[CHAPTER XII]. § 1. Bronze Doors, &c. § 2. Mosaics. Salzenberg’s Description. First Scheme. Later Scheme. Fossati’s Description. Tesserae and Fixing. § 3. Glass. Plaster. Painting. § 4. Monograms and Inscriptions. page 264
S. SOPHIA CHAPTER I
THE CITY OF CONSTANTINE AND THE FIRST CHURCH
Byzantium.—Where the narrow swift-flowing Bosporus, which divides Asia from the most eastern part of southern Europe, flows into the Sea of Marmara, a crescent-shaped arm of the sea runs westward into the land, leaving a narrow promontory, which, like the prow of a boat in profile, puts out to the east. The point of this promontory is a mass of rock rising steeply from the sea: divided by a slight transverse depression from the rest of the land, it forms the first hill of the seven which were afterwards inclosed by the walls of Constantinople.
On this crest (by the present Seraglio Point), commanding the passage to the Euxine, was built, in the seventh century B.C., by colonists from Megara—with whom Dionysius couples the Corinthians—the Acropolis, the sacred city and citadel, and within certain limits the lines of its containing walls may still be traced. The lower city gathered about the slopes outside the Acropolis, and had other walls defining its landward limits. Dionysius, the ancient Byzantine writer, who describes the city before the siege of Severus, 196 A.D., says that this citadel of Byzantium was on the promontory of the Bosporus, above the bay called Keras (the Golden Horn). “At a little distance over the height is the altar of Athena Ecbasia—of the landing—where the colonists fought as for their own land. There is too a temple of Poseidon, an ancient one and hence quite plain, which stands over the sea.... Below the temple of Poseidon, but within the wall, on the level ground are stadia and gymnasia, and courses for the young.”[1] This Acropolis is roughly outlined in [Fig. 1], the evidence being the contours of the hill, remains and records of certain walls to be mentioned later, and the boundaries between the first four regions in Constantine’s city as given in the Notitia,[2] a description of the city written in the beginning of the fifth century. The Acropolis so defined has a striking resemblance to other Greek hill cities—Tiryns, Mycenae, Acrocorinth, and the Acropolis of Athens. In [Fig. 1] the cross shows the site of the present Church of S. Sophia; the arrow shows the Hippodrome, which, still existing, is the great monument of pre-Constantinian times, and forms the key for all study of the subsequent city; O shows the position of the column said to have been erected by Claudius Gothicus about 270 A.D., which stands at the north end of the Acropolis overlooking Seraglio or Demetrius Point.
Of the ancient Greek town few positive remains have come down to us, with the exception of the coins. A publication by the Greek Philological Society of Constantinople mentions as among several pre-Constantinian inscriptions a marble slab found in “the tower next to the Zouk Tsesmé gate on the left as one ascends to S. Sophia,” which refers to the stadium erected by Pausanias the General in 477 B.C., “within the walls of Byzantium and below the temple of Poseidon.”[3] The coins also go back to the fifth century B.C. The early ones show a cow standing on a dolphin, with the letters BY. In the third century we have Poseidon seated on a promontory, and later again a dolphin twined round a trident—all the types having evident reference to the sea-washed city. Another relic of ancient Byzantium is still to be seen below the curve of the Hippodrome, where a white marble capital of good Greek Doric work lies neglected on the seaward bank of the new railway.
In addition to the ancient buildings already mentioned, we learn from Dionysius that the city possessed a temple of Gé Onesidora—the fruitful earth—which consisted of “an unroofed space surrounded by a wall of polished stone.” Near by were “temples of Demeter and the Maiden (Persephone), with many pictures in them, relics of their former wealth.” This author was also shown the sites of temples to Hera and Pluto, “the former having been destroyed by Darius, and the latter by Philip of Macedon.” He also speaks of a large round tower joined to the wall of the city.
Some records or legends of the ancient city are also contained in the Paschal Chronicle.[4] After the siege Severus “built the public bath called Zeuxippus. Now in the middle of the four-porticoed[5] space stood a bronze stele of the sun, below which he wrote the name of the sun. The people of Thrace indeed call the place Helion, but the Byzantines themselves call this same public bath ‘of Zeuxippus’ after its original name, although the emperor ordered it should be called Severion. Opposite to it in the acropolis of Byzantium he built the temple of Apollo, which also faced the two other temples formerly built by Byzas—one to Artemis with the olive, and the other to Phedalian Aphrodite. And the figure of the sun was taken from the four-porticoes and placed in this temple (of Apollo). Opposite the temple of Artemis he built large kennels, and a theatre opposite the temple of Aphrodite. He bought houses and gardens from two brothers, and after pulling down the former and uprooting the latter he built the Hippodrome. Severus restored the Strategion as well. It was first named by Alexander of Macedon, who, in his campaign against Darius, reviewed his troops there before attacking the Persians.”
New Rome.—It was about 328 A.D. or the following year that Constantine decided to enlarge this city, which had long been under the domination of Rome, and to make it his capital. The work of building was pushed forward with great energy, and it was consecrated in May 330. By an edict engraved on a stone erected in the Strategium, it was called the New Rome of Constantine. In the documents of the patriarchs of the Greek Church the city is still called New Rome.
The quarries of easily wrought marble of large crystalline structure and soft white colour found in such abundance in the island of Proconnesus, only a few miles away over the sea to which it has given its name of Marmara, then as now furnished a perfect building material; while the still worked quarries of Egypt and Thessaly provided imperial purple and green. But a richer quarry was doubtless found in the porphyry and cippolino shafts of the old temples of many a declining city.