As to the precise place at which the ships arrived on the Golden Horn Critobulus is probably again the safest guide. They came to the shore τῶν ψυχρῶν ὑδάτων—that is, to the Cool Waters, otherwise called the Springs and now known as Cassim Pasha. There they were launched into the Golden Horn. The statement is confirmed incidentally by several authors who mention that the fleet was opposite a portion of the walls where stands the Spigas Gate—that is, the gate leading to the passage across.[604] Cassim Pasha itself was sometimes spoken of as Spigae.[605] Andreossi (in 1828) suggests that the ships started from Baltaliman or rather the bay of Stenia, but the only evidence in favour of this route is the statement of Ducas—who more than any other contemporary is constantly inaccurate—that they started from the Sacred Mouth (a name usually employed to designate the north end of the Bosporus but used by Ducas for the part between Roumelia and Anatolia-Hissar) and that they reached the harbour opposite the monastery of St. Cosmas which was outside the landward walls.
Dr. Mordtmann and Professor van Millingen think that the balance of evidence is in favour of the route from Dolma Bagshe. The route which Dr. Paspates and Dr. Dethier approved is that which appears to me also not only the most probable but to have the balance of evidence in its favour. The tract along which the ships were hauled formed the short arm of a cross, the long one of which was the road along the ridge now known as the Grande Rue de Péra: the two giving the modern Greek name to the city, of Stavrodromion.
APPENDIX IV
THE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION ON GREEKS AND MOSLEMS RESPECTIVELY
In reading the contemporary authors of the period between the Latin and the Moslem conquests the following questions suggest themselves: What was the influence of the Orthodox Church upon the people of the capital and of the empire? What was its value as a national ethical force? and how did its influence as such a force compare with that of Islam?
Before attempting a reply to these questions certain facts must be noted. It must be remembered that the empire was composed of many races and languages. In the Balkan peninsula alone there were always at least half a dozen races with as many different forms of speech. In Asia Minor the component elements of the population were even still more numerous. The Church largely aided the State in the endeavour to keep these divergent elements under the rule of the empire. Her special task was to change the various races into Christians. But even when this task was completed to the extent of causing them all to profess Christianity they retained their racial characteristics and traditions. These characteristics, though widely various, may be classified in two categories. In other words, it may be said that among all the different populations of the empire there were two streams of tendency: the Hellenic and the Asiatic. The tendency and influence of each were markedly present in the church from the first days of the empire and continued until 1453. Greek influence left an indelible impress upon the Orthodox Church. But while it influenced the other races of the empire, the Greeks themselves fell to some extent under the Asiatic influence. Greek tendency was always to make of Christianity a philosophy rather than a religion. The opposite tendency, which I have called Asiatic and which corresponds fairly well to what Matthew Arnold called Hebraic, had less enduring results upon the population but was nevertheless constantly present. The two tendencies were constantly striving one against the other within the Church.
Greek influence (1) largely aided in the formation of a philosophical body of theology, (2) helped to perpetuate paganism and develop a paganistic tendency, and (3) deprived the Church of the religious enthusiasm which the Asiatic tendency might have provided and has often inspired. The service of the Greeks in reference to the formation of a body of theological philosophy is too completely recognised to require any notice. Greek influence helped to perpetuate paganism in various ways. It was naturally always most powerful in the Balkan peninsula, its chief centres being Athens and Salonica, but had great weight also in the western cities of Asia Minor. Greek polytheists in pre-Christian times were not opposed to the recognition of other gods than those worshipped by themselves. How this rational toleration, which was as utterly opposed to the exclusive spirit of Asiatic Christianity as to that of Islam itself, tended to perpetuate paganism will be best understood by recalling the early history of the later Roman empire. The population under the rule of New Rome had for the most part adopted the profession of Christianity because it was the religion of the State. Most people found little difficulty in conforming to the demands of the emperor and became Christians. Under such circumstances Christianity did not conquer paganism: it absorbed without destroying it. Just as in Central Asia many tribes who have come under the power of Russia have been ordered to elect whether they would declare themselves Christians or Moslems, so in the days of the early Christian emperors, and especially under the laws of Theodosius the choice was between a profession of the Court creed or remaining in some form of paganism where its professors would be subject to various disabilities and persecutions. The conformity which resulted was curious. The people became nominally Christians, but they brought with them into the Church most of their old superstitions. Their ancient deities were not discarded but were either secretly worshipped or came to be regarded as Christian saints: their festal days became the commemoration days of Christian events. I do not forget that something of the same kind went on in the Western Church and that the missionaries, finding themselves unable to persuade their converts to abandon their old observances, deftly adopted them into the Christian Church. But all that was done in this direction in the West was small in comparison with what went on in the East. St. George took the place of Apollo. St. Nicholas replaced Poseidon. The highest hill in every neighbourhood on the mainland and in every island of the Marmora and the Aegean had fittingly been crowned with a temple dedicated to the God of Day. The great dragon, Night, had been overcome by Helios. To this day it is almost universally true that all the peaks in question have an Orthodox church which has taken the place of the temple of Apollo and is dedicated to his successor, St. George.[606] In like manner the temples built in fishing villages to Poseidon have almost invariably been dedicated to St. Nicholas. The episcopal staff of a Greek bishop has the two serpents’ heads associated with Aesculapius. The distribution of holy bread at funerals, the processions to shrines, to sacred groves, to Hagiasmas or holy wells, and numerous other customs of the Orthodox Church, are survivals or rudimentary forms of paganism.[607]