Constantine of Rhodes, on Constantinople and the Church of the Holy Apostles: With a New Edition of the Greek Text by Ioannis Vassis

267 Pages·2012·1.96 MB·English

by  Liz James

Constantine of Rhodes,
On Constantinople and the
Church of the Holy Apostles
With a new edition of the Greek text
by Ioannis Vassis
Edited by
Liz James
Constantine of Rhodes,
on Constantinople and the
ChuRCh of the holy apostles
This page has been left blank intentionally
Constantine of Rhodes,
on Constantinople and the
Church of the holy apostles
With a new edition of the Greek text by ioannis Vassis,
aristotle university of Thessaloniki
Edited by
liz James
University of Sussex, UK
© liz James 2012
all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
liz James has asserted her right under the Copyright, designs and patents act, 1988, to be
identified as the editor of this work.
published by
ashgate publishing limited ashgate publishing Company
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Constantine, of Rhodes, 10th cent.
Constantine of Rhodes, on Constantinople and the church of the holy apostles.
1. hagioi apostoloi (Church : istanbul, turkey)--poetry.
2. architecture, Byzantine--turkey--istanbul--poetry.
3. art, Byzantine--turkey--istanbul--poetry.
4. Constantine, of Rhodes, 10th cent.--Criticism and interpretation.
i. title ii. Vassis, ioannis. iii. James, liz.
881'.02-dc23
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Constantine, of Rhodes, 10th cent.
Constantine of Rhodes, on Constantinople and the Church of the holy apostles / with a
new edition of the Greek text by ioannis Vassis ; edited by liz James, with contributions from
ioannis Vassis and others.
p. cm.
includes bibliographical references and index.
isBn 978-1-4094-3167-1 (hardcover) -- isBn 978-1-4094-3168-8 (ebook)
1. hagioi apostoloi (Church : istanbul, turkey)--poetry. 2. Byzantine poetry.
i. Vassis, ioannis. ii. James, liz. iii. title.
pa5310.C57C66 2012
881'.01--dc23
2012013760
isBn 9781409431671 (hbk)
isBn 9781409431688 (ebk – pdf)
V
printed and bound in Great Britain by the
mpG Books Group, uK
Contents
List of Figures vii
Preface ix
Acknowledgements xi
List of Abbreviations xiii
Section i: the Poem
1 Introduction to the Greek Edition 3
Ioannis Vassis
2 Text and Translation 15
Edition by Ioannis Vassis
Translation by Vassiliki Dimitropoulou, Liz James and Robert Jordan
Index nominum 86
Index verborum notabilium 88
3 Commentary on the Translation 95
Liz James
Section ii: conStantine of RhodeS’S Poem and
aRt hiStoRy, by Liz JameS
4 The Poet and the Poem 131
5 ‘A partial account of the statues of the city and its high and very
great columns’: Constantine’s Account of Constantinople 159
6 The Church of the Holy Apostles:
Fact and Fantasy, Descriptions and Reconstructions 181
7 In Conclusion 219
vi Constantine of Rhodes, On Constantinople and the Church of the Holy Apostles
Bibliography 223
Index 243
List of Figures
1 Map of Constantine of Rhodes’s Constantinople, © Simon Lane xv
2 Mosaic of the Mother of God and Christ-Child between the emperors
Justinian I and Constantine the Great, tenth century, south-west
vestibule, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul (photo: Antony Eastmond) 174
3 Reconstructions of the church of the Holy Apostles 188
3.1 Reinach’s Holy Apostles (originally published in T. Reinach,
‘Commentaire archéologique sur le poème de Constantin le Rhodien’,
Revue des études grecques 9 (1896), 66–103; this version taken from
K. Wulzinger, ‘Apostelkirche und die Mehmedije zu Konstantinopel’,
Byzantion 7 (1932), 7–39 and used with permission)
3.2 Wulff’s Holy Apostles (originally published in O. Wulff,
‘Die sieben Wunder von Byzanz und die Apostelkirche nach
Konstantinos Rhodios’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 7 (1898), 316–331
and used with permission)
3.3 Heisenberg’s Holy Apostles (originally published in A. Heisenberg,
Grabeskirche und Apostelkirche. Zwei Basiliken Konstantins.
Untersuchungen zur Kunst und Literatur des ausgehenden Altertums,
Zweiter Teil. Die Apostelkirche in Konstantinopel (Leipzig, 1908); this
version taken from K. Wulzinger, ‘Apostelkirche und die Mehmedije zu
Konstantinopel’, Byzantion 7 (1932), 7–39 and used with permission)
4 Reconstructions and comparators of the church of the Holy Apostles 189
4.1 Soteriou’s Holy Apostles (originally published in G. A. Soteriou,
‘Ἀνασκαφαὶ τοῦ βυζαντινοῦ ναοῦ τοῦ Ἰωάννου τοῦ Θεολόγου
ἐν Ἐφέσῳ’, Archaiologikon Deltion 7 (1921–1922), 205–228;
redrawn by Simon Lane)
4.2 San Marco in Venice (drawn by Simon Lane)
4.3 St John in Ephesos (drawn by Simon Lane)
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Preface
Constantine of Rhodes’s tenth-century poem on the wonders of Constantinople
and the Church of the Holy Apostles has been regularly used as a source
of information about tenth-century Constantinople and as a basis for
reconstructions of the Church of the Holy Apostles, which was destroyed after
the conquest of Constantinople in 1453. The poem survives in one manuscript,
Athos Lavra 1161, and has been edited twice previously, by Begleri and by
Legrand, both in 1896.1 Large parts of the poem were translated into German
by August Heisenberg in 1908; scattered parts have been published in a range of
other languages. The poem as a whole has not previously been published in an
English translation.2
It is clear from scattered references throughout his work that in the 1940s
and 1950s, Glanville Downey and a group of scholars including Albert M.
Friend Jr., Francis Dvornik and Paul Underwood were working on a study of the
church of the Holy Apostles. In 1951, Downey specifically mentioned that he
had prepared a new edition, translation and commentary on the poem as a part
of this research.3 In his survey of the church and mosaics of San Marco, Otto
Demus used the unpublished texts of a lecture on architectural reconstructions
1 G. P. Begleri, Chram svjatych Apostolov i drugie pamjatniki Konstantinopolja po
opisaniju Konstantina Rodija (Odessa, 1896); É. Legrand, ‘Description des œuvres d’art et
de l’église des saints Apôtres de Constantinople. Poème en vers iambiques par Constantin le
Rhodien’, Revue des études grecques 9 (1896), 32–65.
2 A. Heisenberg, Grabeskirche und Apostelkirche. Zwei Basiliken Konstantins.
Untersuchungen zur Kunst und Literatur des ausgehenden Altertums, Zweiter Teil. Die
Apostelkirche in Konstantinopel (Leipzig, 1908); C. Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire
312–1453 (Toronto, 1972), 199–201 provides the longest published section in English that
I am aware of.
3 In G. Downey, ‘The Builder of the Original Church of the Apostles at Constantinople’,
DOP 6 (1951), 55, n. 8. Other references come in his ‘On Some Post-Classical Greek
Architectural Terms’, Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association
77 (1946), 25, n. 9; ‘Notes on the Topography of Constantinople’, Art Bulletin 34 (1952),
235, n. 3; ‘Constantine the Rhodian: His Life and Writings’, in K. Weitzmann et al. (eds),
Late Classical and Mediaeval Studies in Honor of A.M. Friend, Jr. (Princeton, 1955), 212;
Nikolaos Mesarites, Description of the Church of the Holy Apostles at Constantinople, ed. and
trans. by G. Downey, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 47, 6 (1957), 855.
Here and in his ‘The Tombs of the Byzantine Emperors at the Church of the Holy Apostles