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Distinguished visitors to the Byzantine Court, also, were sometimes allowed to enter the city by this gate, as a mark of special honour. The Legates of Pope Hormisdas were met here upon their arrival on a mission to Justin I.:^[242] here, in 708, Pope Constantine was received with great ceremony, when he came to confer with Justinian II.:^[243] and here, in the reign of Basil II., the Legates of Pope Hadrian II. were admitted.^[244] Under Romanus Lecapenus, the procession which bore through the city to St. Sophia the Icon of Christ, brought from Edessa, entered at the Porta Aurea.^[245]

It was, however, on the return of an emperor to the city after a victorious campaign that the Porta Aurea fulfilled its highest purpose, and presented a brilliant spectacle of life and splendour.

Through this triumphal arch came Theodosius the Great, after his defeat of Maximus;^[246] by it Heraclius entered the capital to celebrate the success of his Persian expeditions;^[247] through it passed Constantine Copronymus, after the defeat of the Bulgarians;^[248] Theophilus, on two occasions, after the repulse of the Saracens;^[249] Basil I., after his successes at Tephrice and Germanicia;^[250] Zimisces, after his victories over the Russians under Swiatoslaf;^[251] Basil II., after the slaughter of the Bulgarians;^[252] and, for the last time, Michael Palæologus, upon the restoration of the Greek Empire in 1261.^[253]