Theodora: Empress of Byzantium (Mark Magowan Books) (41 page)

Justinian had a softer side. Some sources say that he was “gentle.”
⁴
He felt affection for the unknown masses, in their unknown regions, who contributed to the treasury, supporting the empire’s various initiatives. Theodora, who had fewer illusions, must have repeated a verse from the
Psalms
to him: “Do not place your faith in the children of men, for in them there is no salvation.”
⁵
For Theodora, only power counted. The citizens would have to pay in any case—if not to them, then to others, and not out of respect or admiration, but out of fear, custom, or indolence. Only action would prove that their dominion was more than nominal.

Or the building of public works. Everything is impermanent, but at least monuments would survive. Human beings were unwilling to be molded by the enlightened emperor and empress. But the pale Proconnese marble, the rosy marble from Istria, the porphyry columns, ivory, silver, mosaic tiles—all the materials used by the latest generation of artists and craftsmen who had inherited the classical tradition of workmanship (
technê
)—were like putty in their hands. The monograms, the inscriptions bearing the signature of the Augusti, and the descriptions celebrating their excellence were carved into mute stone, offering silent satisfaction. The Augusti would leave this mark for future generations.

Like a meridian, Easter Day, 542, marked fifteen years of Justinian and Theodora’s reign. They must have reviewed a list of their accomplishments and of the other initiatives still in the planning stage or already under construction, from the most remote borders of the empire to the heart of Constantinople. After the destruction wrought by the Nika rebellion, they had completely rebuilt Constantinople in just ten years, transforming it from a city of late antiquity into an imperial capital. A jewel of the Byzantine age, it was to be admired by medieval visitors from both West and East (the Slavs called it Tsargrad), raided by invaders in the second millennium (the Crusaders first, then the Ottoman Turks), and celebrated by poets such as W. B. Yeats. All of this made Constantinople a universal city of the soul. None of this would have transpired without Theodora’s unforgettable speech on that bloody Sunday in 532, in the midst of the raging rebellion.

27. Basilike Cistern, c. 530 –40, Istanbul.

The emperors’ architectural and urban planning policy did not aim to revive the art of previous centuries. Constantine’s and Theodosius’s achievements inspired Justinian’s politics, but their art and architecture did not inspire his. The Augusti leaned toward the new and the grandiose, fusing classical elements with oriental seduction, three-dimensional naturalism with geometric abstraction, urban tradition with Christian touches; they even indulged in personal whims. They rediscovered the daring, insouciant, lighthearted quality that had blessed their early years together, the boldness of those intricate laws that seemed to be written for everyone but were really conceived only for
the two of them. They were inimitable. There were no other comparable patrons of art and architecture until the Renaissance.

After the Nika—which was a political phenomenon that impacted the urban fabric—Justinian and Theodora focused on secular architecture, starting with a redefinition of the facade of power: the facade of the palace. They totally redesigned the vestibule, the Chalkê or “bronze house” (a little building with a golden bronze roof). From the palace, the Chalkê opened onto the imperial square (the Augustaeum), with access to the basilica of the Holy Wisdom—the celebrated Hagia Sophia. The Chalkê was the visual threshold of power, its projection upon the city. After the fires of the rebellion, Justinian and Theodora set out to make the new incarnation of the Chalkê more splendid and precious. So the interior of the new dome was decorated with mosaics celebrating Belisarius’s victories over the Vandals and the Goths. Nearby were the baths of Zeuxippus and the Senate palace; they were also destroyed in the flames of 532. Now they were rebuilt “in more beautiful form” than before.
⁶

But the emperor and empress did not stop here. They had inherited a complex metropolis with an urban administration and police force of more than a thousand men. This required premises for the supply and management of food staples and the channeling of water through aqueducts that still astonish us fifteen hundred years later. Like the ancient provincial benefactors of the earliest pagan tradition (the “Euergeti”), the two emperors undertook other initiatives “for the welfare of their subjects.” Some, like the hospitals and almshouses, were Christian institutions; but the porticoed streets, roads, and cisterns were secular public works that stand to this day as masterpieces of ancient architecture (the Basilike Cistern [
fig. 27
] is one shining example). The rulers who commissioned them, and the skilled engineers and architects, both knew how to “enhance the monumental significance even of those buildings that had a purely functional purpose.”
⁷
Edward Gibbon was wrong to disparage this period: it was not a time dominated simply “by the darkest shadows of shame.”
⁸

The Augusti didn’t leave only their imprint on the city; they left
actual portraits, too. Theodora’s features could be seen and admired in the Chalkê mosaics, in a mosaic in the Holy Wisdom, in a statue near the baths of Zeuxippus, and in the enchanting red porphyry statue of “superior beauty” dedicated to her near the Arcadian baths.
⁹
Justinian’s great ego required works on a monumental scale. A statue of him, called “gigantic … a very noteworthy sight,” dominated the Augustaeum square [
fig. 28
] but was unfortunately lost centuries ago.
¹⁰
This equestrian statue of the emperor stood atop a bronze column and represented him in “heroic” fashion “like Achilles”; contemporary praise said that the statue glittered like Sirius, “the evening star.”

28. Drawing of the lost equestrian statue of Justinian from Constantinople’s Augustaeum square, 15th century, Ms. Ital. 3, University Library, Budapest.

The statue looked eastward: perhaps the horse was galloping toward the Persians. In his left hand, the emperor held a globe, “by which the sculptor signified that the whole earth and sea were subject to him,” and the globe carried a cross because with the cross Justinian, like a new Constantine, “had obtained both his empire and his victory in war.” His open right hand pointed eastward, perhaps “to command the barbarians from that quarter to remain at home and to advance no further,” or to greet the daily miracle of the sunrise, so that the emperor of the sleepless nights could evoke the ancient worship of the sun (even Jesus Christ had been called “the Sun of Justice”).
¹¹

29. The “Barberini ivory,” first half of the 6th century, Louvre, Paris.

The lost statue of the emperor in the Augustaeum begs to be compared to other ancient monuments that have survived, such as the famous “Barberini ivory” showing the emperor on horseback [
fig. 29
] and the porphyry group sculpture from the end of the third century
A.D.
, known as the “Tetrarchs,” which adorns a corner of Saint Mark’s basilica in Venice [
fig. 30
]. In that sculpture, power was signified by the Caesars and Augusti of East and West embracing and exchanging
the kiss of peace, their hands on each other’s shoulders. They are linked by their shared rank and by simple physical contact—but each has one hand poised on the basic sign of power, the sword, ready to be drawn from its gem-studded sheath. Other surviving examples—the fourth- and fifth-century imperial torsos in the Berlin Museum and in Ravenna [figs. 31, 32]—also show a hand on the pommel of a sword; but Justinian’s equestrian statue represented him under one shield only, that of the cross:
Romanus, ergo Christianus
(Roman, therefore Christian).

30. The “Tetrarchs,” porphyry group sculpture, end of the 3rd century, basilica of Saint Mark, Venice.

Just as the empire was ideally based on an autocratic form of Christianity, religion became the structuring element of the city. The visitor who approached it by land or by sea saw a skyline dominated by a daring edifice [
fig. 33
], the dome of the basilica dedicated to God’s Holy Wisdom. It was the crowning achievement of a frenzied period of building
religious edifices: in the capital alone, about thirty churches were constructed, some brand-new and some restored after the Nika revolt.

31. Porphyry statue, emperor’s torso, Alexandria, 4th century. Staatliche Museen, Berlin.

32. Porphyry statue, emperor’s torso, Alexandria, 5th century. Museo Arcivescovile, Ravenna.