XXIX. A What the seasons of the year bring forth, proceeds in order and according to nature. For the Divine, when it is practiced with piety for holy works, is propitious; and while the cities shine, each proud in its own way, all have assumed a common ornament, having set up your images on account of your benefactions; and we do the same as they. To inaugurate these, we do not call together an assembly of the populace—a thing, in the judgment of a prudent man such as you, greatly to be despised. For therein is seen a base pleasure and the delight of a marketplace crowd. Wherefore we have dismissed such things: but our orations venerate your images, and our contests of oratory, and in these, the Muses.
XXX. B But what shall we inscribe upon these? What could be sufficient for their dignity? Or perhaps this altogether: « The city [honors] the author of its salvation, through whom I now raise my proud neck and am a city? » But may you rule the Roman empire for all time, and have very many such good men presiding over affairs; and may the cities weave crowns for their good fortune, and dedicate tablets, and sing hymns; and may the sons of poets and orators, moving their tongues around you, always abound and delight in your triumphs.
COMBEFIS' ADMONITION ON THE PASSAGE OF PROCOPIUS THE RHETORICIAN CONCERNING HAGIA SOPHIA
That some are pleased by shorter works, others by longer ones; where especially the shorter ones appear of greater credibility, being by a certain author and contemporary, who is himself an eyewitness of the facts; I thought I would satisfy everyone, if, by the happy birth in the royal Louvre of the Procopius edited long ago by the learned Claudius Mastret, S.J. (new even to the translator), I obtained what I had long desired, that at last he, thus illustrated and restored, might see the light before these works of mine, and of an uncertain author, concerning the building of Hagia Sophia reached their completion; that I might transfer this passage of his here, and compose it according to my own genius and style; and, if it should ever seem necessary, compare it with my uncertain one, and illustrate one by the other. I, who wished to add historical notes, and either to praise Justinian for so great an undertaking, or to blame him; especially on the occasion of the burning of the former Church and that sedition of the Nica, in which the lives of so many citizens perished, and it lacked little but that Justinian himself—from the stain of which faction he is not considered entirely immune, who had previously given such license to the Venetian faction against the Greens: both of whom his successor, Justinus, and one more cautious and wiser by that craftiness than Justinian, so restrained that from then on those great riots ceased and the citizens cultivated peace. It seemed the duty of a learned interpreter, such as Nicolas Alemannus in his *Notes on the Anecdota*, which he presented as the only ones, to compare them with Eichel’s refutations, or annotations, and either to clear away his crimes, or to rightly defend the injured majesty of Justinian, with all things weighed and in an impartial judgment. Thus indeed would we have a book and a work of the royal Louvre most worthy, and in it almost the prize of Byzantine history. For me to attempt anything in this matter would be beyond my limits: who, attempting in a short volume and only a part of that city’s decorations and origins, am compelled by the brevity to lift a burden from the table. For the author is Procopius himself, he brought perhaps greater stain upon himself than upon Justinian, and whatever remains of his history, he has greatly disparaged. For indeed, if he did so, he preceded in the example of Michael Psellus, and of those whom in his race (I would not wish to say race, in which so many lights have shone in every past age, and which in Christ,
A have the greatest reverence, and I would wish them to be in a sounder and more blessed state) he clearly shows what kind of versatile genius he possesses, and how versatile it is, while he pursues what is useful and despises what is honorable. Indeed, in what a brilliant Oration did Psellus, at the synod, agitate against Michael Cerularius, the Patriarch of Constantinople, who had been thrust from his civil see, and seriously accuse him of impiety, tyranny, and other things, while so readily praising the same man after he departed this life, and forcing upon him such great and exceptional traits that he could seem worthy to be compared to the great bishops and masters of the olden age; praising him most especially for the reason that he more bitterly defended the complaint, long quieted, of the Greeks against the Latins concerning the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone; and he revived, one might almost say from the dead, the Photian schism, which would forever after live on, yielding to no remedies. By this, he betrayed himself as a common shrew, and drew away much of the trust placed in him; and to those whom he more readily fosters, he even attached a stain, lest they too be agitated by a like frenzy, and be held all the more holy the more they are captious and alien to ecclesiastical peace and unity. That matter escaped the very learned Leo Allatius in his *Syntagma* concerning Psellus, which for that reason, among others, he had wished to be published and augmented in his second editions, especially from their Catalogue, which I had previously transcribed for him from the codex of the Emin. Cardinal Mazarin; a most rich one, even if it is decayed and obliterated in many places; which is almost the same fate that the same Allatius laments for the codices of this same Psellus. For me, all those things are stored away which might illustrate the sacred and profane history of those times, and which are of moment to Byzantine history.
PROCOPII RHETORIS DE SANCTA SOPHIA
(OF PROCOPIUS THE RHETOR, ON THE HAGIA SOPHIA) *Translated by Fr. François Combefis.*B At Byzantium, a base mob and the refuse of the populace, stirred up into a rebellion against the Emperor Justinian—a sedition called "Nica" (that is, "Conquer," taken, of course, from the symbol of the gathering)—made an Uprising, which I described with a plain and accurate narrative in my books on the Wars. And so that it might be obscured to no one that they had taken up arms not less against God than against the Emperor, being, as they were, monstrous and impious men, they became so emboldened as to set fire to the Church of the Christians (the Byzantines call the temple "Sophia," that is, "Wisdom," having fashioned the name for the Deity from that most essential gift). But God permitted them to perpetrate such a sin, for His foreknowledge was not unaware of how great the splendor of the restored temple was to be. And indeed, the Church lay entirely reduced to ashes; but not long after, the Emperor Justinian so fashioned it that if any Christian from before had been asked, having been offered a certain image and appearance of the design of what we now see, whether he would wish the Temple to be pulled down and restored in that manner, he would, in my opinion, have immediately wished to see it destroyed, so that in its place it might happily receive this present form and adornment. Therefore, the Emperor, having taken no account of expense, busy with the work on the building, and from every land...
gathering together whatsoever craftsmen there were, Anthémius of Tralles, the most learned of all those who have ever lived in the craft of mechanics—not only of his own time but far surpassing those of earlier ages—readily devoted himself with great zeal to this task, intent upon organizing the work for the builders and prestructuring the models and configurations of what was to be accomplished. B With him was another who understood the craft, Isidore by name, a Milesian by birth, himself a man of singular intelligence and worthy to be chosen by the Emperor Justinian to assist him in the work. Indeed, the favor of the Divinity towards the Emperor was clearly displayed in this, that for the magnitude of the things to be done, He provided him with men most eminently suited to the task. One might also reasonably wonder at the mind of the Emperor himself, in that, for undertakings of such great moment, he knew how to select the most capable men from the whole of the human race.
The church, therefore, has become a spectacle of supreme beauty; to those who see it, it is extraordinary; to those who hear tell of it, it is altogether incredible. For it rises to a heavenly height, and, as if towering over all other buildings, it leans over, resting upon the rest of the city; adorning it, because it belongs to it, and itself being adorned, because, being a part of it and rising so toweringly above it, from it the city may be surveyed as from a watchtower. Its breadth and length have been so aptly measured that one may not easily find it too long or entirely too broad. It is distinguished by an indescribable grace; for it is adorned by its own bulk, C and by the harmony of its measurements, possessing nothing overly large and nothing wanting; for it is more magnificent than is customary, and more elegant than its immense bulk would suggest. It is wonderfully filled with light and the scintillations of the sun. You would say that the place is not illuminated from without by the sun, but that the radiance is born within it. Such an abundance of light is poured into this holy place.
The front of the temple—that is, the part facing the rising sun, where the ineffable mysteries are celebrated to God—has been constructed in this manner. The building rises from the ground, not extended in a straight line, but bending with a gentle, relaxed obliquity, and in the middle it recedes, rising in a steep height into a semi-rounded form, which those skilled in such things call a semicylinder. D The grandeur of this work ends in a quarter-sphere, and above this, other structures connected to the neighboring parts of the building rise higher, curved in the likeness of a crescent moon, which at once excites admiration and...
owing to the slightness of the A construction, appears somewhat fearful. For it produces the impression that it does not rest on a firm foundation, but hangs in a hazardous way over those who are within; and yet it is supported with exceptional stability and security. On either side of these are columns set upon the floor, not standing in a straight line, but arranged inward in a semicircular shape, so that, rising one behind another as if in a choir, they stand beneath the crescent-shaped building. Opposite these, toward the east, a wall has been erected containing the entrances of the temple; and on either side of it, both the columns and what is above them show a semicircle, just like the aforementioned parts. In the middle of the temple, four man-made mounds have been erected, which they call piers; two are toward the north, and two toward the south; they are opposite each other and equal, and each pair encloses four columns in the space between them. The construction of these piers consists of huge stones, which the craftsmen have diligently gathered and skillfully fitted together; they rise to such a height that you would think you were looking at the sheer crags of mountains. Above these, four arches rise, forming as many sides. The ends of these come together in pairs and are supported by the upper reaches of these piers; the curves themselves are lifted to an immense height and hang suspended. Two of the arches, one facing the rising sun and the other the setting sun, are erected in the empty air; but the others have a wall set beneath them with small columns. They support another building, B round and polished, whence the pleasant day at its dawning always shines forth first. For I believe it is higher than the whole earth; and it gradually tapers, being deliberately thinned to that extent, so that light may enter in abundance through its openings, where the day always shines forth first. It soars, I think, to such a degree, having been deliberately diminished above the circular structure, that the building as a whole seems to be suspended, and the division of the building leaves open the spaces where the light is introduced.
These things, I believe, are impossible to describe with a stammering and weak tongue. Since the arches are connected in a square, a space is left between them, finished in four triangles. The base of each triangle, pressed by the meeting of the arches, forms an acute angle at the bottom; then, as it expands upward into the intermediate space, it terminates at the circular building which presents itself there in a rounded circuit, and it forms the remaining angles at that point. This round enclosure is adorned in a marvelous way by a most spacious dome.
A, which makes it exceptionally beautiful. It seems not to rest upon the solid masonry of the building because of the weakness of the structure, but rather to be suspended by a golden chain from heaven, covering the space. All these parts, united in the heights beyond expectation, suspended from one another, and resting only on those parts which are closest to them, compose one most magnificent structure; nor do they ever allow the eyes of the beholders to settle for long; for the individual parts contend to allure the sight and draw it towards themselves with the greatest ease. The gaze is carried now hither, now thither, in perpetual motion, the spectators not knowing what of all these things they should admire most; but, as if eager to survey everything from every side, wherever they fix their eyes, drawing back their minds and eyebrows, they are unable to understand the craftsmanship; they are unequal to the spectacle. And these things are thus in this manner. B
Justinian Augustus and Anthemius the engineer, together with Isidorus, strengthened the church, which is elevated to such a great height, with many things devised by art; all of which I am neither able to conceive in my mind nor to express in words. I shall describe only one at the present time, from which one may clearly understand how great is the strength of the work: for it is thus. The composition of the piers, of which I made mention just now, is not the same as that of the rest of the building, but of this kind. The structure of the stones is square, to which nature has given hardness, and art has given smoothness; and they are cut in such a way that those which were intended for the protrusions of the sides of the pier are angled; but those which sit in the middle are square. He joins them together, not with lime, which they call "live," not with bitumen, which Semiramis used for the magnificent construction of Babylon; nor anything else of this kind; but with lead, which is poured into the hollows, and having spread everywhere between the stones, it has settled into the harmony of the stones and binds them to one another. This, then, has been accomplished in this way. Let us proceed to the remaining parts of the temple. C
The entire ceiling is covered with pure gold, blending the splendor of the structure with its beauty; D however, the gold conquers...
the glimmer of the stones that shine back to it. A There are two porticos on either side, which do not obstruct the construction of the temple but rather amplify the measure of its width; they extend in length to the very end, though they are lower in height. Their ceiling, too, is vaulted, and their gold is an ornament. As for these two porticos, one has been assigned to the men who pray, while the other is celebrated as being set apart for the women offering their own vows and prayers to God. They have nothing disparate, nor do they differ from one another at all; rather, they share an equal beauty with the temple and the resemblance is graceful.
Who could be the interpreter of the upper chambers of the women’s quarters, or who could describe the countless porticos and the peristyle courts (8) with which the temple is surrounded? Who could enumerate the elegance of the columns and the stones with which the holy place has been adorned? One would think they had entered a meadow blooming with beautiful flowers. For one might well marvel at the purple of some, the verdure of others, and those on which crimson blossoms, and those whose whiteness flashes; moreover, there are those that nature, B just like a painter, has dappled with the most contrasting colors. When one enters there to pray, he realizes immediately that this is not the work of human power or art, but the impulse of the divine. As his mind is lifted up to God, it ascends to heaven, thinking that He is not far off at all, but rather that He dwells most especially in the place He has chosen for Himself. And this thought occurs not only to the first-time viewer, but returns to the mind of everyone continually, just as if the sight were presenting itself to his eyes for the first time. No one has ever been sated by this spectacle; rather, while people are in the temple, they are delighted by the most pleasant of sights, and when they depart, they glorify themselves in the conversations they hold about it. Furthermore, concerning the treasures of this church—the gold plating, and everything in silver and precious stones—it is impossible for one speaking with precision to recount them all, which the Emperor Justinian dedicated to this place. I allow those who read these things to conjecture by one single instance: the most holy area of the temple, which is inaccessible to anyone except the priests (which they call the altar), contains forty thousand pounds of silver. C
To conclude once for all, having run through what is most worthy of mention with the tip of one's finger, as they say, and having comprehended them in the briefest of language: thus did the Emperor Justinian build the church of Constantinople, which is commonly called the Great. He did not build it with his resources alone, but with the exertion of his intellect and the competition of his other virtues, as I shall soon show. The arches, which I mentioned just above (mechanics call them *loros*), the one which is opposite to the rising sun, was now rising on both sides, though the middle remained imperfect, awaiting the final hand: