rapped in a shroud of whitewash. Still the
Greek artist retained his skill to the last, and the decorative work of
S. Saviour in the Chora will stand comparison even with the similar work
in S. Sophia.

In Byzantine times the greatness of S. Sophia tended to crush
competition. No other ecclesiastical building approached the 'Great
Church.' But structural ability was only latent, and displayed its old
power again in the erection of the imperial mosques of the early Turkish
Sultans, for they too are monuments of Greek architectural genius.

The origins of Byzantine architecture have been discussed at great
length by Strzygowski, Rivoira, and many other able writers. Much work
still remains to be done in the investigation of the later Roman and
early Byzantine work; nor does it seem probable that the difficult
questions of the Eastern or the Western origin of Byzantine art will
ever be finally settled.

The beginnings of Byzantine architecture have never been satisfactorily
accounted for. With S. Sophia it springs almost at once into full glory;
after S. Sophia comes the long decline. It may, however, be noted that
the 'endings' of Roman architecture are similarly obscure. Such
buildings as the Colosseum, in which the order is applied to an arched
building, are evidently transitional, the Roman construction and the
Greek decoration, though joined, not being merged into one perfect
style. Even in the baths and other great buildings of Imperial Rome the
decoration is still Greek in form and not yet fully adapted to the
arched construction. At Spalatro, in such parts as the Porta Aurea, a
developed style seems to be on the point of emerging, but it is not too
much to say that in no great Roman building do we find a perfect and
homogeneous style.

There is nothing in either the planning or the construction of S. Sophia
which cannot be derived from the buildings of the Roman Imperial period,
with the exception of the pendentive, a feature which had to be evolved
before the dome could be used with freedom on any building plan on a
square. The great brick-concrete vaulted construction is that of the
Roman baths, and with this is united a system of decoration founded on
the classic models, but showing no trace of the Greek beam tradition
which had ruled in Rome.

S. Sophia then may be regarded as the culminating point of one great
Roman-Byzantine school, of which the art of classic Rome shows the rise,
and the later Byzantin