Chapter IV: Along the Walls

For a person wishing to become acquainted with a great city, ready to admire beautiful scenery, and furnished with adequate information, nothing of the kind can be more interesting and memorable than to make the circuit of the old fortifications of Constantinople. It is a tour of thirteen miles, in the course of which, the city, set in the frame of its splendid natural surroundings, is seen from many different points of view, while at the same time the historical student travels through eleven long centuries, crowded with events not only of local interest but of world-wide importance.

_Along the Walls beside the Sea of Marmora_

The aspect which the city presents towards the Sea of Marmora and the Asiatic coast is by many persons considered to be the most beautiful view of Constantinople. It is certainly a very attractive view. Seated on ground rising with long and steep ascent to the ridge of the promontory, the city lies spread before you, from the Seraglio Point to the Seven Towers, over an area five miles in length. As from every other point so here also, Constantinople shows as much as possible of itself at a time. It always appears in large dimensions, lofty, spacious, far-reaching; never descending from its throne, never laying aside its majesty, but constantly maintaining an imperial mien. Along the sky-line is an array of domes and minarets that, in brilliant sunshine, gleam as though made of whitest alabaster. While at the feet of the city lies a sea of sapphire, lovely as a lake; not so broad as to place the city into dim distance, yet wide enough to give the great metropolis sufficient foreground to set off its size and dignity, to obliterate petty details, to render prominent its salient features, to soften any ruggedness, to silence its din, and make the quiet grey tones of its dwellings blend harmoniously with the overhanging heavens and with the surrounding waters. It is, if the expression is allowable, the most poetical view of the Queen of Cities. Sometimes, an early watcher on the Asiatic shore beholds a vision of extraordinary beauty. The silhouette of the slumbering capital is seen against a darker mass of clouds that gathered in the west during the hours of the night. Suddenly, in the hush of dawn, a delicate pink light gleams on a minaret here or a dome yonder. It tints minaret after minaret, dome after dome, house after house. It spreads downwards and athwart, transfiguring everything its rosy fingers touch, until the city, still set against a dark background, is radiant with indescribable grace. Very beautiful also is the scene towards sunset, when the slopes descending to the Marmora are in shade, and the glowing vault of heaven is a canopy of glory; when the windows in the dome of S. Sophia, as the last beams of day shine through them, sparkle like jewels in a coronet, and the sea beneath seems woven of crimson, gold, and purple. Nor can one fail to recall the soft tranquil beauty of the scene when the Sea of Marmora glitters in the moonlight, and the golden waters kiss the shadows of the broken towers and battlements that watched and guarded the city in the days of old.

There is a grave in the British cemetery at Haidar Pasha, which, contrary to the usual mode of interment, fronts westwards to be turned towards this side of the city. It is the grave of an Englishwoman, who, from her Asiatic home near Kadikeui, looked upon these views for many years, and felt their spell so strongly, that by her express order she was laid to rest in a position in which she might face their beauty even in death.

On the Seraglio hill in the middle distance is the palace formerly occupied by the Sultans.]

The fortifications beside the Sea of Marmora consisted of a wall that, for the most part, followed closely the sinuosities of the shore, and was flanked, if the account of a mediæval traveller may be trusted, by no less than 188 square towers. The works attained their full extent in three distinct stages, corresponding to the successive periods in the growth of the city. The portion from the Seraglio Point to the neighbourhood of Achour Kapoussi represented the bulwarks of old Byzantium. The portion from the latter point to the vicinity of Daoud Pasha Kapoussi, the ancient Gate of S. Æmilianus, was added by Constantine the Great, and possibly the wall bounding the vegetable gardens of Vlanga Bostan, formed part of the original defences erected by the founder of New Rome. The extension of the line from Daoud Pasha Kapoussi to the southern extremity of the landward walls was a consequence of the enlargement of the city in the reign of Theodosius II. For the protection of these ramparts against the waves of the Marmora in angry mood, boulders ranged in loose order were placed in the sea, at a short distance from the shore, to serve as a breakwater. Still, like Canute, the emperors of Constantinople often found that the sea scorned their control, and was the worst foe these bulwarks had cause to dread. For instance, a furious storm which occurred on the 12th February 1332 hurled the waves over the battlements, opened breaches, forced the gates, and poured devastation into every adjoining quarter. In the spring of 764 the walls near the Seraglio Point were damaged under most extraordinary circumstances. The preceding winter in the regions along the northern and the western coasts of the Black Sea had been so severe, that the sea itself was frozen hard to an immense distance from the shore. Upon the breaking up of the frost-bound waste, a long procession of ice-floes entered the Bosporus on their way to the south. They came in such numbers that for some time the channel at the Marmora end of the straits was blocked, and men crossed from Scutari to Galata and to S. Mamas (Beshiktash), and from Chalcedon (Kadikeui) to the city (Stamboul) with perfect safety. When at length the ice broke again and moved forward, two huge fragments were flung against the Seraglio Point by the swollen currents coursing in that direction. The strange assailants towered above the battlements, and made the city quake with fear before the weird enemy at whose cold touch strong bulwarks crumbled to pieces. How frequently these walls suffered from their exposure to storm and weather appears in the numerous inscriptions found upon them in honour of restorers of the works. The most extensive repairs were made in the reign of Theophilus (829-842), and large portions of the existing walls belong to his reign. But many other emperors were likewise concerned in maintaining these fortifications in proper order, as for example, Leo the Wise, Basil II., Manuel Comnenus, Michael Palæologus, Andronicus II., and Andronicus III. The legends commemorating repairs are usually formal, laconic records of the names and titles of the rebuilder of a tower or of the curtain of the wall. Three of the inscriptions, however, allow us to see more into the heart of the persons they celebrate, and bring us into touch with the spirit of the times. One of them, forming a line 60 feet long, is found on the wall to the north of Deïrmen Kapoussi, and reads to the following effect:--"Possessing Thee, O Christ, as a wall that cannot be broken, Theophilus the pious sovereign and emperor, erected this wall upon new foundations; which (wall) Lord of All, guard with Thy might, and display to the end of time standing unshaken and unmoved." The second inscription referred to speaks more directly of the injury sustained by the wall owing to the proximity of the sea:--"In the year 1024, Basil, the pious sovereign, erected from the foundations this tower, which the dashing of the sea, battering it for a long time with many and violent waves, compelled to fall." The third inscription tells that in the year 1448, only five years before the fall of the city, George, the Despot of Servia, contributed funds towards the repair of these defences, thus showing clearly how well he understood that the fate of his kingdom was bound up with the fate of Constantinople.

The lighthouse occupies a prominent position near the old palace of the Sultans overlooking the Sea of Marmora.]

The fortifications beside the Sea of Marmora were not called to occupy a prominent place in the active defence of the city; that is to say, they were never the object of a serious hostile attack. This was only what might be expected so long as the Empire maintained its naval superiority to the enemies with whom it was called to contend. But the Empire was not always master of the sea. And the immunity of these fortifications from attack was then due to the difficulties which the currents that sweep along this shore place in the way of the approach of ships within striking distance. The fear that the currents would carry his ships out to sea was the reason why Dandolo refused to bring the fleet of the Fourth Crusade into action against this side of the capital. The nearest semblance of an attack upon these fortifications was when Heraclius, in 610, brought up a fleet from Carthage to depose the tyrant Phocas, and took up a position before the Harbour of Julian or Sophia, the remains of which are seen in the quarter of Kadriga Limani below the Hippodrome. But that was more in the nature of a hostile demonstration than an active assault, for the citizens welcomed Heraclius as a deliverer, and carried Phocas to him as a prisoner. Still the comparative security of these walls from attack did not warrant leaving them in a state to tempt an enemy to strike a blow, and accordingly, though sometimes neglected in time of peace, they were promptly put in order whenever a hostile fleet was expected. This was particularly the case during the period of the Palæologi, when Genoa and Venice and the Ottoman Turks ruled on the sea, and the naval strength of the Empire had fallen into utter decay. In the siege of 1453, the Turkish fleet blockaded this side of the city from the Seraglio Point to Vlanga.

In following the course of these walls to note the arrangements of the city, and to recall historical associations, only a very brief mention of what is most prominent and memorable is here possible. Beginning at the head of the promontory, we have first the eastern portion of the Seraglio Grounds, presenting to view the crags upon which stood the Acropolis of old Byzantium. To become the master of that hilltop, with its wonderful outlook and great strategic value was the ambition of Xenophon and "The Ten Thousand" on their famous retreat from Persia, of Philip of Macedon, of Severus Septimius, of Constantine the Great, not to mention other aspirants. After the foundation of Constantinople, until Turkish days, the site of the Acropolis formed an ordinary part of the city, the most conspicuous edifice on that position being the Church of S. Irene. There also was the hospital of Sampson, as well as that of Eubulus. Among the buildings on the level tract below the Acropolis were two theatres, inherited from Byzantium, one of which has left its stamp in the hollow ground now occupied by the vegetable gardens to the rear of Deïrmen Kapoussi. Scattered over the adjoining territory was a crowd of churches in which saints encamped to guard this exposed point of the city; a host led by S. Barbara, patroness of arms, S. George, the Slayer of the Dragon, S. Mary Hodegetria, with her icon ascribed to S. Luke, and regarded as a palladium. The Mangana or Arsenal, stored with military engines for the defence of the walls, also stood in this vicinity. The vaulted substructures near the ruins of Indjili Kiosk belonged to the Palace of the Mangana, to which the imperial household resorted to enjoy the cool breezes that winged their way down the Bosporus from the north. Here also was a public park, the Philopation, and an atrium built by Justinian the Great, crowded on summer afternoons, when this side of the city is in shade, by people who loved to look out upon the sparkling water, and the hills of the opposite Asiatic shore, resplendent in the mellow light of the setting sun. The fine building that formed the Thermæ of Arcadia was in this neighbourhood, and a portion of the polo grounds, Tzycanisterion, attached to the palace of the Byzantine emperors.

Erected to the memory of the British soldiers and sailors who fell in the Crimean War.]

Fifteen years after the Turkish occupation, Sultan Mehemet the Conqueror transferred his residence from his palace on the hill now surmounted by the War Office to this quarter of the city, and for the security of his new abode built the wall that, on its way across the promontory, from the Sea of Marmora to the Golden Horn, passes to the north of S. Sophia. In its general plan the Seraglio was a series of three courts, opening one into the other; and around and within them, embowered in groves of plane-trees and of cypresses, rose the numerous and picturesque edifices which served the convenience of the imperial household. But however inferior in the magnificence created by art, no royal abode has ever been invested by nature with the beauty and lordliness surrounding that in which the Ottoman Sultans sat enthroned from Mehemet the Conqueror to Abdul Medjid, with its grand outlook over Asia, Europe, and the great waterway between the lands on the north and on the south.

"It was at once a royal palace, a fortress, and a sanctuary; here was the brain and heart of Islam, a city within a city, inhabited by a people, and guarded by an army, embracing within its walls an infinite variety of edifices, places of pleasure or of horror; where the Sultans were born, ascended the throne, were deposed, imprisoned, strangled; where all conspiracies began and the cry of rebellion was first heard; where for three centuries the eyes of anxious Europe, timid Asia, and frightened Africa were fixed, as on a smoking volcano, threatening ruin on all sides."

The slopes which descend from S. Sophia and the Hippodrome to the Sea of Marmora, immediately outside the Seraglio Enclosure, are also haunted by memories of splendour and power, for upon them stood the great palace of the Emperors of New Rome from the time of Constantine the Great to almost the end of the Byzantine Empire. The site did not command so extensive a view of the Bosporus as the Seraglio enjoyed, nor had it the outlook of the latter upon the Golden Horn and the busy life of the harbour. But its prospect over the Sea of Marmora and the hills and mountains of the Asiatic coast, rising to the snows of Mount Olympus or merged in the pale blue of the distant horizon, was wider. It had also the advantage of a sunnier and more temperate climate. The site was furthermore recommended by its proximity to the Hippodrome, as direct communication between the palace and that arena of the city's public life, in serious or gay mood, was of paramount importance in Constantinople as at Rome. We must therefore imagine these slopes wooded with trees, and crowded with stately buildings, often domed, for the accommodation of a Court which sought, in pomp and luxury never surpassed, to find all that power and pleasure can do to satisfy the human heart. As in the case of Byzantine churches, so in the edifices forming the "Sacred Palace," artistic effort was chiefly devoted to the decoration of the interior, and it was with similar means, marble revetments and mosaics, that artistic effects were produced.

The throne-room, for instance, was, as we shall find in the sequel, almost a facsimile of the Church of SS. Sergius and Bacchus. Like that church it was an octagonal hall enclosed in a square, and surmounted by a dome pierced by windows.

Each division of the octagon formed a bay under a semi-dome, and above the bays was a rich entablature, with a cornice that projected so as to constitute a gallery. The floor was paved with slabs of porphyry and variegated marbles, arranged to form beautiful designs and set in borders of silver, while walls and vaults gleamed with mosaics. The hall was entered from the west, and in the bay directly opposite stood the throne, with an icon of Christ in mosaic in the conch above it. The bay immediately to the south of the throne was the emperor's robing-room, leading to a chapel in which his robes of state, his crowns and arms, and two enamelled gold shields, studded with pearls and precious stones, were kept under the guardianship of S. Theodore. The other state rooms of the palace were all varieties of the same type, displaying more or less skill and taste, according to the fluctuations of art in Constantinople. Of all the magnificence that once adorned these slopes, nothing remains but unshapely masses of brickwork, broken shafts, fallen capitals and empty sarcophagi! Slopes that vied with the Palatine as a seat of power, they are without a vestige of the grandeur that lingers around the ruined home of the Cæsars! The higher part of the site of the palace is now occupied by the Mosque of Sultan Achmed, the six minarets of which, combined with the four minarets of S. Sophia, make so striking a feature in the aspect of this part of the city. Upon the lower slopes lives a Turkish population that never dreams of the splendour buried beneath its humble dwellings.

Close to Tchalady Kapou, and at the water's edge, are the ungainly ruins of the residence of Justinian the Great and Theodora, before their accession to the throne. Here began the romance of their lives. In course of time additional buildings were put up at this point, and the group thus formed became the Marine Residence attached to the Great Palace. Here was the little harbour at the service of the Court, with marble steps descending to the water from a quay paved with marble, and adorned with many marble figures of lions, bears, bulls, and ostriches. Here the Emperor embarked or disembarked when moving in his imperial barge from one part of the city to another by water. One of the pieces of statuary, representing a lion attacking a bull, bestowed upon this Marine Residence the name Bucoleon (The Bull and Lion), under which designation it is frequently mentioned in Byzantine history. There was enacted the tragedy of the assassination of the noble Nicephorus Phocas by John Zimisces, with the connivance of the Empress Theophano, the victim's wife; a typical instance of the intrigues and crimes that often dishonoured the palace of the Byzantine emperors. The story has recently been told by the brilliant pen of Mr. Frederic Harrison, and therefore must not be repeated. But the visitor to the spot can recall the event with startling vividness, so well preserved is the stage on which the tragedy was acted. Directly opposite, on the Asiatic shore, is Chalcedon, where the conspirators joined Zimisces to proceed to the scene of their cruel work. The Sea of Marmora over which, on that fatal night, a snowstorm spread a veil to hide the boat which bore the conspirators across the sleeping waters, comes up to the very base of the palace. From one of the palace windows overhanging the sea, a basket, attached to a rope, was let down again and again to the boat, and again and again drawn up, with one conspirator in it at a time--Zimisces being the last--until the whole band stood within the imperial abode. And somewhere in the vaulted building we still find at the water's edge, and whose ruins seem haunted by evil ghosts, was the chamber in which the doomed emperor lay slumbering on the floor, and was rudely awakened to know all the bitterness of ingratitude and the sharpness of a cruel death. Geography and topography are certainly the eyes of history.

This mosque is beautifully decorated with blue and green tiles; on the right is the minber (pulpit) built of marble intricately carved and delicately tinted; behind it is one of the four great marble columns that support the roof.]

To the west of the Bucoleon is the beautiful Church of SS. Sergius and Bacchus, erected by Justinian the Great; for some account of which the reader is referred to the chapters on the churches of the city. The district extending thence to the ancient Gate of S. Æmilianus (Daoud Pasha Kapoussi) is remarkable for having been occupied by the artificial harbours, constructed, from time to time, on the southern side of the city in the interest of commerce, or for the use of the imperial navy. They were four in number, and, notwithstanding the changes of centuries, they have left their impress upon the ground to a degree which allows their site and contour to be clearly identified. First in the order of position, though not of time, came the Harbour of the Emperor Julian, below the Hippodrome. It has already been noticed in the history of the making of Constantinople. It was used for some time even after the Turkish Conquest, but was ultimately abandoned for the deeper water found along the shores of the Golden Horn. The Harbour of the Kontoscalion followed; in the quarter which the Greek population still designates by that old name, but which is commonly known as Koum Kapoussi. It has been filled in, but the mole remains, as well as a considerable portion of the wall around the basin of the harbour. The entrance could be closed against an enemy by great gates of iron bars, and in bad weather three hundred galleys, of fifty or a hundred pairs of oars, might be seen taking refuge here, waiting for a favourable wind.

Next in order was the Harbour of Kaisarius, known also as the Neorion or Dockyard of the Heptascalon, which stood where the Turkish quarter of Tulbenkdji Djamissi is now situated. But few traces of it are left. Indeed its position had been forgotten, and its distinctness from the other harbours along this shore ignored, until 1819, when a great fire in the district revealed the fact that the quarter of Tulbenkdji Djamissi stood in the basin of an old harbour, enclosed by a wall built in three tiers of huge blocks. This agreed with other indications of the presence of a harbour at this point hitherto left unexplained--a mole in front of the shore of the quarter, and a gap in the mole forming an entrance to which corresponded an old opening in the city walls, now closed by masonry of Turkish construction. It harmonised also with the description which the historian Pachymeres gives of a harbour constructed or restored by the Emperor Michael Palæologus on this side of the city. Here Phocas placed troops to oppose the landing of Heraclius, and here also the Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, in 673, stationed his ships, armed with Greek fire, to await the fleet of the Saracens in the first siege of Constantinople by that formidable foe.

Last in order of position was the harbour on the site of the vegetable gardens of Vlanga Bostan, a work, as we have seen, belonging to the time of the founder of the city, and known first as the Harbour of Eleutherius, its original constructor, and later as the Harbour of Theodosius I., who improved it. Its mole and extensive portions of the walls around it remain, and carry thought back to the city's earliest days.

These harbours are a monument to the great commercial activity of the city during the Middle Ages, and formed a feature in the life and aspect of the place which has disappeared. Occasionally, in the fruit-season, a considerable number of the ships and large caïques engaged in the coasting trade between the city and the ports of the Sea of Marmora anchor off the points once occupied by these harbours, and help the imagination to recall the animation, the busy crowds, the varied merchandise, the picturesque craft and strange crews that made what is now an almost silent shore one of the liveliest and most interesting quarters of New Rome. Owing to the sand thrown up against this coast, all these harbours demanded frequent cleaning and restoration, and had a hard struggle for existence. They were at length neglected, and, one after another, turned into dry land on which to plant market gardens, or build dwellings for the poor.

A favourite summer resort of wealthy residents of Constantinople.]

The tract of the city extending from Vlanga Bostan to the landward walls was noted for the number and importance of its churches and monasteries. Conspicuous among them was the Church and monastery of S. Mary Peribleptos in the district of Psamatia. It was destroyed by fire in 1782, and is represented by the modern Armenian Church of S. George, generally styled, after the cistern beneath the old edifice, Soulou Monastir.

The Church of S. John Studius, now a sad ruin, stood likewise in this part of the city. So did the Church and monastery of S. Diomed, upon whose steps one day, towards sunset, a way-worn youth in quest of fortune lay down to rest, after his long journey from Macedonia, and rose to become, in a capital where strange careers were possible, the Emperor Basil I. He founded a dynasty that occupied the throne of the Byzantine Empire for two centuries, and counted among its members such notable sovereigns as Basil II. the Slayer of the Bulgarians, Nicephorus Phocas the Conqueror of the Saracens, John Zimisces who drove the Russians out of Bulgaria across the Danube.