Constantinople: Archaeology of a Byzantine Megapolis

By Ken Dark and Ferudun Özgümüş

Istanbul, Europe’s largest city, became an urban centre of exceptional size when it was chosen by Constantine the Great as a new Roman capital city. Named ‘Constantinople' after him, the city has been studied through its rich textual sources and surviving buildings, but its archaeology remains relatively little known compared to other great urban centres of the ancient and medieval worlds. Constantinople: Archaeology of a Byzantine Megapolis is a major archaeological assessment of a key period in the development of this historic city. It uses material evidence, contemporary developments in urban archaeology and archaeological theory to explore over a thousand years of the city’s development. Moving away from the scholarly emphasis on the monumental core or city defences, the volume investigates the inter-mural area between the fifth-century land walls and the Constantinian city wall – a zone which encompasses half of the walled area but which has received little archaeological attention. Utilizing data from a variety of sources, including the ‘Istanbul Rescue Archaeology Project’ created to record material threatened with destruction, the analysis proposes a new model of Byzantine Constantinople. A range of themes are explored including the social, economic and cognitive development, Byzantine perceptions of the city, the consequences of imperial ideology and the impact of ‘self-organization’ brought about by many minor decisions. Constantinople casts new light on the transformation of an ancient Roman capital to an Orthodox Christian holy city and will be of great importance to archaeologists and historians.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Release date: Nov 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781782971818

Ken Dark

Ken Dark is Associate Professor in Archaeology and History at the University of Reading, where he was Director of the Research Centre for Late Antique and Byzantine Studies from 2001 until 2016. Between 1997 and 2004 he co-directed the British Museum-funded rescue archaeology program for Istanbul, published in 2013 by Oxbow as Constantinople: archaeology of a Byzantine Megapolis.

Book preview

CONSTANTINOPLE

CONSTANTINOPLE

Archaeology of a Byzantine Megapolis

Final Report on the Istanbul Rescue Archaeology Project 1998–2004

directed by

Ken Dark and Ferudun Özgümüş

English language report written by Ken Dark

First published in the United Kingdom in 2013.

Reprinted as a paperback in 2022 by

OXBOW BOOKS

The Old Music Hall, 106–108 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 1JE

and in the United States by

OXBOW BOOKS

1950 Lawrence Road, Havertown, PA 19083

© Oxbow Books and the author, K. R. Dark, 2013

Paperback Edition: ISBN 978-1-78925-806-6

Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-181-8 (epub)

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Dark, K. R. (Kenneth Rainsbury)

Constantinople : archaeology of a Byzantine megapolis : final report on the Istanbul Rescue Archaeology Project 1998-2004 directed by Ken Dark and Ferudun Özgümüş / English language report written by Ken Dark.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-78297-171-9

1. Istanbul (Turkey)--Antiquities. 2. Byzantine antiquities. 3. Turkey--Antiquities. I. Özgümüş, Ferudun. II. Title.

DR725.D37 2014

939’.8618--dc23

2013038133

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher in writing.

For a complete list of Oxbow titles, please contact:

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Oxbow Books is part of the Casemate Group

Front cover: The Theodosian land walls from the west – photograph: K. R. Dark

Back cover: View through the Theodosian land walls, looking west – photograph: K. R. Dark

CONTENTS

List of figures

List of colour plates

Note on authorship

Terminology and conventions

Acknowledgments

Preface

C

HAPTER

1: Introduction: Constantinople and Istanbul

C

HAPTER

2: The Istanbul Rescue Archaeology Project 1998–2004: history, organisation and methods

C

HAPTER

3: The southern part of the study area

C

HAPTER

4: The northern part of the study area

C

HAPTER

5: The Blachernae Palace

C

HAPTER

6: The Church of the Holy Apostles

C

HAPTER

7: Conclusion: archaeology of a Byzantine megapolis

A

PPENDIX

1: The first phase of construction at Fatih Camii

A

PPENDIX

2: The church of Zoodochos Pege

A

PPENDIX

3: The 2000 ‘Fener-Ayakapı-Cibali-Unkapanı’ Survey

Catalogue of material of Roman or Byzantine date recorded in the study area during the project’s work in 1998–99 and 2001–4, followed by distribution maps showing the material recorded in the catalogue with a key to these maps

Maps

Bibliography

LIST OF FIGURES

1. Byzantine Constantinople

2. Typical Ottoman-period wooden houses in the Yedikule area

3. The Blachernae terrace (see ch. 5 ) seen from the east

4. A, probably partly Byzantine, structure and monolithic wellhead from a cistern exposed by construction adjacent to the modern terrace immediately north of the ‘Anemas Café’ (site 7)

5. Part of a Byzantine brickwork structure, perhaps a cistern, visible in the modern street surface adjacent to the stairway of an apartment block at Eski Alipaşa Sok. (site 46)

6. Byzantine column in the grounds of Aksaray metro station (site 4)

7. Byzantine monolithic wellhead and a threshold fragment, exposed by construction work at Sitte-İ Hatun Camii (site 143)

8. A typical street in the northwest of the study area

9. Examples of the most commonly recorded type of worked stone artefact: two Byzantine monolithic column shaft fragments at Panagia tis Sudas (site 120)

10. The study area

11. Column capital and monolithic column shaft at Beyazıd Ağa Camii (site 19)

12. An example of structural evidence where the surface of the structure is largely covered by modern facing and the plan of the Byzantine structure is unknown: the cistern at Block A5, Fatih Sitesi (site 49)

13. A Byzantine column shaft re-used in the porch of Ottoman Mihrimah Camii

14. Byzantine Corinthian column capital re-used as a garden ornament at the Iski water-purification complex (site 76)

15. Byzantine columns and column capitals re-used in the porch of the mosque at Kürkçübaşı Ahmet Şemsettin Camii (site 97)

16. Fragment of a Byzantine column capital re-used in the corner of a modern structure, dated to 1836, at St George’s church (site 129)

17. A stylistically datable Early Byzantine sculpture at Sitte-İ Hatun Camii (site 143), belonging to the fifth century

18. The surviving, second, Golden Gate, showing a statue base exposed by natural decay of the structure

19. Ashlar wall at the Church of the Dormition (site 32)

20. The Byzantine sea wall by the modern roadside on Langa Bostanları Sok. (site 98)

21. Fragments of a monolithic column on Katip Kasım Bostanı Sok. (site 90)

22. The Byzantine brick wall adjacent to Ali Fakih (Paşa) Camii (site 5)

23. Column capital from Beyazıd Ağa Camii (site 19)

24. Fragment of a monolithic column embedded in the modern pavement on the corner of Narlıkapı Cad. and Narlıkapı Ceşmesi Sok. (site 113)

25. Monolithic column with defaced monogram in recessed roundel at Narlıkapı Cad. (site 113)

26. The easternmost of the fragmentary vaults at Müşır Süleymanpaşa Sok. (site 44)

27. The monolithic well-head in the car-park of Sancaktar Hayrettin Camii (site 138) in 1998

28. The north wall of the church of St George of the Cypresses (site 130), showing Byzantine? features under the modern paint

29. Davutpaşa Camii (site 78), from the northeast, showing the Byzantine columns in the porch

30. Fieldwalking at the Bala Tekkesi market gardens (site 16)

31. The Hadim Ibrahim Paşa Türbesi Sok. brick structure (site 74)

32. Early Byzantine worked stone at Sitte-İ Hatun Camii (site 143)

33. Defaced Byzantine sculpture at Sitte-İ Hatun Camii (site 143)

34. The central of the three columns in the south garden of Hekimoğlu Ali Paşa Camii (site 67)

35. The Middle Byzantine sarcophagus at Istanbul University hospital medical school crèche on Taklıpınar Sok., Çapa (site 26)

36. The monolithic Roman-period sarcophagus at Özbek apartments (site 118)

37. A probably fourth-century column capital built into a modern wall at Arka apartments, Ali Sir Nevai Sok. (site 9)

38. The south of the ‘Sofular Structure’ (site 144) exposed by the demolition of Ottoman baths in a small yard east of Sofular Cad

39. Brick ‘mound’ (cistern) covered by an inverted column capital in the ‘Sofular structure’ at 112–114 Yenilmeş Apartments (site 144)

40. The monolithic column shaft in the ‘Sofular structure’ (site 144)

41. The ‘Sofular Structure’ (site 144), view from the southeast showing features visible beneath modern concrete surface

42. Column capital from the Byzantine church of Constantine Lips (site 35)

43. Middle Byzantine frieze fragment from the church of Constantine Lips (site 35)

44. Byzantine column capital from the church of Constantine Lips (site 35)

45. Middle Byzantine column capital from the Byzantine church of Constantine Lips (site 35)

46. Byzantine column capital from the present church of St George (site 129)

47. Illegible Byzantine inscription (probably a tombstone), at St Demetrios of the Vines (site 128)

48. The Byzantine tombstone from Neyzenler Sok. (site 114)

49. Structure comprised of large limestone blocks adjacent to the north wall of the Byzantine church of St Saviour in Chora (site 137)

50. Structure of limestone blocks north of the Byzantine church of St. Saviour in Chora (site 137), seen from the south

51. Byzantine cistern at Karlıtepe apartments (site 86), close to the Byzantine church of St Saviour in Chora (site 137), from the southeast

52. The church of Panagia Salmatomruk (site 134)

53. The best-preserved, southeast, part of the Late Byzantine? structure at the present church of Panagia Salmatomruk (site 134)

54. Part of a Byzantine brickwork structure, perhaps a cistern, visible in the modern street surface at Eski Alipaşa Sok. (site 46)

55. Spiral-fluted monolithic column shaft from the Ottoman cemetery on Meymenet Sok. (site103)

56. The Ottoman cemetery at Meymenet Sok

57. Byzantine tombstone at St Demetrios Kananou (site 127)

58. The present church of St Demetrios Kananou (site 127)

59. Byzantine column capitals in the garden of the modern church of St Mary of Blachernae (site 133)

60. Byzantine column shaft at Toklu Dede Mescidi (site 155)

61. The Blachernae area

62. Tekfur Sarayı from the southeast

63. Map of the area around the north of Dervişzade Sok

64. The Blachernae terrace, immediately north of Emir Buhari Tekkesi

65. The Ottoman mosque of Ivaz Efendi (site 78), from the southeast

66. Byzantine worked stone from adjacent to the ‘Anemas Café’ (site 7)

67. The Byzantine substructure on Dervişzade Sok. (site 38), continuation to the southwest

68. Structure with hypocaust on the terrace to the north of the ‘Anemas Café’ (site 7)

69. The hypocaust (on site 7) from the east

70. Marble slab in the northeast of the churchyard of St Mary of Blachernae (site 133)

71. Column capitals in the churchyard of St Mary of Blachernae (site 133)

72. Byzantine column capitals in the Ottoman shrine at Ebuzer Gifari Camii (site 42)

73. The Byzantine structure at Ebuzer Gifari Camii (site 42)

74. Column capital at the present church of Panagia tis Sudas (site 120)

75. The churchyard of the present church of Panagia tis Sudas (site 120)

76. Byzantine column capital in the garden of the modern church of St Mary of Blachernae (site 133)

77. Fatih Camii (site 47)

78. The ‘Fatih terrace’: the location of the two Byzantine cisterns and the distribution of other locatable Byzantine material, on a map of the Ottoman-period complex

79. Fatih Camii (site 47) from Tabhane Medresesi to the southeast

80. Monolithic column shaft exposed by repaving in the precinct south of Fatih Camii (site 47)

81. Monolithic column shaft exposed by repaving in the precinct south of Fatih Camii (site 47)

82. Eroded limestone courses in the southwest wall of the courtyard of Fatih Camii (site 47)

83. Eroded limestone courses in the north cemetery wall of Fatih Camii

84. The east end of Fatih Camii (site 47) from the east

85. The junction between the fifteenth-century cemetery wall and southeastern wall of the mosque at the library gate (X on Figure 89), showing the mismatched alignment between wall AB, below the cemetery wall, and that of the mosque

86. Hypothetical reconstruction of the Byzantine Church of the Holy Apostles

87. A minimal reconstruction of the outline of the Church of the Holy Apostles; a reconstruction of the outline of the church assuming a western ambulatory; St John’s, Ephesus; San Marco (St Mark’s), Venice

88. Constantinople as a megapolis: the city within the fifth-century Theodosian land walls

89. The recorded features at Fatih Camii

90. Byzantine tunnel or channel adjacent to the holy well at the present church of Zoodochos Pege (site 33)

91. Overall areas (A–D), showing the sites in the catalogue, on a map of modern Istanbul

92. Key to more detailed distribution maps (A1–D2)

93. Area A1

94. Area A2

95. Area A3

96. Area B1

97. Area B2

98. Area B3

99. Area C1

100. Area C2

101. Area C3

102. Area C4

103. Area D1

104. Area D2

LIST OF COLOUR PLATES

1. The Ottoman mosque of Mihrimah Camii (Site 105) on its Byzantine terrace

2. A once-underground brick-built cistern almost fully exposed by modern road construction at Kovacılar Sok. (Site 94)

3. Ottoman-period wooden houses in the course of destruction, with modern apartment blocks in the background, in the Zeyrek area just southwest of the Byzantine Pantocrator monastery

4. Street-by-street survey in progress in 1999 as part of the project’s fieldwork in the northwest of the area within the Theodosian city walls

5. Toklu Dede Mescidi (Site 155), the graffiti-covered wall of the largely-destroyed Byzantine church, with the large monolithic column fragment on the pavement in the left of the foreground

6. Decontextualised columns at Zeyrekhane restaurant (Site 163)

7. One of three Early Byzantine column capitals reused as decoration in a mosque garden wall at Ferruh Kethüda Camii (Site 50). Although used decoratively, they form part of a wider distribution of Byzantine worked stone extending beyond the site of the Ottoman mosque

8. The Byzantine church at Isa Kapı Mescidi, seen from the west

9. The ‘Bulgar Palas’ (Site 24), a grand Ottoman-period building, on its terrace, seen from the south

10. The site of the colonnade on Katip Kasım Bostanı Sok. (Site 90), the one remaining column is to the left of the picture

11. Previously unrecorded monolithic columns lying in the atrium of the well-known Byzantine church of St. John Studios (Site 131)

12. One of the fragmentary Byzantine vaults at Müşir Süleyman Paşa Sok. (site 44)

13. The present church of St George of the Cypresses (centre and left of picture), seen from the north (Site 130)

14. The row of monolithic columns in the south garden of Hekimoğlu Ali Paşa Camii (site 67), seen from the southwest. The Ottoman mosque is to the left just out of the photograph (Site 67)

15. The northwest of the ‘Sofular structure’ (Site 144), as it ran behind (east of) the properties on the east side Sofular Caddesi, seen from the southwest. Showing its relationship to the modern offices, shops and apartments immediately to its west

16. The Byzantine structure at Bıçakcı Alaaddin Mescidi (Site 21), supporting a modern apartment block, seen from the southwest

17. The Byzantine church of Constantine Lips (Site 35)

18. The large natural rock at Çorbacı Çeşmesi Sok. and Kalpakcı Çeşmesi Sok. (Site 36), seemingly the last survival of a type of natural topographical feature once more widespread in Istanbul

19. The Byzantine brick structure on top of the rock at Çorbacı Çeşmesi Sok. and Kalpakcı Çeşmesi Sok (Site 36), seen from the top of the rock, looking to the southwest

20. The Byzantine apsed structure in the garden north of the Byzantine building at Kasım Ağa Camii (Site 88). The newly-exposed wall can be seen to the left of the scale

21. Byzantine upright for a screen, probably a chancel post, at Kasım Ağa Camii (Site 88)

22. The apse of the Byzantine chapel at St Demetrios Kananou (site 127), seen from the south

23. The view from Hancerli Hammam, looking east across the city

24. The city walls enclosing the Blachernae, from the south

25. Lonca seen from the east, giving an impression of the height of the terrace

26. Garden of St Mary of Blachernae

27. Structure with hypocaust on the terrace adjacent to the north of the ‘Anemas cafe’ (site 7), seen from the southeast to show cut to north due to modern construction work

28. Byzantine architectural fragments at the ‘Anemas cafe’ (Site 7)

29. The Byzantine substructure on Dervişzade Sok. (Site 38), seen from the southwest

30. The Byzantine structure at Ebuzer Gifari Camii (Site 42)

31. The schoolyard wall north of Adilsah Kadin Camii on Mumhane Caddesi (Site 109)

32. The entrance in the Byzantine wall at Mumhane Caddesi (Site 109)

33. Eroded limestone courses (AE) in the north cemetery wall of Fatih Camii (Site 47), with the precinct wall overlying them

34. Fatih Camii (Site 47) from the south showing the height of the terrace above the adjacent modern street

35. Eroded limestone courses in the north cemetery wall of Fatih Camii (Site 47). This shows this disproportionate width of wall below that of the fifteenth-century cemetery

36. Showing the contrasting stonework of feature A and the fifteenth-century Ottoman wall above it at Fatih Camii (Site 47)

37. Byzantine tunnel in the entrance area to the crypt containing the holy well at the present church of Zoodochos Pege (Site 33)

38. The fifth-century church of St John Studios (site 131), showing the apse

39. The ‘Aqueduct of Valens’, seen from the southeast

40. General view of the site of the former Byzantine city centre today, with the sixth-century church of Hagia Sophia in the background

41. General view of the city today, seen from the Tower of Galata, looking south across the Golden Horn

NOTE ON AUTHORSHIP

This book was written entirely by K. R. Dark (hereafter abbreviated to KRD). As agreed before the fieldwork reported here began, Dr Ferudun Özgümüş, who co-directed that fieldwork, is preparing a separate Turkish-language final report on its results. Although the 1998–9 and 2001–4 fieldwork was co-directed by KRD and Dr Özgümüş, this book also contains much information derived from subsequent work on the archaeology of the study area, and Istanbul more widely, by KRD alone, using aerial photography, satellite-imagery, the analysis of geophysical and geological publications, and other sources. Likewise, the analysis in this volume is by KRD alone, and it cannot be assumed that Dr Özgümüş agrees with the discussion or interpretations presented here.

TERMINOLOGY AND CONVENTIONS

In this volume, and its title, ‘Constantinople’ is used only to refer to the Byzantine capital city; ‘Istanbul’ refers to the city since 1453. These names have no contemporary political or cultural meaning in this book. ‘Site’ when followed by a number is used specifically to refer to a location at which material in the catalogue was recorded. When used without a following number, it retains its wider meaning as a location at which material data have been found. ‘Turkey’ refers here to the Turkish Republic and its territory, and ‘Turkish’ to its citizens and principal language. The period between 1453 and the establishment of the Turkish Republic is termed ‘Ottoman’, with its Orthodox Christian churches and material culture termed ‘Post-Byzantine’.

Non-English names: rather than following a rigid transliteration for non-English-language names, I have tried to standardise to the most widely-used variant, based on the works cited in the bibliography and standard British academic usage. For example,‘Arcadius’ and ‘Aetius’ rather than ‘Arcadios’ and ‘Aetios’. For site- and place-names discussed in previous archaeological publications and topographical studies, I have used the same system, even when this produced minor inconsistencies in the alphabetical arrangement of the catalogue numbering. For example, ‘St Nicholas’ rather than ‘Aya Nikola’, but ‘Panagia tis Sudas’ rather than ‘St Mary of the Moat’. Given the wide variation in the spelling of Turkish street-names in Istanbul, I have, where possible, standardised to Istanbul council’s: http://sehirrehberi.ibb.gov.tr/

Throughout this volume: Cad. = Caddesi (avenue/street); Sok. = Sokağı (lane); Mah. = mahalle (district); fig. = figure; m = metre(s); cm = centimetres. In the photographs (all of which are by KRD), unless otherwise stated, photographic scales are in 10 cm divisions.

Istanbul Kültür Mirası ve Kültür Ekonomisi Envanter (www.istanbulkulturenvanteri.gov.tr), referred to here as ‘the Inventory’, is used only when a site or find is unreferenced in any published work known to me. Sites in the Inventory are identified by their inventory number, as ‘Inventory no. X’.

Since the twentieth century, ‘megapolis’ and ‘megalopolis’ have been used in urban geography synonymously as a technical term denoting an urban centre of exceptional size. ‘Megapolis’ is used here deliberately to differentiate this modern theoretical term from the Byzantine usage of megalopolis. In the theoretical sense used in this book, a megapolis is an urban centre exceeding in size all others within the same network.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks are, of course, due to the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism for granting official survey permits annually for the fieldwork in 1998, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004, to all of their inspectors assigned to the project, and to the Turkish Embassy and Consulate in London both for their official services and other help, especially in London to Ms E. Ecer, Mr K. Ipek, Mr H. Müftüoğlu and Ms A. Şenyüz. The whole project would have been impossible without their help, that of my family, and of professors E. Özbayoğlu and M. Özdoğan.

Thanks are due as well to the relevant museums, religious organisations (not least the Ecumenical Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople) and landowners in Istanbul who gave permission for work on their property. Financially, the project was supported by The British Museum (who provided the bulk of the funding) and to a lesser extent by the Late Antiquity Research Group, Istanbul University and the IRO (Istanbul Tourist Guides Guild) branch of TUREB (the Federation of Turkish Tourist Guide Associations). The British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara offered the project their written support, but provided no funding. Thanks are also due to Phillips Speech Processing for providing GPS equipment.

The success of the fieldwork depended on the diligence of the many Turkish volunteers who took part in the project over several years. Notable among the latter were (in alphabetical order): S. Akça, H. Çetinkaya, A. V. Çobanoğlu, A. Denknalbant, E. Erdoğan, M. Ermiş, H. Fehmi Yılmaz, Ö. Kadioğlu, E. Karakaya, S. Gel, M. Özkahraman, G. Sincer, B. Soy, A. Tirayaki and B. Tosun. From the UK, J. Chedzey (formerly Spears) (in 1998–9) and A. Harris (in 2001–4) provided assistance in the field. Important support and assistance in Britain was provided by D. Buckton, J. Cherry, C. Entwistle, S. Moorhead and L. Webster at The British Museum, and A. Ball, A. Harris and Ş. Muftoğlu at the University of Reading.

A. Claridge, K. Da Costa, S. Eyice (through Ferudun Özgümüş), J. Evans, J. Freely, J. Gardeyne, A. Gülec, A. Littlewood, C. Mango, M. I. Tunay, U. Peschlow, C. Roueché, F. Haarer, J. Kostenec, R. Matthews, R. Ousterhout, A.-M. Talbot, N. Westbrook and F. Yenişehiroğlu all gave valuable assistance in relation to specific questions or points arising during the project. This report would have been impossible to write without the help of many staff at libraries in the universities of Cambridge, London, Oxford and Reading, and those of Dumbarton Oaks Washington DC, the German Archaeological Institute in Istanbul (DAI), and the Istanbul Archaeological Museum.

Jan Kostenec read most of the text prior to publication and provided many useful comments and suggestions for improvement. Nigel Westbrook also commented on much of the text and generously prepared the excellent distribution maps of the material in the catalogue. Last, but by no means least, Petra Dark prepared the other drawings, provided detailed comments on the whole text, and helped with editing the final draft of the volume.

PREFACE

Europe’s largest city, Istanbul, came first to be an urban centre of exceptional size when it was chosen by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great as a new Roman capital city. This city, named ‘Constantinople’ after him, has been much studied through its rich textual sources, and to some extent with reference to its surviving buildings, but its archaeology remains relatively little known compared to other great urban centres of the ancient and medieval worlds. As the architectural historian Robert Ousterhout has written: ‘Constantinople is ‘a city of words’ …. The surviving structures have been studied in isolation without an attempt to place them into a broader urban context…. Our knowledge of Byzantine Constantinople is limited to discrete, decontexualised, churches …. We know Constantinople more as a concept than as a reality’ (Robert Ousterhout, introduction in Kostenec and Öner 2007, 2).

By contrast, this book takes an archaeological perspective on the study of the Byzantine capital, informed both by the wider field of urban archaeology as this has developed over the previous fifty years and by contemporary archaeological theory. This perspective uses material evidence as the principal source for the city’s development, rather than starting from its, relatively few, surviving buildings, or written texts. As such, it takes as its basic unit of analysis the whole of the city, rather than individual structures, and seeks to use archaeological data and analysis to explore its social, economic and cognitive development over more than a thousand years of Byzantine urban history.

It aims also to escape from the long-standing emphasis in the study of Constantinople on either the city’s monumental core or its defences (especially the impressive fifth-century land-walls), by investigating afresh the least archaeologically understood part of the city: the ‘inter-mural’ area between the fifth-century land walls and the western limit of the fourth-century urban area, the Constantinian city wall. This zone encompasses approximately half of the walled area, yet has had far less archaeological attention. The data to do so derive from a six-year project (the ‘Istanbul Rescue Archaeology Project’) designed to record material being destroyed or damaged by construction or other means. This volume presents a final report on that project, using the information gained both to inform us about the inter-mural part of the city, and to cast new light on more wide-ranging questions about the city’s development. This, in turn, has wide-ranging implications for the study of the Late Roman and Byzantine periods more widely, for Mediterranean urban archaeology, and for the history of what has, both today and for most of the time since its inception, been Europe’s largest urban centre (for example, see Batur 1996b).

The volume has several other distinctive characteristics, compared to previous work on the archaeology of Istanbul. No published work by a non-Turkish scholar has taken into account so much of the Turkish archaeological work on the city, and publications by over a hundred Turkish scholars are referenced here. The city’s archaeology has an extensive ‘grey literature’, almost none of which has hitherto been used in its study. Here, ‘grey literature’ deriving from restoration projects and developer’s evaluations has been consulted wherever relevant, and the Istanbul Kültür Mirası ve Kültür Ekonomisi Envanter (www.istanbulkulturenvanteri.gov.tr), which includes an inventory of unpublished archaeological excavations in Istanbul (referred to here as ‘the Inventory’), is used for the first time in archaeological analysis. Similarly, air-photographic and satellite imagery are employed here for the first time as a source for the archaeology of the city within the Byzantine walls. The project’s fieldwork reported here was also the first to conduct a systematic street-by-street examination of such an extensive part of the city, and the first to undertake systematic fieldwalking within the walled city.

These characteristics render both this volume and the fieldwork project reported here unlike any previous work on the archaeology of Istanbul. The first two chapters (1 and 2) will, after a brief introduction to Byzantine Constantinople, its modern context and its broader significance, consider previous work on the archaeology of the Byzantine capital and the theoretical and methodological issues raised in the present study. Then, data from the project (which are presented in catalogue form at the end of the text) will be discussed in two chapters (3 and 4) covering the southwest and northwest of the walled area of the city. The following two chapters (5 and 6) focus on the only two parts of the study area with sufficient textual evidence to allow detailed interdisciplinary investigation: the Blachernae Palace and the Church of the Holy Apostles. Finally, a concluding chapter (7) will widen the scope of analysis to consider what the data recorded by the project tell us about the Byzantine capital as a whole.

The analysis here uses new methods and new archaeological data (from a part of the city often neglected by previous scholars) to propose a new – archaeologically based – model of Byzantine Constantinople. This aims to escape from the limitation of descriptivism and the over-dominance of textual sources (important as these are) characteristic of much previous work on the city. It will be demonstrated that such an archaeological analysis can inform us about the city’s urban structure in both synchronic and diachronic terms, and explain how and why this changed.

The fieldwork data published here, which would largely have been destroyed unrecorded without this project, enable us to explore a range of themes, from social and economic reconstruction to Byzantine popular perceptions of the city, from the consequences of imperial ideology to the ‘self-organization’ brought about by a multitude of seemingly minor decisions, from the symbolic meaning of cemeteries to the construction of the last Roman imperial palace. This casts new light on the transformations of the Eastern Roman capital into a ‘holy city’ and on the political identity of the Byzantine state from Roman to Orthodox Christian.

C

HAPTER

1

INTRODUCTION: CONSTANTINOPLE AND ISTANBUL

Constantinople (Figure 1), modern Istanbul, was from its inauguration on 11th May AD 330, central in almost every respect to the Eastern Roman, or Byzantine, Empire and its culture (for example, Berger 2005, 2009, 2010, 2011b). As Paul Magdalino has recently re-stated, the city was ‘the very essence of the state’ (Madgalino 2007, IV, 24), and it was ‘the status of Constantinople as the New Rome which made it legitimate for Byzantines to call themselves Romaioi and their state Romania’ (Magdalino 2007, XI, 151. See also Beck 1964). Moreover, both to the Byzantines themselves, and archaeologically compared with any contemporary urban centre, the city was a ‘megapolis’ (J. Harris 2007, 5; Sodini 2011), an urban centre of outstanding size and significance. Without doubt, this was the political, administrative and economic core of the entire empire (Kaplan 2006).

The city’s status as Rome’s political and religious successor was declared first in the Church Council of 381 (Magdalino 2007 X, 181). However, Constantinople was held by the Byzantines not only to be the ‘New Rome’, but also the ‘New Jerusalem’. From the seventh century it gained a further religious epithet, the ‘city of the Mother of God’, and was considered to be under the protection of the Virgin Mary (Limberis 1994; Mango 1996, 2000a; Vasilaki 2000, 2004). This sacral dimension of the city’s identity was enhanced by its many churches and unequalled collection of religious relics (Speck 1973, 1995, 2003; Berger 2009; Kalavrezou 1997; Nicholson 2005; Klein 2006, Ousterhout 2006). Even the sea surrounding the city could be seen by the Byzantines as having a liturgical meaning (Mayer 1998). This was, therefore, more than a capital, but perceived to be a Christian ‘holy city’, perhaps surpassed in this respect only in Byzantine thought by Jerusalem itself. As there seems to have been a close equivalence in the Byzantine mentality (see Magdalino 2007, XI, 151) between the secular and religious identities of the city and state, the archaeological study of Byzantine Constantinople is, in a sense, the study of the cognitive archaeology of the Byzantine Empire as a whole, as much as of its urban, social or economic archaeology (on these terms, see Dark 1995).

The international importance of the city endures, in part, today. At the start of the twenty-first century, Istanbul is still the largest city in Europe, with over 15 million (by some accounts, 20 million) inhabitants spread over 5712 square kilometres. It lies at the junction of the continents of Europe and Asia, on the Bosphorus. To the south of the city, is the Sea of Marmara, the north-eastern ‘corner’ of the Mediterranean, which the Bosphorus links with the Black Sea to the North (on the importance of this unique geographical position: Stichel 2000). On its eastern shore lies Chalcedon, once a suburb of Constantinople (Akürek 2002, 2004) and today again part of its urban sprawl. Among the notable features of the Marmara is a picturesque archipelago of nine small islands, the Princes’ Islands (or ‘Princely Isles’), long used as a retreat from the city’s heat and bustle (for archaeological work on the Princes’ Islands: Gregory 1991; Akürek and Ousterhout 2001; Özbayoğlu 1999, 2000, 2001a, b; Ousterhout and Akyürek 2002).

The shores of the Bosphorus – occupied by both monks and villagers in the Byzantine period (Eyice 1976; Ousterhout 1991; Batur 1996a) – are built-up with the suburbs and outlying districts of the modern city, but were still largely open until after World War II, when Istanbul began to expand rapidly. Even today there is much open land just west of Istanbul, where a large area of woodland (the ‘Belgrad Forest’) is located to the northwest of the built-up urban area. This so-called ‘Green Heart of the City’ feeds the city’s water supply, as it did in the Byzantine and Ottoman periods, when water was carried by a series of long-distance aqueducts (Çeçen 1996; Crow et al. 2008), supplementing the limited supplies from wells in and around the city and from the River Lycus, which ran diagonally across the western part of the Byzantine walled area. Cyril Mango (2001, 20) has noted that the river – called Bayrampaşa Deresi in Turkish – is even shown on a 1934 map of the city. Today, it is barely visible inside the city walls.

Beyond these were the towns and villages of Thrace (Glück 1920; Demangel 1945; Mansel 1951; Eyice 1969b, 1971, 1977–8; Kleiss 1974; Ötüken and Ousterhout 1989, 1995; Ousterhout 1985a, 1989, 1999; Bakirtzis 1989, 1994; Madzharov 1989; Bakirtzis and Triantaphylos 1988; Pralong 1988; Madzharov 1989, Rodley 1994, 291; Pekak 1996; Kountoura 1997; Fiat 2001; Crow 2002, 2009; Bauer and Klein 2006; Dinchev 2007; Külzer 2008, 2009; Crow et al. 2008; Crow and Turner 2009; Bakirtzis et al. 2011), such as the walled harbourside towns of Selymbria – perched high above the sea – and Heraclea (Perinthos). Although ongoing fieldwork (notably by Jim Crow) is beginning to rectify this, none of these is well known archaeologically, although work by Nuşin Asgari (1994) has clarified something of Heraclea (Perinthos), where there was an impressive (probably sixth-century) basilican church, other church buildings, a palace and an aqueduct.

Fig. 1: Byzantine Constantinople. The probable line of the Constantinian city wall is shown as a dashed line. B = the Blachernae palace; C = the gate of Charisius; AE = the Cistern of Aetius; AS = the Cistern of Aspar; MA = the Forum of Marcian; MO = the Cistern of Mocius; P = the Pege gate; X = the Xylokerkos gate; G = the Theodosian Golden Gate; S = the approximate location of the Sigma (C-shaped portico); CG = the approximate location of the Constantinian Golden Gate. Within the probable line of the Constantinian wall: M = the Mese (the main street of the city), with along it a series of public spaces: A = the Forum of Arcadius; B = the Forum Bovis; AM = the Amastrianon;T = the Forum Tauri/Forum of Theodosius I; C = the Forum of Constantine; A = the Augustaion (around which Hagia Sophia, the Patriarchal palace, the Great Palace and the Hippodrome were all located). The principal, textually-attested, streets discussed are shown here as straight lines projected (for purposes of discussion in chapters 3 and 4) from the gateways in the Theodosian walls to Isa Kapı Mescidi. Their actual routes are unknown. (Based on Bardill 2004, fig. 2 with many alterations based on the discussion in the text and Mango 2004 for the Sigma and Constantinian Golden Gate).

A key factor in the expansion of post-World War II Istanbul into its Byzantine hinterland was the influx of economic migrants from Anatolian Turkey, who also transformed the character of the city. This expansion was matched by the city’s rapid growth into the leading economic centre in its region, bolstering rapid expansion both outward and – in terms of skyscrapers – upwards from what is today usually termed ‘the New City’, focussed on Taksim Square in Beyoğlü rather than the earlier focus of Galata, across the Golden Horn. The ‘New City’ reflects in many respects the Westernising and secularist tendencies of Turkey since the 1920s (on the development of Istanbul in the Ottoman period and Turkish Republic: Incicyan 1956; Mantran 1962, 1996, 2000; Eyice 1969a; Duranay et al. 1972; Goodwin 1977; Yerasimos 1990, 1994, 2000, 2005; Çelik 1993, 1998; Yenen, Merey-Enlil and Unal 1993; Yerasimos and Vatin 1994; Yerasimos and Pinon 1996; Ortayalı 1996; Yücel 1996a, b; Enlil 1999; Freely 2000a; Yenen 2001; Kanipak 2006; Gül 2009; Tekeli 2010.

The centre of the ‘New City’ is separated from both the sprawling estates of apartments in the vast European suburbs, and from the historic core of the city by a narrow river-like strait, the Golden Horn (Haliç in Turkish) – the deep inundated valley of a glacial creek with very mild currents forming an excellent commercial waterway. With the Bosphorus to its north and the Sea of Marmara to its south, the European side of Istanbul has an encircling ‘garland [of water] around the city’ (Procopius De Aedeficiis 1.5.10), an image evoking also the impressive sunsets often seen over these waterways. However, much of the cultural life of the city, and its crucial tourist trade, focus on its historic centre on the southern shore of the Golden Horn (Cramer 1978; Tekeli 1994; Balamir 1996; Tapan 1996; Nasir 2004. On local government in Istanbul: Heper 1989. For an excellent bibliography of urban planning and related issues in late twentieth-century Istanbul: Pérouse 2000).

The focal area of the European part of the city (‘the Old City’) is a roughly triangular penisula with seven prominent hills, most of which have major Ottoman mosques on their summits, about 23 sq km in total area. The ‘Old City’ is divided into two large boroughs: Eminönü, in the east, and Fatih, in the west. Byzantine land- and sea-walls surround the ‘Old City, most impressively on the landward side, where the c. 5,650 m long, Theodosian Wall (probably completed in AD 413) continues to be an important physical and cognitive barrier in the urban fabric (Foss and Winfield 1986, 47. For the land walls: Meyer-Plath and Schneider 1943; Perbellini 2004; Asutay-Effenberger 2007. For the sea walls: Dirimtekin 1953a, b). Kennedy Cad., the late twentieth-century coastal highway, built on reclaimed land, runs along the present Marmara coast on the south, giving the ‘Old City’ a clear-cut boundary on this side.

The city within these limits has several natural problems: it is prone to flash floods, contains an insufficient natural water supply to support a large urban population, and is at high risk of a major earthquake. Although estimates vary, its situation only a few kilometres north of the line of the North Anatolian Fault has led to suggestions from seismologists that there is a 77% likelihood of at least a 7.0 magnitude earthquake within a few decades. During the period of the