ABSTRACT

For the topography of Constantinople, I have relied on W. Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon zur Topographie Istanbuls (Tübingen, 1977) and also R. Janin, Constantinople byzantine (Paris, 1964), though this makes relatively little use of Constantine’s text. Also helpful is R. Guilland, Études de topographie de Constantinople byzantine (Berlin and Amsterdam, 1969). Théodore Reinach’s ‘Commentaire archéologique’ to Legrand’s edition in Revue des études grecques 9 (1896), 66–103, is still useful. A. Berger, Untersuchungen zu den Patria Konstantinupoleos, Poikila Byzantina 8 (Bonn, 1988) discusses many of the monuments of Constantinople in the context of the tenth-century Patria.

Asekretis: asekretis of the court, imperial secretary. The title seems to have appeared in the sixth century and to disappear from the sources after the twelfth century. The actual role of the asekretis is unclear. In the ninth-century Kletorologion, they formed the upper echelon of imperial secretaries in thechancellery, ranking below the protoasekretis (ranked 45th in the great officers of the Court) but above the imperial notaries and the dekanos. In the words of Guilland, the position held ‘une certain importance’; in Oikonomides’s phrase, the asekreti had a ‘subaltern’ role. See Kletorologion of Philotheos, 737, 3 in J. B. Bury, The Imperial Administrative System in the Ninth Century (London, 1911), 153 a, 97; R. Guilland, Recherches sur les institutions byzantines (Berlin, 1967), vol. 2, 159 and nn. 75 and 76; N. Oikonomides, Les listes de préséance byzantines? du IXe et Xe siècles (Paris, 1972), 283, 310–311; ODB, vol. 1, ‘Asektretis’.

Of Rhodes. For Constantine of Rhodes, see Downey, ‘Constantine the Rhodian’; Cameron, Greek Anthology; M. D. Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry from Pisides to Geometres. Texts and Contexts, vol. 1 (Vienna, 2003), 116–117; A. Kazhdan, A History of Byzantine Literature, vol. 2 (Athens, 2006), 158–161. For Constantine’s pride in Rhodes and his description of himself as Rhodian, see N. Koutrakou, ‘Universal Spirit and Local Consciousness in the Middle Byzantine Period. The Case of Constantine the Rhodian’, in Rhodes 2,400 Years. The Town of Rhodes from its Foundation to its Turkish Conquest 1523, vol. 2 (Rhodes, n.d.), 485–492 and Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry, 394.

Lines 1–18 form an epigram dedicating the work to the emperor Constantine VII. In the Greek, the initial letters of lines 1–18 form an acrostic reading ‘Κωνσταντίνου Ῥοδίου’, ‘Constantine of Rhodes’. Acrostics 96were a regular feature in hymns, making up either the author’s name or the subject matter, and in gnomologia, collections of pithy maxims, where they often linked chapters and entries, hortatory works and secular encomia, where they often spelt out the name of the recipient, and love songs. H. Hunger, Die hochsprachliche profane Literatur der Byzantiner (Munich, 1978), vol. 2, 165; Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry, 162, 178 on the Byzantines’ love of wordplay.

Line 1. Most powerful Constantine, scion of the purple. This is Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos, born 905, crowned co-emperor 908, died 959. Son of Leo VI, his birth led to the political and ecclesiastical crisis known as the tetragamy controversy. After three previous marriages, Leo had no male heir. Constantine was born to him and his concubine, Zoe Karbonopsina. Leo wanted to legitimise both his son and his relationship through marriage but was fiercely opposed by the patriarch, Nicholas Mystikos. Though Leo eventually had his way, after his death Constantine was excluded from power for almost four decades, initially as a minor and then by his father-in-law, Romanos I Lekapenos. His independent rule began in 945 after the deposition of Romanos’s sons. Constantine was known as ‘Porphyrogennetos’, meaning ‘purple-born’, having been born to a ruling emperor in the purple chamber of the imperial palace (G. Dagron, ‘Nés dans la pourpre’, Traveaux et Mémoires 12 (1994), 105–142). Constantine of Rhodes uses phrases such as ‘scion of the purple’ and ‘son of Leo’ throughout the poem, underlining Constantine VII ’s position as true and hereditary emperor.

Constantine VII was renowned for his work in the systematisation of knowledge and the compilation of encyclopaedic works; he is also said to have been the leading spirit in the so-called ‘Macedonian Renaissance’ and patron of the arts: S. Runciman, The Emperor Romanus Lecapenus and his Reign: A Study of Tenth-Century Byzantium (Cambridge, 1929 and repr. 1988); A. Toynbee, Constantine Porphyrogenitus and his World (Oxford, 1973); P. Lermerle, Le premier humanisme byzantin. Notes et remarques sur enseignement et culture à Byzance des origines au Xe siècle (Paris, 1971), translated as Byzantine Humanism (Canberra, 1986); A. Markopoulos (ed.), Κωνσταντῖνος Ζ´ ὁ Πορφυρογέννητος καὶἡἐpο.ήτïυ Β´Διεθνὴ. ΒυζαντινολογικὴσõνÜνôηóη(Δåλöοß, 22–26 Ἰ.υ.ί.υ1987), (Athens, 1989); I. Ševčenko, ‘Re-reading Constantine Porphyrogenitus’, in J. Shepard and S. Franklin (eds), Byzantine Diplomacy (Aldershot, 1992), 167–198.

Line 5. Swiftest lines of iambs. On iambic metres and their relation to speed and rhythm, commenting on these lines and also on lines 390 and 404–407, see M. Lauxtermann, ‘The Velocity of Pure Iambs’, Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 48 (1998), 9–33, esp. 25. Also Maas, 97‘Der byzantinische Zwölfsilber’, P. Maas, Greek Metre (Oxford, 1962); O. Lampsidis, ‘Σχόλια εἰς τὴν ἀκουστικὴν μετρικὴν Βυζαντινῶν στιχουργῶν ἰαμβικοῦ τριμέτρου᾽, Archeion Pontou 31 (1971–1972) 234–340, M. West, An Introduction to Greek Metre (Oxford, 1987).

Line 7. House: we have consistently translated both δόμος and οἶκος as ‘house’, the literal meaning, reserving ‘church’ for those occasions when Constantine uses ναός.

Line 7. For the church of the Holy Apostles see A. Heisenberg, Grabeskirche und Apostelkirche. Zwei Basiliken Konstantins. Untersuchungen zur Kunst und Literatur des ausgehenden Altertums, Zweiter Teil. Die Apostelkirche in Konstantinopel (Leipzig, 1908); R. Janin, La géographie ecclésiastique de l’empire byzantin. Part 1: Le siège de Constantinople et le patriarcat oecuménique. Vol 3: Les églises et les monastères (Paris, 1953), 46–55, though with almost no reference to Constantine’s poem; Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 405–11.

Line 13. Crown: the topos of a literary crown or garland is a familiar one, found regularly in epigrams and collections of epigrams, above all, perhaps, book epigrams in Byzantium. See Cameron, Greek Anthology, 6–7; Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry, 207. Crowns were also an important part of the imperial insignia, worn in ceremonies and offered to emperors: M. McCormick, Eternal Victory. Triumphal rulership in Late Antiquity, Byazntium and the Early Medieval West (Cambridge, 1986), 210; ODB, vol. 1, ‘Crown’.

Line 14. Muses: there were nine muses in Classical mythology, embodying performed metrical speech in its different forms: by the Hellenic period, they had become fairly standardised as Calliope (epic poetry), Clio (history), Euterpe (lyric poetry), Thalia (comedy and pastoral poetry), Melpomene (tragedy), Terpsichore (dance), Erato (love poetry), Polyhymnia (sacred poetry), Urania (astronomy).

Introduction: prooimion. The first task of the prooimion was to inform the audience of the matter at hand. See M. de Brauw, ‘The Parts of the Speech’, in I. Worthington (ed.), A Companion to Greek Rhetoric (Oxford, 2010), 187–202. This next part, lines 19–254, form the section of the poem on monuments in Constantinople.

A lthough Constantine’s account is sometimes described as being about ‘the seven wonders of Constantinople’ (by Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 37, for example), this is not a description the poet uses. This header, referring to the statues and columns, is a more accurate account of the contents of this part of the poem. The word ‘partial’ suggests that it may well be a later addition to or comment on the text. For discussions of the tradition of seven wonders see K. Brodersen, Reiseführer zu den Sieben Weltwundern. Philo von Byzanz und andere antike Texte (Frankfurt and Leipzig, 1992); for city wonders see H. Saradi, ‘The Kallos 98of the Byzantine City: The Development of a Rhetorical Topos and Historical Reality’, Gesta 34 (1995), 37–56.

In this translation, we have consistently translated στύλος as ‘pillar’ and κίων as ‘column’. I regret that I became aware of S. Kalopissi Verti and M. Panagiotidi (eds.), Polyglōsso eikonographēmeno lexiko horōn vyzantinēs architektonikēs kai glyptikēs /Multilingual Illustrated Dictionary of Byzantine Architecture and Sculpture Terminology (Herakleion, 2010) too late to do anything other than note it here.

Line 19. The city of Constantine is the city of both Constantine the Great, who dedicated the city as capital of the Roman empire in 330, and of Constantine VII.

Line 22. You yourselves… This elaborate metaphor compares four rulers to four stars, to four pillars and to four virtues. It is taken as referring to Constantine’s joint reign with Romanos Lekapenos and his two sons, Stephen and Constantine. The lines 22–25 are used by Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 36 and Downey, ‘Constantine the Rhodian’, 214 and n. 12, among others, to date the entire poem to 931–944. Speck, ‘Konstantinos von Rhodos’, 259–261 and 265, suggests that these lines are a later interpolation, a reading with which Marc Lauxtermann concurs: ‘Constantine’s City. Constantine the Rhodian and the Beauty of Constantinople’, in L. James and A. Eastmond (eds), Wonderful Things: Byzantium through its Art (Aldershot, 2012), though see also the comments of Ioannis Vassis in his Introduction to the Greek Edition and of Liz James in Chapter 4.

Line 24. The reference here to four pillars may also refer to the four columns that Constantine goes on to describe: the column with the statue of Justinian; the porphyry column of Constantine; the column with the cross on it; the column of Theodosios.

Line 25. The four cardinal virtues were courage, righteousness, prudence in the sense of moderation and prudence in the sense of good sense: ODB, vol. 3, ‘Virtue’; A. Kazhdan and S. Franklin, Studies on Byzantine Literature of the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries (Cambridge, 1984), 24–27.

Line 28. My all-glorious emperor is Leo VI .

Line 29. Marvellous, ξένος. We have consistently translated ξένος as ‘marvellous’ rather than ‘strange’, wishing to emphasise Constantine’s focus on wonders.

Line 32. Dome-fashioned, σφαιροσύνθετος, is a compound seemingly invented by Constantine and repeated at 503 and 610. For σφαῖρα as ‘dome’ see Downey, ‘Post-Classical Greek Architectural Terms’, 25. We have consistently translated it as ‘dome’.

99Line 32. For colonnades, στοά, see G. Downey, ‘The Architectural Significance of the use of the Words Stoa and Basilike in Classical Literature’, American Journal of Archaeology 41 (1937), 194–211 and Downey, ‘Post-Classical Greek Architectural Terms’, 24–28, making the point that ‘stoa’ could refer to any colonnaded building.

Line 33. Honorific columns were erected in Constantinople, especially in the fourth and fifth centuries, for commemorative purposes, in continuation of Roman custom. There seem to have been two basic sorts of honorific column, the monolithic shaft on a base supporting a capital and a statue and those with a shaft composed of drums, plus base, capital and statue. These last frequently had the base and shaft carved in relief and figures on a spiral frieze running up the shaft. Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 52–55; G. Becatti, La colonna coclide Istoriata (Rome, 1960).

Line 34. The Forum of Taurus, also known as the Forum of Theodosios, was the first forum to the west of Constantine’s Forum, corresponding to modern Beyazit. It was laid out by Theodosios I (emperor 379–395), perhaps, as Mango suggests, in imitation of Trajan’s Forum in Rome: Theodosios saw himself as a descendant of Trajan. The forum had a triumphal arch at each end (parts of the west one are preserved and line the street of Ordu Caddesi at Beyazit), a basilica, many statues and, on the axis, a monumental column, where the reception of ambassadors took place. It was inaugurated in 393. The column was that of Theodosios I, described by Constantine at lines 202–240. Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 258–265, 273; C. Mango, Le développement urbain de Constantinople (Paris, 1985), 28, 43–45; F. A. Bauer, Stadt, Platz und Denkmal in der Spätantike (Mainz, 1996), 187–203; A. Berger, ‘Tauros e Sigma: due piazze di Costantinopoli’, in M. Bonfioli, R. Favioli Companati and A. Garzya (eds), Bisanzio e l’Occidente: arte, archeologia, istoria. Studi in onore di Fernanda de’Maffei (Rome, 1996), 19–24; J. Bardill, Brickstamps of Constantinople (Oxford, 2004), vol. 1, 28 and nn. 19 and 130. For discussion of the scale of the forum, see A. Berger, ‘Streets and Public Spaces in Constantinople’, DOP 54 (2000), 167–168.

Line 34. The Xerolophos was both the region of the seventh hill of the city, situated in the west of Constantinople and the name given to the column and statue of Arkadios (son of Theodosios I, emperor 395–408) in the Forum of Arkadios located on the southern branch of the Mese. See also the note under line 241. Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 250–253; Mango, Le développement urbain, 28, 43, 45; Berger, Untersuchungen, 356–358; Bauer, Stadt, 203–212.

Line 35. The column with the cross. This was one of the three monumental crosses erected by Constantine the Great in the city, one beneath his triumphal arch, one in the Philadelphion and one in the Artopoleion or Bakers’ Quarters: 100Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 267 and G. Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire. Études sur le recueil des ‘Patria’ (Paris, 1984), 88. Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 43, and Mango, Le développement urbain, 28–29 and n. 37, believe the column described by Constantine of Rhodes to be the one in the Philadelphion. If Constantine’s monuments are described sequentially, however, it is more likely to be either the one in the Forum of Constantine or that in the Artopoleion.

Line 37. The column worked of bronze was Justinian’s column. It was actually brick, sheathed in marble and bronze: Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 52; C. Mango, ‘The Columns of Justinian and his Successors’, Study X in Studies in Constantinople, 4 and Bardill, Brickstamps, 53.

Line 38. The Wisdom of God is the church of Hagia Sophia, Holy Wisdom. The original basilica church was built by Constantius II close to the Great Palace and the Hippodrome. It was rebuilt by Theodosios II and then destroyed in the Nika riots of 532. Isidore of Miletus and Anthemios of Tralles reconstructed it as a domed basilica in the reign of Justinian. Prokopios, Buildings I, 1.21–78, text and trans. by H. B. Dewing (Cambridge, MA, 1940), gives an account of the technical difficulties in the building; Paul the Silentiary, ed. P. Friedländer, Johannes von Gaza und Paulus Silentarius (Leipzig and Berlin, 1912), partially translated in C. Mango, Art of the Byzantine Empire. Sources and Documents 330–1453 (Toronto, 1974), 80–96, provides a sixth-century account of the appearance of the church. It was the largest and most important church in the city, the ceremonial and liturgical focus. From a vast literature, see R. Mainstone, Hagia Sophia. Architecture, Structure and Liturgy of Justinian’s Great Church (London, 1988).

Line 43. Justinian. The statue of Justinian (emperor between 527 and 565) is also described at lines 364–372. It stood outside Hagia Sophia in the Augustaion, an enclosed open space south of the church which separated the church from the palace, a courtyard of restricted access. It commemorated Justinian’s victories over the Persians. Although A. Grabar, L’empereur dans l’art byzantin (Paris, 1936), 46–47, suggested that it was the last equestrian statue to be erected in the city, it may also be the case that Justinian reused a statue, perhaps one of Theodosios I or II , perhaps one of Arkadios. See Downey, ‘Notes on the Topography of Constantinople’, 235; P. W. Lehmann, ‘Theodosius or Justinian? A Renaissance Drawing of a Byzantine Rider’, Art Bulletin 41 (1959), 39–58 and C. Mango’s response, ‘Justinian’s Equestrian Statue: A Letter to the Editor’, Art Bulletin 41 (1959), 1–16. Prokopios described the statue in Buildings I, 2.11–12 in a similar way to Constantine, though he said that Justinian was ‘dressed as Achilles’ (G. Downey, ‘Justinian as Achilles’, Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association 71 (1940), 68–77). Kedrenos’s account, George Kedrenos, Synopsis Historion, edited by I. Bekker, Georgius Cedrenus, 101 Ioannis Scylitzae Operae (Bonn, Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae, 1838)), vol. 1, 556, also echoes that of Constantine, from whom it may have been derived. The statue itself was removed by Mehmet II; Pierre Gilles, The Antiquities of Constantinople, based on the Translation by John Ball 1729 (New York, 1988), 96–98, saw and measured bits of it lying in the Seraglio grounds between 1544 and 1550; it was then melted down. The column on which it was mounted was toppled in c.1515. See Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 248–249; Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire, 209, 261 n. 220 and Plate V; A. Cutler, ‘The De Signis of Nicetas Choniates. A Reappraisal’, American Journal of Archaeology 72 (1968), 114–115; Bauer, Stadt, 154–167; Berger, Untersuchungen, 238–240; and, above all, C. Mango, ‘Columns of Justinian and his Successors’, esp. 1–8 and fig. 1.

Line 44. Golden crown and marvellous crest. A fifteenth-century drawing probably records the statue and the crest in all its glory (it is used as the frontispiece to the Loeb translation of Prokopios’s Buildings). The drawing appears to have come from the circle of Cyriacus of Ancona (though see Mango, ‘Justinian and his Successors’, 6–7) and is now in the University Library of Budapest.

Line 48. Wonders. The use of θαῦμα, ‘wonder’, in descriptions of cities is a standard literary theme. Constantine’s seven are monuments rather than places. See Downey, ‘Constantine the Rhodian’, 216–217 and n. 27; Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire, 13, 42; Berger, Untersuchungen, 153–155. Although Constantine does detail seven monuments as wonders, he does not explicitly state that his poem is focused on a theme of seven wonders. Seven was the number of Wisdom with her seven pillars (Proverbs 9, 1) and of the Holy Spirit. As well as its apocalyptic connotations, the number seven, certainly by the thirteenth century, was known as παρθένος because it could only be divided by one: see Downey’s comment in Nikolaos Mesarites, Description of the Church of the Holy Apostles at Constantinople. Edited and translated by G. Downey, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 47, 6 (1957), 895, n. 8.

Line 51. The famous pillar in the Forum is the porphyry column of Constantine.

Line 53. The porphyry column. This is the oldest of the five columns described by Constantine, the Chronicon Pascale giving 328 as its date of erection. It was also known as the Purple Column or the Column of Constantine, and was put up, as Rhodios says, by Constantine the Great in his circular forum, the first forum to the west along the Mese. It was made of seven drums of porphyry, with a pedestal. Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 40; C. Mango, ‘Constantinopolitana’, Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 80 (1965), 306–313; Mango, ‘Constantine’s Porphyry Column and the Chapel of St Constantine’, Deltion 102tes Christianikes Archaeologikes Hetaireias ser. 4, 10 (1981), 103–110; Mango, ‘Constantine’s Column’, Study III in Mango, Studies on Constantinople (Ashgate, 1993). The column still survives in its original location in Istanbul, in a mutilated state, with a twelfth-century capital, where it is known as the Burnt Column or Çemberlitaş. Porphyry was the hardest stone known to antiquity. It was extracted in Upper Egypt from Mons Porphyrites until the mid-fifth century when the quarries were abandoned. It varies in colour from red to purple and was increasingly reserved for imperial use, especially during the tetrarchy and the reign of Constantine the Great. See R. Gnoli, Marmora romana (rev. edn Rome, 1988), 122–133; M. J. Klein, Untersuchungen zu den kaiserlichen Steinbrüchen an Mons Porphyrites und Mons Claudianus in der östlichen Wüste Ägyptens (Bonn, 1988); D. Peacock and V. Maxfield, The Roman Imperial Quarries: Excavations – Survey and Excavation at Mons Porphyrites 1994–1998 (London, 2007).

Line 61. Sceptre. Constantine’s reiterated stress on the sceptre as a key part of imperial regalia (see also lines 73, 279 and 379, as well as references to it as part of Christ’s regalia in lines 465 and 952) appears unusual. Sceptres are usually said to have played a minor part in Byzantine ceremonial before the eleventh century, though see Book of Ceremonies, vol. 1, 1 (A. Vogt, Le livre des cérémonies (2 vols, Paris 1935–1940), trans.: 12; and commentary, 49). ODB, vol. 3, ‘Scepter’ suggests that where sceptres feature on coins, it is as symbols of imperial authority rather than actual regalia. Sceptres do not appear on coins from the reigns of either Leo VI or Constantine VII. An ivory fragment now in Berlin was identified as part of a sceptre belonging to Leo VI: K. Corrigan, ‘The Ivory Sceptre of Leo VI: A Statement of Post-Iconoclastic Imperial Ideology’, Art Bulletin 60 (1978), 407–416; but in M. Vassilaki and R. Cormack (eds), Byzantium 330–1453 (London, 2009), cat. no. 69, p. 398, Gudrun Bühl suggests that it was a comb.

Line 61. Rome. Constantine I called his city of Constantinople a ‘second Rome’ and the designation of the city as new Rome was common from the sixth century on, reflecting the transfer of imperial power.

Line 63. Atlas was the primordial titan who supported the celestial sphere (see, for example, Hesiod, Theogony, 517–519).

Line 64. The statue of Constantine. The porphyry column bore a statue of Constantine the Great holding a spear and a globe and wearing a radiate crown of seven rays. The statue blew off the column in 1105 and was replaced with a cross. It has been suggested that the statue was originally one of Apollo Helios, reused by Constantine, though Mango, ‘Constantine’s Column’, believes that it was made specifically for the column. See also Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 40; 103Berger, Untersuchungen, 297–298; S. Bassett, The Urban Image of Late Antique Constantinople (Cambridge, 2004), 192–204.

Line 69. Gold. The statue itself was bronze: Mango, ‘Constantine’s Column’: 2; Constantine’s description may imply that it was gilded.

Lines 71–74. The inscription on the column: another version is given by Kedrenos, I, 564. See the discussion of Preger, ‘Review’ and Lauxtermann, ‘Constantine’s City’, on how the differences between the text here and Kedrenos’s account indicate an alternative version of Constantine’s poem.

Line 76. Twelve baskets. These are the relics from the Feeding of the Five Thousand (Matthew 14, 13–21; Mark 6, 31–44; Luke 9, 10–17; John 6, 5–15 – the only one of Christ’s miracles recorded in all four gospels). Constantine does not mention the other relics, both pagan and Christian, that Constantine the Great was said to have placed beneath his column, including the Palladium of Troy and Noah’s axe. Because of the presence of these relics, the column was seen as a sacred defender of the city. See Mango, ‘Constantine’s Column’; J. Wortley, ‘The Legend of Constantine the Relic-Provider’, in R. B. Egan and M. A. Joyal (eds), Daimonopylai. Essays in Classics and the Classical Tradition presented to Edmund G. Berry (Winnipeg, Manitoba, 2004), 287–496; Bassett, Urban Image, 205–206.

Line 91. The Senate. The name ‘Senate’ was given to two buildings in Constantinople, construction of which was usually ascribed, as here, to Constantine the Great. There is no evidence that the assembly of Senators used either building. Both were splendid buildings adorned with statues of emperors and mythological figures. One was located to the east of the Augustaion and burned down in 404. It was restored, again destroyed by fire in 532, and rebuilt by Justinian. The one described here by Constantine was a domed structure in the north part of the Forum of Constantine, which was ravaged by fire in the reign of Leo I: Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 55–57; Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 255–256; Berger, Untersuchungen, 300; L. Rydén, ‘The Date of the Life of Andreas Salos’, DOP 32 (1978), 137–138; Bassett, Urban Image, 30–31; A. Berger, ‘Die Senate von Konstantinopel’, Boreas 18 (1995), 131–142.

Line 94. Vault, ἁψίς. According to Downey, ‘Architectural Terms’, 28–29, ἁψὶς can mean either ‘vault’ or ‘arch’, emphasis lying on the curving nature of the structure. We have used ‘vault’ throughout in our translation.

Line 98. Dye of Tyrian shellfish. Purple in other words, since purple dye was derived from the murex shellfish and was famously made in the cities of Tyre and Sidon. The use of the dye and the manufacture of purple cloth were strictly controlled. M. Reinhold, The History of Purple as a Status Symbol in Antiquity (Brussels, 1970); G. Steigerwald, ‘Die Purpursorten im Preisedikt Diokletians 104vom Jahre 301’, ByzF 15 (1990), 219–276, esp. 229–233 on Tyrian purple. Porphyry columns are thus indicated.

Line 101. The Forum: that is, the Forum of Constantine.

Line 104. The north … the south. Constantine uses Notus and Boreas for the North and South winds. These have a Homeric resonance (for example, Odyssey 5, 295) but are used by Aristotle (see Meteorologica 2, 6, 363a–365a) and were widely used in Byzantine literature.

Line 105. Envy, φθόνος, was closely associated with the devil and can be defined as ‘sorrow over the well-being of somebody else’: M. Hinterberger, ‘Emotions in Byzantium’, in L. James (ed.), A Companion to Byzantium (Oxford, 2010), 123–134, esp. 130–131.

Line 106. Fire was a recurrent hazard in Constantinople: P. Magdalino, ‘Constantinopolitana’, in I. Ševčenko and I. Hutter (eds), Aetos: Studies in Honour of Cyril Mango Presented to him on April 14, 1998 (Stuttgart and Leipzig, 1998), 227–228. Evagrios in his Ecclesiastical History gives a very full account of a great fire in 465, though the Chronicon Pascale records two fires, one in 464 and another in 469. For discussion of these dates, see Evagrius Scholasticus, Ecclesiastical History, trans. M. Whitby (Liverpool, 2000), 96 and n. 139; and Chronicon Pascale, trans. M. Whitby and M. Whitby (Liverpool, 1989), 87 and n. 285, and 91 and n. 296.

Lines 105–110. Leo, Verina and Basiliskos. Leo is Leo I, emperor 457–474; Verina, his wife, Aelia Verina, d.484; and Basiliskos her brother, who usurped power between 475 and 476. Orthodox tradition portrayed Leo and Verina as pious and God-fearing and Basiliskos as heretically opposed to the Church Council of Chalcedon. See L. James, Empresses and Power in Early Byzantium (London, 2001), 96–97. Paul Stephenson suggests that these lines contain a reference to Psalm 91, (92) 13: https://homepage.mac.com/paulstephenson/trans/ConstantinetheRhodianSenateHouse.html (accessed 26/9/11).

Lines 121 and 119. The order of the Greek is syntactically unproblematic, but the lines need to be taken out of sequence to work in English.

Line 121–122. White columns from Prokonnesos, the largest island in the Sea of Marmara, famous for its quarries of blue-tinged marble. Prokonnesian marble was the commonest marble used in Byzantine buildings. Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 263–264; ed. G. Borghini, Marmi antichi (Rome, 2001), 252; J. Clayton Fant, Ancient Marble Quarrying and Trade (Oxford, 1988). These white columns perhaps formed part of Constantine I’s original forum as Zosimus, Historia 2.30, ed. L. Mendelssohn (Leipzig, 1887), noted that the triumphal arches giving access to these arcades were also of Proconnesian marble: Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 58.

Line 119. That porphyry pillar is Constantine the Great’s column again.

105Line 128. Artemis of the Ephesians. Artemis was the daughter of Zeus and Leto and sister of Apollo. At Ephesos, her most famous shrine in Asia Minor, she was venerated as a multi-breasted fertility goddess: A. Bammer, Das Heiligtum der Artemis von Ephesos (Graz, 1984). Her worship was attacked by St Paul, Acts, 19, 27. Kedrenos I, 565, suggests that the doors were given by Trajan to the temple as a souvenir from his Dacian wars.

Line 130. Sculpted, πλαστήν, can also, appropriately enough in this context, mean ‘counterfeit’.

Line 130. The battle of the Giants. This passage offers an opportunity for Constantine to display his Classical learning. The Gigantomachy or Battle of the Giants with the gods was a story formulated in archaic epics and elaborated by later writers, notably Apollodorus. To defeat the giants, the gods needed the help of a mortal, Herakles, who killed many giants with his arrows. Zeus employed the thunderbolt, Apollo his bow and Poseidon crushed giants with whole mountains. The battle was a popular scene in Classical art, especially on temple pediments; the gods most commonly shown are Zeus, Poseidon, Herakles and, later, Athena. The giants were first portrayed as warriors or wild men but later as snake-legged monsters, as they are on the Pergamum altar. F. Vian, La Guerre des géants: le mythe avant l’époque hellénistique (Paris, 1952); H. Heres, Der Pergamonaltar (Mainz, 2004). The tenth-century Life of Andrew the Fool, where the sculptures appear as symbols of idolatry, describes the scene in very similar language to that employed by Constantine: Rydén, ‘The Date of the Life’, 136–141; and L. Rydén (ed. and trans.), The Life of St Andrew the Fool (Uppsala, 1995), vol. 2, 140–143, lines 1921–1933. Also see H. Maguire, ‘The Profane Aesthetic in Byzantine Art and Literature’, DOP 53 (1999), 191, making a link between the iconography of the doors and an image of giants in a tenth-century manuscript of Nikander’s Theriaka (Paris, B.N. gr. 247, fol. 47r); P. Stephenson, ‘Staring at Serpents in Tenth-Century Constantinople, or, Some Comments on Judgement in the Life of St Andrew the Fool ’, Bysantinska Sälskapet Bulletin 28 (2010), 59–81. My thanks to Paul Stephenson for this reference. K. Weitzmann, Greek Mythology in Byzantine Art (Princeton, 1951), 83, suggests that most Byzantines were familiar with Apollodoros.

Line 131. Hellenes (‘Greeks’) is used by Constantine to indicate pagans. The Byzantines called themselves Romans: P. J. Alexander, ‘The Strength of Empire and Capital as seen through Byzantine Eyes’, Speculum 37 (1962), 340; A. Garzya, ‘Visages de l’hellénisme dans le monde byzantin (IVe – XIIe siècles)’, B 55 (1985), 463–482; A. Kaldellis, Hellenism in Byzantium (Cambridge, 2007), 173–187.

Line 133. Zeus, king of the Greek gods, whose weapon was the thunderbolt.

106Line 134. Poseidon, brother of Zeus and lord of the sea, who carried a trident.

Line 135. Apollo, son of Zeus, among whose responsibilities were prophecy, music and poetry, and who was also an archer.

Lines 136–137. Herakles, son of Zeus by the mortal woman Alkmene, recognisable by his lion-skin and club.

Line 147. Race of Hellas: see above, line 131.

Line 150. Constantine is Constantine the Great again. For his bringing statues to Constantinople, see Eusebios, Life of Constantine III , 54.1–7. On Constantine’s removal of statues to Constantinople more generally, C. Mango, ‘Antique Statuary and the Byzantine Beholder’, DOP 17 (1963), 55–75; Bassett, Urban Image, ch. 3.

Lines 151–152. A plaything … and a butt of laughter. This disclaimer echoes Eusebios, Life of Constantine III , 54. 3, which describes the pagan statues brought by Constantine to Constantinople as ‘toys for the laughter and amusement of the spectators’, a theme he developed elsewhere, including Ecclesiastical History, 10.4, 16.

Line 155. Stretching out her hand: this gesture would later prove the statue’s downfall when, in 1203, the Constantinopolitans toppled her, believing she was inviting the armies of the Fourth Crusade into the city: Niketas Choniates, Historia, ed. J. A. van Dieten (Berlin, 1975), 559–560; Mango, ‘Antique Statuary’, 58, 62; Cutler, ‘The De Signis ’.

Line 156. An image of Pallas. Pallas Athena was the daughter of Zeus, patron deity of Athens, and the virgin goddess of war and crafts. Several statues of Athena in Constantinople were identified by different authors as being the Lindian Athena: E. D. Francis and M. Vickers, ‘Amasis and Lindos’, Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 31 (1984), 119–130. One, perhaps of green marble, formed part of the Lausiac Palace collection; another was located in front of the Senate House in the Augusteon; there was also the 30-foot high statue of Athena in the Forum of Constantine described by Niketas Choniates, De Signis, 738. However, confusion over which statue of the goddess was in front of which Senate House is apparent in Byzantine sources. Zosimos, History, 5.24,7 said that the Lindian Athena was in front of the Senate House in the Augusteaon; Kedrenos 1, 565 (probably taken from Constantine’s poem) and Niketas Choniates that it was in front of the Senate in the Forum of Constantine. See Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 58–60; Bassett, Urban Image, 149 and 188–192; Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire, 129 and nn. 9 and 11; Berger, Untersuchungen, 300. R. Jenkins, ‘The Bronze Athena at Byzantium’, Journal of Hellenic Studies 67 (1947), 31–33 and Plate X and also ‘Further Evidence regarding the Bronze Athena at Byzantium’, Annual of the British School at 107Athens 46 (1951), 72–74, attempted to link the statue with Pheidias’s statue of Athena Promachos from the Parthenon, rather than with the Lindian Athena.

Line 156: Lindians. Lindos was the capital city of Rhodes, Constantine’s own island. There had been an ancient cult there associated with Athena, known from an inscription from the temple.

Lines 159–160. Helmet, Gorgon and snakes. The statue seems to have been of a warlike, helmeted Athena wearing a helmet and her aegis, a goatskin breastplate bearing the Gorgon’s head and twisted with snakes.

Title of lines 163–177: because of its location at this point in the poem, the column that bears the cross was almost certainly not that one located in the Philadelphion (Mango, Le développement urbain, 28–30), a lavishly decorated section of the Mese just before it divided into two roads. If the monuments follow each other in a sequential route through Constantinople, it was one of the two other crosses erected by Constantine, one beneath his triumphal arch (Parastaseis Syntomoi Chronikai 16 and Patria 2, 102, p. 205) and one in a courtyard near the Artopoleion or Bakers’ Quarters, known as the Staurion (Parastaseis 52 and Patria 2, 64, p. 185; also Janin, Constantinople byzantine, 63 and 70). Berger has identified this cross on a column with the column of Phokas near the church of the 40 Martyrs. See A. Berger, ‘Zur Topographie der Ufergegend am Goldenen Horn in der byzantinischen Zeit’, Istanbuler Mitteilungen 45 (1995), 153; P. Magdalino, ‘Aristocratic oikoi in the Tenth and Eleventh Regions of Constantinople’, in N. Necipoğlu (ed.), Byzantine Constantinople: Monuments, Topography and Everyday Life (Leiden, 2001), 65. My thanks to Paul Magdalino for advice about the Staurion.

Line 174. Hades was the ancient ruler of the underworld, brother of Zeus and Poseidon. In Byzantine literature, Hades symbolised both the underworld as an equivalent to Christian hell and as the place where the dead congregated, and was used as the personification of death as a symbol for the tyranny of human mortality. In representations of the Anastasis (the descent of Christ to hell), the bound figure below Christ’s feet represented Hades rather than the Devil. See A. D. Kartsonis, Anastasis. The Making of an Image (Princeton, 1986).

Line 181. The bronze construction: ὑποστήριγμα is literally ‘underprop’. This bronze pyramid seems to be recorded by other sources under the name of the Anemodoulion, a monumental, pyramidal weathervane. It was located between the Artopoleion (Janin, Constantinople byzantine, 315) and the Forum of Taurus. Although Constantine described the figure on top as a monstrous bronze creature, Niketas Choniates, De Signis 4, described it as a woman. The Anemodoulion was destroyed in 1204 by the Crusaders. See Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 54; Janin, Constantinople byzantine, 100, with no reference to 108Constantine of Rhodes, but see Downey, ‘Topography of Constantinople’, 235–236; the remarks in Mango, Art of the Byzantine Empire, 44 n. 114; Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire, 131; Rydén, ‘The Date of the Life’, 139–140, and the relevant text in Rydén, The Life of St Andrew the Fool, vol. 2, 140–143, lines 1934–1951. For debate about whether the Anemodoulion was the same monument as the bronze tetrapylon, see Mango, ‘Columns of Justinian’, 5 and n. 14 and A. Berger, ‘Das Chalkun Tetrapylon und Parastaseis, Kapitel 57’, BZ 90 (1997), 7–12. On the Anemodoulion as an eighth-century embellishment of a Late Antique tetrapylon, see B. Anderson, ‘Leo III and the Anemodoulion’, BZ 104 (2011), 41–54.

Line 183 Tiara, τιάρα, is the word for the specific Persian headdress known as a tiara which took the form of a truncated cone.

Line 184. Great Theodosios is Theodosios I in this instance and throughout the poem. This attribution is repeated by Kedrenos (1, 565–566), perhaps deriving his account from Constantine’s. The Patria, 3, 114, however, ascribes the Anemodoulion to Leo III. See Berger, Untersuchungen, 322–323.

Line 190. Naked Erotes. Constantine also uses γυμνὸ. at line 928 to describe Christ on the cross. Erotes (sometimes translated as and seen as putti, as we understand that term in its Renaissance context) were small, naked, male figures used in Classical and classicising art.

Line 193. In contrast, ἔμπαλιν, might also mean ‘on the other side’.

Lines 200–201. The winds. The north, south and east winds are again named as Notus, Boreas, and Euros, as was common practice in Byzantine literature. In Modern Greek, libas is used for a very hot southerly wind, most notably a summer wind, but see also Aristotle, Meteorologica, 2, 6, 363a–365a, where the Lips, λίψ, is a south-westerly autumn wind.

Line 202. The column of Taurus. This is the marble Theodosian Column, apparently set up by Theodosios I and Arkadios in the Forum Tauri, celebrating Theodosios’s victories over the Goths. Theophanes, Chronographia, AM 5878, dates this to 386, but Mango, Le développement urbain, 43, n. 36 says this date should be treated with caution. See also J. Bardill, ‘The Golden Gate in Constantinople: A Triumphal Arch of Theodosios I’, American Journal of Archaeology 103 (1999), 694–695. The column had a spiral decoration, similar in many ways to Trajan’s Column. Several authors including Constantine of Rhodes (line 212) insist that it had an internal staircase, as does Trajan’s Column and as did the Column of Arkadios, allowing exit on to the top. The statue on top may have been dislodged in an earthquake of 480 and replaced with a statue of Anastasios, removed in 512 when images of that emperor were destroyed. See Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 44–45; Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 258–265; Becatti, La Colonna, 83–150. Parts of the column now appear to be built into the baths 109at Beyazit: S. Sande, ‘Some New Fragments from the Column of Theodosius’, Acta ad Αrchaeologiam et Artium Historiam Pertinentia 8, 1 (1981), 1–78; Berger, ‘Tauros e Sigma’.

Line 203. Arkadios, the son of Theodosios I, born in 377/378, made Augustus in 383 and succeeded his father as co-emperor with his brother Honorios in 395.

Line 205. Trophies, that is to say victories, since a trophy was set up by the victor on the battlefield from the armour and standards left behind by the defeated.

Line 207. Well-arranged, συντεταγμέναι might also imply very tight decoration, as is the case on Trajan’s Column. Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 44–45, suggested that drawings in the Louvre represent this column but Mango believes this is unlikely.

Line 209. Scythians: Byzantine writers used the term ‘Scythian’ to denote all nomadic peoples whom they encountered, from Huns to Avars, Seljuks, Ottomans and Mongols. Also see L. Simeonova, ‘Foreigners in tenthcentury Byzantium’ in D. C. Smythe, (ed.), Strangers to Themselves: the Byzantine Outsider (Ashgate, 2000), 229–244.

Line 220. Theodosios I again. The Chronicon Pascale, 565, records the erection of a statue of Theodosios in this forum in 394. Mango, Le développement urbain, 43, n. 36, is uncertain whether this is the equestrian statue described here or the one on top of the column. See also Bardill, ‘Golden Gate’, 694. The Great Chronographer records that the statue of Theodosios on top of the column fell in an earthquake in 478 (see Whitby and Whitby, Chronicon Pascale, 55, n. 174, and Appendix 2, 194). Whitby and Whitby appear to believe that the equestrian statue and the statue on top of the column were the same and that this statue was reused in the equestrian statue of Justinian outside Hagia Sophia. Constantine’s descriptions of both of these statues appearing to exist simultaneously make this scenario improbable. Constantine’s description of the statue here on the street (line 221) pointing to the column (line 239) makes it clear that there was no statue on top of the column in his day. See also Bassett, Urban Image, 208–211. An epigram found only in the Planudean Anthology (see AP 16, 65) may relate to this statue.

Line 221. Step, ἀκρόβαθμος, may also mean ‘plinth’.

Line 221. The great street: the Mese, or ‘Middle Way’, the main street of Byzantine Constantinople running from the Milion, the first milestone of the empire, located in the Augusteion, to the city walls, and connecting the major fora of the city: Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 269.

Line 225. Maximos. Magnus Maximus was commander of troops in Britain under the emperor Gratian, who was proclaimed Augustus by those 110troops in 383. Crossing the Channel, he killed Gratian, gained control of Gaul and Spain and was recognised as emperor by Theodosios I. In 387, he invaded Italy, where he was defeated in battle near Aquileia in 388 by Theodosios and executed.

Line 226. The Scythians in Thrace. The Scythians here are the Goths (P. Heather, ‘The Anti-Scythian Tirade of Synesius’ De Regno ’, Phoenix 42 (1988), 152–172). In 376, the Goths had moved into the Roman Empire; in 378, they defeated and killed the emperor Valens at Adrianople; in 382, a peace treaty was signed between the Goths and Romans, ending the Gothic war. Bardill, Brickstamps, 28, following Theophanes, Chronographia, AM 5878, suggests that the column commemorated the victory of Theodosios’ general, Promotus, over the Goths in 386 and that this is what the sculptures depicted. The orator Themistius was keen to give all credit for success in the Gothic wars to Theodosios rather than share it with Theodosios’ co-emperor Gratian; Constantine’s account here suggests that this was the version that survived. See P. Heather, Goths and Romans 332–489 (Oxford, 1991), chs 4 and 5.

Line 227. The horse. Bassett, Urban Image, 93, suggests that this may have been a reused equestrian statue of Hadrian. It and the statue were bronze.

Line 231. ‘Thinks’ has been moved up from line 234.

Title of lines 241–254. The Xerolophos: the Column of Arkadios, erected by Arkadios in the Forum of Arkadios (which was also sometimes known as the Xerolophos) on the seventh hill in the twelfth region of the city. The Forum was established in 402–403 by Arkadios. A statue of Arkadios was placed on top of the column by his son, Theodosios II in 421; this statue fell to the ground during an earthquake in 740. The base was covered with relief sculptures; spiral reliefs coiled up its length. All that remains now is the unadorned base. Gilles, The Antiquities of Constantinople, 4, 7, recorded some of the dimensions of the column; the sculptures are recorded only in the sixteenth-century drawings of Melchior Lorck (Lorichs) and the anonymous sixteenth-century drawings published by E. H. Freshfield, ‘Notes on a Vellum Album containing some Original Sketches of Public Buildings and Monuments, Drawn by a German Artist who Visited Constantinople in 1574’, Archaeologia 72 (1922), 87–104. See Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 49; Mango, Le développement urbain, 43; Müller-Wiener, Bildlexikon, 250–253; Becatti, La Colonna, 151–264. For a ninth-century account, see G. Dagron and J. Paramelle, ‘Un texte patriographique: “Le recit merveilleux, très beau et profitable sur la colonne du Xerolophos” (Vindob. suppl. Gr. 172, fol. 43v–63v)’, Travaux et Mémoires 7 (1979), 491–523; they date this text to the reign of Leo VI. For a discussion of the imagery of the column, see S. G. MacCormack, Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity (Berkeley, 1981), 56–61; J. H. W. G. Liebschuetz, Barbarians and Bishops (Oxford, 1990), 111120–122 and 273–278, suggesting, as Reinach did, that the reliefs depicted the campaign against the rebel Gothic general Gainas in 400.

Line 244. The pillar of Taurus is the column of Theodosios in the Forum of Theodosios (the Forum of Taurus).

Line 250. The golden gates: there were two gates in Constantinople known as ‘golden’. Pace Reinach (‘Commentaire’, 51), I take it here that Constantine used the plural deliberately, referring to both. The site of the Golden Gate of Constantine the Great, the Gate of Satourninos, on his wall of the city, is marked today by the mosque called İsakapı mescidi. The Golden Gate of Theodosios (usually understood as Theodosios II, but see Bardill, ‘Golden Gate’, on its transition from arch to gate and the date of this) is at the south end of the Theodosian Land Walls and was used for triumphal entries and other imperial occasions: Müller-Weiner, Bildlexikon, 297–300; C. Mango, ‘The Triumphal Way of Constantinople and the Golden Gate’, DOP 54 (2000), 175–176 and 181–182.

Lines 252–254. The Column of Theodosios is said to be in the centre of the city, guarding that, whilst the Column of Arkadios guards the walls and gates.

Line 257. Remaining statues. Constantine’s comment that statues were ‘set up everywhere’ ties in with what is known of Constantine the Great’s filling of the city with statues. Mango, ‘Antique Statuary’, 58, has estimated that by the Middle Byzantine period, perhaps over 100 such statues survived in the city. In editing the Palatine Anthology, Constantine would also have been aware of poems such as Christodoros’s on the statues in the Baths of Zeuxippos (AP 2) describing statuary in Constantinople.

Line 258. Theatre. By the tenth century, theatron was sometimes used to denote the Hippodrome; theatres, in the Classical sense, had ceased to exist: R. Webb, Dancers and Demons. Performance in Late Antiquity (Princeton, 2009). The original theatre of Constantinople may have been located on the Akropolis, near the Temple of Aphrodite and the Kynegion: G. Martigny, ‘The Great Theatre, Byzantium’, Antiquity 12 (1938), 89–93.

Line 258. The Golden Forum is the Forum of Theodosios.

Line 259. The Strategion was one of the two great squares of the original Greco-Roman city, incorporated by Constantine the Great into his plan for Constantinople. It was located in the fifth region of the city in the area of Sirkeci station, perhaps close to the sea: Mango, Le développement urbain, 19–20; ‘The Development of Constantinople as an Urban Centre’, 17th International Byzantine Congress. Main Papers (Washington, DC, 1986), 123; ‘Triumphal Way’, 177–178 and the appendix to this paper, ‘On the Situation of the Strategion’, 187–188; also Berger, ‘Streets and Public Spaces in Constantinople’, 112165. It seems to have been the area where generals received military honours or where forces were exercised. The Patria (II, 61 and III, 24) notes statues in the Strategion: Berger, Untersuchungen, 406–408, 411 and P. Magdalino, Constantinople médiévale. Études sur l’évolution des structures urbaines (Paris, 1996), 51 and n. 3.

Line 287. Melody, μέλος, refers specifically to the song of the nightingale, the songbird above all others.

Line 288. Orpheus was the great musician of Classical mythology, son of Apollo and a Muse, whose playing could charm both the living and the dead.

Line 289. Iambic trimeters have three metres, each of two feet.

Line 294. Zeus in Classical mythology was renowned for his sexual conquests.

Line 295. The abduction of Demeter’s daughter: the rape of Persephone by Hades.

Line 297. Kybele, the Anatolian mother-goddess and Attis her slain lover. Kybele was a prominent deity in Roman religion, renowned for frenzied religious celebrations supposedly involving ecstatic states and self-castration: M. Beard, ‘The Roman and the Foreign: The Cult of the “Great Mother” in Imperial Rome’, in N. Thomas and C. Humphrey (eds), Shamanism, History, and the State (Ann Arbor, 1996), 164–190.

Lines 303 and 304. The Muses, Μοῦσαι, were regarded in myth as the deities of all intellectual pursuits, the personification of intellectual and artistic aspirations (see also the note to line 14). Poets would call on the Muses to inspire their work (for example, Homer in Iliad, 2, 484). The Graces, Χάριτες were seen as the personifications of grace and beauty enhancing daily life and thus accompanying the Muses. Here, Constantine gives these mythological deities a Christian twist by turning them into virtues and the personifications of wisdom, describing them as pure and virginal, fitting with his deliberate employment of Classical imagery for his own purposes.

Line 307. Arrogant, θρασύς, can also be translated as ‘bold’ but it generally carries negative connotations.

Line 308. The Burial of Achilles is described in Odyssey 24, 60–61.

Line 310. Solomon: in Proverbs 1, 9 and 4, 9, Wisdom is the ‘Muse’ is question. David and Solomon were often used as types for the Macedonian emperors, especially Solomon in the context of Leo VI, the Wise: S. F. Tougher, ‘The Wisdom of Leo VI’, in P. Magdalino (ed.), New Constantines (Aldershot, 1994), 171–179.

Line 314. Leader of the Muses. In Classical mythology, the leader of the Muses was Apollo and this title is specific to Apollo as leader of the Muses. Is this a delicate comparison between the emperor and the god?

113Line 331. Traveller, ἔμπορος, often means ‘merchant’. In the context of Constantine’s poem and the Byzantines’ general disregard for merchants, ‘traveller’ seemed better.

Line 346. Bending his neck. The term proskynesis refers to the common gesture of supplication or reverence in Byzantine ceremonial. The physical act ranged from full prostration to a genuflection, bow or simple greeting, and concretised the relative positions of performer and beneficiary within the hierarchical order. It could also act as a form of loyalty display, intense prayer or penance or as a gesture for greeting holy men, all connotations suitable for the traveller’s approach to Constantinople, the Queen of Cities. See ODB, vol. 3, ‘Proskynesis’.

Line 352. Eloquent, εὔλαλος, is another epithet used in the Classical period of Apollo.

Line 358. The great house of God: Hagia Sophia, the church of Holy Wisdom.

Line 364. The pillar is Justinian’s column next to Hagia Sophia, with the equestrian statue of Justinian, also described above at lines 37–51.

Line 369. Medes and Persians and the race of Hagar. The Persians and Arabs, who were the children of Hagar (Genesis 16). Even in the tenth century, Justinian was perceived as the emperor who held these eastern forces at bay. Justinian did not actually fight the Arabs; this may be a reflection of Constantine’s own time or part of the tradition of employing Classical terminology for non- Classical ideas. Mango, ‘Triumphal Way’, 181, wonders if pagan kings bringing tribute were actually depicted on the column. If so, Justinian might have been seen as addressing them directly.

Lines 375–381. As a result of the parenthesis or interpolation after line 367, the substantive that is picked up in the accusative participle in line 375 could perhaps be the cross, which immediately precedes in lines 372–374, rather than Justinian, who is last referred to in line 368. A eulogy of the cross would make sense in terms of the Christian tone of the poem. I owe this suggestion to Paul Magdalino.

Line 397. Pelops. In Classical mythology, Pelops was killed and cooked by his father, Tantalus, and offered to the gods to test if they could distinguish between human and animal flesh; only Demeter, distracted by the loss of her daughter Persephone, ate the flesh of one shoulder. It was replaced with one made from ivory, the mark of Pelops and his descendants.

Lines 399–402 have been rearranged to make sense in the translation.

Line 405. Assael. The renowned runner Assael fought on David’s side against Abner (II Samuel 2, 18–32).

114Line 408. Peter’s companion at the Tomb of Christ was the apostle John (John 20, 4).

line 411. Double course, δίαυλος The double course was a race out and back again.

line 413. Wise teachers. Constantine of Rhodes takes a very positive attitude towards teachers. Christ too is referred to as a teacher on several occasions. There seems to have been a strong bond between teachers and pupils and students served as a living advertisement for their masters. It has been estimated that for the tenth century, no more than 200 individuals passed through the higher levels of the educational process and by the tenth century, teaching seems to have been a way of gaining upward social mobility; this may well have been the case for Constantine himself. see A. Markopoulos, ‘Education’, in E. Jeffreys, J. Haldon and R. Cormack (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Studies (Oxford, 2008), 785–795. Writing in the twelfth century, Nikolaos Mesarites (Mesarites, Description, chs 7–11) describes a school at the Holy Apostles, though it is not clear when this was established. In the context of Constantine’s regular references to teachers, it is worth noting that Leo VI promoted the model of the Christian emperor as teacher originally made by Eusebios: Antonopoulou, Homilies, 76. Also see C. Holmes, ‘Written Culture in Byzantium and Beyond: Contexts, Contents and Interpretations’ in C. Holmes and J. Waring (eds.),Literacy, Education and Manuscript Transmission in Byzantium and Beyond (Leiden, 2002), 1–31; B. Mondrain (ed.), Lire et écrire à Byzance (Paris, 2006).

Line 428. His father was Leo VI.

Line 437–438. A long hill like a neck. The central hill of Constantinople was known as the Mesolophos, rendered vulgarly as Mesomphalos, ‘navel’ (Patria 3, 219, 9–12), a reference to the omphalos, the navel or centre of the world. When Constantine the Great founded the city, however, this hill was not in the middle of the city but close to his city wall. Berger, ‘Streets and Public Spaces’, 168–170, raises issues about the location of the church of the Holy Apostles.

Line 451. The hill standingfourth: Constantine suggests that this hill, the fourth, was the centre of the city and the highest. The fifth hill was actually the highest. See Angelidi, ‘H περιγραφή’, 117–121.

Line 459. Three … upright… and two oblique suggests three domes in a line and two running transverse.

Line 462. A clear statement that the church was cross-shaped.

Line 466. Satan: the devil, in contrast to Hades, and see above, note to line 174 and below, note to line 902.

Line 471. Hades: see note to line 174.

115Line 477. Constantius. Scholarly debate has raged over who was the original founder of the church of the Holy Apostles, Constantine the Great or his son, Constantius. Both Legrand and Beglery in their editions of Constantine of Rhodes’s text read ‘Constantine’ rather than ‘Constantius’ at line 477. Downey, ‘The Builder of the Original Church’, 55 and n. 8, pointed out that this was an emendation of the manuscript on the part of both of these editors, a view with which Ioannis Vassis concurs in this edition. Downey argued that Eusebios’s statement that Constantine founded the church should be disregarded in favour of the alternative tradition found in Prokopios, for example, and in Constantine of Rhodes. Richard Krautheimer, ‘On Constantine’s Church of the Apostles in Constantinople’, in Studies in Early Christian, Medieval and Renaissance Art (London and New York, 1969), 27–34, argued in favour of Constantine as the original founder. Cyril Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum and the Translation of Relics’, BZ 83 (1990), 51–62, proposed that the original church was a circular mausoleum erected by Constantine the Great for his own burial and that next to it, a cruciform basilica was built by Constantius II. For a fuller discussion, see Chapter 4 in this volume.

Line 481. The Apostle Andrew, the brother of Peter, was reputedly martyred at patras in the peloponnese. Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum’, 59¬60, suggested that the choice for the fourth-century church of relics of apostles of whose tombs next to nothing was known reflected caution and political expediency on the part of those responsible, avoiding the removal, potentially by force, of known relics from known burial sites.

Line 483. Luke the evangelist, author of one of the four gospels and of Acts of the Apostles, who was believed to have died in Boeotia.

Line 484. Timothy, the companion of Paul and bishop of Ephesos. The same debate about the founder of the original church of the Apostles has raged over the translation of relics to the building. According to a variety of sources, including Jerome and the Chronicon Pascale, years 356 and 357, it was Constantius who was responsible for the translation of the relics of Timothy in 356 and of Andrew and Luke in 357 to the church of the Holy Apostles: Downey, ‘The Builder of the Original Church’, and Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum, 53–54. However, Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum’, 59–60, has pointed out some of the chronological problems raised by this series of events. Three consular lists and several other sources, including Paulinus of Nola, believed the translation of relics to have been the work of Constantine in 336: see Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum: Addendum’ as part of Study V in Studies on Constantinople, which makes a plausible case for 336. Whitby and Whitby, Chronicon Pascale, 33, n. 102, offer reasons to reject the evidence of the consular lists.

116Line 485–487. Artemios. The sense of these three lines is that Constantius employed Artemios to find these relics before he, Artemios, was martyred. see Mango, ‘Constantine’s Mausoleum’, 53 and n. 12. artemios, later Duke of Egypt, was executed in c.362 by Julian and became a Christian saint. From the seventh century, the relics of St Artemios were widely believed to be in the church of St John Prodromos in Oxeia (see the introduction to V. S. Crisafulli and J. W. Nesbitt (eds), The Miracles of St Artemios (Leiden, 1997), 4–7).

Line 489. Enclosed: taking κλῆσιν from line 491.

Line 499. Justinian’s rebuilding leading to the dedication of the new church in 550, described by Prokopios, Buildings 1.4.9–24. Constantine of Rhodes does not mention the tradition found in the Patria (4, 32, p. 286) that Theodora was a prime mover in the building of the church. See Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 62; Heisenberg, Grabeskirche und Apostelkirche , 113 on; Downey, ‘Justinian as Builder’, The Art Bulletin 32, 4 (1950), 262–266, on Justinian’s rebuilding.

Line 506. Hellenes, that is, ‘pagans’, see note to line 131.

Line 511. The stars. In this section, lines 506–528, Constantine uses a metaphor of the vault of heaven bearing stars in order to compare the deceitful stories of the Greeks with Christian truths. In the process, he also displays a wide knowledge of Classical mythology. Constantine’s catalogue mixes together constellations (8), zodiacal signs (4) and planets (2), displaying a level of familiarity with astronomy, if not necessarily astrology, which was frowned upon by the church. What the significance of his choice of stars was – whether it could be read as a horoscope, for example – is unclear to me. Byzantine astronomy was based largely on Ptolemy and although astronomical studies appear to have paused in the seventh and eighth centuries, the ninth and tenth centuries saw a revival of interest. Arabic texts on astrology and astronomy began to be translated from the eleventh century on. D. Pingree, ‘The Horoscope of Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus’, DOP 27 (1973), 217 and 219–231; A. Tihon, ‘L’Astronomie byzantin (du Ve au XV siècle)’, B 51 (1981), 603–624; P. Magdalino, L’Orthodoxie des astrologues: la science entre le dogme et la divination à Byzance, VIIe-XIVe siècle (Paris, 2006), esp. ch. 3; P. Magdalino, ‘Occult Science and Imperial Power in Byzantine History and Historiography, Ninth to Twelfth Centuries’, in P. Magdalino and M. Mavroudi (eds), The Occult Sciences in Byzantium (Geneva, 2006), 119–162.

Line 514. Display has been moved up from line 515.

Line 514. The savage dog. The giant hunter Orion’s dog was Sirius, the dog star, mentioned by Homer, Iliad 22, 29–31, as bringing harm. The choice of Orion, the Plough or Bear and the Pleiades in the next few lines echoes the constellations depicted on the shield of Achilles (Iliad 18, 487–489).

117Line 515. The Plough, ἅμαξα. As Homer says (Iliad 18, 487), the Plough (or Wain) is the same constellation as the Great Bear.

line 516. The Great Bear was the nymph Kallisto, who had a child by zeus, was turned into a bear by Hera, the wife of zeus, and put into the heavens by zeus himself. Why she is here a ‘rearer of zeus’ is unclear.

Line 517. The Pleiades were the seven daughters of Atlas, who were pursued by Orion and turned into stars (Hesiod, Works and Days, 618–623).

Line 518. The Bull: Europa was kidnapped by zeus who took the form of a bull. This is the zodiacal sign of Taurus.

Line 519. The lion: the Nemean lion, slain by Herakles as his first labour, the zodiacal sign of Leo.

Line 520. The centaur archer: the zodiacal sign of Sagittarius.

Line 521. Pegasus, the immortal winged horse, changed into a constellation.

Line 522. The Twin boys: zeus seduced Leda in the form of a swan and she had two sets of twins, the boys Polydeukes (who was divine) and Kastor (who was not); and the girls Helen (who was divine and the cause of the Trojan war) and Clytemnestra (who was not). The twins are the zodiacal sign of Gemini.

Line 523. Amalthia: the nurse of zeus was either a nymph or a she- goat, depending on which version of the legend one reads. She was transformed into the star Capella, part of the constellation Auriga (the Charioteer).

Line 524. The hull of the Argonauts: the ship, the Argo, in which the Argonauts sailed in the quest for the golden fleece, was placed in the sky as a constellation. The hull had killed Jason by falling on his head as he slept beneath it.

Line 525. Andromeda and Perseus. On his return from having killed the gorgon Medusa, Perseus rescued Andromeda from a rock where she had been tied in sacrifice to a sea monster. He then married her. Both Perseus and Andromeda are constellations.

Line 526. Aphrodite’s star: the planet Venus. Venus, or Aphrodite to use her Greek name, as Constantine does, was the goddess of love.

Line 526. Kronos: the planet Saturn (Kronos in Greek), the father of zeus.

Line 527. Offspring, γονή, can also mean ‘genitals’ or ‘parentage’, either of which would be as appropriate here.

Line 527. Zeus was renowned for his sexual assaults on mortals and immortals alike, both male and female, and the considerable numbers of children that these produced. However, there are no stars or constellations named after him, though there is the planet Jupiter.

Line 529. Word. Constantine calls Christ the Word (logos) of God (deriving from John 1, 1); he goes on to use logos in line 535 and 537 in the 118context of his own work, but surely with a conscious wordplay that recurs throughout the poem (see, for example, line 840).

Line 541. Architect, μηχανουργός. Μηχανικὸς is the more usual term employed for ‘architect’, used by prokopios for example, alongside μηχανοποιός of Anthemios and Isidore. A mechanikos was someone versed in the liberal arts and so proficient in both the theories and practices of architecture: G. Downey, ‘Byzantine Architects: Their Training and Methods’, B 18 (1946–1948), 99–118; N. Schibille, ‘The Profession of the Architect in Late Antique Byzantium, B 79 (2009), 360–379. Constantine of Rhodes’s word, μηχανουργός, may well carry the same implications. However, it can also carry implications of ‘working with’, suggesting the more hands-on practical side of building and so Rhodios may be using it as deliberately interchangeable with τεχνίτης, ‘craftsman’, see below, line 557.

Lines 541–547. Constantine appears to be saying that, without being an architect himself, inspired by Christ the Word of God, he will nevertheless appropriate the vocabulary of architects in order to describe the church. In this way, he both disclaims responsibility for the misuse of such terms and also distances himself as a literary man from the language of craftsmen.

Line 550. Anthemios or the younger Isidore. Anthemios was the architect and rebuilder of Hagia Sophia. Isidore the Younger was the nephew of Isidore of Miletos, the original builder of Hagia Sophia. He was responsible for rebuilding the dome after its first collapse in 557.

Line 552. Prose writers of narratives, such as Prokopios (in Buildings 1,24), in contrast to Constantine himself who is writing poetry and at line 412 claims to be the first to describe the church.

Line 553. Cube, κύβος: also ‘square’. The cube or square is ofconsiderable significance in Constantine’s account; he constructs the whole church around this shape: Angelidi, ‘H περιγραφή’, 112–115.

Line 554: Four-sided, τετρασύνθετος, is another Constantinian compound. Four is the number that recurs most frequently throughout the poem as a key number in the construction of the church in terms of magic numbers. Four encloses the first even number, two; it is square and represents stability and harmony. See Angelidi, ‘H περιγραφὴ’, 112–115. Number symbolism and theory played a large part in Neoplatonic philosophy and was further developed by the Byzantines. particular significance, mystical or magical, was ascribed to various numbers, especially one (one God, one kosmos, one emperor), two (natures in Christ), three (Trinity, orders of angels, immersion at baptism for example), four (justice, stability, elements, quarters of the world, cardinal virtues), five (the uniting of the first female and male numbers, two and three and so the universe or the human microcosm), seven (particularly prominent in the 119Book of Revelations; also wisdom, the Holy Spirit, perfection), eight (the ideal number as the cube of two). Symbolic interpretation was popular in rhetoric and political propaganda; it was also popular in art and architecture, especially in threes and fours. See F. Dornseiff, Das Alphabet in Mystik und Magie (Leipzig and Berlin, 1925); N. Hiscock, The Symbol at Your Door. Number and Geometry in Religious Architecture of the Greek and Latin Middle Ages (Aldershot, 2007). E. Reiss, ‘Number Symbolism and Medieval Literature’, Medievalia et humanistica 1 (1970), 161–174, is useful, though almost exclusively Western in its focus.

Line 557. Craftsman, τεχνίτης, is a more general term and is contrasted with μηχανικὸς by N. Schibille, ‘The Profession of the Architect’, 360–379.

Line 559. Corners, γωνία, can mean a ‘corner’ or an ‘angle’: Downey, ‘Architectural Terms’, 29.

Line 559. Ἔμβολος is a problematic word. We have translated it here and at 563 as ‘porticoes’, suggesting that Constantine is describing colonnades running between the corners of the cubes. However, it can also mean ‘pegs’ and so he may be describing the marking out of the shape of the church on the ground through pegs. Later, at 634, it seems that it can only mean ‘peg’.

Line 562. Piers, mvffóq, is the same term as the more usual Classical word neffffóq. Although it can mean ‘cubical block of masonry’ or ‘support for a pillar’, here we have taken it to refer to the piers of the building, perhaps in the context of the main masonry piers of the building. This is how the term is translated in the Loeb Prokopios, Buildings, 1,1,37, 69 and 71, and by Mango, Art of the Byzantine Empire, 75, 77 and n. 102, though see the note by D. S. Robertson, ‘The Completion of the Loeb Procopius’, The Classical Review 55 (1941), 79–80.

Line 562. Equally four in number, like the corners.

Line 564. Four-sided, τετρασκελής, literally ‘four-legged’.

Lines 566 and 565 need reversing to make sense in translation.

Line 567. Midpoint, μεσόμφαλος, as in line 437, with its implicit sense of ‘centre of the world’.

Lines 573–577 need to have the line order changed to make sense in English.

Line 574–575. As many domes as arches: five of each therefore. Σφενδόνη literally means ‘sling’. We have translated it as ‘arch’, picking up on the word’s emphasis on curves, and reserving ‘vault’, which might be an alternative, for ἁψίς.

Line 578. Cylinder, κύλινδρος, underlines the rolling effect of these features. This may perhaps suggest some form of barrel vaulting.

Line 580. Dome cut in two: for this translation, see Downey, ‘Post- Classical Architectural Terms’, 25.

120Line 591. Foundations, βάσις, has the geometric sense of ‘base’.

Line 592. Towering piers, πινσοπύργοι is a compound created by Constantine. It may be that these refer specifically to piers larger than the others, perhaps specifically to the four piers supporting the domes around the church. It may be that the term worked as a line-filler. It may also be that Constantine’s distinction between πινσοι and πινσόπυργοι was one between ‘blocks’ and ‘piers’.

Line 595. Four-fold: the key numbers for Constantine in his account of the church are two and multiples of two, especially four, 16 and 48.

Line 608. This suggests that there was a gallery in the church.

Line 615. Generals and commanders of tagmata: these are military terms. Στρατηγὸς is translated here as ‘general’, its classical meaning. It was, by the eighth century, the term used for the military governor of a theme. Such officials were at the height of their power in the eighth century; gradually their numbers increased, their term of office decreased and their power was restricted. Philotheos lists 26 in his Kletorologion. Στρατάρχης, translated here as ‘commander’, was a term that in the Kletorologion and in the Book of Ceremonies indicated a special category of high official holding an intermediary position between military dignitary and civil functionary. There is also a later eleventh- century sense of its use simply as ‘high-ranking general’. A τάγμα, ‘tagma’ (plu. tagmata), was originally used to designate a legion. Constantine V (741–775) created a professional army of tagmata under the direct control of the emperor in the eighth century, which was expanded in the ninth, and tended to be based in and around Constantinople. The tagmatic army appears to have declined by the end of the tenth century and the term acquired a more vague meaning of military contingent. H. Ahrweiler, ‘Recherches sur l’administration de l’empire byzantin aux IX-XIème siècles’, Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique 84 (1960), 1–111; J. Haldon, Byzantine Praetorians. An Administrative, Institutional and Social Survey of the Opsikion and Tagmata, c. 580–900 (Bonn, 1984), 228–337; J. Haldon, C. Mango and G. Dagron (eds), Strategies of Defence, Problems of Security: The Garrisons of Constantinople in the Middle Byzantine Period (Aldershot, 1995); W. T. Treadgold, Byzantium and Its Army, 284–1081 (Stanford, 1995).

Line 616. Phalanxes: the Classical term referred to a rectangular military formation usually of heavy-armed infantry. It could also be used to describe a massed infantry formation.

Lines 620 and 619 need to be reversed in translation.

Line 625. Four-numbered. Ioannis Vassis emends the manuscript’s πενταρίθμους to τετραρίθμους, looking to the ’four circles’ of line 623. 121However, the church had five domes and line 626 goes on to talk about the fifth dome so a case might be made for leaving the text as it stands.

Line 626. The implication of this line is that the central dome was the highest of the five.

Line 630. The line suggests that there was an image of Christ in the central dome of the church.

Line 635. Towering piers, πινσόπυργοι, again, as in line 592.

Line 634. Here χαλκέμβολοι appears to mean bronze pegs rather than bronze porticoes.

Lines 638–642 need to be moved around to make sense in English.

Line 645. The verb used here in line 643, join, συναρμόζω, is also used of joining in wedlock, appropriately enough as Constantine goes on to use a metaphor of a bride and a bridal chamber and a bride (one used also at line 705). Such a metaphor is wholly appropriate in describing the church, the Bride of Christ.

Lines 650 to 674. This part of the description is where Constantine’s knowledge of Paul the Silentiary is most obvious, as it echoes Paul’s account of the marbles of Hagia Sophia at lines 617–646: Reinach, ‘Commentaire’, 64 and Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 48–51. For Paul’s marbles, see M. L. Fobelli, Un tempio per Giustiniano. Santa Sofia di Constantinopoli e le ‘Descrizione’ di Paolo Silenziario (Rome, 2005), 151–153. Constantine was familiar with Paul’s writing, having copied his work as part of the Palatine Anthology (Cameron, Greek Anthology , 327). As with Paul’s description of Justinian’s church, Constantine’s use of different marbles here conveys a sense of the scope of empire, but one that no longer existed in the tenth century. Africa had been long lost to the Byzantines and Aquitania was far off and remote. Exotic marbles tended not to be quarried in the Middle Ages but were reused from other buildings or monuments and were greatly prized: C. Mango, ‘Ancient Spolia in the Great Palace of Constantinople’, in C. F. Moss and K. Kiefer (eds), Byzantine East, Latin West: Art-Historical Studies in Honor of Kurt Weitzmann (Princeton, 1995), 645–658.

Line 650. Phrygia: the mountainous region of Asia Minor between the Aegean plains and the central plateau, an area of great strategic importance. Phrygian marble is white with red or purplish colouring: Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 169–171; ed. G. Borghini, Marmi antichi (Rome, 2001), 264–265.

Line 651. Dokimios, now Iscehisar near Afyon in Turkey. Dokimian marble and marble from Synnada are both also known as Phrygian marble and are white with reddish or purple colouring: Gnoli, Marmora romana, 160–171; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 264–365.

122Line 652. Karia: South-west Asia Minor, south of the Meander river. The marble was quarried near Iasos and is dark red with white bands: Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 244–245, ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 207.

Line 653. Galatia in Cappadocia produced a white, alabaster stone, like ivory in colour: Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 219; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 219.

Line 655. The river Karystos is on the southern tip of the island of Euboia in the Aegean, off the east coast of Greece. The stone is a clear green in different shades: Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 181–183; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 202–203.

Line 656. Laconia is a part of Sparta in southern Greece. The stone is probably a form of green serpentine or porphyry, though it may be a green brecchia, both Spartan. For serpentine, see lapis lacedaemonius: Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 141–144, ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 279–281. For brecchia, breccia verde di Sparta: R. Gnoli, Marmora Romana (1st edition, Rome, 1971), 96–97; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 196.

Line 659. Green-hued… Thessalian columns: a green marble was mined at various sites in Thessaly: Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 162–165; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 292–293.

Line 660. Aquitania: a marble from France, known also as ‘Celtic marble’, which was how Paul the Silentiary described it. It is an intense black and white marble, very vivid in appearance: Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 196–198; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 154–156.

Lines 661 and 662. Libya and Carthage. In the Roman period, Libya signified the North African coastal area and Carthage, on this coast, was the largest city in the western Mediterranean after Rome itself. In the fifth century, North Africa was taken by the Vandals, but reconquered by Justinian in 533; by the late seventh century, North Africa was under Arab rule. The stone is a granite. Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 155 and n. 2 suggests that there may be a four-line lacuna here, for reasons that I do not follow. Nothing in the manuscript suggests such a lacuna.

Line 667. Porphyry see above, note to line 53.

Line 668. Sardonyx is normally a gemstone. Here, however, it may refer to alabaster, perhaps to Egyptian alabaster, though this is normally white and honey-coloured (Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 215–218; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 140–141); or to alabaster from Gebel Oust in Tunisia, which has a red colour (Gnoli, Marmora Romana , 227; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 146); or even to various types of alabaster from Algeria, coloured in reds and whites (Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 227, 228; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi , 149, 150). So-called African alabaster is multi-coloured in red and purple shades, though 123it was actually mined in Turkey in the Izmir region (Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 174–178; ed. Borghini, Marmiantichi, 133–135).

Line 669. Erythra can be the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean or the Persian Gulf. Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 50 and n. 8, interprets zambax as mother of pearl, citing G. R. Cardona, ‘Due voce bizantine d’origine Iranica’, Annali dell’Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli 17, 1 (1967), 73–75. I have been unable to obtain a copy of this article.

Line 670. Prokonnesian marble again. These two lines refer to the floor of the church, otherwise barely mentioned by Constantine.

Line 672. Deep-delled, βάθυγγος (?): we have actually translated βαθύγειος, as conjectured by Criscuolo, ‘Note all’ Ekphrasis di Costantino Rodio’. See also Ioannis Vassis’s note to the edition. Kyzikos was an important port city on the southern coast of the Sea of Marmara at the head of routes leading in to Asia Minor. It served as an export point for Proconnesian marble: Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 263–264; ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 252.

Line 674 Paros is an island in the Cyclades famed for its marble. In the third and fourth centuries, inscriptions describe it as a splendid polis, but by the early tenth century, the Life of Theoktiste of Lesbos (Acta Sanctorum Novembris 4 (Brussels, 1925), 224–233) suggests that it was deserted and visited only by hunters. Parian marble is a white, translucent stone. Gnoli, Marmora Romana, 261–262, ed. Borghini, Marmi antichi, 250.

Line 675. Tunics, χιτών. The chiton or tunic was the basic garment of most Byzantines; it was the term usually used to describe the classical tunic worn by Old Testament figures, Christ and the Apostles. It was also worn by middle-ranking court officials. J. Ball, Byzantine Dress. Representations of Secular Dress in Eighth-to Twelfth-Century Painting (London and New York, 2005), 40.

Line 677. Double girdles perhaps refers to the string courses. Ζώνη was the standard word for belt or girdle, and belts formed a key part of official insignia: ODB, vol. 1, ‘Belt’; M. Parani, Reconstructing the reality of images: Byzantine material culture and religious iconography (11th-15th centuries) (Leiden, 2003), 65.

Line 678. Kοσμήτης, also used in line 747, is translated as cornice by Mango in his translation of parts of Constantine’s poem, Art of the Byzantine Empire, 200; also see his n. 72 on p. 197. G. W. H. Lampe, A Patristic Greek Lexicon (Oxford, 1961), suggests ‘entablatures’.

Line 681. Adamant, ἀδαμάντινος, referred to anything made of especially hard materials, whether diamond, gem or metal.

Line 684. Earthquakes: Constantinople lies in an area of the world prone to earthquakes and quakes in the empire as a whole are recorded for almost every year of Byzantine history. They tended to be interpreted as signs or warnings 124of God’s anger. V. Grumel, La chronologie (Paris, 1958), 476–481 for a list; G. Dagron, ‘Quand la terre tremble …’, Traveaux et Mémoires 8 (1981), 87–103.

Line 695. The simile of stones and marbles compared to meadows and flower buds is not unique to Constantine and is found in the Palatine Anthology, for example, at I, 10, 60–61.

Line 698. The Milky Way was known as such from the Classical period, if not before.

Line 700. The east. The implication seems to be that these particular columns were used only in the east end of the church.

Lines 704 and 705. Παστὰς is translated here as bridal chamber to pick up on the double meaning of συναρμόζω, ‘fit together’, ‘join in wedlock, in the preceeding line. It can also mean ‘colonnade’. This bridal metaphor echoes that of line 643.

Line 707. Prokopios’s account in Buildings 1, 4, 12, where he describes how the lines of the plan of the church were defined by the walls on the outside and by rows of columns on the inside, makes this passage clearer.

Line 710. Side, κλίτος, here might possibly mean ‘aisle’.

Line 712. Attendant, νεωκόρος, is defined by Lampe, Patristic Greek Lexicon, as ‘temple-keeper’ in the sense of a menial official. Constantine s use of the term suggests that it had more importance than that.

Line 713. Initiator, μυσταγωγός, a mystagogue carried out liturgical rites: H.-J. Schulz, The Byzantine Liturgy (New York, 1986), 184–192.

Line 715. Commanders of tagmata, ταξιάρχης, taxiarchs, were high-ranking officers in command of 1,000 man units: Oikonomides, Listes, 335. However, in patristic literature, the term was used to characterise God as the creator of order (τάξις), or the archangels, especially Michael, as leaders of the heavenly hosts. For the tagma, see the note to line 615.

Line 715. Generals, στρατηγέτης, see note to line 615.

Line 716. Spear-bearer, δορυφόρος, can also mean bodyguard.

Line 716. Master of all, παντάναξ, is a specifically Christian term used of God (cf. Lampe, Patristic Greek Lexicon).

Line 718. The number of the wise Apostles: 12. Forty-eight, the number of columns, represents four times the number of the Apostles.

Line 724. This suggests that there were galleries.

Line 725. Panels, διάγλυφος: διαγλύφω means to carve out or scoop out; the adjective appears to mean carved or coffered (of ceilings).

Line 725. Carved, λακαρικός: following Mango, Art of the Byzantine Empire, 98, n. 214, our translation is derived from λαξεύω, ‘to hew (in) stone’. Mango suggests that it might be derived from the Latin laquearia. A similar 125term is used in the Narratio de S. Sophia, section 15 (Preger, Scriptores Originum, vol. 1, p. 93).

Line 733. Robes, χιτών, see above line 675.

Line 734. Sidon. This ancient Phoenician city in Syria was noted from the Roman period for its factories for dyeing cloth purple.

Lines 735 and 736 are reversed in the translation.

Line 738. For the common metaphor of Christ as the sun see, for example, Revelations 10, 1, where he is seen as the sun of Justice.

Line 739. The implication is that this image was located in the central dome. Whether Constantine goes on to describe a mosaic depicting Christ, Apostles and Virgin together, possibly an Ascension (as is the case at San Marco), or whether these should be understood as three separate mosaics is unclear.

Line 742. Gold mingled with glass: gold mosaic.

Line 747. Cornice, κοσμήτης. See above, line 678. This line implies that the mosaic started where the marbling stopped, as is the case at Hosios Loukas, for example. Despite the reconstructions of scholars such as Heisenberg, Grabeskirche und Apostelkirche 2, 141, at no point is Constantine any more precise about the location of the mosaics in the church than he is here.

Line 749. Abasement, κένωσις, literally ‘emptying’, is a theological term, derived from Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, 1, 7.

Line 750. Presence, παρουσία, is a theological term, used of the universal presence of the Logos.

Line 751. Wonder: Constantine describes seven scenes as wonders (the Annunciation, the Nativity, the Coming of the Magi, the Presentation in the Temple, the Baptism, the Transfiguration, the Crucifixion) to match his seven marvels of the first section of the poem, though he actually describes 11 Gospel events (the raising of the Widow’s Son, the Raising of Lazarus, the Entry into Jerusalem and the Betrayal being the other four). The first wonder is the Annunciation on the part of the Archangel Gabriel to Mary, Luke 1, 26–38.

Line 752. Incarnation, σάρκωσις, literally ‘enfleshing’, is another theological term, ultimately derived from John 1, 14.

Line 753. Inspired by God, ἔνθεος, ‘divine’, can also mean ‘full of God’.

Line 755. General of the armies of Heaven was normally used of the archangel Michael, but is here applied to Gabriel.

Line 760. The Nativity, Luke 2, 1–20.

Line 772. The coming of the Magi, Matthew 2, 1–12.

Line 775. King of Israel: Matthew’s Gospel uses the phrase ‘King of the Jews’: the difference may reflect Constantine’s anti-Jewish bias.

Line 777. Barlaam: the prophet Barlaam foretold the coming of the Messiah, Numbers 24, 17–19.

126Line 780. The Presentation in the Temple, Luke 2, 25–38. It is argued that Constantine’s description of Symeon carrying the Christ-child dates this specific mosaic to after Iconoclasm: H. Maguire, ‘The Iconography of Symeon with the Christ-Child in Byzantine An’, DOP 34/35 (1980/1981), 261–269.

Line 783. The phrase ‘fall of evil’ in Greek specifically refers to the Fall of Satan.

Line 793. The Baptism of Christ by John the Baptist in the River Jordan, Matthew 3, 13–17; Mark 1, 9–11; Luke 3, 21–22; John 1, 29–34.

Line 806. The Transfiguration, Matthew 17, 1–13; Mark 9, 2–13; Luke 9, 28–36. The three apostles who ascended Mount Tabor with Christ were Peter, James and John.

Line 824. Bowed down, νεύω, has specifically liturgical resonances.

Line 830. The Raising of the Widow’s Son, Luke 7, 11–17. This is a very unusual scene, not often depicted in surviving Byzantine art: see, for example, a ninth-century manuscript of the homilies of Gregory of Nazianzos (Paris, B.N. Gr. 510, fol. 316r) and an eleventh-century gospel book (Paris B.N. Gr. 74, fol. 121r). We have translated cpoor|cp6pov, light-bringing’ as ‘brought back to light’. As Ioannis Vassis notes, the Greek is problematic. Beglery suggested an emendation to ζωηφόρον, ‘brought to life’ and in the course of producing this translation, Robert Jordan suggests an emendation to φθορηφόρον, ‘bringing sorrow’, ‘carrying death’, to balance the ζωηφόρον used in line 833.

Line 835. The Raising of Lazarus, John 11, 1–45. Mary and Martha are not mentioned (though this does not prove that they were not depicted). The reference to the putrefying body made the point that Lazarus really was dead, not in a coma.

Line 839. Shrouded, κατεσπειρωμένον: we have derived this translation from Homer’s σπεῖρον, meaning cloth, wrapping or shroud (Odyssey 2, 102; 6, 179).

Line 845. The Entry into Jerusalem, Matthew 21, 1–11, Mark 11, 1–11, Luke 19, 28–44, John 12, 12–15. God-killers denotes the Jews. Attacks on Jews were commonplace in Byzantine writings, particularly religious texts. The Byzantines regarded themselves as having superseded the Jews as God’s Chosen People, since the Jews had failed to recognise the Messiah in Christ and had, instead, asked for Barabas when Pilate had offered Jesus for release. A. Sharf, Byzantine Jewry from Justinian to the Fourth Crusade (London, 1971); A. Sharf, Jews and other Minorities in Byzantium (Jerusalem, 1995); N. de Lange, ‘Hebrews, Greeks or Romans? Jewish culture and identity in Byzantium’ in Smythe (ed.), Strangers to Themselves, 105–118.

Line 848. Sion: Jerusalem. Sion (or Zion) was first used as a synonym for Jerusalem in II Samuel 5, 7. It and the phrase ‘Daughter of Sion’ were used 127similarly in the New Testament (for example, Matthew 21, 5, John 12, 15 and Romans 11, 26).

Line 850. Son of David: the Messiah was the descendant of King David. Christ is identified as the ‘Son of David’ in Matthew’s generalogy of Christ (Matthew 1, 1) and addressed as such in, for example, Luke 18, 38–39 as well as at His Entry into Jerusalem.

Line 851. People, δῆμος, is perhaps a deliberate choice of word, implying the common herd and, in Byzantium, the circus factions.

Line 854. Sion: Jerusalem. See note to line 848.

Line 859. Best [of men], Φέριστος, is addressed to Constantine VII, though it is an unusual way to address an emperor.

Line 861. The artist, ζωγράφος, is mentioned for the first time but is not named. This is the standard term for ‘artist’.

Line 868. Lord and teacher is derived perhaps from John 13, 14. Constantine uses this phrase three times of Christ in this section.

Line 868. The Betrayal, Matthew 26, 47–56; Mark 14, 43–52; Luke 22, 47–53; John 18, 2–13.

Line 870. The kinsman of the Lord was Jude.

Line 879. Profit, λῆμμα: Constantine emphasises the Betrayal of Christ for money. In this attack on Judas, his expertise as a satiric poet and lampoonist is apparent.

Line 880. People, λαός, are again deliberately ‘common folk’.

Line 881. People, δῆμος again. Lawless Hebrews: ‘Lawless’ is also a barb aimed by Constantine at the Jews, as those believing in the Law of the Old Testament, now superseded by the New Testament. It is used also at line 937.

Line 883. Swords. A σπάθη is specifically a broad-bladed sword.

Line 887. Reward, τιμή, is perhaps ironic here as it carries a primary meaning of honour.

Line 888. Noose as profit: according to Matthew 27, 6, Judas hanged himself in remorse for his actions.

Line 889. Artist, τεχνίτης, perhaps ‘artificer’ rather than ζωγράφος, ‘artist!

Line 890. Impression, τύπωσις, carries a sense of τύπος, ‘model’ or ‘type’.

Line 893. Asps were commonly used to denote low poisonous creeping beasts. Psalm 91, 13, ‘Thou shalt walk upon the asp and the basilisk…’ was seen by the Byzantines as a verse foretelling Christ’s victory. Comparing a man to an animal was a way of lowering him: G. Dagron, ‘Image de bête ou image de Dieu. La physiognomonie animale dans la tradition grecque et ses avatars byzantines’, in Poikilia, Études offertes à J-P. Vernant (Paris, 1987), 69–80.

Line 895. The look of a murderous man: the Byzantines believed that physiognomy was a guide to character: J. Eisner, ‘Physiognomies and Art’ in 128 S. Swain (ed.), Seeing the Face, Seeing the Soul. Polemon’s Physiognomics from Classical Antiquity to Medieval Islam (Oxford, 2007), 203–224.

Line 902. Satan: rather than the ‘prince of darkness’, the devil in Byzantium was, in Cyril Mango’s phrase, a ‘devious “operator”’, leading others astray, as indeedhe appears here: Mango, ‘Diabolus Byzantinus’, DOP 46 (1992), 215–223.

Line 907. Avarice: φιλαργυρία, love of money, was one of the eight deadly vices, systematised by Evagrios Pontikos in the fourth century. The vices were sinful desires, part of an habitually evil disposition and leading the individual into sin: I. Hausherr, ‘L’origine de la théorie orientale des huit péchés capitaux’, Orientalia Christiana Analecta 30 (1933), 164–175.

Lines 914–915. Lazarus and the wealthy man: the parable of the Rich Man and Lazaros is found at Luke 19, 1–31.

Line 918. The Crucifixion, Matthew 27, 33–56; Mark 15, 22–41; Luke 23, 32–49; John 19, 17–27.

Line 928. Γυμνός can mean both ‘naked’ or ‘lightly clad’. Downey in Mesarites, Description, 874, n. 8 suggests that in this context in Constantine’s poem, it should be translated as ‘loincloth’.

Line 934. A corpse. The description of Christ as a corpse and the reference in line 928 to his nakedness are indications of a date for this mosaic after Iconoclasm: J. R. Martin, ‘The Dead Christ on the Cross in Byzantine Art’, in K. Weitzmann (ed.), Late Classical and Medieval Studies, Late Classical and Mediaeval Studies in Honor of A. M. Friend, Jr. (Princeton, 1955), 189–196; H. Maguire, ‘Truth and Convention in Byzantine Descriptions of Works of Art’, DOP 28 (1974), 111–140.

Line 938. People: δῆμος again, and again ‘lawless’: see note to lines 851 and 881.

Line 943. The disciple present at the Crucifixion was John (John 19, 26).

Lines 945–981. The Virgin’s lament. For this as a threnos, see M. Alexiou, ‘The Lament of the Virgin in Byzantine Literature and Modern Greek Folk-Song’, BMGS 1 (1975): 111–140; Alexiou, Ihe Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition (Cambridge, 1974); Maguire, ‘Truth and Convention’, 129 and n. 87, which also situates it in the traditions of homiletic literature.

Line 958. Those refers to the words of Gabriel, contrasted to these, the words of Symeon in line 956.

Line 978. Resurrection, ‘Ἀνάστασις, is the term used of Christ’s Resurrection.

Line 981. Matthew28, 51 and 54 recorded earthquakes at the point of Christ’s death.

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