of Allah,
Mohammed, and the first four khalifs. In the pendentives may still
be seen the gigantic wings of the four mosaic seraphim, whose faces
are now concealed beneath golden roses. From the roofs of the domes
hang innumerable silken cords, measuring almost the entire height
of the building, from which are suspended ostrich eggs, lamps of
wrought bronze, and crystal globes. Here and there stand cassia-wood
reading-desks, inlaid with copper and mother-of-pearl, on which lie
manuscript copies of the Koran. On the pavement are spread great
numbers of rugs and mats. The walls are bare, whitish, yellowish, gray,
still adorned in some places with discolored mosaics. The general
aspect is inexpressibly mournful.
[H] This pulpit is the _minbir_, used only on Friday, and then
by the rhatib to read a prayer for the Sultan, Khalîf, and
Islam.--TRANS.
[I] The names of Allah, the Prophet, and four khalifs mentioned
below are on these green disks, not verses from the
Koran.--TRANS.
[Illustration: Interior of the Mosque of St. Sophia.]
The great marvel of the mosque is the central dome. Gazing up at it
from the middle of the nave, it truly seems, as Mme. de Staël said
of the dome of St. Peter’s, as though a vast abyss were suspended
over one’s head. It is very lofty, with an enormous circumference,
and is made to appear still larger from the fact that its depth
is but one-sixth of its diameter.[J] Around its base runs a small
gallery, above which are a row of forty arched windows, and around
the crown are inscribed the words pronounced by Muhammad II.
when he drew his horse up opposite the high altar on the day of the
conquest of Constantinople: “Allah is the light of heaven and earth.”
These letters, white on a dark background, are some of them more than
twenty-seven feet long. As is well known, this aërial prodigy could
never have been constructed had ordinary materials been employed. The
roofs were built of pumice-stone, which floats on the surface of water,
and of bricks from the Isle of Rhodes, five of which hardly weigh as
much as one ordinary brick; on each of them was inscribed the sentence
from David, “_Deus in medio eius non commovebitur. Adiuvabit eam Deus
vultu suo_,” and with every twelfth row relics of various saints were
walled in. During the progress of the building operations the priests
chanted and Justinian attended in person clad in a coarse linen tunic,
while immense crowds looked on in admiration; and this is hardly to
be wondered at when we consider that the construction of this “second
firmament,” which even at the present time is an object of wonder, was
an undertaking without parallel in the sixth century. The common people
believed it to be the result of magic, and the Turks must have had
much ado for a long period after the conquest to keep their gaze fixed
upon the east when praying in St. Sophia, instead of resting it upon
that “stone heaven” above their heads. The dome covers, indeed, nearly
half the nave, in such a manner as to light up and dominate the entire
edifice: it can be seen, at least in part, from every point, and,
wander where you will, you invariably bring up beneath it to find your
gaze attracted for the hundredth time to that immeasurable space, where
eye and mind float with ecstatic delight as though borne on wings.
[J] This is a mistake: the great dome of St. Sophia is 107
feet across by 46 in height. (See Fergusson, _Hist.
Architecture_.)--TRANS.
After inspecting the nave and dome one has but just begun to see St.
Sophia. Whoever takes the least shadow, for example, of historical
interest in the building could spend an hour over the columns alone.
Here may be found spoils from every temple in the world. The four
columns of green marble supporting the large galleries were presented
to Justinian by the magistrates of Ephesus, having formerly stood
in the temple of Diana, which was burned by Herostratus. The eight
porphyry columns which stand two and two between the pilasters were
a part of the temple of the Sun at Baalbek, and were carried thence
by Aurelian to Rome. Others are from the temple of Jupiter at Cyzicus
and of Helios at Palmyra--from the temples of Thebes, of Athens, of
Rome, of the Troad, the Cyclades, and from Alexandria: altogether,
they present an endless variety of style, form size, and color. What
between the columns, the railings and pedestals, and the portions of
the ancient covering of the walls which still remain, there are marbles
from every quarry of the Archipelago, Asia Minor, Africa, and
Gaul: the white Bosphorus marble speckled with black contrasts with
the black Celtic veined with white; the green marble of Laconia is
reflected in the blue Libyan, while the Egyptian spotted porphyry,
starred granite of Thessaly, the red-and-white striped stone of Mt.
Jassey, and pale _caristio_ streaked with iron, mingle their colors
with the purple Phrygian, red Synadian, gold of the Mauritius, and
snow-white marble of Paros. Added to this wealth of color is the
indescribable variety of form, as seen in the friezes, the cornices,
roses, and balustrades, and odd Corinthian capitals carved with
foliage, crosses, animals, and strange chimerical figures, all
interlaced: others, again, belong to no order in especial, of curious
design and unequal size, evidently coupled together by chance--shafts
of columns, pedestals ornamented with strange sculptures, injured by
time and mutilated by sabre-cuts,--altogether an effect of wild and
barbarous magnificence which, while it outrages the rules of good
taste, attracts the eye with an unresistible fascination.
[Illustration: First Columns Erected in St. Sophia.]
From the nave one hardly appreciates the vast size of the building, of
which it indeed forms but a comparatively small part. The two aisles
beneath the large galleries are in themselves two large edifices, out
of either one of which a separate temple might be formed. Each of these
is divided in three and separated by large vaulted openings. Indeed,
everything here, column, architrave, pilaster, roof, is gigantic.
Passing beneath these arches, you can barely see the nave from between
the columns of the Ephesian temple, and seem almost to be in another
basilica: the same effect is produced from the galleries, reached by a
winding stair with very gentle gradations, or rather it is an inclined
plane, for there are two steps, and one might readily ascend it on
horseback. The galleries were used as gynæconitis; that is, those parts
of the church reserved for women: penitents remained without in the
eso-narthex, while the mass of the faithful occupied the nave. Each one
of these galleries is capable of accommodating the entire population
of a suburb of Constantinople. You no longer feel as though you were
in a church, but rather walking in the foyer of some Titanic theatre,
expecting at any moment to hear the sudden outburst of a chorus sung
by a hundred thousand voices. In order to realize the immense size
and obtain a really good view of the mosque one must lean well over
the railing of the gallery and look around. Arches, roofs, pilasters,
have all swelled to gigantic proportions. The green disks which, seen
from below, appear to measure about the length of a man’s arm, are now
large enough to cover a house. The windows look like portes-cochères
of palaces, the seraphim wings like the spread sails of a vessel, the
tribunes like vast open squares; while it makes one’s head swim to
look up at the dome at all. Casting the eyes below, one is taken aback
to find how high he has mounted: the pavement of the nave is far away
at the bottom of an abyss, while the pulpits, jars from Pergamum, mats,
and lamps seem to have shrunken in the most extraordinary manner.
One rather curious circumstance about the mosque of St. Sophia is
particularly noticeable from this elevated position: the nave not being
precisely in line with Mecca, toward which it is incumbent upon every
good Mussulman to turn while praying, all the mats and strips of carpet
are placed obliquely with the lines of the building, and produce upon
the eye the same disagreeable effect as though there were some gross
defect in the perspective. From there, too, one is enabled to see and
observe all the life of the mosque. Turks are kneeling upon the mats
with foreheads touching the pavement; others stand erect and motionless
as statues, with hands held before their faces, as though interrogating
their palms; some are seated cross-legged at the foot of a pilaster,
much as they would rest beneath the shade of a tree; veiled women kneel
in a distant corner; old men seated before the lecterns read from the
Koran; an _iman_ is hearing a group of boys recite sacred verses; and
here and there beneath distant arches and through the galleries the
forms of _rhatib_, _iman_, or _muezzin_ and various other functionaries
of the mosque glide noiselessly back and forth, as though their feet
hardly touched the ground, clad in strange, unfamiliar costumes, while
the vague, subdued murmur of those who pray and those who read, that
clear, steady light, the thousand odd-looking lamps, the deserted apse
and echoing galleries, the immensity of it all, the past associations
and present peacefulness,--combine to produce such an impression of
greatness and of mystery as neither words can express nor time efface.
But the dominating sensation, as I have already said, is one of
sadness, and that great poet who compared St. Sophia to a “colossal
sepulchre” was not far wrong. On all sides you see the signs of a
barbarous devastation, and experience more melancholy in the thought
of what has been than pleasure in contemplating what still remains.
After the first feelings of amazement have to some extent subsided,
one’s mind turns intuitively to the past. And even now, after a lapse
of three years, I can never think of the great mosque without trying to
imagine the church. Overthrow the pulpits of the Mussulman, remove the
lamps and jars, cut down the disks and tear away the porphyry slabs,
reopen the doors and windows that have been bricked up, scrape away the
plaster which covers wall and roof, and, behold! the basilica whole and
new as it appeared on that day, thirteen centuries ago, when Justinian
exclaimed, “_Glory be to God, who has judged me worthy to perform this
mighty work! O Solomon, I have surpassed thee!_” Every object upon
which the eye rests shines or glitters or flashes like the enchanted
palaces in a fairy tale. The enormous walls, once more covered with
precious marbles, send back reflections of gold, ivory, steel, coral,
and mother-of-pearl; the markings and veins of the marble look like
coronets or garlands of flowers; wherever a ray of sunlight chances to
fall upon those walls, all encrusted with crystal mosaics, they flash
and sparkle as though set with diamonds; the capitals, entablatures,
doors, and friezes of the arches are all of gilded bronze; the roofs of
aisle and gallery are covered with angelic forms and figures of saints
painted upon a golden background; before the pilasters in the chapels,
beside the doors, between the columns, stand marble and bronze statues
and enormous candelabra of solid gold; superb copies of the Gospels
lie upon lecterns adorned like kings’ thrones; lofty ivory crosses and
vases encrusted with pearls stand upon the altars. The extremity of
the nave is nothing but one blaze of light from a mass of glittering
objects: here is the gilded bronze balustrade of the choir, the pulpit
overlaid with forty thousand pounds of silver--the Egyptian tribute for
a whole year; the seats of the seven priests, the Patriarch’s throne,
and that of the emperor gilded, carved, inlaid, set with pearls, so
that when the sun shines full upon them one is forced to avert the eye.
Beyond all these splendors in the apse a still more vivid blaze is
seen proceeding from the altar itself, the table of which, supported
upon four gold pillars, is composed of a fusion of silver, gold, lead,
and pearls; above it rises the ciborium, formed of four pillars of pure
silver supporting a massive gold cupola, surmounted by a globe and by a
cross also of gold weighing two hundred and sixty pounds.[K] Beyond the
altar is seen the gigantic image of Holy Wisdom, whose feet touch the
pavement and head the roof of the apse. High over all this magnificence
shine and glisten the seven semi-domes overlaid with mosaics of crystal
and gold, and the mighty central dome covered with figures of apostle
and evangelist, the Virgin and the cross, all colored, gilded, and
brilliant like a roof of jewels and flowers. And dome and pillar,
statue and candelabra, each and every gorgeous object, is repeated in
the immense mirror of the pavement, whose polished marbles are joined
together in undulating lines, which, seen from the four main entrances,
have the effect of four majestic rivers ruffled by the wind. But we
must not forget the atrium--surrounded by columns, and walls covered
with mosaics--in which stood marble fountains and equestrian statues;
and the thirty-two towers whose bells made so formidable a clamor that
they could be heard throughout the seven hills; or the hundred bronze
doors decorated with bas-reliefs and inscriptions in silver; or the
hall of the synod; the imperial apartments; the sacerdotal prisons;
the baptistry; the vast sacristies overflowing with treasure; and a
labyrinth of vestibules, tricliniums, corridors, and secret stairways
built in the walls and leading to tribunes and hidden oratories.
[K] Some authorities give the weight of this cross as
seventy-five pounds.--TRANS.
And now let us in fancy attend some great state function--an imperial
marriage, a council, a coronation. From the enormous palace of the
Cæsars the glittering procession sweeps forth through streets flanked
by thousands of columns, perfumed with myrrh, and spread with flowers
and myrtle. The houses on either side are decorated with precious
vases and silken hangings. Two bands, the one of _azzurri_, the other
_verdi_, precede the cortége, which advances amid the songs of poets
and noise of the heralds shouting vivas in all the tongues of the
empire, and there, seated like an idol laden with pearls in a golden
car with purple hangings, and drawn by two white mules, the emperor
appears, wearing the tiara surmounted by a cross, and surrounded with
all the pomp of a Persian monarch. The haughty ecclesiastics advance
to the atrium to receive him, and all that throng of courtiers,
attendants, place-seekers, sycophants, lord high constables, chief
eunuchs, master-thieves, corrupt magistrates, spurious patricians,
cowardly senators, slaves, buffoons, casuists, mercenaries, adventurers
from every land, the entire glittering rabble of gilded offscourings,
pours through the twenty-seven doors and into the huge nave lit up
by six thousand candelabras. Then along the choir-rail and beneath
arcade and tribune there is a coming and going; a movement and mingling
of bared heads and purple cloaks; a waving of jewelled plumes and
velvet caps; the glitter of golden chains and silver breastplates;
an interchange of ceremonious greetings and courtly salutations; the
constant rustle and sweep of silken garments and rattle of jewelled
hilts; while soft perfumes load the air and the vast servile throng
makes the sacred edifice ring again with shouts of admiration and
profane applause.
After making the circuit of the mosque several times in silence, we
gave our guides permission to talk. They commenced by showing us
the chapels built beneath the galleries, now, like the rest of the
basilica, despoiled of everything of value: some of them, like the
_opistodomo_ of the Parthenon, serve as treasuries, where Turks who are
about to start on long journeys deposit their money and other valuables
to be secure from robbery, sometimes leaving their possessions there,
under the protection of Allah, for years at a time; others have been
closed up and are used either as infirmaries for the sick, where they
lie awaiting death or recovery, or else places of confinement for the
insane, whose melancholy cries or bursts of wild laughter awaken from
time to time the echoes of the vast building.
We were now reconducted to the centre of the nave, and the Greek
dragoman began to recount the marvels of the basilica. The design, it
is quite true, was sketched by the two architects, Anthemius of Tralles
and Isidorus of Miletus, but the first conception came to them through
angelic inspiration; it was also an angel who suggested to Justinian
the idea of opening the three windows in the apse to represent the
three Persons of the Trinity; in the same way the hundred and seven
columns of the church stand for the hundred and seven pillars which
support the House of Wisdom. It took seven years merely to collect
the necessary materials for constructing the edifice, while a hundred
master-builders were employed to overlook the ten thousand workmen,
five thousand on one side and five thousand on the other, who labored
at its erection. When the walls had risen to the height of but a few
hands only from the ground more than four hundred and fifty quintals
of gold had already been expended. The outlay for the building alone
amounted to twenty-five million francs. The church was consecrated by
the Patriarch five years eleven months and ten days after the first
stone was laid, and Justinian celebrated the occasion by feasts and
sacrifices and distributions of money and food which were prolonged for
two weeks.
At this point the Turkish _cavas_ interrupted in order to call our
attention to the pilaster upon which Muhammad II. left the bloody
imprint of his right hand on the day of his victorious entrance, as
though to seal his conquest; he then pointed out the so-called “cold
window,” near the mihrab, through which a perpetual current of cool
air inspires the most eloquent discourses from the greatest orators
of Islamism. He next showed us, close by another window, the famous
“shining stone,” a slab of transparent marble which gleams like crystal
when struck by the sun’s rays, and made us touch the “sweating column,”
on the left of the north entrance. This column is overlaid with bronze,
through a crack in which the stone can be seen covered with moisture.
And finally he showed us a block of hollowed-out marble, brought from
Bethlehem, in which, it is said, was placed immediately after his birth
Sidi Yssa, “the Son of Mary, apostle of, and Spirit proceeding out
from, God, worthy of all honor both in this world and the next.” But it
struck me that neither Turk nor Greek placed very much faith in this
relic.
The Greek now took up his parable, and led us by a certain walled-up
doorway in the gallery, in order to recount the celebrated legend of
the Greek bishop; and now his manner was one of such entire belief
that, if it was not sincere, it was certainly wonderfully well feigned.
It seems that at the very moment when the Turks burst into the church
of St. Sophia a bishop was in the act of celebrating mass at the high
altar. Leaving the altar at sight of the invaders, he ascended to one
of the galleries, where some Turks, following in hot pursuit, saw him
disappear within this little door, which was instantly closed up by a
stone wall. Throwing themselves against it, the soldiers tried with all
their force to break it down, hammering and pounding furiously against
the stones, but with no other result than to leave the marks of their
weapons upon the wall. Masons were sent for, who worked an entire day
with pickaxes and crowbars, finally abandoning the attempt: after them
every mason in Constantinople tried in turn to effect an opening, but
one and all failed to make any impression upon the miraculous wall,
which has remained closed ever since. On that day, however, when the
profaned basilica shall be restored to the worship of Christ the wall
will open of its own accord, and the bishop will come forth, wearing
his episcopal robes, and, chalice in hand, his face illumined as with a
celestial vision, will mount the steps of the altar and resume the mass
at the very point where he left off centuries ago; and then will be the
dawn of a new era for the city of Constantine.
As we were about leaving the building the Turkish sacristan, who had
followed us all about, lounging and yawning, gave us a handful of bits
of mosaic, which he had dug out of a wall shortly before, and the
dragoman, whom this incident had interrupted as he was about to launch
forth into the account of the profanation of St. Sophia, resumed his
recital.
I certainly hope, however, that no one will interrupt me, now that the
whole scene has been brought so vividly before me by this description
of the building.
Hardly had the report been noised abroad throughout Constantinople,
at about seven in the morning, that the Turks had actually scaled
the walls, than an immense throng of people rushed to St. Sophia for
refuge. There were about a hundred thousand persons in all--renegade
soldiers, monks, priests, senators, thousands of virgins from the
convents, members of patrician families laden with their treasures,
high state dignitaries, and princes of the imperial blood,--all pouring
through nave and gallery and arcade, treading upon one another in every
recess of the huge building, and mingling in one inextricable mass
with the dregs of the population, slaves, and malefactors escaped from
the prisons and galleys. The mighty basilica resounded with shrieks of
terror such as are heard in a theatre at the outbreak of fire. When
every nook and corner, gallery and chapel, was filled to overflowing,
the doors were shut to and securely bolted, and the wild uproar of the
first few moments gave place to a terror-stricken silence. Many still
believed that the victors would not dare to violate the sanctity
of St. Sophia; others awaited with a stubborn sense of security the
appearance of the angel foretold by the prophets who was to annihilate
the Turkish army before the advance-guard should have reached the
Column of Constantine; others, again, had ascended to the gallery
running around the interior of the dome, from whose windows they could
watch the movements of the enemy and impart their intelligence by signs
to the hundred thousand strained and ashy faces turned up to them from
the nave and galleries below. An immense white mass could be seen
covering the city-walls from the Blachernæ to the Golden Gate, from
which four shining bands were seen to detach themselves and advance
between the houses like four torrents of lava, increasing in volume
and noise and leaving behind them a track of smoke and flame. These
were the four attacking columns of the Turkish army driving before
them the disorganized remainder of the Greek forces, and burning and
plundering as they came, converging toward St. Sophia, the Hippodrome,
and the imperial palace. As the advance-guard reached the second
hill the blare of their trumpets suddenly smote upon the ears of the
terrified throng in the basilica, who fell upon their knees in agonized
supplication; but even then there were many who still looked for the
angel to appear, and others who clung to the hope that a feeling
of awe at the vastness and majesty of that building, dedicated to
the worship of God, might hold the invaders in check. But even this
last illusion was soon dispelled. Through the thousand windows there
broke on their ears a confused roar of human voices mingled with the
clashing of arms and shrill blare of trumpets, and a moment later the
first blows of the Ottoman sabres fell upon the bronze doors of the
vestibule and resounded throughout the entire building, sounding the
death-knell of the listening multitude, who, feeling the chill breath
of the grave blow upon them, abandoned hope and recommended their
souls to the mercy of God. Before long the doors were battered in or
struck from their hinges, and a savage horde of janissaries, spahis,
_timmarioti_, dervishes, and sciaus, covered with dust and blood, their
faces contorted with the fury of battle, rapine, and murder, appeared
in the openings. At sight of the enormous nave, glittering with gold
and precious stones, they sent up a great shout of astonishment and
joy, and, pouring in like a furious torrent, abandoned themselves to
the work of pillage and destruction. Some busied themselves at once in
securing the women and virgins, valuable booty for the slave-market,
who, stupefied with terror, offered no resistance, but voluntarily held
out their arms for the chains. Others attacked the rich furnishings
of the church: tabernacles were violated, images overthrown, ivory
crucifixes trodden under foot, while the mosaics, mistaken for
precious stones, fell under the blows of the cimeters in glittering
showers into the cloaks and caftans held open to receive them; pearls,
detached from their settings with sabre-points, rolled about over the
pavement, chased like living creatures and fought over with savage
kicks and blows. The high altar was broken up into a thousand pieces of
gold and silver; thrones, pulpits, the choir-rail, all disappeared as
though swept away by an avalanche of rock and stone, and still those
Asiatic hordes continued to pour into the church in blood-stained
waves, and on all sides nothing could be seen but a whirlwind of
drunken ruffians, some of whom had placed tiaras on their heads, while
others wore different parts of the sacerdotal vestments over their own
clothing. Chalices and receptacles for the Host were waved aloft, and
troops of newly-acquired slaves, bound two and two with ecclesiastical
scarfs of gold, and horses and camels laden with plunder, were driven
over the pavement strewn with broken fragments of statues, torn
copies of the Evangels, and relics of the saints--a barbarous and
sacrilegious orgy in which shouts of triumph, fierce threats, bursts
of hoarse laughter, children’s cries, the neighing of horses, and
shrill clanging of trumpets mingled in one overpowering uproar, until,
suddenly, the mad tumult ceased, and in the awed hush which followed
the august figure of Muhammad II. appeared in a doorway, on horseback
and surrounded by a group of princes, viziers, and generals, haughty
and impassive, like the living representative of the vengeance of God.
Rising in his stirrups, he announced in a voice of thunder, which
re-echoed throughout the whole of the devastated building, the first
formula of the new religion: “Allah is the light of heaven and earth.”