There were even periods when such renovation was carried out on an extensive scale, as for instance under Justinian the Great and under Basil I. (867-886). But not less frequently the old fabric was so weakened by age or shaken by earthquake that to repair it was out of the question, and the only thing to be done was to use its stones and bricks and marbles as materials in the construction of other buildings. Much of the material, for instance employed in the erection of the Tower of Isaac Angelus, in front of the Palace of Blachemae, was taken from the ruins of old churches. While for the construction of the citadel which John VI. Palaeologus (1841-1891) built near the Golden Gate, material was taken from the remains of churches so noted in their day as the Church of All Saints, the Church of the Forty Martyrs, and the Church of S. Mokius.

Upon the recovery of Constantinople from the Latins in 1261, something indeed was done to repair the damage due to the occupation of the city, for some fifty-seven years, by barbarous and covetous strangers. But the last two centuries of the Empire were years of wars and civil broils, years of decline and poverty, and at length of despair, so that comparatively little could be undertaken to rebuild the sad ruins inherited from the past, or to arrest the decay whose withering touch was laid on the monuments that still survived more or less intact Even the Imperial Palace beside the Hippodrome was allowed to fall into such neglect and desolation, that when the Turkish conqueror visited its empty halls they echoed to his ear the couplet of the Persian poet: " The spider has become the watchman of the royal abode, and has spread his curtain over its doorway."

The decay which had smitten the city impressed every visitor daring the half-century preceding the Turkish Conquest " Although the city is large," says the Spanish envoy already cited, "and has a wide circuit it is not thickly populated everywhere; for it contains many hills and valleys occupied by cultivated fields and gardens, and where one sees houses such as are found in an outlying suburb; and all this in the heart of the city. . . . There are still many very large buildings in the city, houses, churches, monasteries, but most of them are in ruins."

Themistius and Anthemius

The great disproportion between the size of the city and the number of the population made a similar impression on Bondelmontius, who came here from Florence in 1422 istanbul black sea blue gate. He speaks of vineyards flourishing within the city bounds, and adds, " There are innumerable churches and cisterns throughout the city, remarkably large and constructed with much labour, and found in ruin." La Broqui&re, to cite one witness more, who was here in 1488, observes that the open spaces in the city were more extensive than the territory occupied by buildings. Times had indeed changed since the days of Themistius and Anthemius.

Constantinople was therefore far from being a rich and splendid city when it fell into the hands of its Turkish conquerors in 1458, and the scarcity of the monuments of its former wealth and grandeur must not be ascribed wholly to the action of its new masters. The ravages of time, and the vandalism of the Latin Crusaders, had left little for other rude hands to destroy.

In his dealing with the religious rights of the Christian community the Ottoman lord of Con-stantinople proved conciliatory. While appropriating S. Sophia and several other churches for Moslem use, he allowed the Greeks to retain a sufficient number of their former places of worship.

He, moreover, ordered the free election of a new patriarch, who should enjoy, as far as possible under altered circumstances, the privileges which the chief prelate of the Great Orthodox Church had formerly possessed. Upon the election of Gennadius to the vacant post, the Sultan received him graciously at the palace, and presented him with a valuable pastoral cross, saying " Be patriarch and be at peace. Depend upon my friendship so long as thou desirest it, and thou shalt enjoy all the privileges of thy predecessors." The Church of the Holy Apostles, only second in repute to S. Sophia, was assigned to the patriarch as a cathedral, and he was not only allowed free access to the Seraglio, but was even visited by the Sultan at the patriarchate.

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