A Summary View of the Whole City
Having taken a particular View of the City, as divided into Wards, I shall now, continues my Author, give the Reader a more large and general Description of it, to shew that its Beauty and Magnificence is not only to be ascribed to Art and good Workmanship, but that Nature herself by the Mediation of the Elements, has happily contributed to its Security and Defence. The divine Providence has with so much Wisdom consulted the Preservation of its Inhabitants, even to future Ages, that a long Tract of Land, in the Nature of a Promontory, full of Windings and Harbours in its Sides, facing the Chaps of the Black-Sea, narrow in Breadth, is strongly fortified by the Sea. The Isthmus, the only Part of the City not bounded by the Sea, is at the same Time strengthened with a double Wall with numerous Towers on its Ramparts. The City thus enclosed and defended, contains in the Whole the following Buildings. Five Palaces; fourteen Churches; five divine Houses of the Augustæ; three of the most illustrious Ladies; eight Bagnio’s; two Basilica’s; four Fora’s; two Senate-Houses; five Granaries, or Store-Houses; two Theatres; two Lusoria; four Havens; one Circo; four Cisterns; four Nymphea; three hundred and twenty two Streets; four Thousand three hundred and eight large Houses; fifty two Portico’s; a hundred and fifty three private Baths; twenty publick, and a hundred and twenty private Mills; a hundred and seventeen Gradus; five Flesh Markets; one Porphyry Pillar; two Pillars with winding Stairs; one Colossus; one Golden Tetrapylum; the Forum of Augustus; the Capitol; the Mint, or Treasury; and three Gradus by the Sea-Shore. It was under the Care and Government of fourteen Curators, fourteen Vernaculi, five hundred and sixty Collegiati, and sixty five Vico-Magistri. The Length of the City from the Porta Aurea in a direct Line to the Sea-Shore, is fourteen Thousand and seventy five Feet; the Breadth of it, six Thousand one Hundred and fifty. Thus concludes the Author of the Description, I shall now go on with my
Notes
It has five Palaces.] Old Rome, instead of these, has one Thousand one hundred and eighty Houses.
Fourteen Churches.] Rome had four Hundred and twenty four Temples.
Five divine Houses of the Augustæ, and of those who bore the Title of the Most Illustrious three.] The Houses of those Ladies, who bore the Title of Augustæ were called Divine. They had also other Marks of Imperiality and Honour conferr’d upon them. By the Mistake of the Writer these Houses were reckoned six, though they were no more in Number than five only, viz. two of Placidia, two of Pulcheria, and one of Eudocia, the Wife of Theodosius. As to the Houses belonging to the Ladies, entitled the Most Illustrious, one of them belonged to Marina, and the other two to Arcadia, and bore the same Title with themselves.
Eight Bagnio’s.] Victor writes, that at Rome there were eleven.
Two Basilica’s.] There were ten of them at Rome.
Four Fora’s.] At Rome there were eleven; Victor says nineteen.
Two Senate-Houses.] At Rome, as Victor says, there were three; one stood between the Capitol, and the Forum Romanum, where was the Temple of Concord; another by the Porta Capena, and a third in the Temple of Bellona, which stood in the Circo of Flaminius, where the Foreign Ambassadors resided, because they would not allow them Admittance into the City.
Five Granaries.] At Rome there were two hundred and ninety two.
Two Theatres.] At Rome there were three.
Two Lusoria.] At Rome, according to Victor, there were sixteen.
Four Havens.] At Rome there was but one.
One Circo.] At Rome there were two.
Four Cisterns.] At Rome there were none.
Four Nymphea.] At Rome there were fifteen.
Three hundred and twenty two Streets.] At Rome four Hundred and twenty four.
Four Thousand three hundred and eighteen large Houses.] At Rome there were forty six Thousand six hundred and two Insulæ, and one Thousand seven hundred and eighty large Houses. The Houses here mentioned were large roof’d Buildings, tyl’d at Top four Ways; the Insulæ were roof’d Buildings, tyl’d only before and behind.
Forty two Portico’s.] At Rome there were six only.
A hundred and fifty three private Baths.] At Rome there were eight hundred and fifty six.
Twenty publick, and a hundred and twenty private Mills.] At Rome two hundred and fifty four.
A hundred and seventeen Gradus.] At Rome none.
Five Flesh-Markets.] At Rome two only.
Five hundred and sixty Collegiati.] It is apparent that thirty seven of them are omitted in the last Ward. There was no such Office at Rome, yet there were, instead of them, Watchmen divided into seven Companies, whose Business, according to Dion and Suetonius, was much the same with that of the Collegiati.
Sixty five Vico-magistri.] It should be read seventy; for five of them are omitted in the last Ward. At Rome the Number of Collegiati was six hundred and seventy two.
A Porphyry Pillar.] There was no such Pillar, as Cedrinus says, at Rome, tho’ this was brought from thence. Gyllius writes, that this Pillar was made of square marble Stones, and that it stood in the Hippodrom.
Two Pillars with Winding-Stairs in the Inside of them.] There was the same Number at Rome.
One Colossus.] At Rome there were two. ’Tis omitted in the Description of the Wards, as many other Things of Note are.
The Golden Tetrapylum.] Gyllius quotes an unknown Author who will have this Tetrapylum to have been a Quadrangle with Portico’s round it, having Four Gates, and was formerly call’d Quadrivium. The Latines call it a Stadium. But there’s no such Place to be found in the Wards of the City, unless it be the Stadium in the Fourth Ward, which is omitted in the Summary View of the City. Cedrinus, in his Life of Leo Magnus, mentions this Tetrapylum. Evagrius in the twenty eighth Chapter of his third Book tells us, that it was built by the Senator Mammianus, in the Reign of Zeno. He built, says he, two stately Portico’s of exquisite Workmanship, and beautify’d them with a neat glossy Marble. As to the Tetrapylum built by Mammianus, there are not, as Gyllius tells us, the least Remains of it. Victor writes, that there was a Pentapylum in the tenth Ward of Rome.
The Augusteum.] This was the Forum of Augustus.
The Capitol.] At Rome, as Victor writes, there were two; the old and the new Capitol.
The Mint, or Treasury.] There was no such Place at Rome.
Three Gradus by the Sea-Shore.] There were no such Stairs at Rome, yet they had their Lakes, their Naval Fights, &c.
The City is reported to have had twenty three Gates. Laonicus Chalcondylus, in his History of the Ottomans, tells us, that Constantinople contains in compass a hundred and eleven Furlongs, which is more than thirteen Italian Miles. ’Tis generally thought to be eighteen Miles in Circumference. Besides the foremention’d Curiosities, Constantinople has been famous for the Aqueduct of Hadrian, which furnish’d the Palace, the Nymphea, and the Bagnio’s with a Sufficiency of Waters, as Theodosius mentions in a Letter to Cyrus, Prefect of the City. The Bagnio’s of Achilles are also mention’d by him, where he says, that these Bagnio’s were supply’d with Water convey’d into them from the said Aqueduct by leaden Pipes. Cedrinus says, that these Bagnio’s were built near the Strategium, and took their Name from an Altar, which was dedicated to Ajax and Achilles: And Cassiodorus relates, that the Fire, which happen’d in the Reign of Constantine the Great, burnt down the City, as far as the Bagnio’s of Achilles.