In the second place, it is exceedingly doubtful whether the archway with the Nikè, to which the name Gate of the Kynegos is commonly ascribed, was, after all, a city gate in the ordinary sense of the term. It does not stand alone, but is one of three archways which pierce, respectively, the curtain-walls between three towers. And these three openings were in close proximity to a gate (Balat Kapoussi), amply sufficient for the requirements of public traffic in this quarter of the capital. Such facts do not accord with the idea that any one of these archways was a gateway. Furthermore, when their real destination could be more accurately ascertained than at present, Gyllius found that they formed the entrances to an artificial harbour within the line of the fortifications. This explanation of their presence in the wall is perfectly satisfactory, and any other is superfluous. But if Balat Kapoussi was the only gate in this vicinity, it must have been the Gate of the Kynegos, which certainly stood in this part of the city. There is nothing strange in the existence of a harbour within the line of the fortifications in the quarter of the Kynegon. It is what might be expected when we remember how closely the quarter was connected with the Palace of the Porphyrogenitus and the Palace of Blachernæ, and how necessary such a harbour was for the accommodation and protection of the boats and galleys at the service of the Court. That the harbour behind the three archways near Balat Kapoussi was the Neorion of Blachernæ is unlikely; the most probable situation of that Neorion being at Aivan Serai Iskelessi. But it may very well have been the harbour on the shore of the Kynegon at which, during the period of the Palæologi, the emperor and visitors to the palaces in the vicinity embarked or disembarked in moving to and fro by water. The landing at which the Spanish ambassadors to the Byzantine Court were received is described as near the Gate of the Kynegos: “Près de la porte de Quinigo.”[688] The galleys sent by the Council of Basle to convey John VII. Palæologus to the West, and which reached Constantinople fifteen days after the arrival of four Papal galleys on a similar errand, were detained for one day at Psamathia, until the rival parties had been prevailed upon to keep the peace, and then came and moored at the Kynegon (εἰς τὸν Κυνηγὸν). There the emperor embarked for Italy, under the escort of the Papal galleys; there the galley having on board the patriarch, who was to accompany the emperor, joined the Imperial squadron; and there the emperor disembarked upon his return from the Councils of Ferrara and Florence.[689] During the siege of 1453 a fire-ship, with forty young men on board, proceeded from the Gate of the Kynegos to burn the Turkish vessels which had been conveyed over the hills into the Golden Horn.[690] All this implies the existence of a port somewhere on the shore of the quarter of the Kynegon.