Now Procopius, whose contemporary history of the edifices built by Justinian was, according to Krumbacher,[49] finished and published in the year 558 or the spring of 559 at latest, makes no mention of this earthquake of 558, though he describes in full how, during the building of the church, which was completed in 537, the piers of the eastern arch threatened to give way before it was finished. We may therefore conclude that he describes Justinian’s church in its first state. The translation from Procopius here given is based on that of Mr. Aubrey Stewart, published by the Palestine Pilgrims’ Text Society, which has been compared with the original. We give in Fig. 3 a plan of the church as built by Justinian, so far as the evidence will allow of an approximately certain restoration. As the several different curved portions of the plan are difficult to distinguish, we propose so far as possible to reserve certain words for separate parts. The small eastern semicircle and its vault will be called apse and apsoid respectively. Hemicycle and semidome will refer to the great semicircle at the east or west and its vault. The pairs of curved spaces forming the lateral recesses in the hemicycles we propose to name exedras and their half-domes conchs. [Illustration: FIG. 3.--Plan of S. Sophia as built by Justinian.] _Procopius._--“The lowest dregs of the people in Byzantium once assailed the Emperor Justinian in the rebellion called Nika, which I have clearly described in my _History of the Wars_. To prove that it was not merely against the emperor but no less against God that they took up arms, they ventured to burn the church of the Christians which the people of Byzantium call Sophia, a name most worthy of God. God permitted them to effect this crime, knowing how great the beauty of this church would be when restored. Thus the church was entirely reduced to ashes; but the Emperor Justinian not long afterwards adorned the new one in such a fashion, that if any one had asked the Christians in former times, if they wished their church to be destroyed and thus restored, showing them the appearance of the church which we now see, I think it probable that they would have prayed that they might so soon as possible behold their church destroyed, in order that it might be changed into its present form. The emperor, thinking not of cost of any kind, pressed on the work, and collected together workmen (_technitai_) from every land. Anthemius of Tralles, the most skilled in the builder’s art, not only of his own but of all former times, carried forward the king’s zealous intentions, organised the labours of the workmen, and prepared models of the future construction. Associated with him was another architect (_mechanopoios_) named Isidorus, a Milesian by birth, a man of intelligence, and worthy to carry out the plans of the Emperor Justinian. It is indeed a proof of the esteem with which God regarded the emperor, that He furnished him with men