rt of the hospice of
Eubulus, and the hospital of Sampson with its patients.

The restoration of the church was included in the magnificent scheme of
Justinian the Great to build on the wilderness of ashes created by his
rebel subjects the finest monuments of his empire. And so S. Irene rose
from its ruins, the largest sanctuary in Constantinople, except S.
Sophia.[133] The bricks bearing the mark 'the Great Church,' [Greek:
Megale 'Ekklesia], which are built into a raised bank against the
northern wall of the atrium, afford no indication of the date when S.
Irene was rebuilt. The bank is of comparatively recent origin.[134]

In the month of December 564, the thirty-seventh year of Justinian's
reign, another great fire threatened to destroy the buildings which that
emperor had erected in the quarter of the city beside S. Sophia. The
hospital of Sampson was again burnt down; the atrium of the Great
Church, known as the Garsonostasion, suffered; two monasteries close to
S. Irene perished, and, what most concerns us, the atrium and part of
the narthex of S. Irene itself were consumed.[135] How soon these
injuries were repaired is not recorded.

During the 176 years that followed the reconstruction of the church by
Justinian, S. Irene does not appear in history. But in 740 it was
injured by the earthquake which shook Constantinople in the last year of
the reign of Leo III. the Isaurian.[136] Theophanes[137] is very precise
in regard to the time when the disaster occurred; it was on the 26th of
October, the ninth indiction, on a Wednesday, at eight o'clock. The
damage done both in the city and in the towns of Thrace and Bithynia was
terrible. In Nicaea only one church was left standing, while
Constantinople deplored the ruin of large portions of the landward
fortifications and the loss of many churches, monasteries, and public
monuments. S. Irene was then shaken, and, as the examination of the
building by Mr. George has proved, sustained most serious injuries. The
Emperor Leo died about six months after the disaster, and it is
therefore uncertain whether the church was rebuilt before his death. His
first attention was naturally directed to the reconstruction of the
fortifications of the city, where his name still appears, with that of
his son and successor Constantine Copronymus, as the rebuilder of the
fallen bulwarks. But although there is no record of the precise date at
which the ruined church was repaired, we may safe