Byzantine Palaces

466 July Byzantine Palaces TTTTHEETO those who have described the ceremonies and pageants Downloaded from JLL of the Byzantine court, the imperial processions from the palaces to St. Sophia, the scenes in the hippodrome, and the popular demonstrations in the Augusteion, have been content to do so without giving any topographical description of the buildings in which those events took place. The recent work, therefore, of M. Faspate, http://ehr.oxfordjournals.org/ which deals minutely with this subject,1 is of extreme value as opening out for us a new field for research, which when followed up will add life and reality to the complex facts related by Gibbon, and before hfm by Constantino Porphyrogennetos, our most trust- worthy authority on Byzantine imperial life. Th» difficulties which attended M. Paspate in his patient investigations have deterred others from attempting this work. The Turks who inhabit the squalid houses which cover a great portion of the hill of palaces at Université Laval on June 29, 2015 objected to intrusion; the archaeologist could only penetrate these narrow alleys at the risk of being pelted with stones, rotten eggs, and other objectionable missiles. But two events encouraged M. Paspate to persevere: one was the building of the university in 1848, which disclosed the position of several disputed sites in the Augusteion; and secondly the cutting of the Thracian railway in 1872, right through the wall of the old palaces: these discoveries gave him sufficient data to go upon, 'beacon lights,' as he calls t.heTrij • to guide me in thia labyrinth.' Before accompanying M. Paspate within the walls which en- closed the bill of palaces, or, as he calls it, the 'Acropolis of Byzan- tium,' we will see what he has to say about that large open space which existed immediately before it, and was called the Augusteion, the centre of popular life in those days, and adorned with statues and objects of art. It was an oblong space lying between the hippodrome and the wall of the palaces, and shut off from the town on the north by St. Sophia; the southern boundary is a little uncertain, but M. Paspate considers that its whole length was about 520 yards, and its uniform width 138 yards. It was adorned with palaces, 1 Ti Boiarrvi 'Krijcrofm, ad T4 r4pi( a&rir ZSpifum. With m Plmn. By A. G. Psspate. Atham, 1885. 1887 BYZANTINE PALACES 467 statues, tiny churches, and works of Hellenic art collected from all parts of Greece and Atria: to-day it is covered by the mosque of Sultan Achmed Dar el Fhorinoun and grwn.11 Turkish houses. All this apace (says M. Paspate), the ornaments and ruins of which have long been destroyed or removed to adorn other buildings, is now covered with dark and noisome workshops, public and private buildings which are visited rarely by strangers, and by natives under the greatest difficulties and with the greatest persuasion; the stupid inhabitants look on with derision, whilst children throw stones at those who give their attention to such things. The earlier buildings of this place, and all the wondrous works Downloaded from of art which it contained, were destroyed by the great fire in Justinian's reign. It was originally a place where cooks and coster- mongers vended their wares, and where the inhabitants danced on festive occasions; but Justinian drove away the cooks, raised up magnificent buildings thereon, and paved it with marble. Through http://ehr.oxfordjournals.org/ the open space between the buildings, commonly referred to as 'the middle' by Byzantine writers, the emperor passed on his visits to and from St. Sophia, and in it he held his receptions of all the city deputies, and heard their plaints. It is curious that there is greater ease in placing the ' minor monuments of the Augusteion,' as M. Paspate calls them, than the greater ones. Most of these stood by the side of the hippodrome. To the north, near St. Sophia, was the Milion, originally a simple post from which distances in miles at Université Laval on June 29, 2015 -were measured, over which was afterwards raised ' a square building with seven marble pillars on steps supporting a dome,' and called the chamber of the Milion. Here the emperor always stopped to receive deputations on his way from St. Sophia; here were memorial columns, according to Codinos, to Constantine the Great, St. Helena, Sophia the wife of Justin the Thracian, and others; on this building were stuck up the heads of malefactors who had been executed. During the excavations in 1848 for the founda- tions of the university, a square building with seven pillars and arches was disclosed; this at once established a satisfactory basis on which to start a topographical plan of the western side of this agora. Immediately to the south of the Milion are the large founda- tions on which stood the statue of Justinian. The following account of it is given by M. Paspate: Some time ago, the barbarians despoiled this statue of Justinian: they took from it the gilded brass ornaments which adorned it Thirty years ago, the statue fell from the wlnmn which supported it. Now the base has been turned into a fountain; the statue itself was taken off and shut up in one of the rooms of the sultan's palace, but has lately been carried off to the furnace, where they cast implements of war. The calf of the leg of Justinian exceeded my own height, the nose was more 468 BYZANTINE PALACES July than nine times the length of one of my fingera. I was unable to measure the feet of the horse as they lay on the ground; however, without the Turks seeing me, I was able to ascertain that one of Justinian's toenails was five times the length of one of my fingers. Attached to this colossal statue was the oratory of St. Constan- tino, often alluded to in Byzantine history as a spot where the emperors used to worship on stated occasions. During the excava- tion of 1848 the base of the silver statue of Eudoxia was found, the empress about whom we read so much in the life of Chrysostom, and whose anger at being denounced by him was the cause of his exile. On the base of this statue was an inscription in Greek and Downloaded from Latin: it was, curiously enough, discovered on the northern side of th& Augusteion, at some distance from the spot where the evidence of writers who saw it has placed it. So M. Faspate is inclined to think that the base had been removed during some popular demon- stration, and accordingly places it between the statue of Justinian http://ehr.oxfordjournals.org/ and the church of the two horses. Nicephorus the Phocian, before he ascended the throne, set up in the Augusteion a roofless temple, dedicated it to St. Fhocas, and near it placed two stone horses, which gave it the name of the church of the two horses. We have a description of a revolt in 1184, in which the followers of the emperor Alexius took up their position in the church, and shot with their arrows at the soldiers of the emperor John, who had taken up their position in at Université Laval on June 29, 2015 the Mflion. Close behind the Turkish university M. Faspate has discovered ruins of Byzantine walls with low doorways, into which the owner of the house, despite all his persuasions, will never allow him to penetrate. From the facts above mentioned, M. Faspate considers these to be the ruins of the church of the two horses: it is within easy bowshot of the MQion, and the only building which could have given protection to soldiers, unless they had occupied St. Sophia itself. Thus we have a fair picture of what this side of the great agora was like. With regard to the eastern side just beneath the wall of the palaces, M. Faspate cannot give us so satisfactory a description. He has been unable to find any traces whatever of the patriarch's palace, of the old council hall, and of the baths of Zeuxippos, but he holds out tempting promises to those archaeologists who may be fortunate enough to live in times when bigoted Turks will not inhqhifc the densely crowded abodes which cover the sites of those buildings. Meanwhile, all that M. Faspate could do was to collect the mentions made of these buildings by Byzantine writers, and assign them the most probable positions after carefully weighing the evidence. In so doing he had one advantage over former writers on ft"" subject, for he knew the exact course of the wall of the palace which was behind these btnldingB. He first places 1887 BYZANTINE PALACES 469 the church of the Virgin of the brass vendors to the north of this eastern side of the Augusteion, dose beneath the walls of the palaces and near the great gate of ChalM. Here the emperors generally heard a liturgy before they proceeded to St. Sophia itself, and the often-mentioned wooden staircase connected it with St. Sophia, so that the imperial family when so disposed might attend service in private. A wooden door still existing, but now always closed, on the east side of St. Sophia, M. Faspate considers was in connexion with this staircase, ' for it is the only entrance, according to the nature of the ground, which could be approached by a staircase.' Downloaded from The patriarch's palace was outside the palace walls, and in the Augusteion.

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