The iconostasis probably reached up to the base of the porphyry strip

which forms the border of the marble plating of the bema; if so it was

about twenty feet high; it had three doors--“The Holy Doors”--that in

the centre being the largest.

The “gold and silver columns in the middle of the temple” seen by

Benjamin of Tudela, 1173, must refer to the iconostasis.

When the Crusaders practically sacked the church, the iconostasis,

ciborium, and altar were broken up and distributed. Nicetas says, “The

furniture of surpassing beauty, the silver, which went round the screen

of the bema, the ambo, the doors, and many ornaments, in which gold was

used, were carried away.” The _Novgorod Chronicle_[124] gives a fuller

account of the eventful morning when the doors were broken through and

S. Sophia was invaded. “They broke down the podium of the priests,

ornamented with silver, the twelve silver columns, the four panels

in the wall, decorated with images, and the Holy Table. They also

destroyed the screen walls of the altar placed between the columns, and

twelve crosses which stood above the altar; amongst these were crosses

of metal, like trees, higher than a man. All these things were made of

silver.

“They carried off also the wonderful table, with the gems and a great

pearl; so great a crime did they commit in ignorance. Moreover they

snatched away forty cups standing on the altar, and silver candelabra,

whose number was so great that it is not possible to enumerate them,

as well as the silver vessels which the Greeks use, more especially on

feast days.

“They stole a Gospel, that was used for the services, and sacred

crosses and single images and the covering which was above the altar,

and forty censers made of pure gold: they laid hands on all gold and

silver and on priceless vessels in the cupboards, walls, and other

places, in such quantity that they cannot be numbered.”

Grelot says that before the Turks altered the church the iconostasis

had figures of the Virgin and S. John Baptist between the central and

side-doors and the Twelve Apostles over.[125]

_Prothesis and Diakonikon._--Two chapels that in Byzantine churches

almost invariably occur right and left of the bema with which they

communicate directly are usually called the prothesis and diakonikon;

they were sacristies, used respectively for the preparation of the

mass and as a treasury or vestry. Du Cange in both editions placed

them in the two exedras of the eastern hemicycle, and in this he is

followed by Salzenberg. The impossibility of this arrangement is shown

by Neale, who suggests that two chambers on either side of the bema

which Du Cange thought were only supplementary were the sacristies

in question. The chapels at the east end of S. Sophia have now been

built up, but the doors that led into them still exist. We are not

however certain that these chapels were built with the church. Paulus

does not mention them, and there do not appear to have been chapels

in this position at S. Sergius. In regard to the use of the prothesis

and diakonikon, Dr. Freshfield[126] considers that the procession with

the bread and wine called the _Megale Eisodos_, described in our last

chapter, only became a part of the ritual in the reign of the successor

of Justinian, to whose time the Cherubic Hymn sung during the ceremony

is referred. The earlier liturgies, he says, contain no directions for

this ceremony, but merely speak of the deacon as moving the elements

from the prothesis table to the altar, and he concludes that the two

side-chapels found in so many churches belong to a time subsequent to

Justin II. Two narrow passages however, right and left of the bema, at

S. Sophia, S. Sergius, S. Irene, and S. Vitale seem to show that they

were intended for access to lateral portions used in connection with

the bema, even if these parts were merely screened from the aisles,

and a comparison of many early churches in Syria and Asia Minor proves

that such chapels were in frequent use if not essential long before

Justinian built his church.[127] See our figures 31 and 32, and compare

Cattaneo, page 60.

The prothesis and diakonikon of S. Sophia are very infrequently

mentioned by those names. In the catalogue of the Constantinopolitan

patriarchs we read of “relics being kept in the diaconicum.”[128]

The diakonikon is also named where Codinus speaks of the emperor

as “hearing the prayers of S. Basil near the diakonikon,” and the

prothesis is mentioned in the passage on p. 63. Certain divisions

of the church at the east end are however frequently mentioned by

Porphyrogenitus, the Anonymous, and the Russian pilgrims. Thus we have

the skeuophylakium (treasury of vessels) and other chapels referred to.

The skeuophylakium of the Anonymous seems to be the same as the “lesser

sanctuary” of Anthony, by which stood the cross which gave the exact

height of Christ. This lesser sanctuary, or skeuophylakium, is probably

the diakonikon--“the oratory in front of the metatorion”--where the

relics of the Passion were kept.[129] Again we read: “Then by the

right-hand side of the bema, they enter the oratory where stands the

silver crucifix ... after worshipping they ascend by the cochlea

[spiral stair, we suppose at south-east angle where minaret now is]

which is by the part called the Holy Well, to the eastern part of the

right-hand catechumena.” Again, “Then by the right-hand side of the

bema, they enter the oratory where stands the silver crucifix.”[130]

_The Holy Well and Metatorion._--The Holy Well, so frequently mentioned

in the _Ceremonies_, seems to have been not merely an object but a

division of the church. Labarte makes it a chamber external to the

church on the south side, but the Anonymous shows that it was to the

east, by speaking of “that part of the temple in which was the Holy

Well, the bema, and the ambo.” The author of an account of “the miracle

in the Holy Well of the Great Church” speaks of a picture of Christ

as being by the eastern gate, “where is the holy mouth of the well of

Samaria.”[131]

The Russian pilgrims generally speak of the Samaritan well, from which

flowed water from the Jordan, as “in the sanctuary:” the Anonymous

Russian says “in the chapel to the right.” At this time it was probably

in one of the eastern chapels, which, may have been identical with

the prothesis or diakonikon. Some passages of the _Ceremonies_ seem

to imply that in the tenth century the Holy Well was without the

building; thus we hear of the “embolos [portico] of the Holy Well:”

and again, “from the Holy Well, they enter by the door leading to the

church;”[132] possibly it was moved later, but probably one of the

eastern attached chapels will fulfil the conditions. In our Fig. 5

we have followed Du Cange’s ground-plan in the distribution of these

eastern chapels. It is possible that the round north-east building

was used as a great sacristy as Salzenberg suggests; Grelot calls it

so on his plan, and T. Smith says this was a tradition. The Anonymous

definitely distinguishes the Skeuophylakium, the Holy Well, and the

Chapel of S. Peter.

The Metatorion, frequently spoken of together with the Holy Well,

Labarte and Paspates place on the south side, external to the church.

We think it was probably the name of portions of the side-aisles

screened off by curtains. This would agree with Unger,[133] who

thinks that the word means a “quarter of the church” (_metatio_),

and that Du Cange was mistaken in deriving it from _mutatorium_.

In the _Ceremonies_,--“The princes go out of the right side of the

bema and enter the metatorion.” Again, the patriarch stands within

the iconostasis “on the right-hand side of the bema, towards the

metatorion.” From the metatorion a small door led to the Holy Well.

Again, “they leave the bema by the right-hand side through the small

holy door (in iconostasis) and proceed to the porphyry columns (of

exedra), and by the staircase of the metatorion they enter the

catechumena.”[134] Again, “the emperor takes off his crown in the

metatorion within the Beautiful Gate,” and “within the veil, hanging

in the metatorion at the back of the narthex door.” Metatoria in the

catechumena of S. Sophia and of S. Sergius are also referred to.[135]

_Solea._--The later writers often mention the solea of S. Sophia. Thus

Cantacuzenus speaks of the emperor passing through the solea up to the

“Holy Doors.”[136] It was immediately outside the iconostasis, and must

have closely agreed with the choir of the singers in a Western church.

Paulus does not use the word, but he describes the singers as occupying

the space in front of the Holy Doors, and embraced by the exedras. The

ambo, with its long passage of approach from the step of the Holy

Doors, divided this space in two, so it is clear that the singers stood

on either side of the ambo. The portion round about the ambo screened

by the circle of columns was reserved for the leaders of the choir,

the Protopsaltae.[137] We cannot infer from the Silentiary that there

was any other screen to the Solea, and no stalls for the singers are

mentioned.

It is possible that in the tenth century, when the _Book of the

Ceremonies_ was written, the ambo had been modified at least in

regard to the approach from the bema, and that a considerable space

was interposed between it and the Holy Doors, in front of which

there was at this time a porphyry omphalion stone (see our page 96).

Paspates[138] says this is still quite intact, somewhat oval in shape,

seven feet across, and adorned with a mosaic of marbles. It seems

probable from the Anonymous that in these later days the solea was

inclosed by a screen which he says was of silver.[139]

Paulus describes a part on the south side as being inclosed for the

emperor, and in Porphyrogenitus we read that the emperor had his

seat “near the Holy Doors on the right-hand side.” It is probable

that opposite the emperor’s throne there was another bishop’s chair,

for that in the bema might only be occupied by the bishop in his own

diocese. Grelot indeed reports that the emperor’s and bishop’s thrones

were opposite one another.

_Nave._--We now come to the central division of the church, the naos or

nave, the square space beneath the dome contained between the four main

piers: its centre was called _omphalos_, _mesomphalos_, or _mesonaos_.

The pavement, according to the poet Paul, was covered with white

Proconnesian marble and darker Bosporus stone. In the opening lines

of the description before given he seems to compare the veined marble

to flowing streams, or foam-flecked sea, and the ambo is likened to

an island rising from the sea. According to Glycas and Codinus the

first pavement was of various hues like the ocean. The Anonymous, in

comparing a pavement which he says was laid down afterwards with this

supposed earlier one, says that “messengers were sent to Proconnesus,

and marble of a green colour was worked there, as is seen now like

rivers flowing into the sea.” Codinus says, “four rivers of leek-green

marble were like the four streams which flow from Paradise to the sea.”

_As is seen now_ certainly seems to bring something definite before our

eyes, and so far as the pavement can be seen through the narrow chinks

of the matting there is much to confirm this part of the Anonymous.

Grelot tells us that the pavement is laid in compartments. It is of

whitish gray Proconnesian marble, laid in slabs about 4 × 10 feet, with

here and there strips of verde antique about 2 feet wide, which suggest

the quartering of the floor by a great cross. Moreover the square of

rich Alexandrine work still existing, and figured by Salzenberg, lies

on a diagonal, and would thus exactly occupy one of four square spaces

left in the angles (see Fig. 5). Now in the palace the floor of the

bedchamber of Basil had four rivers or streams of Thessalian-green

marble which seemed to flow away from the centre, and the quarters

were filled with mosaics of large eagles.[140] It may also be noticed

that four rivers are depicted as flowing away from the cross on the

central bronze door of narthex. Many parallel examples of pavements,

still existing, confirm the Anonymous in this respect. The mosaic

floors of Italy furnish many instances where the four rivers of Eden

are represented in the several angles as human forms pouring from urns,

waters which are inscribed with the names Gihon, Tigris, Euphrates, and

Pison. The design of the pavement of the Baptistery at Florence has

been much disturbed, but it seems to have represented flowing streams,

which led from the font in the middle to the doors like four paths. It

has been pointed out that the carpet of Chosroes, which is described

as having represented a garden with flowing streams, was a traditional

pattern of which an example showing four streams quartering the field

is in the possession of Mr. Colvin.[141] We understand that a similar

carpet is now in New York.

We give here a representation of a square of pavement at the centre of

the Western Gynaeceum; it is of Proconnesian slabs with border, and a

disc of verde antico.

[Illustration: FIG. 9.--Marble Pavement at centre of West Gallery.]

_Font._--A fine marble font formerly in the precincts of the Mosque

Zeinab Sultana at the west of S. Sophia, and now in the Imperial

Museum, is the one referred to by Paspates as being probably the font

of S. John Baptist (the Baptistery). He writes that there were only

two remaining in Constantinople, the other being a smaller font in

the precincts of the Mosque Kotza Mustapha Pasha.[142] The font in

the museum which we illustrate is 8 feet 2½ inches long, 6 feet 1½

inches wide, and 4 feet 6 inches high, wrought out of one fine block

of Proconnesian marble. The outside is carefully finished, which shows

that it stood above the floor. The inside is formed into steps, and

about the rim are several roughly sunk crosses, which we suggest

were filled by inlaid votive crosses of metal. Similar fonts are

shown in the mosaics at S. Mark’s and other places. Texier found one

in the marble quarries of Synnada with steps inside, and others are

found in Palestine, one of which, illustrated in the _Memoirs_ of the

Exploration Fund,[143] closely resembles this at Constantinople, which

we may therefore look on as a typical Byzantine font.

[Illustration: FIG. 10.--Font from Constantinople.]

_Consecration or other Crosses._--On the great verde antico columns of

the north side of the nave, about six feet above the floor, appear sunk

crosses about six inches high; on the south side shallow sunk panels

occupy similar positions, formed we may suppose by the Turks for the

purpose of destroying the crosses. Similar sunk crosses occur on some

of the marble columns in the gallery at S. Sergius and at Bethlehem; at

Sinai the nave columns bear inlaid bronze crosses. From the character

of those at S. Sophia we should suppose that they were also formerly

filled by inlaid metal; their similarity in size and the regularity

with which they are placed seem to show that they are of the nature of

consecration crosses rather than being merely votive, or rather that

they were made by the builders, just as a farmer crosses his bags of

wheat. In most of the cisterns of Constantinople one column at least

bears a large fairly wrought cross.

_Miraculous Marbles and Mosaics._--Clavijo describes a large white slab

in the right of the gallery naturally figuring “the Virgin with Christ

in her most holy arms:” beneath this was an altar in a little chapel

where they said mass. These marbles, in which accidental resemblances

to figures might be traced, were evidently much valued. Felix Fabri

describes a slab at the Holy Sepulchre in which S. Jerome and his

lion appeared. “This picture was not produced by art, but by simple

polishing alone.”

The column of S. Gregory Thaumaturgus, mentioned by Anthony of Novgorod

as by the entrance and “covered with bronze plates,” may possibly be

the celebrated “sweating column,” which is the first square pillar in

the north aisle. At about five feet from the floor it is cased with

bronze, in which a hole is left over the cavities in the pillar which

are supposed to exude the dampness. The indents are smooth, and look

like natural cavities discovered in the marble when it was wrought.

Canon Curtis, who was kind enough to examine the pillar for us, says

it was perfectly dry, and the attendants assured him that water never

oozed out of the cavities, although “a few drops of water might be

easily kept in each of them.” Sweating columns are well known in the

legends of the middle ages. Benjamin of Tudela speaks of two in

Rome which sweated on the anniversary of the fall of Jerusalem, and

Mandeville mentions four pillars in the Holy Sepulchre “that always

drop water, and some men say that they weep for our Lord’s death.”

Stephen of Novgorod speaks of a mosaic of Christ in S. Sophia from

which holy water flowed from the wounds of the feet.

_Water Vessels._--At the west end of the church in the right and left

exedras stand two large white Proconnesian marble urns about seven

feet high, of beautiful gourd-like forms. They rise from the centre of

polygonal basins, and water is drawn from them through bronze taps.

It has been said that they were brought from Pergamus or Marmora

by Sultan Murad III.[144] The carving of the turban-like tops is

certainly Turkish, but the vessels seem to be of Byzantine form, and

we are disposed to agree with Grelot, who saw them in their present

position before 1680. He says they were kept full of water “to cool the

Mohammedans overheated by their devout gesticulations.” “If they are

not very ancient, they stand in the place of others, which contained

holy water for the Christians who entered the church.” He associates

with these the palindrome inscription given by Gruter (see our page

191), which he says was written on these, or similar, vessels in gold

letters.[145]

Now a beautiful cantharus in the Church of S. Peter and S. Andrew, on

the island of Murano,[146] which is almost identical with those of S.

Sophia, is stated to have been brought back thence with the Venetian

booty, and bears a Byzantine inscription:--

ΑΝΤΛΗϹΑΤΑΙ · ΥΔΩΡ · ΜΕΤΑ · ΕΥΦΡΟϹΥΝΗϹ · ΟΤΙ · ΦΩΝΗ ·

ΚΥ · ΕΠΙ · ΤΩΝ · ΥΔΑΤΩΝ ·

(“Draw the water with gladness, for the voice of the Lord is upon the

waters”); together with a monogram which reads ΝΙΚΟΜΕΔΟΥ. Beneath the

monogram appears a stopping where evidently a tap was fixed, in exactly

the position of those to the urns in S. Sophia. The first half of the

latter inscription is on a small vessel of lead found at Tunis, which,

from the character of the decoration, cannot be later than the fourth

or fifth century. The first mention of the vessels in S. Sophia which

we have been able to find is by an English traveller, Fynes Moryson

(1595), who says, “I did see two nuts of marble of huge bigness and

great beauty.”

We give in Fig. 11 the vessel in the south exedra at S. Sophia,

together with that of Murano, and for further comparison some beautiful

vessels from a relief of Justinian’s time on the ivory throne at

Ravenna. We have omitted the Turkish top of the former. Canon Curtis,

who has specially examined them, writes to us that between the top and

body of each vessel is a copper band which conceals the joint, if there

is a joint.

_Images and Tombs._--Very few fragments of Christian sculpture remain

in Constantinople. The Silentiary does not mention any sculpture at S.

Sophia. Probably the feeling which was mature in Leo the Isaurian was

always latent; Oriental Christians sharing in the dislike with which

Jew and Moslem regarded statues. Canon Curtis writes: “On the northern

side of the sweating column I used to see parts of a bas-relief

representing, as I thought, a procession, but it was almost concealed

by the metal plates, and now it is entirely hidden.” The wealth of

the church in icons at a late period may be gathered from incidental

references. Not until a late time do we hear of any tombs in the

church. S. Chrysostom and most of the other patriarchs were buried in

the Church of the Holy Apostles.

Pachymeres mentions “the stele of the three Germani (Patriarchs of

Constantinople) near the porphyry columns on the west.” Nicephorus

Gregoras[147] also writes that the remains of the patriarch Arsenius

were buried in the great Church of S. Sophia.

[Illustration: FIG. 11.--Water Vessels from S. Sophia and Murano.]

_Hangings._--The descriptions on several occasions mention veils and

hangings by the names of _vela_ and _velothyra_. With mosaics and

miniatures to help us it is possible to judge of the lavish way in

which these hangings were used.

The mosaics at Ravenna show veils hanging at the door of the church

through which Theodora is about to enter, and the large elevation of

the Palace of Theodoric, likewise in mosaic, shows hangings in all the

arches of the portico. Such textiles suspended at entrance doorways

are often mentioned by contemporary authors.[148] At S. Sophia the

doors entering the narthex, and those between it and the church, all

have bronze hooks, to which such “door veils” were suspended; and

embroidered Turkish hangings, which roll up from the bottom by means of

cords and pulleys, are still hung to them. In the Byzantine mosaics the

hangings are often shown raised by being gathered into a loose knot, or

by being drawn to the sides and passed once round the pillars between

which they hang.

[Illustration: FIG. 12.--Vessels of Sixth Century: from Ivory Throne,

Ravenna.]

The account of the coronation ceremony describes how the royal persons

were seated in the gynaeceum, screened by “golden velothyra,” so

that they should not be seen until the psaltae sang the “Lift up,”

when immediately the velothyra were raised. Of these hangings in the

interior we have a picture in the account given in the continuation

of Theophanes of an ambassador, Iber Curopalates, who visited

Constantinople in 923, and “was taken to the church of S. Sophia, that

he should inspect its beauty and size and precious ornaments. Now

the walls were all draped with cloth of gold before they led him in,

and he, struck with the great size of the church and its wealth of

adornment, exclaimed, ‘Truly this is the house of God,’ and returned

home.”[149] The _Ceremonies_ mention gold hangings in Catechumena above

Royal Door.[150] Nicetas tells us how the Crusaders “spared neither

the house of God nor His ministers, but stripped the great church of

all its fine ornaments and hangings, made of the richest brocades of

inestimable value.”

We have no doubt that S. Sophia was frequently adorned inside by the

arcades of both tiers having hangings suspended from the iron bars,

which cross all these arches at their springing, exactly like those

shown in the mosaic of Theodoric’s palace. Indeed Ignatius of Smolensk

(_circ._ 1395), who was present at the coronation of Manuel, says that

the women in the galleries remained behind curtains of silk so that

none might see their faces.[151]

These hangings seem either to have had simple figures such as squares

with large “gammidae” at the corners worked on them, probably in

gold, or they were patterned over with figures, animals, and flowers,

woven in the stuff like the elaborate veils of the altar described by

the Silentiary. The linen vestments found at Panopolis in Egypt show

us that the “gammidae” originated in embroidered shoulder straps,

with seal-like ends applied on either side of the neck opening. Fig.

13 shows two of the door veils represented at Ravenna; that on the

right is from the mosaic in S. Apollinare Nuovo showing the palace.

The gammidae are here exactly of the form found on the early Coptic

linen vestments, and it cannot be doubted that they were “applied” in

a similar way. The pattern on the left is the door-hanging from the

mosaic of S. Vitale; the plain squares are of gold. The designs on the

robes in this mosaic are interesting. Justinian’s chlamys is covered

with birds in circles, the border of Theodora’s robe displays the three

Magi making their offerings; one of her attendants has a robe powdered

with swimming ducks and a mantle with four petalled red roses on a gold

ground, and another robe has five pointed leaves scattered over its

field. Many examples of the figured silks are preserved in museums.

There is at South Kensington Museum a piece of pictured silk of this

kind, probably of Justinian’s time, which is covered with circles, in

each of which is figured a man and a lion. More than a century before

the time of Justinian, Asterius, Bishop of Amasius, had made these

elaborately figured stuffs a subject of satire: “When men so draped

appear in the streets the passers-by regard them like painted walls.

Their clothes are pictures which little children trace out with their

fingers. There are lions, panthers, and bears, also rocks, woods, and

hunters. The most devout carry Christ, His disciples, and His miracles.

Here we may see the marriage in Galilee and the pots of wine; there

is the paralytic carrying his bed, the penitent woman at the feet of

Jesus, or Lazarus come again to life.”[152]

[Illustration: FIG. 13.--Door Veils of the Sixth Century: Ravenna

Mosaics.]

Later the patterns became more heraldic and larger in scale, figuring

for the most part great displayed eagles, and griffons, or lions

affronted. A piece of a textile of this kind in the museum at

Düsseldorf, of which there is a full-size copy at South Kensington,

bears golden lions about two feet six inches long, and the names of

Constantine VIII. and Basil on a pallid purple ground. Frauberger[153]

compares this with another signed example of the same age and similar

design preserved at Siegburg, and a third at Autun, “all of which

were intended for church hangings.” The same writer says that after

Justinian’s introduction of silk weaving in 552 and the loss of Bosra

with its purple-dye vats to Chosroes, an imperial textile industry was

established by the Golden Horn, which existed until the fourteenth

century. Here these hangings were probably produced.

_Carpets._--Portions of the floor of S. Sophia were almost certainly

strewn with carpets. Porphyrogenitus relates of the New Church of Basil

that “woollen carpets (_nakopetai_) called prayer carpets, of wonderful

size and beauty, and resembling the bright plumage of peacocks, were

laid one over another, completely covering the mosaic pavement of

valuable stones.” The carpets and prayer-rugs of the mosques thus had

their direct parallels, if not their prototypes, in the Byzantine

churches.

_Synods._--The patriarchal registers, dating from the fourteenth

century, speak of synods sitting “in the right-hand catechumena”; this

probably refers to the south gallery, where the vault has displayed in

mosaic the descent of the Holy Ghost on the Apostles.

Across this gallery there is at present a screen, which possibly, as

Paspates suggests, shut off the part used by the Synods. (See dotted

line on Fig. 6.) The screen is made up of two marble slabs, each

sculptured into the form of panelled double doors, with architraves

and carved panels. Above the opening left between these is a coloured

marble slab. At the top is a carved wood beam, which, being exactly

like the permanent vault ties, is evidently of Justinian’s age; but the

whole is certainly not an original assemblage of the parts. Each slab,

which imitates a pair of wood doors, has a representation of a bronze

ring handle and a lock-plate on one half, and a hasp on the other, all

exactly copied in sculptured marble. We believe that these imitation

doors are earlier than the church; the idea was common in late classic

times. De Vogüé and Dr. Merrill[154] found several tomb doors,

similarly panelled, studded with imitation nails, and having elaborate

knockers, all carved in stone. An example in marble now in the museum

at Leeds closely resembles the S. Sophia slabs.

_Clergy and Ritual._--In the time of Justinian the total number of

clergy was 525, but at the time of Heraclius this had been increased to

600.[155] They were thus divided:--

Presbyters 80

Deacons 150

Deaconesses 40

Subdeacons 70

Readers 160

Singers 25

Doorkeepers 75

---

Total 600

The subdeacons, according to the forty-third canon of the Council

of Laodicea, stood by the doors. Porphyrogenitus[156] speaks of the

emperor “passing through the narthex of the gynaeceum, where the

deaconesses have their usual place.” The same author also mentions[157]

“hypurgi of the narthex, readers for alternate weeks, ostiarii of

the Holy Well, a domesticus of the subdeacons, and deputati of S.

Sophia.” A series of seals of the officers of S. Sophia is given by

Schlumberger;[158] the seals are those of the klerikos, diakonos,

manglabites, ekdikos, deuteroboetes, protospatharios, and the

chartophulax. An anonymous author[159] gives a list of the officers of

the “holy and great” church which is too long to be given in full, but

we may note some of the duties mentioned.

The Oeconomus held “one of the flabella, and stood at the right hand of

the altar, when the patriarch was officiating;” while “the sacellarius,

holding a napkin, stood on the left.” The skeuophylax stood in front of

the skeuophylakium, so as to be ready to hand any vessel that might be

wanted. The chartophulax stood near the “holy doors,” and pronounced

the words of the service, “Approach, ye priests.” The castensius holds

the censer, and draws the curtain at the _Trisagion_. The refendarius

and deputati carried the orders of the patriarch to the princes and

nobles, and summoned them to his presence. When the patriarch was

officiating, the protopapas took precedence of all the other priests,

and even gave the communion to the patriarch. The protopsaltes “stood

in the middle of the church between the right and left choirs,” and led

the singing. On one occasion the number of priests was so great “that

the church of S. Sophia, though it is the greatest of all on the earth,

seemed then too small.”[160]

Up to the eleventh century, services were only performed in S. Sophia

on Sundays and Saints’ days. In the middle of the eleventh century,

Monomachus arranged that the service should be every day, and for this

extra salaries were given.[161]

Some idea of the ritual of the services may be gathered from the

offices in the _Euchologium_, edited by Goar, the Cherubic and other

hymns, together with the _Ceremonies_ of Porphyrogenitus. An account

given by Anthony of Novgorod is quoted in the next chapter. Bertrandon

Brocquière writes: “I was curious to witness the manner of the Greeks

performing divine service, and went to S. Sophia on a day when the

patriarch officiated. The emperor was present accompanied by his

wife, his mother, and his brother, the despot of the Morea. A Mystery

was represented, the subject of which was the three youths whom

Nebuchadnezzar had ordered to be thrown into the fiery furnace.”

Having in our last chapter quoted the description of the procession

and celebration of the Mass, we now give the accounts of the Adoration

of the Cross given by Arculf[162] in the seventh century, and by

Porphyrogenitus in the tenth; together with the directions for the

emperor’s procession to the great church.

_The Adoration of the Cross._--“In the northern part of the interior

of the house (S. Sophia) is shown a very large and beautiful aumbry,

where is kept a wooden chest, in which is shut up that wooden cross of

salvation on which our Saviour hung for the salvation of the world.

This notable chest, as the sainted Arculf relates, is raised with its

treasure of such preciousness upon a golden altar, on three consecutive

days after the lapse of a year. This altar also is in the same round

church, being two cubits long, and one broad. On three consecutive

days only throughout the year is the Lord’s cross raised and placed

on the altar, that is on the day of the supper of the Lord, when the

emperor and the armies enter the church, and, approaching the altar,

after that sacred chest has been opened, kiss the Cross of Salvation.

First of all the emperor of the world kisses it with bent face, then

going up one after another in the order of rank or age all kiss the

cross with honour. Then on the next day, that is on the sixth day of

the week before Easter, the queen, the matrons, and all the women of

the people approach it in the above-mentioned order, and all kiss it

with reverence. On the third day, that is on the Paschal Sabbath, the

bishop, and all the clergy after him, approach in order with fear

and trembling and all honour, kissing the Cross of Victory which is

placed in its chest. When these sacred and joyful kissings of the

sacred cross are finished, that venerable chest is closed, and with

its honoured treasure it is borne back to its aumbry. But this should

also be carefully noted, that there are not two but three short pieces

of wood in the cross, that is the cross beam and the long one which

is cut and divided into two equal parts; while from these threefold

venerated beams when the chest is opened, there arises an odour of a

wonderful fragrance,[163] as if all sorts of flowers had been collected

in it, wonderfully full of sweetness, satiating and gladdening all in

the open space before the inner walls of the church, who stand still as

they enter at that moment; for from the knots of those threefold beams

a sweet-smelling liquid distils, like pressed-out oil, which causes

all men of whatever race, who have assembled and entered the church,

to perceive the above-mentioned fragrance of so great sweetness. This

liquid is such that if even a little drop of it be laid on the sick,

they easily recover their health, whatever be the trouble or disease

they have been afflicted with.”

The passage from the _Book of the Ceremonies_[164] describing the

Exaltation of the cross on September 14th begins with the emperor

“passing through the palace Manaura, and the upper corridors, ascending

by the wooden staircase, and entering the _catechumena_[165] of the

great church.” After he has reached the catechumena and “lighted

candles, and prayed, he takes his seat in the part on the right-hand

side.” “The emperor then summons the patriarch, who remains for a

short time with the emperor, and then goes out, and comes to the small

secretum, where is kept the Holy Wood, and receives the emperor there.

And as the congregation begin the ‘Glory to God in the Highest,’ the

emperor enters, and kisses the Sacred Wood, and comes out into the

great secretum. Then the emperor, following the Cross, descends by the

great winding staircase, keeping to the left, and passes through the

Didaskalion,[166] where the paschalia are inscribed, and having gone

down the steps, he enters through the great gate of the narthex, and

reaches the royal doors and stands there. The emperor and patriarch now

pass through the middle of the nave, and on the right of the ambo into

the solea; here the emperor stands before the Holy Doors, and gives

the candle he is carrying to the praepositus. He then enters the bema,

and having kissed the Sacred Wood, and turning round, he comes out

again, and passes through the solea, then mounts the third or fourth

step of the ambo and stands there, holding the candle. The patriarch

then comes out of the bema and mounts the ambo with the Sacred Wood,

and the emperor gives his candle to the praepositus, and remains there

until the Wood has been elevated in the four quarters of the ambo. The

emperor and patriarch then descend from the ambo and enter the bema,

and the Wood being placed before them the emperor prays and kisses it,

and coming out through the side of the bema he is conducted by the

patriarch to the Holy Well, and having kissed it, he continues to the

palace.”

It would almost appear that whereas in the time of Arculph (_circa_

680) the Cross was kept in one of the north-eastern chambers by the

bema, in the time of Porphyrogenitus (tenth century) it was preserved,

during certain periods, in a secretum accessible from the gynaeceum.

Possibly the small upper chapel on the south side with mosaic ceiling,

and the additions over the south porch, both built about the tenth

century, may be the chambers in question. At the end of the ceremony

the Cross was left in the bema, and it may be that only on the

occasion of the Festival of the Cross was it taken up to the gallery,

preparatory to a procession through all parts of the church.

_Procession to the Church._--The following is an account of a pageant,

which is the first in the _Book of Ceremonies_--the order of the royal

procession to the Great Church. On the day preceding the feast, notice

was given so that the way might be adorned with flowers. The emperor

and princes carried gifts, and processional candles, and the Cross

of St. Constantine.[167] Priests were sent to receive him with the

Cross of the Lord, which was taken from the church by the Sacristan

(_skeuophulax_).

In proceeding to the church there were six “receptions.” Three were

in various parts of the palace, “and the princes come to the gate

(Chalké), and the fourth reception takes place outside the barrier of

Chalké; the fifth reception takes place in front of the Great Gate

which leads into the Augusteum; and the sixth reception is at the

Horologium of S. Sophia.”[168]

“And from thence the princes enter through the Beautiful Gate, and

have their crowns removed by the praepositi within the curtain that

hangs in the chamber, that is to say, the propylaeum of the narthex.

And the patriarch receives them at the door of the narthex with the

usual ceremony.... The lords remove their crowns, kiss the holy Gospel

carried by the archdeacon, greet the patriarch, and proceed up to the

royal doors. Bearing the candles and bowing thrice, the entrance is

made after a prayer by the patriarch; then those carrying the sceptres

and vessels stand right and left of the church; but those bearing the

banners and the books stand on either side in the solea; and the Cross

of St. Constantine is placed on the right side of the bema. And when

the lords come to the Holy Doors and to the porphyry omphalion, the

patriarch alone enters within the screen, by the holy door on the left.

The princes, after bowing thrice, enter with the candles, following

the patriarch, and coming to the holy table they kiss the holy cloth,

and they place as is usual on the holy table the two white veils, and

kiss the holy chalices, and the two discs and the holy corporal cloth,

which are handed to them by the patriarch. And then by the right-hand

side of the bema the princes enter with the patriarch the _Kuklis_,

where is placed the Holy Crucifix of gold, and again they bow with the

candles three times praising God; and the patriarch gives the censer to

the emperor and he censes the crucifix: then they kiss the patriarch,

and take leave of him and enter the oratory, which is in front of the

metatorion, and there, bowing three times and praising God, they kiss

the Holy Cross as well as all the Instruments of our Lord’s Passion,

and then enter the metatorion.”

CHAPTER VI

RELICS, TREASURE, AND THE LIGHTING OF THE CHURCH

§ 1. RELICS.

_The True Cross._--There would seem to be little doubt that a discovery

was made about 326 of what was supposed to be the true Cross. S. Cyril

of Jerusalem, writing some twenty-five years later, says that portions

of the Cross were spread all over the world. We have seen (p. 14) that

early historians relate that a portion of this precious relic was sent

to Constantinople by Helena. The principal part however remained at

Jerusalem until it was taken by Chosroes. It is described by some of

the pilgrims to the holy city as being encased in silver. Brought back

from Persia by Heraclius in 628 together with the spear and sponge,

it rested for a brief interval in S. Sophia, where it was “uplifted”;

but it was again returned to Jerusalem until 636,[169] when under the

fear of the coming troubles the larger portion at least was removed.

Rohault de Fleury, who devoted a folio volume to the Instruments of the

Passion, quotes a letter from Anseau, a priest of the Holy Sepulchre

in the twelfth century, which was sent to Paris with a portion of

the Cross. According to this account the Holy Wood was divided into

nineteen small Crosses, of which Constantinople possessed three besides

the “Cross of the Emperor,” and Jerusalem retained four. We have

positive evidence that in the century before Heraclius Constantinople

was a centre where portions of the Cross were to be obtained: thus

Radegunde, wife of Clothaire, received a fragment from Justin II. and

Sophia in 569.[170] At this time, according to John of Ephesus, there

was “a day of the adoration of the Holy Cross of our Saviour; on this

festival the Cross is brought out and set up in the Great Church, and

the senate and all the people of the city assemble to worship it.”[171]

Probably the Exaltation was celebrated concurrently at Jerusalem and at

Constantinople.

When we more definitely hear of the True Cross at S. Sophia, it is

evident, from the frequent occasions in which it is transported to

different parts of the church, and to the palace, that it was quite

small, a relic in fact.

Arculf (_circa_ 680), as we have seen, describes it as kept in a chest,

on a golden altar, which was only two cubits long by one broad. He

says: “it should be specially noticed that there are not two but three

short pieces of wood in the cross; that is, the cross beam, and the

long one divided into two equal parts.”

Now in the _Menologium_ of Basil we have a representation of the

Exaltation of the Cross, which the patriarch is uplifting in an ambo.

It is represented as a double cross made up of three pieces, not of

two. A miniature of the finding of the Cross in the National Library of

Paris shows the same form. Didron remarks that the cross with double

branches probably originated in Greece, “for it is constantly seen in

Attica, in the Morea, and on Mount Athos.” This form appears frequently

on the later coins of Constantinople, and we find that most of the

relics of the True Cross which still exist on Mount Athos and other

places are made up with double arms. A reliquary for the fragment,

said to be that which was sent to Radegunde, was preserved in the

monastery of S. Cross at Poitiers in the last century. The field was of

_cloisonné_ enamel, blue with here and there a red flower. A drawing of

this relic, of which we give an outline,[172] shows that this fragment

of the True Cross was made up in the double-armed form, which was

repeated in the relic at the Ste. Chapelle.[173] Two such relics now

at Venice are doubly interesting, for besides a cross of this form two

supporting figures are represented which are inscribed Constantine and

Helena.[174] Now Cedrenus and other late writers say that in the Kamara

of the Milion were the figures of Constantine and his mother, with the

cross between them. The same composition appears in the mosaics at

the monastery of S. Luke. The two Venice relics bear the names of the

Empresses Maria (1180) and Irene (1350).

[Illustration: FIG. 14.--Showing form of True Cross at S. Sophia.]

Fig. 14 represents the Poitiers reliquary; the True Cross as shown in

the _Menologium_; and a cross from a late coin. We cannot doubt that

the Cross at Constantinople was of this form. Was it the result of the

conjunction of three pieces as mentioned by Arculph, or did the upper

arm from the first represent the label?

With the Cross were associated the other Instruments of the

Passion--the Crown of Thorns, the Sponge and Spear, and slabs from the

Tomb.

The catalogue of relics by Nicholas Thingeyrensis (1200) says, “In S.

Sophia is the Cross of the Lord which Helena the Queen brought;”[175]

but at that time the greater part of the Cross and other relics of

the Passion seem to have been transferred to the chapel in the palace

of Boucoleon, where they were seen by Robert de Clari (1200). The

anniversary of the day on which they were moved from S. Sophia, August

14th, was kept as a holiday. According to Paspates all the relics of

the Passion were removed in 1234. Baldwin II. took the Crown of Thorns

which was acquired by S. Louis. It is evident, however, from the later

Pilgrims quoted below, and from Mandeville, that a part of the Passion

relics remained or that others were acquired.

_Other Treasure and Relics._--“Not only kings and patriarchs, but also

private individuals and monks brought to Constantinople relics of the

apostles and martyrs, ancient ikons, and all kinds of sacred objects

connected with the saints of the church. Anything of value in the

whole land of Palestine was for the most part moved to Constantinople,

and such was the reverence for relics that no church, monastery, nor

oratory was built without them.”[176] So early as 415, when S. Sophia

was rededicated, it was necessary to have fresh relics (see page 16).

A description of the relics and the treasure of Constantinople is given

in the letter supposed to have been written in 1095 by Alexius Comnenus

to Robert, Count of Flanders, in which he craves the assistance of

the West against the Turks. After enumerating the relics scattered

throughout the city, he continues, “If you do not care to fight for

these, and gold will tempt you more, you will find more of it at

Constantinople than in the whole world, for the treasures of its

basilicas alone would be sufficient to furnish all the churches of

Christendom, and all their treasures cannot together amount to those of

S. Sophia, whose riches have never been equalled even in the temple of

Solomon.”

The dispersion of the relics and treasures of S. Sophia and the other

churches at Constantinople has been exhaustively treated by Count

Riant.[177] The description by Anthony, Archbishop of Novgorod, who

visited S. Sophia in 1200, three years before the capture by the

Crusaders, furnishes the best account of the accumulated riches of the

great church. We give this in full from the French version contained in

_Itinéraires Russes en Orient_.[178]

“I, Antonius, Archbishop of Novgorod, an unworthy and humble sinner, by

the grace of God and by the help of S. Sophia, who is the Wisdom and

the Eternal Word, reached in safety the imperial city, and entered the

great Catholic and Apostolic Church. We first worshipped S. Sophia,

kissing the two slabs of the Lord’s sepulchre. Furthermore we saw the

seals, and the figure of the Mother of God, nursing Christ. This image

a Jew at Jerusalem pierced in the neck with a knife, and blood flowed

forth. The blood of the image, all dried up, we saw in the smaller

sanctuary.

“In the sanctuary of S. Sophia is the blood of the holy martyr

Pantaleon with milk,[179] placed in a reliquary like a little branch

or bough, yet without their having mixed. Besides that there is his

head, and the head of the Apostle Quadratus, and many relics of other

saints: the heads of Hermolaus and Stratonicus; the arm of Germanus,

which is laid on those who are to be ordained patriarchs; the image of

the Virgin which Germanus sent in a boat to Rome by sea; and the small

marble table on which Christ celebrated His Supper with the disciples,

as well as His swaddling clothes and the golden vessels, which the Magi

brought with their offerings.

“There is a large gold ‘disc’ for the mass, given to the patriarch by

Olga, a Russian princess, when she came to the imperial city to be

baptized.[180] In this disc there is a precious stone which displays

the image of Christ, and the seal-impressions from this are used as

charms; but on the upper side the disc is adorned with pearls.

“In the sanctuary is likewise preserved the real chariot of Constantine

and Helena, made of silver; there are gold plates, enriched with pearls

and little jewels, and numerous others of silver, which are used for

the services on Sundays and feast days: there is water also in the

sanctuary coming out of a well by pipes.

“Outside the smaller sanctuary[181] is erected the ‘Crux Mensuralis,’

which shows the height of Christ when on earth; and behind that cross

is buried Anna, who gave her house to S. Sophia, where now is the

smaller sanctuary, and she is buried near. And near this same smaller

sanctuary are the figures of the holy women and of the Virgin Mother

holding Christ, and shedding tears which fall on the eyes of Christ.

They give of the water of the sanctuary for the blessing of the world.

“In the same part is the chapel of S. Peter the Apostle, where S.

Theophania is buried. She was the guardian of the keys of S. Sophia,

which people used to kiss. There is also suspended the carpet of S.

Nicholas. The iron chains of S. Peter are kept there in a gold chest;

during the feast of ‘S. Peter’s Chains’ the emperor, the patriarch,

and all the congregation kiss them [see Fig. 8]. Near by, in another

chapel, is also shown the crystal of the ancient ambo, destroyed when

the dome fell.

“By the side of [the images of] the holy women is the tomb of the son

of S. Athenogenius.... There are no other tombs in S. Sophia except

that, and a lamp hangs in front of it, which once fell, full of oil,

without being broken. The place is inclosed by a wood screen, and the

people are not allowed to enter.

“When one turns towards the gate one sees at the side the column of

S. Gregory the Miracle-Worker, all covered with bronze plates. S.

Gregory appeared near this column, and the people kiss it, and rub

their breasts and shoulders against it to be cured of their pains;

there is also the image of S. Gregory. On his feast day the patriarch

brings his relics to this column. And there placed above a platform is

a great figure of the Saviour in mosaic; it lacks the little finger of

the right hand. When it was finished, the artist looked at it and said,

‘Lord, I have made thee as if alive.’ Then a voice coming from the

picture said, ‘When hast thou seen me?’ The artist was struck dumb and

died, and the finger was not finished, but was made in silver-gilt.

“Above the gate is depicted on a large panel the Emperor Leo the Wise,

and in front of it is a precious stone, which illuminates S. Sophia at

night-time. This same Emperor Leo took a certain writing from Babylon,

which was found in the tomb of the prophet Daniel. It was copied, and

on it were written the names of the Greek emperors. At the royal gate

is a bronze romanistum[182] or bolt by which the door is closed. Men

and women are brought to it, and if they have drunk serpent poison or

any other poison, they cannot remove the bolt from the mouth, until all

the evil of the disease has trickled away with the saliva.

“By the great altar on the left is the place where an angel of the Lord

appeared to the boy who was guarding the workmen’s tools, and said,

‘I will not leave this spot as long as S. Sophia shall remain.’ Three

figures are shown in this place, for the angels are painted there; and

a multitude of people come there to pray to God. Not far from there

is the place where they boil the holy oil, burning underneath it old

ikons, whose features one can no longer trace. With this oil they

anoint children at baptism. Above the sanctuary there rises in the air

a great hollow vault covered with gold. In the sanctuary are eighty

candelabra of silver for use on feast days, which occupy the first

place, besides numberless silver candelabra with many golden apples.

“Above the great altar in the middle is hung the crown of the Emperor

Constantine, set with precious stones and pearls. Below it is a golden

cross, which overhangs a golden dove. The crowns of the other emperors

are hung round the ciborium, which is entirely made of silver and

gold. Thus the altar pillars and the sanctuary and the bema are built

of gold and silver, ingeniously made, and very costly. From the same

ciborium hang thirty smaller crowns, as a remembrance to Christians of

the pieces of money of Judas. To the ciborium were attached curtains,

which were formerly drawn by the bishops during the services. We asked

why they did so, and they answered so that the priests should not see

the women and the people, but should serve the supreme God with a pure

heart and soul. Later the heretics,[183] when nobody could see them as

they were behind the curtains, took the body and blood of Christ, and

spat them out, and trampled on them. The Spirit warned the fathers of

this heresy, and the fathers fixed the curtains to the columns of the

ciborium, and set an archdeacon near the patriarch, metropolitan, or

bishop, so that they should worship God holily without heresy.... When

Jerusalem was taken by Titus many sacred vessels and curtains were

brought to [New] Rome with the royal treasures and given to the church

of S. Sophia. In S. Sophia also are preserved the tables of the Law, as

well as the Ark and manna. The subdeacons, when they sing ‘Alleluia’

in the ambo, hold in their hands tablets like those of Moses. During

the procession of the Holy Sacrament the eunuchs commence to sing, and

then the subdeacons, and then a monk chants alone. Then many priests

and deacons carry the Holy Sacrament in procession; at this time all

the people not only below, but also in the galleries, weep in great

humility. What then ought to be the fear and humility of the bishops,

the priests, and the deacons in this holy service?

“How magnificent are the gold and silver chalices, garnished with

precious stones and pearls! When the splendid chest, called Jerusalem,

is brought out with the flabella, there rises amongst the people a

great groaning and weeping.... But here is a wonderful miracle, which

we saw in S. Sophia. Behind the altar of the larger sanctuary is a

gold cross, higher than two men, set with precious stones and pearls.

There hangs before it another gold cross a cubit and a half long, with

three gold lamps, which hang from as many gold arms (the fourth is now

lost). These lamps, the arms or branches, and the cross, were made by

the great Emperor Justinian who built S. Sophia. By virtue of the Holy

Spirit the small cross with the lamps ascended above the big cross,

and again slowly came down again without going out. This miracle took

place after matins, before the commencement of the mass: the priests

who were in the sanctuary saw it, and all the people in the church who

saw it cried with fear and joy, ‘God in His mercy has visited us.’ ...

This great and wonderful miracle was wrought by God in the year 6708

[A.M.] on Sunday, May 21st, being the Commemoration of S. Constantine

and his mother Helena, during the reign of the Emperor Alexius and

the patriarchate of John. It was on the feast of the 318 fathers.

Iverdiatinus Ostromitza was then living at Constantinople; he was an

ambassador from the great Roman duke. Nedanus, Domagirus, Demetrius,

and Novgaro were also there.

“At S. Sophia on the right near the sanctuary is a piece of red marble,

on which they place a golden throne; on this throne the emperor is

crowned. This place was surrounded by bronze closures to prevent people

walking on it; but the people kiss it. At this place the Holy Virgin

prayed to her Son, our Lord, on behalf of all Christians; a priest who

was guarding the church at night saw her. On the same side is also

the grand icon of S. Boris and S. Glebe, which artists copy. When

officiating, the patriarch holds it high up in the tribune.

“In the chapel behind the altar are affixed to the wall the upper

slab of the Lord’s sepulchre, the hammer, the gimlet, and the saw,

with which the cross of the Lord was made; also the iron chain which

was hung to the gate of S. Peter’s prison, and the wood of the cross

which Christ’s neck touched. This is inserted in a reliquary in the

form of a cross. In this chapel above the door is painted S. Stephen,

protomartyr, and a lamp is hung before him; when any one has bad eyes,

they put round his head the rope by which this lamp is hung, and his

eyes are healed.

“There is also the figure of Christ whose neck the Jew struck,[184] and

the bronze trumpet of Joshua, who took Jericho, and the marble mouth

of the well of Samaria. Near it Christ said to the woman of Samaria,

‘Give me to drink;’ the well mouth has been cut in half, and the

Samaritans still draw water [from the other half].

“There lie also the bodies of S. Abercius, S. Gregory, and S.

Sylvester, and the heads of Cyrus and John, and many other relics.

There also is the Baptistery, upon which is painted all the history of

the baptism of Christ by John in the Jordan: and how John taught the

people, and how little children and men threw themselves in the Jordan:

all this was executed by Paul the Skilful during my lifetime, and there

is no painting like this. There are there wooden supports, upon which

the patriarch has had placed the figure of Christ, thirty cubits high;

Paul first painted the Christ with colours made of precious stones and

crushed pearls mixed with water; this image is still at S. Sophia.

“And when they sing matins at S. Sophia, they sing first before the

great doors of the church, in the narthex, then they enter and sing in

the middle of the church; then they open the paradise gates, and sing

the third time before the altar. Sundays and saints’ days the patriarch

assists at matins and at mass, then he blesses the singers from the

ambo, they stop singing and then say the _polykronia_: then they begin

to sing again, and sing as harmoniously and sweetly as the angels till

the Mass. After matins are finished, they put off their surplices

and then go out and ask the patriarch’s benediction for the mass.

After matins the prologue is read in the ambo till the mass; when the

prologue is finished, the liturgy is commenced, and, after the service

is over, the chief priest in the sanctuary recites the prayer called

‘Of the ambo,’ while the second priest recites it in the church on the

side of the ambo, away from [the sanctuary]: both, when the prayer is

finished, bless the people. In a similar way vespers are sung. There

are no bells at S. Sophia, but a little hand-bat [_hagiosidère_]

which they strike for matins, though they do not strike it for mass

and vespers, as in other churches: they follow the precepts of the

angel in having this bat; the Latins have bells.... When they built S.

Sophia, they inclosed holy relics in the walls of the sanctuary. There

are also many cisterns at S. Sophia. Above [evidently _under_] the

galleries are the cisterns and storehouses of the patriarchs and of

the Church. Vegetables of every kind [suitable for the table] of the

patriarchs, melons, apples, and pears are preserved at the bottom of

the cisterns in baskets hung by cords: when the patriarch wants to eat,

they bring them up quite fresh: and the emperor eats them also. The

bath of the patriarch is also above [under] the galleries; the water

of the fountains mounts by pipes, and the rainwater is preserved in

cisterns. On the galleries are painted all the patriarchs and emperors

of Constantinople, and those who shared their heresies. In the choirs

of the church are five heads ornamented with pearls like a silver [word

indecipherable].... Lazarus, the image painter[185] ... first painted

at Constantinople, in the sanctuary of S. Sophia, the Virgin holding

Christ and two angels.... S. Sophia has 3,000 priests; 500 share in the

benefices of the church and 1,500 have no share; when one of the 500

priests dies, his place is taken by one of the 1,500.”

* * * * *

_Frankish Occupation and After._--Three years after the visit of

Anthony, Constantinople was taken by the Latins. One of the Crusaders,

Villehardouin, writes, “Of holy relics I need only say it contained

more than all Christendom combined; there is no estimating the quantity

of gold, silver, precious vessels, jewels, rich stuffs, silks, robes

of vair, gris, and ermine, and other valuable things--the production

of all the climates in the world. It is the belief of me, Geoffrey

Villehardouin, maréchal of Champagne, that the plunder of this city

exceeded all that has been witnessed since the creation of the world.”

Much of the accumulated wealth of six centuries--the gifts from

emperors and private individuals of “sacred vessels of gold and pearls

and precious stones”[186]--was removed by the Venetians and Franks.

Many of these precious objects are lost beyond hope of recovery; such

are the candlesticks and crosses. As some representation of these we

give a figure of a gemmed processional cross, with its _seizae_ of

jewels, from the _Menologium_ of Basil (Fig. 15).

[Illustration: FIG. 15.--Jewelled Processional Cross.]

In the treasury of S. Mark’s at Venice there is however a rich hoard of

vessels, lamps, and other objects, which were taken from the churches

of Constantinople; and many of these crystal lamps, agate cups, and

enamelled book-covers doubtless belonged to S. Sophia.

Amongst these may be mentioned an agate chalice with the name

Sisinnius. This may probably be referred to a Patriarch of

Constantinople of that name in 996; another with the name Ignatius to a

patriarch in 877; a third with the inscription “Lord help Romanus, the

Orthodox Emperor” to Romanus Lecapenus (919-944).[187] Extracts from

the Venetian historians mentioning objects brought from Constantinople

are given by Riant. Paulus Maurocenus speaks of “the many holy relics,

and small figures, and chalices and patens and other beautiful things

from the church of S. Sophia;” also, “the very same doors which now

close the church of S. Mark’s ... and two censers of gold from S.

Sophia of such grace and beauty that one cannot see them without being

astounded.” He also mentions, though it is not quite clear if he

associates this with S. Sophia, “The palla of silver-gilt with the

figures of our Lord, the Virgin, the Apostles, prophets, doctors, and

martyrs, which is now placed in the church of S. Mark.”[188]

The head of S. Pantaleon was taken by Heinrich Ulmen to the church of

the saint at Cologne.

After the interregnum, S. Sophia was visited by several other Russian

pilgrims, who have left accounts of the church which agree very

closely. Of the fullest of these, which is by an anonymous Russian

writer, 1424-1453, we give a condensed abstract, as it contains one or

two more points, shows the acquisition of other relics in the place

of those lost, and is useful for comparison with the anonymous Greek

author translated in the next chapter:--

Near the west door in the middle of the narthex are the doors of the

ark of Noah and the chain which bound the apostle Paul. Above the

door is the miraculous image of the Saviour, and a lamp is suspended

before it. In the sanctuary is the life-giving Cross on which the Jews

crucified Christ. The stone on which He sat and conversed with the

woman of Samaria is in the chapel on the right. Here is the table of

Abraham. At the bottom of the church against the wall to the right

of the altar is the bed of iron on which martyrs were burnt. Here is

a stone coffer with relics of Martyrs and the Innocents. To the left

is the tomb and the whole body of Arsenius: the doors of the ark: the

bench where Jeremiah the prophet wept, and a column by which Peter

wept. To the left are buried S. George and S. Theologos. On the left is

a little shrine beautifully built; it contains the image of the Virgin

which wept when the Franks held Constantinople. Her tears, resembling

pearls, are kept in a coffer before the image. The instruments of the

Passion are exposed from Thursday to Saturday. Beyond is the image of

Christ in marble, and the cross of S. John chained to the wall. Near

the Holy Table in the bema is the tomb of S. John Chrysostom, covered

by a plank overlaid with gold and gems. To the right on entering the

church are situated a well and large basin of marble in which the

patriarch baptizes. One leaves S. Sophia by the south door; at some

steps from the gate, to the left, is the Church of the Holy Saviour;

above the door is suspended an image which an emperor attempted to

destroy. Behind the bema of S. Sophia is the church of S. Nicholas.

Near by in front of the door which is behind the altar of S. Sophia is

the place where they bless the water, plunging in the Cross; a roof

covered with lead surmounts the basin of green marble. It is here they

baptize the emperors; four cypresses and two palms form a crescent

in this place. Some distance in front of the ambo of S. Sophia is a

pedestal of marble which supports the holy chalice; it is within a

stone inclosure, and is covered by a vault of gilt copper. From the

entrance of the church to the ambo is 66 cubits, and it is 30 beyond to

the sanctuary, which is 50 long by 100 wide. The church is 200 cubits

wide and 150 high. Above the first door is Solomon in mosaic in a

circle of azure.

That these accounts accurately relate the stories of the guardians of

S. Sophia is sufficiently proved by La Brocquière, who was told in 1433

that S. Sophia possessed “one of the robes of our Lord, the end of the

lance that pierced His side, the sponge that was offered to Him, and

the reed that was put in His hand. I can only say that behind the choir

I was shown the gridiron on which S. Lawrence was roasted [the iron

bed], and a large basin-like stone on which they say Abraham gave the

angels food when they were going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah.”

§ 2. LIGHTING.

The description by the Silentiary[189] of the lamps and candelabra

which illuminated the Great Church forms one of the most fascinating

parts of the whole poem. Although the multitude of lamps which once

lit up the interior have long disappeared, the main features of the

lighting may be brought back to our imaginations by comparing the

description with illustrative examples. First then in the central

space under the great dome, chains fell from the height of the upper

cornice, where they were probably attached to strong bronze arms which

projected far out like the present metal stakes which project in the

exedras on the first-floor cornice. These chains all terminated at

some height above the floor in supporting the great sweep of a metal

circle to which were suspended flat circular discs of silver, each of

which was pierced with holes into which were dropped glass oil vases

with rims which prevented them falling through. With these discs were

associated crosses of metal which also carried lamps. These, cross and

disc together, or alternately, hanging round in a great circle made a

“circling chorus of bright lights” within which was a large corona of

other lamps and above it a large central disc.

Then along the sides of the church were rows of lamps in the forms of

silver bowls, and ships; other rows of lights were attached to beams

supported above the floor by metal standards, and to projecting metal

arms, or suspended rods. Upon the beam of the iconostasis was a row

of candelabra, each with a series of horizontal circles diminishing

upwards about the stem, like a fir-tree, issuing from a silver bowl.

Above the centre of the iconostasis was a great standard light-bearing

cross. Round about the ambo similar light trees were placed.

Light coronae, crosses, or single lamps were favourite gifts to a

church, and in these objects S. Sophia probably became much more

wealthy as time went on. Michael III., for instance, gave to the church

in 867 “a circle (_kuklos_) for lights which they call a polycandelon,

as big as any of the others but all of gold weighing sixty pounds. To

it was given the first and most holy place.”[190] “A chalice and paten

superior to all the others, as well as a polycandelon in the form of

a cross with many lamps,” are also mentioned as given by Michael. His

successor Basil I., “as there was a danger of the sacred lamps being

extinguished for want of oil,” assigned for the use of the church “the

tribute called mantea, so that the light might never be quenched.”[191]

The Anonymous doubtless exaggerates beyond belief with his 300

polycandela and 6000 lamps all of gold, but the kinds of candelabra he

speaks of must have been perfectly well known (p. 140).

[Illustration: FIG. 16.--Polycandelon or Disc, for Seventeen Lamps, in

the British Museum.]

At the end of the twelfth century, Robert de Clari, the knight of

Amiens, wrote--“Throughout the church hang one hundred candelabra, and

there is not one which does not hang from a silver chain as thick as a

man’s arm, and each candelabrum has quite twenty-five lamps or more,

and there is not a single candelabrum which is not worth two hundred

silver marks.” Benjamin of Tudela mentions “candelabra, lamps, and

lanterns, of gold and silver more than any man can name;” and Stephen

of Novgorod (1350) speaks of “a multitude immense, innumerable, of

lamps.”

Of the great brilliance of illumination obtained in the early churches

there can be no doubt. Paulinus writes that at his church at Nola the

lights were suspended in such profusion that they seemed to float in a

sea. An interesting account of the method of lighting followed at the

Lateran, illustrated by a plan of the circles, is given by Rohault de

Fleury.[192]

A Byzantine lamp-holder lately sent to the Louvre from Constantinople

is probably almost identical in general form with the “discs” of

Paulus. This polycandelon is a broad flat ring of bronze pierced with

eight holes for as many lights, and suspended by four chains. It bears

a votive inscription which reads, “Lord, remember thee of Thy servant

Abraham, son of Constantine.”[193]

In the British Museum is a much more ornate example of the same kind of

disc. This is also of bronze, about sixteen inches diameter, pierced

with seventeen holes for the lights, the interspaces being cut away

to form a radiating pattern. We give a drawing of this interesting

lamp, with which we have associated a small pierced plate for a lamp

chain in the same collection (Fig. 16). In the Archæological Museum at

Granada there is an ornamental disc closely resembling the example in

the British Museum. It came from the mosque of Elvira, and probably

belongs to the ninth century. We mention this because the bottom plate

of the modern mosque lamp with the small holes which take glass tubular

vessels eight or ten inches long and only about two inches in diameter,

continues the tradition of the Byzantine polycandela, and the oil

vessels well represent those like spear shafts mentioned by the Poet.

[Illustration: FIG. 17.--Silver Polycandelon from Lampsacus, in the

British Museum.]

In another example in the British Museum the disc is not quite flat but

of the form of a dinner plate, the holes for the lamps being around the

rim. This lamp-holder is of silver, and was brought from Lampsacus near

Gallipoli with several altar vessels inscribed with a monogram which

reads ΜΗΝΑ or ΑΜΗΝ. In Fig. 17 we have restored the oil vases. Another

bronze polycandelon has recently been brought from Egypt by Professor

Flinders Petrie: this is about eight inches across (Fig. 18[194]).

[Illustration: FIG. 18.--Coptic Polycandelon for Four Lamps.]

On Mount Athos we probably find the best existing parallel to the

circle of discs at S. Sophia in the monastery of Docheiareiu (see Fig.

19).[195] In the words of the Silentiary, “these discs form a coronet.”

The second crown of lights, which hung within the great circle of discs

at S. Sophia, would also have had a circular rim supported by chains

with lamps suspended beneath, or attached to arms projecting from the

rim. S. Bernard speaks of a church where were placed “not crowns but

wheels with precious stones and lights around them.” To these circular

candelabra ecclesiastical writers usually give the title of coronae.

Leo III. gave to the basilica of S. Andrew at Rome a “gold corona of

lamps set with gems.” Other authors call crowns with lamps of this kind

_phara_; we read in Leo Ostiensis of a “pharum or large crown of silver

with six and thirty lamps hanging from it.”[196] They are also spoken

of as _cycli_, but more generally as _polycandela_. The _Chronicon

Cassinense_ mentions “a pharos or crown of silver, weighing a hundred

librae, twenty cubits round about, with twelve towers projecting from

it, and thirty-six lamps hanging from it. This was fixed outside the

choir, before the great cross, by an iron chain adorned with seven gold

apples.”[197] The same chronicle also speaks of a “silver-gilt corona,

coloured with precious stones, with six crosses hanging from it.” The

great circles of Aix and Hildesheim are the best-known examples of the

ancient coronae. These have twelve towers like that just mentioned, and

they symbolised the New Jerusalem. R. de Fleury suggests that relics

were contained in such turrets. An extremely beautiful pharos in the

Hermitage Museum represents a basilica.

[Illustration: FIG. 19.--Corona with Lamp Discs, Mount Athos.]

The light crosses were very generally known throughout Christendom,

and the historian Socrates mentions that crosses of silver with

burning candles upon them were carried in processions in the time of

Chrysostom. According to Anastasius, at S. Peter’s there was a large

pharos “in the form of a cross which hung before the presbyterium

having 1,370 candles;” this was lighted four times a year; also “a

gold carved cross hanging before the altar with twelve candles,”

and “a cross lamp with two little ships and three fishes.” The lamp

cross hanging in S. Mark’s is the best-known example remaining. It

is possible that those at S. Sophia mentioned with the discs hung

horizontally to four chains.

[Illustration: FIG. 20.--Single Lamp with Votive Inscription.]

At S. Sophia, in addition to the discs, crosses, and circles, there

were, according to Du Cange, lamps hung from nets. The word which he

interprets in this way is that translated “skiff” (line 480), as it

means a small row-boat. How he gets his interpretation of nets it is

difficult to see. We mention it here for its intrinsic beauty only: it

was a familiar arrangement for lamps. Anastasius in his Lives of the

Popes speaks of one of the churches at Rome having “a pharos in the

form of a net,” and again of a large pharos “like a net with twenty

baskets,” and also “a bronze net with silver baskets.”

The hanging lamps in the form of ships mentioned by our poet would

have carried the oil vessels round their sides. A most interesting

example of a lamp of this kind is given in the _Dictionary of Christian

Antiquities_ (Smith and Cheetham). It represents a small vessel with

a mast and sail, containing two figures, one steering, and the other

looking out from the prow. These figures are either Peter and Paul

or more probably Christ and Peter. The symbolism of the ship for the

Church is too familiar to need comment; the mast in the centre, without

which the ship is unsafe, as S. Ambrose says, typifies the cross

without which the church is unable to stand. The galley form of lamp

was well known also in antiquity. In the Christian era it was only one

of the many beautiful and suggestive forms in which lamps were made;

some resembled birds, crystal fish, or shells, others again were bowls

of white or emerald glass.

[Illustration: FIG. 21.--Sixth-century Candlestick.]

In the sanctuary there would have been suspended large single lamps

which burnt perpetually (_Akoimetoi_). A very fine single Byzantine

lamp of this kind is shown in the fifteenth-century picture by Marco

Marziale in the National Gallery, in which the interior of S. Mark’s

figures as the temple. In Fig. 20 we give a restoration of fragments

of a beautiful early Christian bowl-shaped lamp bearing a votive

inscription figured by Rossi. On Mount Athos Dr. Covel noticed a lamp

of beaten gold set with jewels.

The treasury of S. Mark’s probably still contains lamps which hung in

S. Sophia: one of especial beauty is a glass bowl with circles cut on

the outside and attached to a metal rim on which is inscribed in Greek,

“St. Panteleon, succour thy servant Zacchariah, Archbishop of Iberia,

Amen.”[198]

In illustration of the tree-like candelabra which stood above the beam

of the iconostasis, and round the ambo, we may mention the well-known

classical examples. A lamp-bearer in the museum at Brussels is

described as “an _arbuste_ of considerable size and irregular trunk and

branches with lamps suspended from the extremities of its boughs.”

Anastasius mentions a “tree of bronze with candlesticks to the number

of fifty in which were placed wax candles, thirty-six lamps as well

hung from the boughs.” Paulinus also speaks of hanging candelabra

at Nola “with branches like a vine bearing little glass cups which

resembled burning fruit; when they were lighted it was like the sudden

burst into life of spring flowers.”

[Illustration: FIG. 22.--Candlesticks.]

Besides all these oil lamps there would have been a great number of

standing candlesticks in the sanctuary. The Anonymous speaks of some

the height of a man. One constant type is represented in Fig. 21; this

is inlaid in mother-of-pearl on the apse walls at Parenzo, and is of

Justinian’s time. Fig. 22 shows two others from the _Menologium_. Wax

candles, which are frequently mentioned, were patterned and coloured.

The miracle of the moving cross of lights mentioned by Anthony reminds

us of a remarkable custom in regard to the great coronas of lights

in Byzantine churches which is observed on Mount Athos, and also at

Sinai, and is probably ancient. A part of the great festival service

at Vatopedi consists in singing the _Polyeleos_. “When the last of the

multitude of candles had been lighted in the great coronas under the

domes, the monks fetched long poles, with which they pushed out the

candelabra to the full extent that their suspending chains permitted

and then let them go, the result being that in a few minutes the whole

church was filled with slowly swinging lights.”[199]

The method of lighting described by the Silentiary has not changed in

the unchanging East. S. Sophia is still lighted by a myriad little

lamps arranged in rows, or suspended in circles. The single lamp is a

small glass vessel of oil on which floats the wick; the two typical

forms being like a bowl or an elongated tumbler. These cups are hung

by three chains, or inserted in a ring, at the end of a metal arm,

projecting from the wall or from the rim of a suspended circle.

[Illustration: FIG. 23.--Hanging Rods for Lamps in S. Sophia until

1850.]

Up to the time of Fossati’s restoration there was an immense polygon of

probably some sixty feet diameter of iron rods suspended from the dome.

Grelot[200] described it in 1680 as a large circle of iron rods hanging

down to within eight or ten feet of the pavement and having fixed to

it “a prodigious number of lamps, ostrich eggs, and other baubles.”

In the mosque of Achmet, several rings are bound together by straight

rods, making overhead a geometrical arrangement of bars, from which

the lamps are suspended; although these are all Turkish, the system

remained from Byzantine times. Fig. 23 is re-drawn from Fossati. (_Aya

Sophia_, Constantinople, 1852.) One of the most beautiful methods is

that of suspending the lamps to long straight iron bars running the

whole length of the building as at S. John Studius.

In the mosque of Damascus, before the recent fire, there were hanging

assemblages of circles one above another somewhat similar we may

suppose to the trees of the poet. At Salonica a network of lamps

which hangs almost like a curtain before the bema of S. Demetrius may

illustrate the “nets” if nets there were. During Ramazan festoons of

lamps are hung from minaret to minaret arranged in inscriptions; in

1676 Dr. Covel of Cambridge saw illuminations before the Sultan at

Adrianople which represented “castles, mosques, peacocks, Turkish

writings, &c., extremely pleasant and wonderful to behold.” These were

formed by lamps hung to light frames; the method was probably derived

from Byzantine illuminations such as the fireworks mentioned as being

exhibited in the Hippodrome.

The four marble pillars that stand up out of the parapet at the western

gallery of S. Sophia (Fig. 41) must always have carried lights on metal

branches at the top, much as at present; and the long metal stakes with

hook ends, that project from the first cornice at the angles of the

exedras, and from which chandeliers hang, are possibly original in some

cases.

The multiplication of small lights is the most brilliant system of

illumination, for not only is there light everywhere but flame, and

hence no shadows. Whoever sees the great church lighted for the solemn

services of Ramazan, when, according to Fossati, “six thousand lamps

are suspended at various heights,” may imagine the splendour of the

lighted interior in Byzantine times. When, after one of the services,

the lamplighters walked round and extinguished the lamps with a whisk

from long fan-shaped brooms, we saw the need of the passages above the

different cornices; and leaving Constantinople one April evening, as

we slowly wound round the point, while the circle of windows in the

lighted dome seemed to hang above the city, we realised that it was no

idle saying of the poet’s that the mariner guided his laden vessel “by

the divine light of the church itself.”

CHAPTER VII

LATER HISTORY AND LEGENDS

§ 1. HISTORY.

From the date of the completion of Justinian’s restored church it has

had to withstand the frequent earthquake shocks which, as we have so

recently seen, devastate the city from time to time. Von Hammer[201]

calculates, from the accounts of the Byzantine historians, that from

the beginning of the seventh to the middle of the fifteenth century

there were twenty-three severe earthquakes, one of which, in 1033,

lasted intermittently for 140 days. In the Turkish records, from 1511

to 1765, ten earthquakes are mentioned. It is remarkable that in this

length of time the delicately poised construction of the church should

only have required restorations which are relatively unimportant.

It is difficult to say how far the church suffered during the struggles

about image worship, which raged for more than a century. The question

will be considered more fully when we deal with the mosaics of the

vaults. The restoration of images was finally accomplished in 842,[202]

by Theodora and Michael.

A belfry was built in the centre of the west front about the year

865:[203] and the eastern walk of the atrium was probably transformed

into an exonarthex at the same time. The first regular restoration

was also undertaken in the second half of the ninth century, under

Basil the Macedonian: “For the wide and lofty western arch of the great

church called S. Sophia was showing rents and threatening to fall. With

the help of the workmen he girded it round and rebuilt it, so that it

was safe and strong. And on it he figured the Virgin with her Child

on her arms, and Peter and Paul, the chief of the apostles, on either

side.”[204]

[Illustration: FIG. 24.--Plans of Additions to West End. A and C North

and South Porches; B Belfry.]

The north and south porches and great lateral stairways, which

injuriously altered the exterior, must also have been built by Michael

or Basil, as we find them mentioned in the _Book of Ceremonies._

In October 975 an earthquake caused the “hemisphere with the western

arch (_apsis_) to fall.”[205] They were restored again by the same

emperor in six years: he spent, Scylitzes says, “on the machines for

mounting for the workmen to stand on, and for raising the scaffolding,

to build what was fallen; ten centenaria of gold.”[206] According to

Glycas, Romanus Argyrus (1028) beautified the capitals; Scylitzes also

says this emperor “made bright with silver and gold both the capitals

of the great church and of our Lady of Blachernae.”[207]

The injuries wrought by the Crusaders to S. Sophia are referred to

in Chapter V. Baldwin was crowned here in 1204, and for fifty-seven

years Catholic priests read masses at its altar. On the recapture the

Byzantine emperors made an effort to restore, but the church never

recovered its former splendour. The patriarch Arsenius during the

reign of Michael Palaeologus “restored the bema and ambo and solea at

the king’s expense, besides enriching the church with vestments and

sacred vessels.”[208] In the first half of the fourteenth century,

Andronicus Palaeologus, the elder, strengthened the north and east

sides. Nicephorus Gregoras says the emperor “heard from several

experienced builders that in a short time the parts towards the

north and east would give way, and fall unless strengthened. And he

built pyramidal structures from the foundations and prevented the

threatened destruction,” but bricks and mosaic continued to fall.[209]

The pyramidal structures to the east must be the four great sloping

buttresses which stand over the low attached buildings on that side;

they are shown on Fossati’s plan. Gregoras also inveighs against the

Empress Anna as having, in the reign of Cantacuzenus, robbed the church

of furniture and ornaments, and says that tyranny and oppression were

the chief causes of the destruction of the church. Cantacuzenus, in his

own history,[210] speaks of the damage caused by an earthquake in 1346,

when about a third of the roof fell, destroying “the great stoa by the

side of the bema” (perhaps the iconostasis). This is also referred to

by Gregoras, “the easternmost of the four arches which rival heaven

fell, dragging with it the part of the house which rested on it. The

hidden beauty of the bema was destroyed as well as its ornaments of

sacred icons.”[211] The stoa and bema were restored by the Empress

Anna, the wife of Andronicus Palaeologus, Phaceolatus being prefect

of the works, but the upper parts with the roof had to wait until the

accession of Cantacuzenus in 1347. He restored the decoration both

in marble and mosaic, a work which John Palaeologus finished. Both

emperors were helped “by one Astras, in many things a clever man, but

especially in building, and by John, surnamed Peralta, one of the Latin

subjects of the emperor.”[212]

The church was necessarily much neglected in the last days of the

Empire. Clavijo, who gave a careful account of the church in 1403 (see

Chapter IX.), says “the outer gates by which the church was approached

were broken and fallen.” He notes that “the Greeks do not call

Constantinople as we name it, but speak of it as _Escomboli_.” This

clearly proves that the derivation of the Turkish name Istambul from

εἰς τὴν πόλιν, “to the city,” is correct.[213]

The Florentine Bondelmontius, who was there in 1422, says that “only

the dome of the church remained, as everything is fallen down and in

ruins.” This exaggeration is probably explained by a story given by

the Chevalier Bertrandon de la Brocquière, who visited the city eleven

years later, in the course of his remarkable ride from Damascus to

Dijon along the route of the present Oriental express. He attended

service in the church, and writes:--“There the patriarch resides, with

others of the rank of canons. It is situated near the eastern point,

is of a circular shape, and formed of three different parts, one

subterranean, another above the ground, and a third over that. Formerly

it was surrounded by cloisters, and was, it was said, three miles

in circumference.[214] It is now of smaller extent, and only three

cloisters remain, all paved and inlaid with squares of white marble,

and ornamented with large columns of various colours. The gates are

remarkable for their breadth and height, and are of bronze.”[215] The

visit of the Chevalier Bertrandon brings us within twenty years of the

fall of the great city.

The incidents of the later years of the empire, the vain efforts to

get help from Europe, and the schemes for uniting the Greek and Latin

churches, are described by Chedomil Mijatovich.[216] In the year

before the Fall the negotiations with the West had proceeded so far,

that, on the 12th of December 1452, a _Te Deum_ after the Latin rite

was sung by Cardinal Isidore in S. Sophia, but this did not meet with

favour from the populace. Ducas speaks of the church after that time as

being nothing better than a Jewish synagogue or heathen temple. Five

months later, on the 28th of May 1453, the last Christian service was

held within its walls. At the vesper service on that solemn evening,

the emperor, after praying with great fervour, left his imperial chair,

and, approaching the iconostasis, prostrated himself before the figures

of Christ and the Madonna on either side of the great central door. He

then asked for pardon from any whom he might have offended, and the

ritual proceeded.

On the morrow at the first capture of the city the Janissaries rushed

to the great church, which they conceived was filled with gold, silver,

and precious stones. They found the doors fastened, but broke them

open, and at once began to pillage. The sultan as soon as possible rode

to S. Sophia. Dismounting on the threshold, with the mystic symbolism

of an Oriental, he stooped down, and, collecting some earth, let it

fall on his turbaned head, as an act of humiliation. Then he entered

the edifice, but stopped in the doorway some moments, and gazed in

silence before him.

“He saw a Turk breaking the floor with an axe. ‘Wherefore dost thou

that?’ inquired the conqueror. ‘For the faith,’ replied the soldier.

Mahomet in an impulse of anger struck him, saying, ‘Ye have got enough

by pillaging, and enslaving the city, the buildings are mine.’”

A letter to Pope Nicholas V., written in 1453, describes how “the

profane heathen broke into the marvellous temple of S. Sophia,

unsurpassed by Solomon’s; they reverenced not the sacred images, nay,

rather broke them in pieces; they put out the eyes of the priests,

scattered the relics of the saints, and seized on the gold and

silver.”[217]

Ducas, who died eleven years after the Fall, bewails “the Great Church,

a new Sion which has now become an altar of the heathen, and is called

the house of Mahomet.” “The dogs hewed down the holy ikons, tore off

the ornaments, the chains, the napkins, and the coverings of the holy

table. Some of the lamps they destroyed, and others they carried away.

They stole the sacred vessels from the skeuophylakium. Everything made

of silver and gold or other precious materials was taken away, and the

church was left naked and desolate as it had never been before.”

With the exception of the removal of much of the treasure, the church

did not immediately suffer great harm from its new masters.

On the outside however the destruction of many of the low attached

chambers, and the addition of the minarets, have very much changed

its appearance. The first minaret, which was indeed the first in

Constantinople, was built at the south-east corner by Mahomet the

Conqueror. Selim II., who reigned from 1566 to 1574, built the second

at the north-east corner, and also restored the eastern apse which had

been again damaged by an earthquake: Amurath III. erected the last two

minarets at the western corners.[218]

“The description of the church of S. Sophia as it now appears,”

which forms one of the chapters in Gyllius’ († 1555) _Topography of

Constantinople_, describes the church before the addition of these

three last minarets. It is interesting to note that he remarks how

little the building had been altered, “and it is despoiled of nothing,

except a little of the metal work [mosaic?] which shows itself in

great abundance through the whole church. The Sanctum Sanctorum,

formerly holy and unpolluted, into which the priests only were suffered

to enter, is still standing, though there is nothing remaining of

the jewels and precious stones which adorned it, these having been

plundered by its sacrilegious enemies.” This is later supported

by Grelot,[219] who writes, “It is decorated with everything that

human industry and skill could devise to render the work absolutely

perfect.... I say nothing about the beautiful pictures, the faces of

which have been destroyed by the Turks.” It is clear from Tournefort

(1702) and Lady Mary Montagu (1717) that the mosaics were not wholly

obliterated; the latter writes, “the figures were in no other way

defaced but by the decays of time: for it is absolutely false that the

Turks defaced all the images they found in the city.” On the other

hand, an Italian MS. description of S. Sophia in the British Museum,

written in 1611, says, “The Turks took away all the beautiful work and

covered everything with whitewash.”[220] It is evident from Dr. Covel’s

MS., quoted later, that much was destroyed, defaced, and plastered

over. Dr. Walsh tells us that one of the smaller vaults fell in about

1820, scattering its mosaic over the floor.

§ 2. THE ANONYMOUS ACCOUNT.

We must now examine the description of the church by the writer

generally called the Anonymous of Combefis (otherwise of Banduri or

Lambecius). Codinus, who is believed to have died soon after the

capture of Constantinople by the Turks, has so closely copied the

Anonymous that the accounts differ only in a few minor particulars.

Combefis says that the text of the Anonymous was collated by Lambecius,

“who produced it from the royal archives” with the _Chronography of the

Logothetae_, a tenth-century work to which the same account is added

as a separate treatise. Labarte however considers that it was written

in the eleventh century: Choisy assigns it to the fourteenth, a view

with which we are inclined to agree; but in any case we cannot think it

earlier than the twelfth century.

The description by Paulus is so precisely accurate where we can--as is

so largely the case--check it by the existing work, that there cannot

be a doubt of his entire accuracy. With the Anonymous this is not so;

and it must first of all be borne in mind that he professes not to

write of the church as he saw it, but to celebrate its splendour when

first completed by Justinian; in this his account differs entirely

from the Silentiary’s, which there is no sign to show that he had

ever read. The Anonymous has been very largely used by scholars of

the ability of Labarte and Bayet, but we believe him to be entirely

unreliable where he speaks of the former state of the church. He simply

gathers the legends which had grown up, because facts were forgotten,

and enumerates the relics.

“The great church,[221] known as S. Sophia [formerly a place of heathen

worship--Codinus], was first built of an oblong (_dromica_) form,

like those of S. Andronicus and S. Acacius. On its completion it was

adorned with many statues. This building lasted seventy-four years.

But in the reign of Theodosius the Great, at the time of the second

synod of Constantinople, an Arian uproar arose, during which the roof

of the church was destroyed by fire. The most holy patriarch Nectarius

took up his office at S. Irene, a church which was also built by

Constantine. Then for two [Codinus and Glycas say sixteen] years S.

Sophia was without a roof, until Theodosius, with Rufinus as his master

workman (_magistros_), covered it with cylindrical vaults. After this

it remained unhurt for thirty-nine years, making altogether eighty-five

years (_sic_) from the time of Constantine, until the fifth year of

Justinian’s reign. This was after the massacre in the Circus, in which

thirty-five thousand men were killed, when a faction elected Hypatius

emperor. However, in the fifth year of Justinian’s reign, the Most High

God put it into his mind that he should build a temple to surpass all

that had ever been built from the time of Adam.

“He wrote therefore to the strategi, toparchs, judges, and satraps

of the different provinces, that with all zeal they should look for

materials--columns, piers, panels, and lattice-doors--everything in

fact that would be useful for building. Obeying the emperor’s letter,

they quickly sent all that could be found from the shrines of the pagan

idols, from baths, and private houses, from every province of east,

west, north, and south, and from all the islands.

“Eight porphyry columns from Rome, which, according to Plutarch,

Justinian’s secretary, a widow Marcia had received as dowry, were

transmitted to Constantinople. They had formerly stood in a temple of

the Sun built by Valerian, who surrendered himself to the Persians.

Eight others of green, of marvellous beauty, were quarried and sent

from Ephesus by the praetor Constantine. The Marcia, whom I have just

mentioned, wrote to the emperor as follows: ‘I send thee, master, eight

columns from Rome of equal length and size, and the same weight, for

the safety of my soul.’

“Of the other columns some were brought from Cyzicus, some from the

Troad, others from the Cyclades and Athens. And when sufficient was

collected for the work seven and a half years had been spent. Then in

the twelfth year of Justinian’s reign, the church built by Constantine

was destroyed with the foundations; the old materials were put aside,

as a sufficient amount of fresh had been prepared; and Justinian began

to buy up the neighbouring houses. The first of these was one belonging

to a widow named Anna, of which the price was estimated at eighty-five

librae. She was however unwilling to sell it to the emperor, and

refused to give it up under five hundred librae; nor did the emperor

gain his purpose by sending the nobles of the court to win her over.

He finally went himself and begged her to sell her house at any price.

But when she saw him as a suppliant, she fell at his feet, saying,

‘Lord and King, I can accept no moneys for my house from thee; I ask

only that I may obtain reward in the day of judgment, and that I may

be buried in a tomb near the future church, so that the memory of my

gift may live for ever.’ The emperor promised that when the church was

finished she should be buried there, for the land which she had given

up, that the memory of it might live for ever. The part which she gave

to the great church is that now occupied by the skeuophylakium, and the

chapel (_naos_) of S. Peter.

“Then the part which is occupied by the Holy Well, and all about

the thysiasterium, and the place of the ambo, and the middle of the

nave, was the house of a certain eunuch, Antiochus, which was valued

at thirty-eight librae. He was offended because the emperor had not

offered him a proper price for it. Now the emperor was much distressed,

wondering what to do. But the Magister Strategius--a guardian of the

treasures, the adopted brother of the emperor--promised that the

emperor should gain his point by a little guile, and that the other

should sell his house. Now this Antiochus was an eager frequenter

of the Circus, and especially favoured the blue faction. When the

games were about to be given, he was arrested and imprisoned in the

Praetorian prison. Then Antiochus called out from the prison that if he

could only witness the games he would do whatever the emperor wished.

He was then led by the emperor’s orders to his empty seat, and made

to sell his house before the games commenced, the Quaestor and the

whole Senate being witness. Now there used to be the custom, that as

soon as the emperor ascended to his seat the charioteers should begin,

but because they stopped then, until the eunuch had accomplished his

deed of sale, even to the present day the chariots for the races are

accustomed to enter at a slow trot.

“The whole of the right-hand part of the Gynaeceum[222] up to the

column of S. Basil, and some portion of the nave, was the house of an

eunuch, Chariton, nicknamed Chenopolus, who sold it as a favour for

double its value, which was twelve librae.

“The left part of the Gynaeceum[222] up to the column of S. Gregory

Thaumaturgus was the house of one Xenophon, a cobbler. When they wanted

to buy this house, besides asking twice the value, which was fourteen

librae, he also demanded that, on the day of the games, the four

charioteers of the four factions should do obeisance to him as well as

to the emperor. The emperor decreed that it should be done as he had

asked, but made him a laughing-stock for ever. For on the day of the

games he was set midway in the boundaries, so that the charioteers, by

way of joke, bowed to his back before beginning their courses, and so

it is still done, and the man is styled ‘Chief of those below.’ He

wears a white chlamys, woven with byssus.

“On the area of the naos, the four nartheces, the louter, and the parts

adjacent, was the house of Damianus, a noble of Seleucia, the value of

which he estimated at ninety librae, and gladly gave to the emperor.

“Now Justinian, when he had measured out the site, and found a stone

to act as centre, from the thysiasterium as far as the lower [western]

apse, laid the foundations of the great dome in circle-wise. Now from

the apses right away to the most outside narthex, the foundations

were laid in marshy and spongy ground. And when it had been begun, he

urged Eutychius the patriarch to offer up prayers to God for its safe

building, and then, taking with his own hands lime and stone, giving

thanks to God, he himself laid the first stone in its place. Now

before the church was built he constructed the oratory of S. John the

Precursor with a gilt vault, and various ornamentations of precious

stones. This is generally called the Baptistery, and is situated near

the Horologium. He built at the same time the adjacent portion of the

Metatorium, that he might frequently rest there with his court, and

refresh himself with food. Then also he built the whole of the portico,

which leads from the palace up to the Great Church, so that, as often

as he liked, he might cross over and devote his time to the building,

without being seen by any one. There were one hundred master workmen,

and each had a band of a hundred men under him, making ten thousand men

altogether. Fifty bands took one side, and fifty the other; and by the

emulation between them, the work quickly progressed.

“The form of the church was shown to the emperor in a dream by an

angel. And the first Deviser (_mechanikos_) of the builders was skilful

and full of sound wisdom, and well versed in building churches. Barley

was put into cooking pots, and its decoction, instead of water, was

mingled with unslaked lime (_asbestos_) and tiles [crushed]. The

mixture, when warm, became viscous and sticky. At the same time they

cut slips off willow trees, which were cast into the cooking pots with

the barley; they then made solid masses, having a length of over fifty

feet, and fifty feet broad, and twenty feet deep, and placed them in

the foundations. They were put there, not hot, nor yet quite cold, that

so they might bind better, and above these masses they placed large

square stones.

“When the foundations had arisen from the earth two cubits, they had

spent four hundred and fifty-two miliarisia of gold. Money was brought

daily from the palace, and placed in the Horologium, and each of those

who carried stone received a piece of silver, lest any slackness should

come upon them, or they should be tempted to complain. Some of them,

when carrying stone, gave way under the weight, and fell head foremost

and were hurt. Strategius, whom I have mentioned, distributed the

wages: he was a Count of the royal treasury, and foster-brother of

Justinian.

“Now when the piers (_pinsoi_) had been finished, and the great

columns, both those from Rome and the green ones, had been put in their

position, the emperor left his noonday sleep and devoted himself to

the work, and inspected, with Troilus, a count of the household, all

the polishers (_lithoxooi_), stonecutters (_laotomoi_), carpenters

(_tektonikoi_), and labourers (_oikodomoi_), promising them each week a

nummus more, or as much as each might ask, above their fixed wages. He

used to come to see how the work was proceeding, clad in a white linen

garment, his head covered with a kerchief, and holding a stick in his

hand.

“And when they had raised the vaults (_apsides_) of the upper floor,

those on the right and on the left, and had covered over these vaults,

the emperor decreed that no miliarisia should be carried from the

palace on Sundays. Now it was the third hour of the day, and Strategius

ordered the men to go to their dinners. As Ignatius, the first

_mechanikos_ of the builders whom I have mentioned above, came down,

he left his son on the right-hand side of the upper floor, where he

had been working, with strict orders to watch the workmen’s tools. He

was a boy of about fourteen. As he was sitting there, a eunuch, clad

in shining garments, and fair to look upon, like one sent from the

palace, appeared to him and said, ‘What is the reason why the workmen

do not quickly finish the work of God, but have left it and gone to

eat?’ To him the boy answered, ‘At the earliest hour, my lord, they

will be here.’ But he cried, ‘Go quickly and bring them.’ When the boy

said that he was not to leave, lest the tools should disappear, the

eunuch said, ‘Go quickly and summon them here, for I swear to thee, my

son, by the Holy Wisdom, whose temple is now being built, I will not

depart, since, by the command of the Word of God, I am to minister and

guard here until you return.’ When he heard this, the boy quickly set

out, leaving the angel of God as guard. And when he had got down, and

gone to his father and the rest, he related everything in order; then

the father took his son and led him to the emperor’s table. For the

emperor was then dining in the oratory of St. John the Precursor, by

the Horologium. When he heard the story, he summoned all his eunuchs,

and showed each in turn to the boy. Then the boy calling out that he

saw none like the one that had appeared, the emperor knew that it was

an angel of the Lord who had addressed the boy, and this was made more

clear, as the boy said that he was clothed in a white robe, his eyes

glittering like fire; then the emperor praised God, saying, ‘God has

accepted my temple.’ And as he had been wondering what name to call it,

he named it S. Sophia, according to interpretation ‘Word of God.’ And

the emperor took counsel with himself and said, ‘I will not allow the

boy to return, so that the angel may guard it for ever, as he promised

by his oath. For if the boy return, the angel will depart.’ Having

consulted with the principal senators and the bishops, the emperor

commanded that the boy should not be sent back to the temple, so that,

by the grace of God, it should have a guardian till the end of the

world. And then the emperor loaded the boy with gifts and honours,

and, with the consent of his father, sent him to the Cyclades. Now

the conversation of the angel with the boy happened on the right-hand

side of the pier of the upper arch, as one ascends towards the dome.

[Codinus says, “near the Syllagonum,” for this it has been suggested

to read Syllagoeum, or “the place of the council”].

“When the workmen had continued the work up to the second catechumena,

and the upper columns and arches were built, and they were roofing

the adjacent parts, the emperor began to be anxious for want of

funds. But as he was standing in the upper part of an arch, as they

were about to begin the dome, at the hour of the Sabbath just before

dinner, an eunuch appeared to him, clad in white, and said, ‘Why are

you distressed for money? To-morrow bid some of your nobles to come,

and they shall have as much gold as they wish.’ On the following day

the eunuch came and showed himself to the emperor. The emperor sent to

follow him Strategius, and Basilides the quaestor, and Theodorus the

patrician, and Colocyns who was a praefect, besides fifty servants,

twenty mules, and twenty paniers. With all these he marched out of the

Golden Gate. And when they had come to the Tribunalium, there seemed

to those who were sent to be built there palaces of stupendous beauty.

But when they had dismounted, the eunuch bade them ascend a wonderful

stair, and then, producing a splendid gold key, he opened the door of

a room, and, as Strategius says, the whole floor was heaped with gold

coins. Taking a shovel, the eunuch filled each panier with four hundred

pounds of gold, amounting altogether to eight thousand, and with these

he sent them back to the emperor; and having closed up the room with

the key, he said to them, ‘Take the gold to the emperor, and bid him

spend it on the work.’ The eunuch left them there, and they came and

showed the emperor the gold they had received. He was astonished, and

asked them where they had been, and where the eunuch dwelt. They told

him all in order, and how the wealth of gold was spread on the floor

of the room. The emperor hoped that the eunuch would return, but as

he was disappointed he sent a slave to the place. When the slave had

found the place where the palace had been, and saw that there were

no houses there, he returned, and told all to the emperor. He was

then astonished, but understanding how it was, said, ‘Truly this is a

miracle as all may see;’ and he praised God.

“Now when they were going to build the thysiasterium and let in the

light through glass windows, the Deviser (_mechanikos_) suggested

that the apsoid (_muax_) should have one light. Then he changed his

mind, and suggested that it should have two, so that it should not be

heavy, because no wooden ties (_ikriomata_) were placed there as in the

narthex, and on the sides of the church. But the rest of the craftsmen

were opposed, saying that one arch (_kamara_) would light the holy

place. Then the chief builder (_protooikodomos_) was at a loss what

to do, because the emperor said at one time that there should be one

arch (_apsis_), and at another time two. Whilst the master (_maistor_)

was thus pondering and anxious, on the fourth day, at the fifth hour,

appeared an angel of the Lord, like the emperor, with royal robes and

red shoes, and said to the craftsman, ‘I will that there be a triple

light, and that the conch be made with three windows,[223] in the

name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.’ He then disappeared

quickly. Then the master, struck with wonder, rushed to the palace,

and said to the emperor, ‘You keep not to your word. Until to-day you

wanted one window, and then two, to light the bema; but now, when the

work is all but finished, you come to me and say, three windows shall

light the bema, as a symbol of the Trinity.’ Now the emperor knew that

day that he had not left the palace, and he recognised that an angel of

the Lord had spoken. He said, ‘As I have bidden thee, so do.’

“All the piers (_pessoi_) inside and outside were made strong by iron

bars (_mochloi_), so that they were bound together, and made immovable;

the joints of the piers were made with oil and _asbestos_; and upon

them was placed a plating of many marbles (_orthomarmarosis_).

“The emperor sent Troilus the Cubicular, Thedosius the Prefect, and

Basilides the Quaestor, to Rhodes to have bricks (_besala_) of Rhodian

clay, made all equal in weight and length, with the words engraved on

them, ‘God is in the midst of her, therefore shall she not be moved;

God shall help her, and that right early.’[224] And they sent bricks

of measured sizes to the emperor, twelve of them weigh one of ours;

for the clay is light, spongy, fine, and white; hence arose the common

idea that the dome is built of pumice stone (_kiserion_); but this is

not so, though it is light and of a white colour.

“Thus the four great arches were built; and when they had been raised

to the level of the dome (_troulos_), on the completion of every

twelfth course, prayers were uttered for the church, and relics of the

saints built in. Thus arose the building; it was then adorned with

marble and covered with mosaic. And into the piers, arcades, and larger

columns they placed relics of the saints. And when the marble plating

had been finished, they applied gold to the margins of the slabs, and

to the capitals of the columns. And the carved work, and the ornaments

of the upper galleries, both of the parts with two stories, and with

three (_diorophoi_ and _triorophoi_), were all covered with pure gold.

The thickness of the gold plating (_petalos_) was two inches.[225]

“But all the vaults (_orophoi_) of the upper galleries, of the parts

with two stories on the sides, and the vaulting of the nave, and of the

parts adjacent, and of the four nartheces, he gilded with glass mosaic.

He gilded even the proaulia, with their upper chambers, and columns,

and marble slabs.

“The floor of the nave was adorned with various marbles, both with

the Roman of a rue-green colour and others of a rosy red; and these

were all laid down and polished. The walls outside and all round were

covered with large and valuable stones.

“The thysiasterium was of shining silver, the barrier (_stethea_),

and its large columns, with the doors, were all of silver. All the

silver was dipped in gold. Four tables were set up in the thysiasterium

supported on columns, and these were gilt. The seven seats of the

priests, on which they sat on either side, with the throne of the

patriarch, and the four columns, were all gilded. And it was forbidden

to go up into the holy place, the _Kuklios_, also called the Holy of

Holies, which is above the steps.

“He set up also large columns of silver-gilt, and the lilies with

the ciborium. And the ciborium he made with silver and nielloed

(_arguroencauston_). Above the ciborium was a globe of solid gold,

weighing 118 pounds, and golden lilies, weighing six pounds, and above

them a golden cross, with most precious and rare stones, weighing

eighty pounds. Such was the design he made.

“And as he wished to make the holy table more beautiful than the

rest, and more precious with gold, he collected numerous craftsmen,

and consulted with them. Their opinion and advice was to cast into

the melting pot (_choneuterion_) gold, silver, stones of every kind,

and pearls, copper, electron, lead, tin, iron, glass, and every other

metallic substance. And they ground them all together and formed them

into masses (_olboi_), and poured them into the pot; and when it had

been melted, they took it from the fire and poured it out into a mould

(_tupos_). Thus the holy table was made. And it was then set up by the

emperor on solid columns of gold, studded with precious stones. And

the ‘sea’ (_thalassa_) of the holy table was ornamented with gold and

precious stones. Who can see the holy table without being astonished?

and who can gaze at it on account of the many glinting surfaces? so

that at one time it all appears of gold, from another place all of

silver, and in another of glittering sapphire; and altogether there are

eighty-two different colours of metals and stones and pearls.

“He made also, above and below, carved ivory doors overlaid with gold,

to the number of 365. In the first entrance into the louter he made

the doors of electron; doors also of electron were in the narthex,

two of them smaller than the middle one, which was much larger, and

of silver dipped in gold (_chrusembaphos_). The architraves also were

overlaid with gold. Three or the doors inside, instead of being made

of new wood, were made of wood from the Ark. He wished to make the

pavement entirely of silver [Codinus says gold], but his advisers

dissuaded him, saying that in the future poor emperors might have it

taken up. And those who persuaded him were Maximian and Hierotheus,

Athenian philosophers and astronomers, saying that in the latter days

poorer rulers would come and take it all away. And following these

counsels the thought was given up. And every day the emperor had 2,000

miliarisia put in a heap and mingled with earth; and when work was

finished, in the evening, the craftsmen dug out the mound and found the

miliarisia, and this the emperor did that they might be eager for their

work. And collecting the materials, as was said, took seven and a half

years. But the completion of the temple, even with the crowd of workmen

I have mentioned, all labouring with the greatest eagerness, took nine

years two months.

“The ambo with the solea he paved with sardonyx, and inserted precious

stones; its columns were of solid gold, with carbuncles and crystals

and sapphires; and he overlaid the upper part of the solea richly with

gold. The ambo had also a golden dome studded with pearls, lychnites,

and emeralds.

“The gold cross of the ambo weighed 100 pounds. It had also

seizae,[226] and lychnites, and was embroidered with pearls. And the

ambo above had a hat-shaped covering (_petasion_), upon[227] supports

(_stethea_).

“The top of the Holy Well was brought from Samaria. It was considered

sacred, because Christ had sat on it, and talked to the woman. And

the bronze trumpets, which stand by the Holy Well, were brought from

Jericho; they were those at whose blasts by angels the walls of Jericho

fell down. The honoured Cross, to-day in the skeuophylakium, which was

the measure of our Lord’s height, was eagerly sought for in Jerusalem

by the faithful and brought hither. And for this reason they surrounded

it with silver, and all kinds of precious stones, and overlaid it

with gold. And to this day it works healing wonders, and drives away

diseases and demons. And in every column [of the church] both above and

below is placed one sacred relic.

“He made also golden vessels for the twelve solemn feasts, according

to the sacred Gospels: basins (_cherniboxeses_), ewers (_orkioloi_),

chalices (_diskopoteria_), and patens (_diskoi_); they were all of

solid gold, set with precious stones and pearls. And the number of

the sacred vessels was 1,000; altar-cloths (_endutai_), with rows

of jewels, 300; crowns, 100. Every festal day had its own chalice

covering (_poterokalumma_). There were paten covers (_diskokalummata_)

of gold, with pearls and precious stones, to the number of 1,000;

four-and-twenty gospels, each worth two centenaria; thirty-six

censers of solid gold with precious stones; 300 lamps (_luchnitai_)

weighing forty pounds; 6,000 candelabra (_polycandela_), and clustered

lights[228] of solid gold, for the ambo, the bema, the two gynaecea,

and the narthex.

“The revenues of 365 farms in Egypt, India, and all the East and West

were devoted to the maintenance of the church. For each holy day was

set aside 1,000 measures of oil, 300 measures of wine, and 1,000

sacramental loaves. Similarly for the daily services, the clergy,

including the lowest, numbered 1,000, with 100 singers divided into

two for alternate weeks. For the clergy there were cells round the

building; for the singers there were two monasteries.

“He made five gold crosses, each weighing 100 pounds, which were

adorned with all kinds of precious stones, so that they were each

valued at eight centenaria: also two candlesticks of gold incrusted

with pearls and precious stones, valued at five centenaria, as well

as two other large carved candelabra (_manoualia_) of gold; these

had golden feet, each worth 100 pounds, to stand below the golden

candelabra. He made fifty others too, of silver, of the height of a

man, to stand by the altar. On the adornment of the ambo and solea was

spent 100,000 pounds, which was the tribute levied by Constantine on

Saroboris, King of the Persians, and on many others. The whole church

with the parts outside and around--with the exception of the vessels

and ornaments, which were given by the emperor--cost 800,000 pounds.

“Now Justinian alone began and alone finished the church with no other

helping him, or even building a part of it. Its beauty is wonderful

to behold; all kinds of pearls glitter there like the sea, and one

seems to see the ever-flowing waters of great rivers. Now the four

boundaries[229] of the church he called after the rivers that flowed

from Paradise, and he made a law that whosoever was excommunicated

should stand there for his sins. And for the phiale in the centre he

made twelve arcades, and lions belching out water for the people to

wash in. On the right side, however, of the right-hand gynaeceum, he

made a basin (_thalassa_) of one cubit for the water to come up in,

and one flight of steps (_klimax_) for the priests to cross above the

water. He placed too in the front of the basin (_dexamene_) an open

tank for the rain (_ombusia_), and carved twelve lions, twelve pards,

twelve deer, and eagles, and hares, and calves, and crows, twelve

of each, and these spouted out the water for the use of the priests

alone. The place was called the place of the lions (_leontarion_)

and metatorion, because there was a golden couch there, that the

emperor might rest on his way to the temple. But who can describe the

comeliness and beauty of the temple, overlaid with resplendent gold

from the crown to the pavement?

“When the temple and the sacred vessels had been all completed, on

the 24th of December he marched in solemn pomp from the palace to the

Gate of the Augusteum, opening into the Horologium; and he killed

1,000 oxen, 6,000 sheep, 500 deer, 1,000 pigs, 1,000 fowls, and gave

them to the poor and needy, as well as 30,000 measures of wheat. And

the distribution of these on that day took three hours, and then the

emperor entered with the cross, and the patriarch Eutychius, and at

the royal entrance he left the patriarch and walked alone to the

ambo; then, stretching out his hands to heaven, he cried, ‘Glory be

to God who has thought me worthy to finish this work. Solomon, I

have surpassed thee.’ And when the ceremony was over he distributed

largesse, and with the help of Strategius gave away three hundred

pounds of gold. But on the following day he solemnly opened the temple,

and killed even more oxen, and feasted every one for fifteen days

until the feast of Epiphany, praising God. In such a way as this was

the great work completed.

“Now the new dome which was built by Justinian, and the gorgeous and

wonderful ambo, with the solea, and the patterned pavement of the nave,

lasted seventeen years. But after the death of Justinian, his nephew

Justin succeeded, and in the second year of his reign, and the fifth

day, at the sixth hour the dome fell, and destroyed the wonderful ambo

with the golden supports, and the solea, and all the sardonyx, and

choice pearls and sapphires. But the arches, and the columns, and the

rest of the building remained unhurt. Then the emperor summoned the

skilful mastermen, and inquired what had caused the fall of the dome.

But they answered and said to the king, ‘Your uncle took away too

quickly the supports (_antinux_) for the dome, which were of wood, to

cover it with mosaic; and made it too high so that it should be seen

from everywhere, and thus the craftsmen, by destroying the scaffolding

(_skalosis_) before the foundations had been sufficiently set, caused

the fall of the dome.’ Thus spake they to the king, and they added that

if he wished to build a dome like a hollow cymbal he should follow his

uncle’s example, and send to Rhodes, and should order bricks made in

the same way and of the same weight as the previous ones. The emperor

gave the order, and bricks were brought from Rhodes, similar to the

previous ones. So once more the dome was built, with fifteen fathoms

taken from its height, and formed like a drum so that it should not

again fall. The supports were left for a year, until they knew that

the dome had become well set. But the ambo and solea, which they were

not able to build of an equal magnificence to the former ones, they

are made of marble, with columns covered with silver, and there was

a silver inclosure (_stethos_), round the solea. But the dome of the

ambo he did not build again, frightened by the expense. And for the

pavement, as he was not able to find slabs of such beauty and size

as heretofore, he sent Manasses, a Patrician and Praepositus, to

Proconnesus, and marble was worked there as is seen now, of a green

colour, like rivers flowing into a sea.

“But when they wished to cut away the scaffolding of the dome, and

to take away the timbers, they filled up the church with water to a

height of five cubits, and threw down the beams into the water, and

thus the lower parts of the walls were uninjured. And he covered it

all with mosaic. Hence there are some who say that Justin, Justinian’s

nephew, built the church, but in this they lie. Let us rather give

thanks to our God who has willed that the great structure should remain

untouched, so that we can enter it, and give the praise that is due to

Christ; for He is worthy of all glory, honour, power, and worship, now

and for ever, Amen.”

§ 3. LEGENDS.

Many of the points in this celebration of the wonders of S. Sophia seem

to be traceable to the writer’s absorbing traditions of the work of

Basil--who built like a goldsmith at his new church--into his account.

In the destructive rapacity of the Crusaders and the interregnum that

followed while they occupied S. Sophia we find such a satisfactory

cause for this half-mythical retrospect undertaken in all good faith

that we cannot think it was written until after the Frankish ascendency.

We need not suppose that the Anonymous invented even the wildest of

these stories; such stories grow up as a matter of course, and to-day

various forms of some of them are told within the walls of many other

buildings. The accounts given by the Russian pilgrims (see Chapter VI)

agree so closely in many respects with the Anonymous description that

we might think the writer had been their guide in the church. That the

stories were widely told in Constantinople at this time is proved by

the account of S. Sophia given by El Harawi, an Arab traveller, who

visited the city in the thirteenth century. “Here is also Agia Sophia,

the greatest church they have. I was told by Yakub Ibn Abd Allah that

he had entered it: within are 360 doors. And they say one of the angels

resides there; round about this place they have made fences of gold,

and the story they relate of him is very strange.”[230]

This story of the angel recalls the Wingless Victory of the Athenian

acropolis, but it is probably more closely related to the “Angels of

the Churches” in the Revelation. An interesting reference to this

thought is made by Palladius in his Life of Chrysostom. Before he left

S. Sophia for ever the patriarch entered it saying, “Come let us pray

and say farewell to the Angel of the Church;” but, adds his biographer,

“the Angel departed with him.” We give here an account of the church

from a thirteenth-century English MS., in the British Museum, _Vit.

A._ xx. 14, which refers to the more commonplace part of the story as

told by the Anonymous. “That famous city is endowed with wonderful and

inestimable wealth. In it may be seen the famous church Agia Sophia,

that is the Holy Wisdom; an angel of God appeared and taught the

workmen as they were building. Underneath the church in its cisterns

there is refreshing water, some of which is salt and some of it

rainwater. The church below is borne on one hundred and seventy-three

columns of marbles, and above on two hundred and forty-six. Round the

choir from the top to the bottom it is covered with silver gilt. And

this same choir has an altar ‘starred’ (_stellatum_) all over with

most wonderful and precious stones. In the church are lamps of the

purest silver and gold, and their number cannot be counted. The church

is opened and closed by seven hundred and fifty-two double doors, and

there are windows innumerable. There are seven hundred prebendary

priests, of which three hundred and fifty take each week in turn. Now

the Patriarch of Agia Sophia has in that city one hundred metropolitans

and archbishops, and each metropolitan has seven suffragans in the same

city.”

The idea of competition with Solomon’s Temple and the Tabernacle would

be sure to suggest itself, and, once received, it would be justified by

many assertions; indeed a tendency to imitate the biblical accounts may

be detected in the Anonymous author. For instance, we have Justinian’s

intention to cover the floor with silver, the description of the gold

vessels for the altar, and the “sea” for the priests. Justinian’s

oft-quoted speech on entering the completed church may be assigned

to this leading idea, which we find expressed as early as the sixth

century by Corippus, the poet-bishop, who says, “Praise of the temple

of Solomon is now silenced, and the Wonders of the World have to yield

the preeminence. Two shrines founded by the wisdom of God have rivalled

Heaven, one the sacred Temple, the other the splendid fane of S.

Sophia, the Vestibule of the Divine Presence.”[231] Glycas, who tells

many of the stories given by the Anonymous, continues the idea further.

Justinian, he says, set up a statue “representing Solomon as looking at

the Great Church and gnashing his teeth with envy.”[232]

In the Book of Proverbs we read, “Wisdom hath builded her house, she

hath hewn out her seven pillars.” This was also seized upon, and

Michael Psellus speaks of S. Sophia as “the very beautiful temple, the

incomparable home which the Divine Wisdom built in His own name and

which He raised on seven pillars.”[233] Modern writers, Tournefort,

Von Hammer, &c., have delighted to point out that the church has 107

columns; indeed, with a little humouring, 108 may be counted. The

symmetrical number of the workmen employed according to the Anonymous

may be matched in a legendary account of the building of S. Luke’s,

according to which there were twenty-four protomaistores, each of whom

had twenty-four workmen under him.

The story of Justinian mixing money with the earth is parallel to

the account, given by Vasari, of Brunelleschi’s scheme for building

the dome of S. Maria del Fiore in Florence. It is impossible that

the church should have been flooded with water, as described by the

Anonymous. There appears to be no basis for the supposition that the

great dome was gilt outside. In the texts of Codinus the dome is said

to be of ivy-wood (κισσηρίνος): this is evidently somebody’s misreading

for pumice-stone (κισήριον).

The stones were actually supposed to be specifics for diseases by the

Russian pilgrims and others. Clari the Knight of Amiens[234] (1200)

speaks “of the Minster (_Moustier_) of S. Sophia, and the riches which

were there.... There are vaults all round over the church, which are

carried on large columns, very rich; for there is not a column but is

of jasper, or porphyry, or some precious marble, and every column has a

medicinal quality; some keep off _Mal des rains_, some _Mal du flanc_,

and other diseases: and there is nothing in this minster such as a

hinge (_gons_) or band (_verveles_) generally of iron, which is not of

silver.”

Codinus concludes his account of the church with a story, which may be

classed with a large series, as “the gratitude of employers to their

architects;” imprisoning and blinding them, or cutting off their hands.

It is in a sense one of the truest of stories! The master workman of

the great church, “Ignatius (_sic_), owing to the great favour which

his work won for him from the people, was shut up by the emperor in

his statue in the Augusteum.” To parallel other tales this must be the

artist’s own work which is the instrument of his torture. Here he would

have died of hunger had it not been for his faithful wife, who threw to

him a rope besmeared with liquid pitch; afterwards fire destroyed all

evidence of his flight.

We have also the customary tales of statues found in the ground when

the church was begun. Gyllius, quoting from Suidas, says that Justinian

discovered more than seventy statues of the Greek deities, the figures

of the twelve signs of the zodiac, and eighty statues of Christian

princes and emperors. The travels that bear the name of Sir John

Mandeville relate that once when an emperor made a grave in S. Sophia,

“they found a body in the earth, and upon the body lay a plate of

gold, that said thus in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, ‘Jesus Christ shall

be born of the Virgin Mary, and I believe in Him.’ It was laid there

2,000 years before the birth of Christ, and is still preserved in the

treasury of the church. And they say that it was Hermogenes, the wise

man.”

The legends were not forgotten after the taking of the church. Sandys,

the English traveller, who was in Constantinople about 1610, tells

us that “one of the doors was famed to be the ark of Noe, and is

therefore left bare in some places to be kissed by the devoted people,”

and “the total number of doors was said to be as many as the days of

the year.”

When this, the church of the world, fell into the hands of the Turks,

many stories came to the West, or arose there without coming. The

poetry of the Fall required the miraculous salvation of the priest

celebrating mass, and the prophecy of his return as told by Theo.

Gautier. It also required a massacre in the church, the riding in of

the proud conqueror, and the mark of his blood-stained hand, which

indeed is still pointed out some twenty feet above the pavement!

Mijatovich, in his history of the last of the emperors, regards the

massacre as unhistorical.

An English romance almost contemporary with the Fall tells us how the

Turks took possession,

“For to let theyr hawkys fly

In the chirch of Saint Sofy.”

CHAPTER VIII

FOSSATI’S REPARATIONS. SALZENBERG’S DESCRIPTION.

Sancta Sophia seems really to have been in a dangerous condition when,

in 1847, the Sultan Abdul Mesjid began a much-needed work of reparation

which was carried on under the guidance of the Italian architect

Fossati, who appears to have taken great pains, and notwithstanding

some alterations and “restorations” in the worst sense he deserves

our gratitude for probably saving the building. In the preface to his

lithograph views published in London in 1852 he says, “The portions of

the building that looked most threatening were reconstructed, and the

lead roofs were repaired. The dome was relieved of four heavy buttress

arches, whose function was taken by a double ceincture of iron around

its base. Thirteen columns of the gynaeceum, which were inclining under

the thrust of the great arches that support the dome, were put straight

again.” The marble work of the interior was cleaned, and the gold

mosaic vaults were cleared of the crust of limewash which concealed

them. All representations of figures were however covered again. The

sultan’s tribune was built, Fossati says, “in the Byzantine style.” The

walls outside, after being repaired, were covered with a coating of

plaster on which red stripes were painted.

Since this time various remains of the Great Court, which existed as

late as 1873, have entirely disappeared, and the broad bare space, in

front of the exonarthex, has little now to recall the atrium with its

fountain and quadriporticus.