Page:The International - Volume 3.djvu/18
8 THE INTERNATIONAL
TOWER OF EMPEROR ISAAC ANGELUS,
" L s
WHERE EMPRESS ANNE WAS IMPRISONED. ALSO TEMPLE OF HERAKLIUS.
The most important of these fortifica- tions, the landward walls, are composed of three parallel and concentric lines of walls buttressed by towers and protected by a broad, deep, bridgeless moat, with a breast- work on its inner edge. The inside wall— the strongest part of the fortification—was some thirty-six feet in height, and sixteen feet thick, while along its top ran a road- way upon which the defenders could fight under cover of the parapets and towers in the rear. At intervals of one hundred and sixty feet rose towers of square, round or hexagonal form, always projecting from, and overtopping the wall. These were entered from the city by small doorways, were divided into stories, and pierced by windows and loop-holes.
About three rods in advance stood the second or outer wall, also reinforced by towers; while less than four rods from the outer wall stretched the great moat lined on both sides by walls of hewn stone whose inner sheath constituted the third wall of defence. This was divided at varying dis- tances by narrow partitions which served Go gle as locks; while concealed in each were water pipes whose existence and manage- ment, revealed but to a trusted few, could flood the moat or carry water to the be- sieged as occasion required.
What wonder that when complete, the inhabitants believed their walls absolutely impregnable, or that besiegers, confronted by these massive fortifications alive with phalanxes of defenders, should confess; . . . that there was no man so bold that his flesh did not creep, and by no means was it a marvel.” But, though invulner- able to men, and the implements of ordi- nary warfare, an earthquake in 447 threw this mighty work of men’s hands to the ground. Undismayed, Cyril, the prefect of the city, at once began their restoration.
From this time on until the Mohamme- dan conquest the walls were watched and strengthened by each succeeding emperor in turn; the most noteworthy additions and repairs being the Heraklian wall—built by Heraklius in the seventh century for the protection of the Blachernai quarter against the Persians and Avars—the general res-