The inauguration anthem of Hagia Sophia in Edessa: a new edition and translation with historical and architectural notes and a comparison with a contemporary Constantinopolitan kontakion

Abstract

Of the two great sixth-century inauguration anthems on churches dedicated to “Holy Wisdom” it is, oddly enough, that from the Mesopotamian city of Edessa, not its Constantinopolitan equivalent on the Great Church of the metropolis, which has been translated and retranslated, re-edited and revisited by historians of architecture and of theological symbolism and by students of its wider context in the epoch of Justinian. This is partly because excellence shines more brightly in the relative isolation of the province, partly because of the architectural and symbolic detail which distinguishes the Syriac poem. The last article devoted to it, The Domed Church as Microcosm by Kathleen McVey, is an outstanding treatment of the symbolic thought of the poet in its historical context. Her edition, however, is poorly presented and imperfectly collated, and both her historical introduction and her literary analysis miss some cardinal points. Again, in order to improve on Schneider’s and Grabar’s attempts to reconstruct the architecture of the church, which was destroyed before the later twelfth century, a more accurate translation is needed. McVey’s translation does justice neither to the beauty, nor to the coherence of the original. Her commentary contains much that is useful, but does not discover the key to the poem’s unity, which lies in the dedication of the church. This interpretation can be substantiated by comparing the Syriac anthem with a kontakion written for the second inauguration of Justinian’s Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, after the dome had been rebuilt, in A.D. 562. The comparison also provides an opportunity to rescue the latter masterpiece from an undeserved neglect.

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