State and Church

My time today was divided between secular and ecclesiastical architecture, and I thought this would be a good opportunity to talk a little bit about how little meaning the "church and state" distinction had in Byzantium.  While in western Europe there was at least some independence of the state from the Church, in the East this wasn't really the case.  But, rather than the Church dominating imperial affairs, the situation was the reverse: the emperor was the boss, and by and large the Church--by which I mean the Patriarch of Constantinople--bowed to his will.

This is of course something of an exaggeration; the term "caesaropapism" is no longer widely used, and there are certainly examples of Patriarchs acting in defiance of the emperor's wishes.  But, for the most part, the state was responsible for the Church.  Furthermore, imperial revenue was behind most ecclesiastical building; there were wealthy patrons who funded churches as well, but most of the truly grand buildings--particularly in Constantinople itself--were paid for by the imperial coffers.

This is all sort of a side note, but I thought it had some relevance to what I saw today.  Also, the following is somewhat out of order, in the interest of making the actual post more interesting.  We went to whatever made the most sense based on where we were in the city, but I'm going to cover secular stuff first, then ecclesiastical things.  I started by going to Yedikule, a fortress in the southwest corner of Istanbul.  Literally "Seven Towers" in Turkish, the fortress is a combination of the Royal Gate in the Theodosian Walls and later additions by the Ottomans, creating a fortress with a grand total of 7 towers.  It was never actually used as a fortress, but rather acted as the Ottoman treasury and political prison.  The gate--also known as the Porta Aurea--and the walls give a fairly good impression of just how formidable they were in their heyday:

A shot with some people, for scale

As you can see, these were MASSIVE.  The walls of Constantinople were the most effective defensive structure in Europe without question, and personally I would argue you can count the rest of the world too.  Built in the 5th century AD, they successfully withstood siege after siege, finally succumbing to the Ottomans in 1453 when cannons were used against them.  Part of the reason for their success was the 3 layers of defense:

It's hard to tell from this picture, but the Theodosian walls are in effect 3 separate walls.  Right around the center-left of this picture you can see the crenelations; these stood above a deep moat, so that attackers would have had to fight uphill and against a well defended area to breach the first layer.  Next came the outer wall, which is what makes up the bulk of the picture.  If they managed to get beyond this wall, they then had to scale the much higher inner wall, which is where this picture was taken from.  To make things even more difficult, there were numerous towers on both the inner and outer walls, positioned so that it was impossible to attack without being in the view of one tower or another.  It's not surprising that it took gunpowder to get through these defenses, especially when you see how substantial they really were.  Here are a few more shots of the walls:

From inside Yedikule

Imagine these towers, along with 92 identical twins, and you have a pretty good idea of what the inner wall was like

A view from the very top of one of the towers, looking towards the end of the Golden Horn on the northern end of the city.

In 1453, when the Ottomans finally succeeded in capturing the Queen of Cities, Constantinople held only about 50,000 souls, compared to roughly 1 million in earlier times.  Constantine XI Palaiologos--the final Byzantine emperor--had only about 7,000 men to command, while his attackers were able to field roughly 80,000.  Outnumbered more than 10 to 1, the Byzantines still had the potential to win the battle; had sultan Mehmet II not had his massive cannons, the walls of Theodosius would likely have held the day once again. To see these walls, which stood unbreached for over 1000 years, was truly remarkable.

We also saw the Palace of the Porphyrogenitos, a medieval addition to the walls.  It became the preferred palace of the emperors in later years, and was the imperial residence at the time of the siege.  Porphyrogenitos literally means "born in the purple," and was a title given to members of the royal family who were born in a special birthing chamber constructed entirely of porphyry.  These people held the highest status in the empire; members of the imperial family born elsewhere were considered to be of a lower rank, and farther from the succession.  The palace is fairly ruined, although there were construction crews working during our visit.  Hopefully it will be restored and open to the public fairly soon.

Facing into the city...

...and facing out.

Moving to the Church side of "State and Church," we visited the Patriarchate, the seat of the Patriarch of Constantinople.  And yes, I meant to write Constantinople, not Istanbul (despite what the song may tell you).  In Greece, the city is still called Konstantinopolis, and the leader of the Orthodox Church is the still the Patriarch of Constantinople.  The status of the Patriarch is a sore spot between Greeks and Turks (by Turkish law he is required to be a citizen of Turkey; no native Greek can hold the position), but I digress.  Unfortunately (at least in my opinion) the Patriarch is not permitted to be based in one of the ancient churches of the city, but instead is located in a structure from the 19th century.

Quite the difference from his old station in Hagia Sophia, huh?

The interior of the church was fairly nondescript, although it was littered with ancient relics and icons.  However, a church service was just starting, so we refrained from taking pictures inside.  If someone who is reading this happens to be travelling to Istanbul in the future, I would suggest that you visit, at least if you find icons and relics interesting.

We did, however, go to several more noteworthy churches.  One of the most interesting ones was St. Mary of the Mongols.  One of the few (possibly the only, quite frankly I'm not sure) churches constructed prior to the conquest of Constantinople that has remained a church ever since, it was really interesting to see what a church that had been in continuous use for the past 700 years looked like.  The only reason it remains a church is a decree from Mehmet II guaranteeing in perpetuity the sanctity of the space, and that it would never be converted to a mosque (the decree is proudly displayed within).  Like the Patriarchate, the interior itself was relatively plain, but also like the Patriarchate, it had some truly ancient relics and icons.  The front door was locked and we were about to leave, when a man beckoned us to come in and proceeded to give us a tour, pointing out the notable pieces and encouraging us to take photos and explore.

The Iconostasis

Emperor Constantine (a saint in the Orthodox Church) and his mother, St. Helena

There was also a tunnel which leads underground to the Hagia Sophia, several kilometers away.

We also saw two churches notable for their extensive mosaics (in fact, along with Hagia Sophia, they are the 3 places in Istanbul with the most original Byzantine mosaics).  Both were originally churches, then mosques, and now museums (and therefore requiring an entrance fee).  The first was St. Savior in Chora.  Built in the 11th century, the church was extensively decorated in the 14th century, after Michael VII Palaiologos recaptured the empire from the Latins who had controlled Constantinople since the Fourth Crusade in 1204.  Much, much smaller than Hagia Sophia, it was possible to get quite close to these mosaics, and it also better represents just how covered these churches were in artwork (despite the fact that many of Chora's mosaics are no longer intact):

The Hagia Sophia's dome probably looked like this, only much larger

When the church was new it would have been decorated over every inch, and despite the damage the effect is still pretty impressive.  It also gives a better impression of what the Hagia Sophia would have looked like in its heyday; Chora is important not only for the actual mosaics, but also as a fairly complete example of what a Byzantine church looked like, and it allows you to infer the grandeur of other, larger buildings.

We also saw the Theotokos Pammakaristos, "All-Blessed Mother of God," another church-cum-mosque-cum-museum.  It too was decorated after the expulsion of the Latins in 1261, and is an important example of late Byzantine art and architecture.  We were only allowed into the side chapel, but that is where most of the mosaics are:

So, in 3 days, I managed to see the majority of the Byzantine mosaics extant in Istanbul.  That's pretty cool, but it's also pretty sad.  So much damage has been done just in the past 500 years, much less the past 1000. How much has been lost is incalculable.  At least there are preservation efforts, but I still wonder how long it will be until it's all gone, given how little is left as it is.

That's it for now!  One more post to follow on Istanbul, and then it's off to Ravenna.  As usual, please leave comments, especially if there's something you'd like me to elaborate on.