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The Name of the Church of St. Sophia in Constantinople

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 August 2011

Glanville Downey
Glanville Downey
Affiliation:
Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, D. C.
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Extract

All scholars who have been concerned with the Church of St. Sophia in Constantinople have noticed that different sources sometimes give it different names, or different forms of the same name. A certain number of examples of the usage of the ancient writers have been collected and have been available in the current works of reference, but these published lists are not exhaustive. Having had occasion to make a study of the name of the church as given by Nikolaos Mesarites, the present writer has made a collection of examples which appears to be larger than any hitherto published, and it is hoped that the testimonia assembled here may give scholars a better understanding of the conception which the ancient writers had of the dedication of the church and the significance of the designations which were applied to it.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 52 , Issue 1 , January 1959 , pp. 37 - 41
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1959

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References

1 See for example Du Cange, Constantinopolis Christiana (Paris, 1680), Book III, pp. 6–7 (it should be remembered that several important texts had not yet been published in Du Cange's time), and La Géographie ecclésiastique de l'empire byzantin. Iere partie, Le siège de Constantinople et le patriarcat oecuménique. III, Tome, Les églises et les monastères, par R. Janin (Paris, 1953), p. 471.Google Scholar

The writer has been unable to discover any evidence for the date at which churches began to have individual names. At Constantinople, for example, literary traditions of the fourth century and later contain allusions to churches of the second and third centuries which were named for individual saints, and the names of churches which began to be built in the time of Constantine the Great are recorded in texts which are not much later in date: see La géographie ecclésiastique de l'Empire byzantin. Iere partie, Le siège de Constantinople et le patriarcat oecuménique, III, Tome, Les églises et les monastères, par R. Janin (Paris, 1953), pp. 1–2Google Scholar. However, it was also a common usage even in large cities to speak of “the Great Church” or “the Old Church,” as a common designation which everyone would understand (see the following note).

2 Antioch: Malalas, 318,4; 324,9; 325,14; 419,21 Bonn ed.; Chrysostom, t. VI, p. 255 Montf. Alexandria: Malalas, 359,8–9. Procopius mentions “the Great Church” at Daras (De aed., II, iii, 26). Some of the bricks used at St. Sophia are stamped Μεγ(άλη)ς ᾽Εκκλ(ησία)ς; cf. Swift, E. H., Hagia Sophia (New York, 1940), p. 50Google Scholar, and Mango, C. A., Byzantine Brick Stamps, American Journal of Archaeology, LIV (1950), pp. 24, 26.Google Scholar

3 II, 16, P.G. 67, 217.

4 II, 43, P.G. 67,356.

5 III, 6, 26.

6 E.g. Cedrenus, I, p. 753 Bonn; Theoph. Cont., p. 354, 1 Bonn.

7 Ignatius, Life of Nicephorus, in Nicephori opuscula historica, ed. Boor, C. De (Leipzig, 1880), p. 164, 8. A characteristic list of the various epithets applied to the church may be found in De Boor's Index, p. 249.Google Scholar

8 Cedrenus, II, pp. 438, 609 Bonn. This designation is also found in Theoph. Cont., p. 399, 17–18 Bonn.

9 Theoph. Cont., pp. 384,5–6, 402,15 Bonn; Zonaras, IV, p. 35 Dindorf; Georgius Monachus, p. 919,3–4 Bonn; Leo Diaconus, p. 95 Bonn.

10 P.G. 105, 544–545.

11 P.G. III, 888 C.

12 P. 154,6–7 Bonn.

13 IV, p. 153 Dindorf.

14 IV, pp. 123–124 Dindorf; see also IV, p. 35.

15 Mesarites, Nikolaos, Description of the Church of the Holy Apostles at Constantinople, ed. and tr. by Downey, G., Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, N.S., XLVII, pt. 6 (1957), p. 916, ch. 40 § 4.Google Scholar

16 I, p. 318 Bonn.

17 III, p. 271,3 Dindorf.

18 III, p. 191 Dindorf.

19 III, p. 328 Dindorf.

20 I, p. 679, II, P. 338 Bonn.

21 I, P. 753 Bonn.

22 I, p. 650, II, pp. 438, 609 Bonn.

23 The inscription is reproduced by Salzenberg, W., Altchristliche Baudenkmale von Konstantinopel (Berlin, 1854), p. 31Google Scholar. See Mercati, S. G., “Sulle iscrizioni di Santa Sofia,” Bessarione, 1923, pp. 200–222.Google Scholar

24 The Chronicon Paschale (p. 543,16 Bonn) states that the encaenia took place in 360, and adds that this was thirty-four years after the laying of the foundations (p. 544,14).

25 I Cor. I, 24; cf. Ibid. 30; Prov. 8, 22.

26 Cf. the discussions of the question in writings of Athanasius: Expos, fidei, 1, p. 79 (P.G. 25, 200); Ibid., 4, p. 81 (col. 208); De decretis Nicaenae synodi, 14, p. 174 (P.G. 25, 441); Ibid., 17, p. 175 (col. 444); De sententia Dionysii, 25, p. 205 (P.G. 25, 517); Ibid., 26, p. 206 (col. 517); Orat. I contra Arianos, 28, p. 341 (P.G. 26, 69); Orat. II contra Arianos, 78, p. 432 (col. 312).

27 Soteriou, G. A., ‘H ῾Αγία Σοϕία (Athens, 1917), p. 10.Google Scholar

28 Cf. Ledercq, art. “Byzance,” Cabrol-Leclercq, Diet., II, 1419; Schneider, A. M., “Die vorjustinianische Sophienkirche,” B.Z., XXXVI (1936), p. 79Google Scholar. Swift, E. H., Hagia Sophia (New York, 1940), p. 8Google Scholar, states that the church “was known at first simply as ‘the great church.’ Later it was dedicated to the Immortal Wisdom of Christ, ᾽Αθανάτῳ Σοϕίᾳ το Χριστοû.” This statement seems to be based on the inscription mentioned above. Attention may be called to the legend of the origin of the name preserved in the Anonymous of Banduri, Script. Orig. Constantinopol., I, pp. 85–88 Preger.

29 “The Emperor Constantine's Conversion to Christianity in the Light of New Research” (in Hungarian), Theologia (Budapest), VI (1939), pp. 312–321.Google Scholar