Mabch, 1903.] 



KNOWLEDGE 



49 



^INfiEJLiTERATl]^4^r 



Founded by RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 

 Vol. xxYi.] LONDON : MARCH, 1903. [No. 209. 



CONTENTS. 



St. Sophia, Constantinople. — II. By E. M. Antoxi.\di, 



F.H.A.s. (Illustrated)... 

 Animal Wind-Bags — Useful and Ornamental. — III. 



WindBags as Danger-Signals and l.ife-Buoys. 



By A\'. P. Pycraft, a.l s., f.z.s., etc. (lUustrnted} ... 

 Giant Land-Tortoises. By R. Lydekkbk. (Illustrated) 

 The Great Marion s Tortoise (Tesfudo sumeireij. (Plati;) 

 Modern Cosmogonies.— I. The Nebular Hypothesis. 



By AONES M. Cl.KRKE 



The Path of the Moon,— II. ^^ A. C. D. Ckommelin. 



(Illustrated) ... ... ... ... ... 



Letter : 



Did the Romans know Aluminium ? By A. Duboin 

 Obituary : 



SiE G-EOEOE Stokes 



Notes 



British Ornithological Notes. Conducted by IIabbt F. 



WiTHERBT, P.Z.8., M.B.O.U. ... 



Notices of Books 



Books Received 



Familiar British Wild Flowers and their Allies. II. — 



The Rose Family. By R. Lloyd Pbaeobb, b.a. 



{Illustrated) " 



Microscopy. Conducted by M. I. CBOsa 



Notes on Comets and Meteors. By W. P. Denning, 



p.b.a.s. (Illustrated) ... 

 The Face of the Sky for March. By W. 



ShacKLBTON, p.b.a.s. (Illustrated) 



Chess Column. By C. D. Locook, b.a 



ST. SOPHU, CONSTANTINOPLE. 



By E. M. Antoniadi, f.r.a.s. 



Illustrated from orifiituxl drawings hi/ the Author. 



IT. 



The Innek Division op thk Chuech. 



The first sectiou of the present study »ii the great cathedral 

 has dealt with its history and outer appearance, and it is 

 now the design of this, as well as of the two succeeding 

 sections, to describe the interior ; starting with the inner 

 division of St. Sophia during the 858 years it remained in 

 the hands of the Christians. 



To render the argumentation on this suhjoct intelligible 

 it is necessary to accompany it with a plan of the church. 

 Fig. 4, which meets this requirement, is mostly the result 

 of the writer's own direct measurements, excejit for the 

 now inaccessible parts of the building, where Salzenborg's 

 data* have been utilized. The plan further gives a syu- 



* Altchristlirhe Baudenkmale ron CoiUitantinopel, Berlin. 1854. 

 It was not without some rehictunco that Salzenberg's i-eprceentations 

 of the annexes now closed were incorponiteil in f if;, -l, owiiif; to the 

 great unt.ustworthiness oi the German artist, who, although haying 

 liad unique opportunities with the scaffolding and unveiling of the 

 mosaics in 1848, could not avoid, in his plates, a aeries of ghiring, 

 and, indeed, unaccouutablo, architectural oversights. 



thesis of the results of Paul the Silentiary, Constantine 

 Porphyrogenitus, the Anonymous Greek author, Grelot, 

 Neale, Byzantios, Lethaby and Swainson, followed by the 

 writer's analysis. 



It should not be assumed that the new interpretation of 

 the inner arrangements of St. Sophia is at all meant to be 

 final or decisive. Such an inquiry, it must be remembered, 

 treads on treacherous ground, where hasty conclusions and 

 unjustified assertions are particularly dangerous. The plan 

 is, therefore, at best, a first approximation, subject to all 

 such modifications as would be rendered imperative by 

 further investigation. 



The Ambo or Pulpit. — In modem Greek churches the 

 pulpit IB to the left of the nave. But this was not its 

 original position in the great cathedrals of the past. 

 According to the poet, the Ambo of St. Sophia stood " in 

 the sunshiny centre of the nave, but rather inclining east- 

 wards." * Also, Germanos, Patriarch of Constantinople, 

 mentions that "the ambo stands in front of the door of 

 the sanctuary." Again, Symeon of Salonica speaks of 

 " the ambo before the bema," adding that " it is placed 

 ojjposite the sanctuary, provided the church is spacious 

 enough to allow of such an aiTangement."t These 

 remarks leave no doubt as to the position of the pulpit : 

 it was in the middle of the nave, on the great axis, but 

 decidedly nearer the eastern wall. It must have been 

 somewhere under the great arch to the east, in the position 

 assigned to it by Messrs. Lethaby and Swainson, ;}: and not 

 under the central square area, as, in that case, it would 

 interfere with the circle of lamps hanging from the cornice 

 of the dome. 



The Choir of Singers is described by Paulus as divided 

 into two parts, each half " embraced " by the two eastern 

 exedras. 



Sanctuary, Soleas and Imperial Throne. — A curious 

 feature of the ground floor to the east is that, through 

 time or intention, it no longer forms a plane surface. The 

 Bema or Sanctuary is reached to-day by three steps from 

 the west, and by as many from the south, but by only two 

 on the north side. The western steps, constituting the 

 Soleas, § are now approximately turned towards Mecca, 

 forming an angle of some 18° with the minor axis,|| so 

 that it is almost impossible to conjecture their original 

 design. Under such circumstances, the disposition given 

 them in the plan is very uncertain, although there can be 

 no doubt that the Soleas was originally much larger than 

 what it IS in modern Greek churches. 



It would seem that there always was an Imperial Throne 

 somewhere about the Choir or Soleas. True, such a 

 throne is not mentioned l)y Paulus in the sixth century, 

 nor by Porphyrogenitus in the tenth. But the statements 

 of Sozomenus and Theophanes are eloquent on this point. 

 " The king's place in the chui'ch," says the former of these 

 authors, " is in front of the sanctuary, so as to enable 

 him to preside, on one side, over the people and, 

 on the other, over the priests " ; while Theophanes 

 remarks that " the custom of having the kings standing 

 outside the sanctuary, with the ]>eople. held good " up to 

 his time (9th century) It will lie seen on the plan that 

 the Imperial Thrime has been placed by the writer to the 

 south, in the position of the modern archiepiscopal throne 



• Paul the Silentiary, DeseripHo Ambonis, verses 50, 51. 

 t Du Cange, k?. Sophia, §74. 



I S. Sopliia, Fig. 5. 



§ Probably from soleum, a throne. 



II The perpendicular to these steps does uot appear to face >recca, 

 whose azimuth from Constantinople is 331", so that the faithful, 

 praying in the mosqiie, and wishing to face the Kajiba, ought to 

 iueiine slightly to the right. 



