Читать книгу Around the Black Sea. Asia Minor, Armenia, Caucasus, Circassia, Daghestan, the Crimea, Roumania онлайн

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It is difficult to believe all this, but the ruins are there, and the mute walls of crumbling stone would probably confirm the statements if they could speak. There is an enormous monastery in ruins at the top of a hill, which is said to have played an important part in the history of the city and was the scene of a crisis which ended the empire. There is an old church in the suburbs which dates back nearly a thousand years and contains the tombs of several of the emperors of Trebizond and a monument to Solomon, one of the early kings of the neighbouring state of Georgia, now a Russian province.

About two miles west of the town is the Church of St. Sophia, which was built eight hundred years ago, and must have been a magnificent structure, judging from what remains. It has been a mosque for several centuries, but is seldom used these days. The pavement of many-coloured marble is very beautiful, and the walls are decorated with pictures in mosaic, like those in the mosques of Salonika, although the vandals have covered them with whitewash because they represent Christian saints and martyrs. In the vestibule, until 1843, was a fine fresco representing the emperor Alexius, his mother, the dowager Irene, and his wife, the empress Theodora, all clad in their imperial robes, but it mysteriously disappeared while the church was being repaired and has never been recovered. There are other relics of ancient times which one would like to know more about, but there was no one to tell us, and the archæologists have neglected this part of the world.