the City, (which the People say was dedicated to the _Virgin Mary_) a Spring now running, which the _Greeks_ tell us was consecrated to her. The Place, where the Spring is, is call’d the _Blachernæ_. Upon my first coming to _Constantinople_, some Remains of it were to be seen, but now there nothing appears even of its Ruines. From the Bottom of the sixth Hill, which rises above the Church in the _Blachernæ_, there shoots an _Aqueduct_ with two Pipes; one of which is stopp’d with a Cock, and the other flows in a constant Stream. I took Notice before, that _Andronicus_ the Emperor brought this _Aqueduct_ from the River _Hydrales_, into the _Ward_ of the _Blachernæ_, where there was no River Water till his Time. The Emperor _Anastasius_ built the great _Triclinium_ in the _Blachernæ_, which went under his Name, even in the Time of _Suidas_. _Zonaras_, and others assure us, that the Emperor _Tiberius_ built the publick Bath in the _Blachernæ_. ’Tis certain from some modern Histories, that there was in the Time of _Zonaras_, even down to the Reign of _Manuel_ the Emperor, an Imperial Palace in that Place. The Reason why ’tis called the _Blachernæ_, is mentioned by _Dionysius_ a _Byzantian_, in his _Navigation of the Bosporus_, from whom I shall just touch upon some Places described by him, which reach from the Foot of the fifth Hill, to the furthermost Angle of the City, and the sixth Hill. _Beyond Mellacopsas_, says he, (this, I took Notice of before, was at the Foot of the fifth Hill) _there are two Places which afford good Sport in Fishing, all the Year. One upon the Shallows under the Promontories, the other under the deep hollow Shores which are never ruffled by the Wind. The first of these is called_ Indigenas, _from some great Man who was a Native there; the other_ Pyracius, _from_ Pyræus, _a Port of_ Athens; _or as some believe, from some antient Inhabitant. There’s a Place between them called_ Cittos, _from the great Plenty of Ivy it produces._ There is also a steep Place called _Camara_, which adjoins that of _Pyracius_. ’Tis much exposed to the Wind, and therefore often feels the Roughness of the Sea. Thence, up higher, stands _Thalassa_, which is the Boundary of the _Ceratine Bay_, where the Rivers begin to flow into it. ’Tis thus called, either by Reason of their Nearness to the Sea, whose Salt Waters they mingle with their Freshness, or because it stands steddy, and more out of the Wind; or rather, because the constant Influx of the Rivers into it, brings down daily a muddy Substance into the Sea, which very much thickens it; though it serves for Nourishment to the Multitudes of Fish with which it abounds. The first Place that stands upon this calm Sea is called _Polyrrhetius_, from a Man named _Polyrrhetus_: The next is _Vateiascopia_, so called from the deep Sea that is about it; a third is the _Blachernæ_, which is a barbarous Word; and the last Place is the Marshes. CHAP. VI.