Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/35

 due to vegetation are found chiefly in the abundance of plane, pine, chestnut, and other trees, but more especially of the cypress. Earthquakes are a permanent source of annoyance, and have sometimes been very destructive. Such in brief are the geographical features of this region, which the caprice of a prince, in a higher degree, perhaps, than its natural endowments, appointed to contain the metropolis of the East.

When Constantine determined to supplant the ancient capital on the Tiber by building a new city in a place of his own choice, he does not appear to have been more acute in discerning the advantages of Byzantium than were the first colonists from Megara. It is said that Thessalonica first fixed his attention; it is certain that he began to build in the Troad, near the site of Homeric Ilios; and it is even suggested that when he shifted his ground from thence he


 * [Footnote:

[Greek: ypsêlôn oreôn koryphas kai prôonas akroys, kai pedia lôteynta kai andrôn piona erga, kai teph alos poliês kechytai limesin te kai aktais, kyma de min prosplazon eryketai alla te panta eilyatai kathyperth ot epibrisê Dios ymbras.]

Iliad, xii, 279, [Greek: k.t.l.] ]