ould seem to have had an atrium or narthex. Its
main interest for us to-day lies in the beauty of its columns of bigio
antico, cipollino, porphyry, granite, and other marbles belonging to
the original church, with their Roman and Byzantine capitals. Also to
the right of the nave we see a curious _ambone_ hollowed out of a
fragment of a gigantic column of Greek marble. The altar, too, is
formed from an ancient sarcophagus which is said to hold the dust of
the two archbishops, Sergius, with whom the pope had so much trouble,
and Agnellus. According to Agnellus the chronicler there was a
portrait of the archbishop S. John Angeloptes in the apse, but this
like the great mosaic of the tribune is gone. It was here, however,
that S. John got that strange surname of his--Angeloptes. He and his
predecessor S. Peter Chrysologus with S. Maximian and Sergius were the
great archbishops of this great see. We hear that the emperor
Valentinian III., according to Agnellus--but we should place the
bishopric of S. John Angeloptes 477-494--"was so much affected by the
preaching of this holy man that he took off his imperial crown and
humbly on his knees begged his blessing.... Not long after he gave him
fourteen cities with their churches to be governed by him
_Archieratica potestate_. And even to this day (ninth century), these
fourteen cities with their bishops are subject to the church of
Ravenna.[1] This bishop first received from the emperor a _Pallium_ of
white wool, just such as it is the custom for the pope to wear over
the _Duplum_; and he and his successors have used such a vestment even
to the present day."

[Footnote 1: The Archbishop of Ravenna at the present day has seven
suffragans, Bertinoro, Cervia, Cesena, Comacchio, Forli, Rimini,
Sarsina. It is hard to decide whether this man or Peter Chrysologus
was the first archbishop of Ravenna.]

This passage of Agnellus is important, but does not seem, on
examination, to have any real bearing upon the question of the
dependence of the See of Ravenna upon Rome. The Pallium was originally
an imperial gift to the popes, probably in the fourth century. And the
fact that it is the emperor and not the pope who bestowes it upon the
archbishop of Ravenna in the fifth century, if it be true, can have no
meaning at all in the question of papal supremacy.

Agnellus, whom I have quoted, goes on to tell us of that miracle which
gave S. John, archbishop of Ravenna, his surname of Angeloptes