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JUSTINIAN AND THE BYZANTINE EMPIRE 145 and fifty feet in the form of a vast nave with an aisle on either side. In this respect St. Sophia is something like a basilica, but by virtue of its central and subsidiary domes it belongs to the round or concentric style of ecclesiastical architecture. The central dome was pierced with a ring of forty arched windows through which light flooded the spacious interior. "It is singularly full of light and sunshine," writes Proco- pius. " You would declare that the place is not lighted from without, but that rays are produced within itself, such an abundance of light is poured into this church." Columns and capitals have now broken away from the restrictions of the three classical Greek orders and are no longer uniform in style. Often the capitals are carved differently and have each some particular design worth noting, but this variety is not carried so far but that they harmonize. Henceforth we must speak of Byzantine as well as Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian columns and capitals. "Who could tell," con- tinues Procopius, "of the beauty of the columns and marbles with which the church is adorned? One would think that one had come upon a meadow full of flowers in bloom. Who would not admire the purple tints of some and the green of others, the glowing red and glittering white, and those too which nature, like a painter, has marked with the strongest contrasts of color? " Unfortunately, since the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453, much of this wonderful coloring and ornamentation has been covered with Mohammedan whitewash. The mosaics of the cherubim with six wings in the pendentives of the great dome are almost the sole visible remnant of Christian decoration. Procopius finally speaks of the psychological and religious effect of the great, yet light and graceful, interior upon the beholder. "Whoever enters there to wor- ship perceives at once that it is not by any human strength or skill, but by the favor of God that this work has been perfected. His mind rises sublime to commune with God, feeling that He cannot be far off, but must especially love to dwell in the place which He has chosen. And this takes