The Ecclesiastical History of Evagrius Scholasticus - Coptic ...

ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY: BOOK VI 299
proper place. 29 There also fell down much of the area called Ostrakine,
and the Psephium, which we mentioned previously, and the whole of
the area called Bursia, and the vicinity of the all-holy shrine of the
Mother of God, with only the central colonnade being miraculously
preserved. 30 All the towers on the level ground su¡ered, although the
rest of the structure remained unharmed except for the battlements,
for some stones from these were twisted backwards but did not fall. 31
Other churches also su¡ered and of the public baths the one that is
divided according to the seasons. 32 And an unquanti¢able multitude
was caught: as certain people conjectured, inferring from the bread
supply, this a¥iction consumed about 60,000. 33
29 This description of the history of the dome of the Great Church has been variously
interpreted. In the BEL translation (453^4) Ephrem secured the dome with timbers from
Daphne, and these were thrown into a leaning position by subsequent quakes. According to
Festugie're (453), Ephrem actually rebuilt the dome in timber, although it later also had to be
supported by woodenbuttressing.Evagrius doessuggest that twoseparate setsof timbers are
involved, for the construction by Ephrem and then for the buttressing necessitated by later
shocks; the latter now collapsed.
There is no other evidence to clarify the history of the church. I would suggest that reconstruction
probably began soon after the destruction in 526, with a dome, perhaps envisaged
as a temporary repair, built of timber; this su¡ered in 528, at which point extra support was
supplied, perhaps by Ephrem as well. The later earthquakes of 551 and 557, to which Festugie're
attributed the northward tilt, are not known to have caused serious damage in Antioch.
30 The region of Ostrakine had been a¡ected in the earthquake of 458 (ii.12, with n. 136);
for the reconstruction of the Psephium under Theodosius II, cf. i.18 with n. 162 above; the
area known as Bursia is not otherwise attested, but Downey (Antioch 568 n. 25) suggested it
was an area connected with leather-working. On the Church to the Virgin, cf. v. n. 76 above.
31 This indication that Antioch still possessed substantial defences should be set against
the exaggerated criticism of their dilapidated state in 573 (v.9 with n. 41 above). There had
been plenty of time for repairs to be carried out in the intervening ¢fteen years, but it is more
likely that the basic structures had remained standing throughout (as is indicated in depictions
of the walls from the early nineteenth century, which show characteristic brick-banded
late Roman work).
32 It was quite common for there to be separate winter and summer bath houses (e.g. at
Edessa); the division might be re£ected in a decorative scheme representing the seasons, as
at the winter baths in Gaza whose painting of the cosmos is described by John of Gaza (ed.
P. Friedla«nder [Leipzig, 1912] pp. 135^64).
33 The mortality in the disaster of 526 is recorded as 250,000, but the total then had been
swelled by the in£ux into Antioch of numerous country-dwellers for the festival of Ascension
(iv. n. 12 above). Two generations later Antioch was undoubtedly a less populous and
prosperous place, especially bearing in mind the Persian capture in 540 and the successive
ravages of the plague since 542, but the casualty total of 60,000 indicates that it was still a
very major centre.