, "for the Salvation of her soul." [Footnote 131]
[Footnote 130: Anonymi de Antiquit. Constantinop. (in Banduri's Imperium Orientale), p. 55.]
[Footnote 131: Anonymi, p. 55.]
Indeed, some of the incidents of the undertaking are so curious in themselves, and illustrate so curiously the manners and feelings of the age, that we are induced to select a few of them from among a mass of more or less legendary details, supplied by the anonymous [{646}] chronicler already referred to, whose work Banduri has printed in his Imperium Orientals [Footnote 132] and who, if less trustworthy than Procopius or the Silentiary, has preserved a much greater amount of the traditionary gossip connected with the building.
[Footnote 132: Under the title Anonymi de Antiquitatibus Constantinopoleos. The third part is devoted entirely to a "History and Description of the Church of St. Sophia.">[
For the vastly enlarged scale of Justinian's structure, it became necessary to make extensive purchases in the immediate circuit of the ancient church; and, as commonly happens, the demands of the proprietors rose in proportion to the necessity in which the imperial purchaser was placed. It is interesting to contrast the different spirit in which each sought to use the legal rights of a proprietor.
The first was a widow, named Anna, whose tenement was valued by the imperial commissaries at eighty-five pounds of gold. This offer on the part of the commissary the widow unhesitatingly refused, and declared that she would consider her house cheap at fifty hundred-weight of gold; but when Justinian, in his anxiety to secure the site, did not hesitate to wait upon the widow herself in person, she was so struck by his condescension, and so fired by the contagion of his pious enthusiasm, that she not only surrendered the required ground, but refused all payment for it in money: only praying that she might be buried near the spot, in order that, from the site of her former dwelling itself, she "might claim the purchase-money on the day of judgment." She was buried, accordingly, near the Skeuophylacium, or treasury of the sacred vessels. [Footnote 133]
[Footnote 133: Anonymi, p. 58. ]
Very different, but yet hardly less characteristic of the time, was the conduct of one Antiochus, a eunuch, and ostiarius of the palace. His house stood on the spot now directly under the great dome, and was valued by the imperial surveyor at thirty-five pounds of gold. But Antiochus exacted a far larger sum, and obstinately refused to abate his demand. Justinian, in his eagerness, was disposed to yield; but Strategus, the prefect of the treasury, begged the emperor to leave the matter in his hands, and proceeded to arrest the obdurate proprietor and throw him into prison. It chanced that Antiochus was a passionate lover of the sports of the hippodrome, and Strategus so timed the period of his imprisonment that it would include an unusually attractive exhibition in the hippodrome—what in the language of the modern turf would be called "the best meeting of the season." At first Antiochus kept up a determined front; but, as the time of the games approached, the temptation proved too strong; his resolution began to waver; and, at length, when the morning arrived, he "bawled out lustily" from the prison, and promised that, if he were released in time to enjoy his favorite spectacle, he would yield up possession on the emperor's own terms. By this time the races had begun, and the emperor had already taken his seat; but Strategus did not hesitate to have the sport suspended, led Antiochus at once to the emperor's tribunal, and, in the midst of the assembled spectators, completed the negotiation. [Footnote 134]
[Footnote 134: Anonymi p. 59.]