Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/85

 to divide the track of departure from that of return. It is adorned from end to end with a range of monuments of great diversity. In the middle stands an Egyptian obelisk, inscribed with the usual hieroglyphs, resting on four balls sustained in turn by a square pedestal. An inscription at the bottom of the pedestal, illustrated by diagrams, exhibits the engineering methods adopted under the great Theodosius for the erection of the monolith on its present site; higher up elaborate sculptures show the Emperor in his seat presiding at the games. Farther to the south is a still loftier column of the same shape, covered with brass plates, called the Colossus. Intermediately is the brazen pillar, ravished from the temple of Delphi, composed of the twisted bodies of three serpents, whose heads formerly supported the golden tripod dedicated to Apollo by the Grecian states in memory of the defeat of the Persians at Plateia. The names of the subscribing com-*

Antiq.). V. The name tr. to whole Spine by Byzantines; Jn. Lydus, De Mens., i, 12, [Greek: Euripos ônomasthê hê meson tou hippodromou krêpis]; Const. Porph., op. cit., pp. 338, 345; Cedrenus, ii, p. 343, etc. Labarte seems strangely to have missed all but one of the numerous allusions to the Euripus; op. cit., p. 53. This note is necessary, as no one seems to have caught the later application of the name.]*
 * [Footnote: p. 258); Lyons and Barcelona mosaics (see Daremberg and S. Dict.