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.