Amastrianum

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Map of the Byzantine Constantinople. The Forum Amastrianum is located northeast of Eleutherion Harbor and near the Myrelaion Monastery.

The Amastrianum ( Greek τά Αμαστριανοῦ , ta Amastrianoú), occasionally also Forum Amastrianum , was a public space ( Latin forum ) in the Byzantine Constantinople (today Istanbul ). The square was also used as a site for public punishments and executions and disappeared after the end of the Byzantine Empire .

location

The exact location of the square is unknown: In De Cerimoniis of Emperor Constantine VII , the square is described as being on the south-western axis of the main street ( Mese ) between Philadelphion and Forum Bovis . Therefore, the Amastrianum must have been in the valley of the Lycus, between the seventh and third hills of Constantinople between the present-day districts of Şehzadebaşı and Aksaray . According to another source, the square could also have been on the southern slope of the fourth hill of Constantinople, where Ataturk Caddesi and Şehzadebaşı Caddesi cross today . It belonged to the administration of Region IX. More recent considerations come to the conclusion that the north-facing semicircular forecourt at Myrelaion (Bodrum Camii) are the remains of the Amastrianum.

history

No Byzantine source literally names the Amastrianum as a forum, but this is clear from the context. The square takes its name from the city of Amastris (today Amasra ) in Paphlagonia on the Black Sea coast. Why this is so is unclear. One theory says that someone from the city who had business here could have been killed here, another hypothesis suggests that the square bears the city's name because executions were frequent here and the Papal Agonians were considered criminals. According to the Patrologia Latina , the statues of a papal agonist and his slave stood in the square, which were always covered with garbage and excrement. In fact, the area around the square had a bad reputation. Michael III was here in the 9th century the exhumed body of the iconoclasts -Kaisers Konstantin V. burn public and Basil I burned here slaves who had killed her owner. In 932 Romanus I burned the usurper Basil Halkocheir at the stake because he had started a rebellion in Bithynia .

In Byzantine times, the Amastrianum was also the center of the horse trade in the city. This is also where the Bothroi had their seat, who as officials supervised the animal trade.

architecture

A bronze modius as a measure of grain

According to some sources, the square is said to have had a rectangular floor plan, p. 286 other sources assume a semicircular square with a semicircular portico that opened to the Mese. Several pagan statues of Zeus as Helios , Artemis , Valentinian with silver scales and that of a sleeping Heracles are said to be in the square . In addition, groups of turtles and birds, an eagle and a she-wolf and 16 statues of snakes and serpent women adorned the square. The square was bordered by a marble fence, the posts of which were decorated with crescent moons. The unusual and strange décor and use as a place of execution led the population to believe that the place was inhabited by demons.

According to Parastaseis syntomoi chronikai , a building called Modius ( Greek Μόδιον , "Modion") is said to have stood on the square . The building in front of the house of a certain Krateros is said to have had a symmetrical floor plan and a dome supported by columns on which a pyramid sat. A silver modius , an old Roman grain measure , is said to have been kept in the building . Two bronze hands on spikes are said to have been shown on the facade of the building. This was intended to warn the grain merchants against fraud through incorrect measurements: In the 5th century, the emperor is said to have cut off the right hand of two sailors because they were accused of having cheated on the emperor while selling grain. Over the years the original meaning of the bronze hands was forgotten, but the square remained a place of punishment for criminals.

The location of the building was no coincidence: the square was not far from the Egyptian and Theodosian grain stores near the Eleutherios port . The Modius was built by Emperor Valentinian I in the second half of the 4th century. A statue of him with a modius stood under the vault of the building.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Raymond Janin: Constantinople Byzantine . Institut français d'etudes byzantines, Paris 1964, p. 69
  2. ↑ a b Alexander Kazhdan: Mese . In: Alexander P. Kazhdan (Ed.): The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium . Online, 2005, accessed May 12, 2019
  3. ^ A b Ernest Mamboury : The Tourists' Istanbul . Çituri Biraderler Basımevi, Istanbul 1953, p. 73
  4. ^ Ernest Mamboury: The Tourists' Istanbul . Çituri Biraderler Basımevi, Istanbul 1953, p. 67
  5. ^ A b Alessandra Bravi: Greek works of art in the political life of Rome and Constantinople . (= KLIO / supplements. New volume 21), De Gruyter, Oldenbourg 2014 p. 286
  6. ^ A b c Raymond Janin: Constantinople Byzantine . Institut français d'etudes byzantines, Paris 1964, p. 68
  7. ^ Raymond Janin : Constantinople Byzantine . Institut français d'etudes byzantines, Paris 1964, p. 95
  8. ↑ Alexander Kazhdan: Bothros . In: Alexander Kazhdan (Ed.): The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium . Volume 1, Oxford University Press, New York / Oxford 1991, p. 315
  9. ^ Frédéric de Clarac : Musée de antique et modern . Volume III, Imprimerie Nationale, Paris 1850, p. CXXXVIII
  10. ↑ Alessandra Bravi: Greek works of art in the political life of Rome and Constantinople . (= KLIO / supplements. New series 21), De Gruyter, Oldenbourg 2014 p. 287 f.
  11. ^ A b c d Raymond Janin: Constantinople Byzantine . Institut français d'etudes byzantines, Paris 1964, p. 104
  12. ^ Raymond Janin: Constantinople Byzantine . Institut français d'etudes byzantines, Paris 1964, p. 55