Note 8 — BOOK I.

‘St. Irene templum a Constantino M. extructum—tres sacras ædes. Deiparæ scilicet, St. Theodori et St. Irenes, eidem magnæ ecclesiæ unitas fuisse, neque proprium clerum habuisse, qui in iis sacra ministeria perageret.‘ ‘Unde cum Sophianæ ædis appendix fuerit, intra ejusdem septa ædificata dicitur.’ ‘Denique concussa est ipsa ædes eo terræ motu qui accidit Leone Isauro regnante. Hodie intra septum regium includi.’—Ducange, ‘Byzantinæ Historiæ Scriptoribus Constantinopolis Christiana’ (Venice, fol., 1729), lib. iv., p. 102.

Rebuilt, in part at all events, by Justinian late in his reign, but in a style entirely different from that of St. Sophia or SS. Sergius and Bacchus, being oblong on plan, with aisles and an apse at the east end. This apse was cleared in 1881. Mr. Edwin Freshfield, who visited the church at that time, states that he ‘found that it was filled with marble benches, or steps, somewhat similar to the Church of Torcello, near Venice. There is no doubt that they formed part of the original arrangement of the church, and that this was due to its being the Patriarchal church.’—Athenæum, 15th August, 1885. (L.)