Читать книгу Byzantine Constantinople, the walls of the city and adjoining historical sites - Alexander Van Millingen - Страница 15

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The entrance between the thirteenth and fourteenth towers to the north of the Golden Gate was the Second Military Gate, τοῦ Δευτέρου.^[287] Its identity is established by its position in the order of the gates; for between it and the Fifth Military Gate, regarding the situation of which there can be no doubt,^[288] two military gates intervene. It must therefore be itself the second of that series of entrances.

Hence, it follows that the quarter of the city known as the Deuteron (τὸ Δεύτερον) was the district to the rear of this gate. This fact can be proved also independently by the following indications. The district in question was without the Walls of Constantine;^[289] it lay to the west of the Exokionion, the Palaia Porta, and the Cistern of Mokius;^[290] it was, on the one hand, near the last street of the city,^[291] the street leading to the Golden Gate, and, on the other, contained the Gate Melantiados,^[292] now Selivri Kapoussi.^[293] Consequently, it was the district behind the portion of the walls in which the gate before us is situated. This in turn supports the identification of the gate as that of the Deuteron. It is the finest and largest of the military gates, and may sometimes have served as a public gate in the period of the Empire, as it has since.

Of the churches in the Deuteron quarter, the most noted were the Church of the SS. Notarii, attributed to Chrysostom,^[294] and the Church of St. Anna, a foundation of Justinian the Great.^[295] Others of less importance were dedicated respectively to St. Timothy,^[296] St. George,^[297] St. Theodore,^[298] and St. Paul the Patriarch.^[299]

The next public entrance (Selivri Kapoussi) is situated between the thirteenth and fourteenth towers north of the Gate of the Deuteron. Its present name appears shortly before the Turkish Conquest (πύλη τῆς Σηλυβρίας),^[300] and alludes to the fact that the entrance is at the head of the road to Selivria; but its earlier and more usual designation was the Gate of the Pegè, i.e. the Spring (Πύλη τῆς Πηγῆς),^[301] because it led to the celebrated Holy Spring (now Baloukli), about half a mile to the west. This name for the entrance is found in the inscription placed on the back of the southern gateway tower, in commemoration of repairs made in the year 1433 or 1438.^[302]

The gate possessed considerable importance owing to its proximity to the Holy Spring,^[303] which, with its healing waters and shrines, its cypress groves, meadows, and delightful air, formed one of the most popular resorts in the neighbourhood of the city.^[304] There the emperors had a palace and hunting park, to which they often retired for recreation, especially in the spring of the year. On the Festival of the Ascension the emperor visited the “Life-giving Pegè” in state, sometimes riding thither through the city, at other times proceeding in his barge as far as the Marmora extremity of the walls, and then mounting horse for the rest of the way.^[305] But in either case, the Imperial cortége came up to this gate, and was received there by the body of household troops called the Numeri. It was on returning from such a visit to the Pegè that the Emperor Nicephorus Phocas was mobbed and stoned, as he rode from the Forum of Constantine to the Great Palace beside the Hippodrome.^[306]

The gate is memorable in history as the entrance through which, in 1261, Alexius Strategopoulos, the general of Michael Palæologus, penetrated into the city,^[307] and brought the ill-starred Latin Empire of Constantinople to an end. For greater security the Latins had built up the entrance; but a band of the assailants, aided by friends within the fortifications, climbed over the walls, killed the drowsy guards, broke down the barricade, and flung the gates open for the restoration of the Greek power. By this gate, in 1376, Andronicus entered, after besieging the city for thirty-two days, and usurped the throne of his father, John VI. Palæologus.^[308] In the siege of 1422 Sultan Murad pitched his tent within the grounds of the Church of the Pegè;^[309] while during the siege of 1453 a battery of three guns played against the walls in the vicinity of this entrance.^[310]

There is reason to think that the gate styled Porta Melantiados (Μελαντιάδος)^[311] and Pylè Melandesia (Μελανδησία),^[312] should be identified with the Gate of the Pegè. Hitherto, indeed, the Porta Melantiados has been identified with the next public gate, Yeni Mevlevi Haneh Kapoussi;^[313] but that view runs counter to the fact that the Porta Melantiados stood in the Deuteron,^[314] whereas the next public gate was, we shall find, in the quarter of the city called, after the Third Military Gate, the Triton (τὸ Τρίτον).^[315] Unless, therefore, the Porta Melantiados is identified with the Gate of the Pegè, it cannot be identified with any other entrance in the Theodosian Walls.

The Gate of the Pegè.

That the Gate of the Pegè had originally another name is certain, since the Holy Spring did not come into repute until the reign of Leo I.,^[316] nearly half a century after the erection of the Wall of Anthemius. And no other name could have been so appropriate as the Porta Melantiados, for the road issuing from the gate led to Melantiada, a town near the Athyras^[317] (Buyuk Tchekmedjè) on the road to Selivria. The town is mentioned in the Itinerary of the Emperor Antoninus as Melantrada and Melanciada, at the distance of nineteen miles from Byzantium; and there on different occasions the Huns, the Goths,^[318] and the Avars^[319] halted on their march towards Constantinople.

At the gate Porta Melantiados, Chrysaphius, the minister and evil genius of Theodosius II., was killed in 450 by the son of John the Vandal, in revenge for the execution of the latter.^[320] It has been suggested that the Mosque of Khadin Ibrahim Pasha within the gate stands on the site of the Church of St. Anna in the Deuteron.^[321] It may, however, mark the site of the Church of the SS. Notarii, which stood near the Porta Melantiados.

The Third Military Gate is but a short distance from the Gate of the Pegè, being situated between the fourth and fifth towers to the north. To the rear of the entrance was the quarter called the Triton (τὸ Τρίτον),^[322] and, more commonly, the Sigma (Σίγμα);^[323] the latter designation being derived, probably, from the curve in the line of the walls immediately beyond the gate. What precisely was the object of the curve is not apparent. One authority explains it as intended for the accommodation of the courtiers and troops that assembled here on the occasion of an Imperial visit to the Pegè.^[324] But the Theodosian Walls were built before the Pegè came into repute;^[325] and the visits of the emperors to the Holy Spring were not so frequent or so important as to affect the construction of the walls in such a manner.

In the quarter of the Sigma stood a column, bearing the statue of Theodosius II., erected by Chrysaphius.^[326] And there, in the riot of 1042, the Emperor Michael Calaphates and his uncle Constantine were blinded, having been dragged thither from the Monastery of Studius, where they had sought sanctuary.^[327]

The most noted churches in the quarter were dedicated respectively to the Theotokos,^[328] St. Stephen, and St. Isaacius.^[329] The site of the first is, in the opinion of Dr. Paspates, marked by the remains of an old Byzantine cistern off the street leading from the Guard-house of Alti Mermer to the Mosque of Yol Getchen.^[330]

The Gate of Rhegium.

The next public gate, Yeni Mevlevi Haneh Kapoussi, situated between the tenth and eleventh towers north of the Third Military Gate, was known by two names, Porta Rhegiou (Ῥηγίου),^[331] the Gate of Rhegium, and Porta Rhousiou (τοῦ Ῥουσίου),^[332] the Gate of the Red Faction. That it bore the former name is established by the fact that the inscription in honour of Theodosius II. and the Prefect Constantine, which was placed, according to the Anthology, on the Gate of Rhegium, is actually found on the lintel of this entrance.^[333] The name alluded to Rhegium (Kutchuk Tchekmedjè), a town twelve miles distant, upon the Sea of Marmora, whither the road leading westward conducted.

The title of the gate to the second name rests partly upon the consideration that the name cannot be claimed for any other entrance in the walls, and partly upon the fact that two circumstances connected with the gate can thus be satisfactorily explained. In the first place, the seven shafts employed to form the lintel, posts, and sill of the gateway are covered with red wash, as though to mark the entrance with the colour of the Red Faction. Secondly, on the northern face of the southern gateway-tower is an inscription, unfortunately mutilated, such as the Factions placed upon a structure in the erection of which they were concerned. The legend as preserved reads thus: “The Fortune of Constantine, our God-protected Emperor triumphs....”

† ΝΙΚΑ Η ΤΥΧΗ

ΚΩΝΣΤΑΝΤΙΝΟΥ ΤΟΥ ΘΕΟ

ΦΥΛΑΚΤΟΥ ΗΜΩΝ ΔΕΣΠΟΤΟΥ

† †

The missing words with which the inscription closed were at some date intentionally effaced, but analogy makes it exceedingly probable that they were ΚΑΙ ΡΟΥΣΙΩΝ, “and of the Reds.”^[334]

The number of inscriptions about this entrance is remarkable, five being on the gateway itself, and two on its southern tower. Of the former those commemorating the erection of the Theodosian fortifications in 447 are of special importance and interest;^[335] another records the repair of the Outer Wall under Justin II. and his Empress Sophia.^[336] Indistinct traces of the fourth are visible on the southern side of the gateway; while the fifth, too fragmentary to yield a meaning, is on the tympanum, arranged on either side of a niche for Icons,^[337] for the gates of the city were, as a rule, placed under the ward of some heavenly guardian. This gate was closed with a portcullis.

The Fourth Military Gate stood between the ninth and tenth towers to the north of the Porta Rhousiou. The northern corbel of the outer gateway is an inscribed stone brought from some other building erected by a certain Georgius.^[338]

The Gate of St. Romanus.

The Gate of Charisius.

Top Kapoussi, between the sixth and seventh towers north of the Fourth Military Gate, is the Gate of St. Romanus (πόρτα τοῦ Ἁγίου Ρωμάνου)^[339] so named after an adjoining church of that dedication. Its identity may be established in the following manner: According to Cananus,^[340] the Gate of St. Romanus and the Gate of Charisius stood on opposite sides of the Lycus. The Gate of St. Romanus, therefore, must have been either Top Kapoussi, on the southern side of that stream, or one of the two gates on the stream’s northern bank, viz. the walled-up entrance at the foot of that bank, or Edirnè Kapoussi upon the summit. That it was the gate on the southern side of the Lycus is clear, from the statements of Critobulus and Phrantzes,^[341] that in the siege of 1453 the Turkish troops which invested the walls extending from the Gate of Charisius (Edirnè Kapoussi) to the Golden Horn were on the Sultan’s left, i.e. to the north of the position he occupied. But the tent of the Sultan was opposite the Gate of St. Romanus.^[342] Hence, the Gate of Charisius was one of the gates to the north of the Lycus, and, consequently, the Gate of St. Romanus stood at Top Kapoussi, to the south. In harmony with this conclusion is the order in which the two gates are mentioned by Pusculus and Dolfin when describing the positions occupied by the defenders of the walls from the Sea of Marmora to the Golden Horn. Proceeding from south to north in their account of the defence, these writers place the Gate of St. Romanus before, i.e. to the south of, the Gate of Charisius.^[343]

The Church of St. Romanus must have been a very old foundation, for it is ascribed to the Empress Helena. It claimed to possess the relics of the prophet Daniel and of St. Nicetas.^[344]

The entrance between the second and third towers north of the Lycus, or between the thirteenth and fourteenth towers north of the Gate of St. Romanus, is the Fifth Military Gate, the Gate of the Pempton (τοῦ Πέμπτου).^[345] It is identified by the fact that it occupies the position which the Paschal Chronicle assigns to the Gate of the Pempton; namely, between the Gate of St. Romanus and the Gate of the Polyandrion—one of the names, as we shall find,^[346] of Edirnè Kapoussi.

Some authorities^[347] have maintained, indeed, that this entrance was the Gate of Charisius. But this opinion is refuted by the fact that the Gate of Charisius, as its whole history proves, was not a military gate, but one of the public gates of the city.^[348] Furthermore, the author of the Metrical Chronicle and Cananus expressly distinguish the Gate of Charisius from the gate situated beside the Lycus.^[349]

To the rear of the entrance was the district of the Pempton, containing the Church of St. Kyriakè and the meadow through which the Lycus flows to the Sea of Marmora. The meadow appears to have been a popular resort before the Theodosian Walls were built, if not also subsequently. Here, about the time of Easter, 404, the Emperor Arcadius came to take exercise on horseback, and here he found three thousand white-robed catechumens assembled. They proved to be persons who had recently been baptized by Chrysostom, in the Thermæ Constantianæ, near the Church of the Holy Apostles, notwithstanding his deposition on account of his quarrel with the Empress Eudoxia. Arcadius was extremely annoyed by the encounter, and ordered his guards to drive the crowd off the ground.^[350]

While riding down one of the slopes of the Lycus valley, in 450, Theodosius II. fell from his horse and sustained a spinal injury, which caused his death a few days later. The Gate of the Pempton was probably the entrance through which the dying emperor was carried on a litter from the scene of the accident into the city.^[351]

The next public gate, Edirnè Kapoussi, between the eighth and ninth towers to the north of the Fifth Military Gate, was named the Gate of Charisius (τοῦ Χαρισίου). The name, which appears in a great variety of forms, occurs first in Peter Magister,^[352] a writer of Justinian’s reign, and was derived, according to the Anonymus, from Charisius, the head of the Blue Faction, when the Theodosian Walls were built.^[353] While some authorities, as already intimated, have attached this name to the Gate of the Pempton, others have supposed that it belonged to the entrance now known as Egri Kapou.^[354] This, as will be shown in the proper place, is likewise a mistake.^[355]

The grounds on which the Gate of Charisius must be identified with the Edirnè Kapoussi are these:^[356] From the statements of Cananus and Critobulus, already considered in determining the position of the Gate of St. Romanus,^[357] it is clear that the Gate of Charisius was one of the two gates on the northern bank of the Lycus; either the gate at the foot of that bank or Edirnè Kapoussi upon the summit. That it was not the former is clearly proved by the fact that Cananus and the Metrical Chronicle, as already cited, distinguished the Gate of Charisius from the entrance beside the Lycus. The Gate of Charisius was, therefore, Edirnè Kapoussi, the gate on the summit of the bank.

Again, the Gate of Charisius was, like Edirnè Kapoussi, at the head of the street leading to the Church of the Holy Apostles. This is evident from the circumstance that when Justinian the Great, returning to the city from the West, visited on his way to the palace the tomb of the Empress Theodora at the Holy Apostles’, he entered the capital by the Gate of Charisius instead of by the Golden Gate,^[358] because the former entrance led directly to the Imperial Cemetery near that church.

To these arguments may be added the fact that near the Gate of Charisius was a Church of St. George,^[359] the guardian of the entrance, and that a Byzantine church dedicated to that saint stood immediately to the south-east of Edirnè Kapoussi as late as the year 1556, when it was appropriated by Sultan Suleiman for the construction of the Mosque of Mihrimah. At the same time the Greek community received by way of compensation a site for another church to the north-west of the gate, and there the present Church of St. George was built to preserve the traditions of other days.^[360] Lastly, like Edirnè Kapoussi, the Gate of Charisius stood at a point from which one could readily proceed to the Church of the Chora (Kahriyeh Djamissi), the Church of St. John in Petra (Bogdan Serai), and the Palace of Blachernæ.^[361]

Another name for the Gate of Charisius was the Gate of the Polyandrion, or the Myriandron (Πόρτα τοῦ Πολυανδρίου, τοῦ Μυριάνδρου), the Gate of the Cemetery. This follows from the fact that whereas the respective names of the three gates in the walls crossing the valley of the Lycus are usually given as the Gate of Charisius, Gate of the Pempton, the Gate of St. Romanus, we find the first name omitted in a passage of the Paschal Chronicle referring to those entrances, and the Gate of the Polyandrion mentioned instead.^[362] Evidently, the Gate of Charisius and the Gate of the Polyandrion were different names for the same gate.

The latter designation was peculiarly appropriate to an entrance on the direct road to the Imperial Cemetery. Probably a public cemetery stood also outside the gate, where a large Turkish cemetery is now situated, and that may have been another reason for the name of the gate.^[363]

With the portion of the walls between the Gate of St. Romanus and the Gate of Charisius, memorable historical events are associated which cannot be passed over without some notice, however brief.

On account of its central position in the line of the land fortifications, this part of the walls was named the Mesoteichion (Μεσοτείχιον).^[364] It was also known as the Myriandrion,^[365] on account of its proximity to the Gate of Polyandrion; the portion to the south of the Lycus being further distinguished as the Murus Bacchatareus,^[366] after the Tower Baccaturea near the Gate of St. Romanus.^[367]

View Across the Valley of the Lycus (Looking North).

Owing to the configuration of the ground traversed by the Mesoteichion, it was at this point that a besieging army generally delivered the chief attack. Here stood the gates opening upon the streets which commanded the hills of the city; here was the weakest part of the fortifications, the channel of the Lycus rendering a deep moat impossible, while the dip in the line of walls, as they descended and ascended the slopes of the valley, put the defenders below the level occupied by the besiegers. Here, then, for Constantinople was the “Valley of Decision”—here, in the armour of the city, the “heel of Achilles.”

In the siege of 626 by the Avars, the first siege which the Theodosian Walls sustained, the principal attack was made from twelve towers which the enemy built before the fortifications extending from the Gate of Charisius to the Gate of the Pempton, and thence to the Gate of St. Romanus.^[368]

Upon the Gate of Charisius attempts were made: by Justinian II. and his allies for the recovery of his throne in 705;^[369] by Alexius Branas against Isaac Angelus in 1185;^[370] by John Cantacuzene in 1345^[371] and through it the Comneni entered in 1081, by bribing the German guards (Nemitzi) at the gate, and wrested the sceptre from the hand of Nicephorus Botoniates.^[372]

In 1206, during the struggle in which the Latins, soon after their capture of the city, involved themselves with Joannicus, King of Bulgaria, a raid was made upon the Gate of St. Romanus and the adjacent quarter by Bulgarian troops encamped near the capital.^[373] In 1328 the gate was opened to admit Andronicus III. by two partisans, who stupefied the guards with drink, and then assisted a company of his soldiers to scale the walls with rope ladders.^[374] In 1379 John VI. Palæologus and his son Manuel, after effecting their escape from the prison of Anemas, and making terms with Sultan Bajazet, entered the city by this gate, and obliged Andronicus IV. to retire from the throne he had usurped.^[375]

But it was in the sieges of the city by the Turks that this portion of the walls was attacked most fiercely, as well as defended with the greatest heroism. Here in 1422 Sultan Murad brought cannon to bear, for the first time, upon the fortifications of Constantinople. His fire was directed mainly at an old half-ruined tower beside the Lycus; but the new weapon of warfare was still too weak to break Byzantine masonry, and seventy balls struck the tower without producing the slightest effect.^[376]

In the siege of 1453 this portion of the walls was assailed by Sultan Mehemet himself with the bravest of his troops and his heaviest artillery, his tent being pitched, as already stated, about half a mile to the west of the Gate of St. Romanus.^[377] At the Murus Bacchatareus fought the Emperor Constantine, with his 400 Genoese allies, under the command of the brave Guistiniani, who had come to perform prodigies of valour “per benefitio de la Christiantade et per honor del mundo.” The three brothers, Paul, Antony, and Troilus, defended the Myriandrion, “with the courage of Horatius Cocles.”

As the struggle proceeded two towers of the Inner Wall and a large portion of the Outer Wall were battered to pieces by the Turkish cannon. The enemy also succeeded in filling the moat at this point with earth and stones, to secure an unobstructed roadway into the city whenever a breach was effected.

On the other hand, Giustiniani repaired the breach in the Outer Wall by the erection of a palisade, covered in front with hides and strengthened on the rear by a rampart of stones, earth, branches, and herbage of every description, all welded together with mortar, and supported by an embankment of earth. Between this barricade and the Inner Wall he furthermore excavated a trench, to replace to some extent the moat which had been rendered useless; and to maintain his communications with the interior of the city he opened a postern in the great wall.

Against these extemporized defences assault after assault dashed in all its strength and fury, only to be hurled back and broken. Meanwhile, more and more of the Inner and Outer Walls fell under the Turkish fire, and the Sultan decided to make a general attack at daybreak on the 29th of May. The onset upon the Mesoteichion, directed by the Sultan in person, was, however, repeatedly repelled, and the day threatened to go against the assailants, when a Turkish missile struck Giustiniani and forced him to leave the field. His soldiers refused to continue the struggle, abandoned their post, and disheartened their Greek comrades. The Sultan, perceiving the change in the situation, roused his janissaries to make a supreme effort. They swept forward, carried the barricade, filled the trench behind it with corpses of the defenders, and passing over, poured into the doomed city through every available opening. Some made their way through the breach in the great wall, others entered by the postern which Giustiniani had opened,^[378] while others cut a path through the heap of dead bodies which blocked the Gate of Charisius. The heroic emperor refused to survive his empire, and found death near the Gate of St. Romanus.^[379] And through that gate, about midday, the Sultan entered, the master of the city of Constantine. It was the close of an epoch.

The next Theodosian gate stands between the last tower in the Outer Wall to the north of the Gate of Charisius and the old Byzantine Palace now called Tekfour Serai. In its present condition the entrance pierces only the Outer Wall; for the Inner Wall terminates abruptly a little to the south of the palace, having been broken away, probably when that edifice was erected. By way of compensation the Outer Wall was then raised higher and built thicker, and flanked by a large tower.

According to its place in the order of the gates, this entrance should be the Sixth Military Gate; and the smallness of its dimensions is in keeping with this view. But as it led to a Circus built of timber beside the Church of St. Mamas without the walls, it was styled Porta Xylokerkou (Ξυλοκέρκου),^[380] Gate of the Wooden Circus, or more briefly, Kerko Porta (Κερκόπορτα),^[381] the Gate of the Circus.

In support of this identification there is first the fact that the Gate of the Xylokerkus, like the gate before us, was an entrance in the Walls of Theodosius, for it bore an inscription, which has unfortunately disappeared, in honour of that emperor and the Prefect Constantine, similar to the legend on the Porta Rhegiou.^[382] In the next place, the Gate of the Xylokerkus, like the entrance before us, was in the vicinity of the Gate of Charisius, and below a palace^[383] (Tekfour Serai).

The (So-Called) Kerko Porta.

The history of the gate has an interest of its own. When the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa was at Philippopolis, on his way to the Holy Land at the head of the Third Crusade, the prevalent suspicion that he had designs upon the Byzantine Empire found expression in the prophecy of a certain Dositheos, a monk of the Monastery of St. John Studius, that the German emperor would capture Constantinople, and penetrate into the city through this entrance. Thereupon, with the view of averting the calamity and preventing the fulfilment of the prophecy, Isaac Angelus ordered the gate to be securely built up.^[384] In 1346 the partisans of John Cantacuzene proposed to admit him into the city by breaking the gate open, after its long close.^[385]

But what gives to the Kerko Porta its chief renown is the part which, according to Ducas, it played in the catastrophe of 1453, under the following circumstances. A large portion of the Outer Wall, at the Mesoteichion, having been overthrown by the Turkish cannon, the besieged were unable to issue from the city to the peribolos without being exposed to the enemy’s fire. In this extremity some old men, who knew the fortifications well, informed the emperor of a secret postern long closed up and buried underground, at the lower part of the palace, by which communication with the peribolos might be established.^[386] This was done, to the great advantage of the Greeks. But on the last day of the siege, while the enemy was attempting to scale the walls with ladders at several points, a band of fifty Turkish nobles detected the newly opened entrance, rushed in, and mounting the walls from the interior of the city, killed or drove off the defenders on the summit. Thus a portion of the fortifications was secured against which scaling-ladders could be applied without any difficulty, and soon a considerable Turkish force stood on the Inner Wall, planted their standards on the towers, and opened a rear fire upon the Greeks, who were fighting in the peribolos to prevent the Turks from entering at the great breach. The cry rose that the city was taken, whereupon an indescribable panic seized the Greeks, already disheartened by the loss of Giustiniani, and, abandoning all further resistance, they fled into the city through the Gate of Charisius, many being trampled to death in the rout. The emperor fell at his post; and the Turks poured into the city without opposition.^[387] The fate of Constantinople was thus scaled by the opening of the Kerko Porta.

But here a difficulty occurs. In one very important particular the Kerko Porta, as described by Ducas, does not correspond to the character of the entrance with which it has been identified. The gate which the historian had in mind led to the peribolos, the terrace between the two Theodosian walls, whereas the gate below Tekfour Serai opens on the parateichion, the terrace between the Outer Wall and the Moat. This discrepancy may, however, be removed to some extent by supposing that under the name of the Kerko Porta. Ducas referred to the postern which Dr. Paspates^[388] found in the transverse wall built across the northern end of the peribolos, where the Inner Wall of Theodosius terminates abruptly a little to the south of Tekfour Serai. The postern was discovered in 1864, after some houses which concealed it from view had been destroyed by fire. It was 10-½ feet high by 6 feet wide, and although the old wall in which it stood has been, for the most part, pulled down and replaced by a new construction, the outline of the ancient postern can still be traced. Such an entrance might be buried out of sight, and be generally forgotten; and to open it, when recalled to mind in 1453, was to provide the defenders of the city with a secret passage, as they hoped, to the peribolos and the rear of the Outer Wall, where the contest was to be maintained to the bitter end.

The suggestion of Dr. Paspates that this was the entrance at which the incidents recorded by Ducas occurred may, therefore, be accepted. But, from the nature of the case, an entrance in such a position could not have been, strictly speaking, the Gate of the Circus, and to call it the Kerko Porta was therefore not perfectly accurate. That was, properly, the name of the gate below Tekfour Serai. Still, the mistake was not very serious, and, under the circumstances, was not strange. Two entrances so near each other could easily be confounded in the report of the events in the neighbourhood, especially when the postern in the transverse wall had no special name of its own. Dr. Mordtmann^[389] thinks that the postern near the Kerko Porta was the one which Giustiniani, according to Critobulus,^[390] opened in the Inner Wall to facilitate communication with the peribolos. The latter postern, however, is represented as near the position occupied by Giustiniani and the emperor, while the former is described as far from that point.^[391]