[Renfield]

Check out this article...it's much more interesting than its pedestrian title would suggest.

[Renfield]

Ping

[Venturer]

Sitting around at Daytona, waiting for the “Big One”.

LOL.

[bert]

-——Procopius portrayed Theodora as a wanton of the most promiscuous sort, ———

My take....... Rush is Procopius!!

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Good post!

[PGR88]

very interesting

[Parmenio]

If anyone wants to see 3-D recreations of Constantinople’s Hippodrome, plus many more Byzantine buildings (some of which no longer exist), you can find them at this website:

http://www.byzantium1200.com/

[PapaBear3625]

The Nika Riots marked the end of an era in which circus factions held some sway over the greatest empire west of China, and signaled the end of chariot racing as a mass spectator sport within Byzantium. Within a few years the great races and Green-Blue rivalries were memories. They would be replaced, however, with something yet more threatening–for as Norwich observes, within a few years of Justinian’s death theological debate had become what amounted to the empire’s national sport. And with the Orthodox battling the Monophysites, and the iconoclasts waiting in the wings, Byzantium was set on course for rioting and civil war that would put even the massacre in the Hippodrome in sorry context.

The Nika riots happened in 532. A hundred years later, the damage and dissension within the Byzantine Empire would be taken advantage of by the Muslims.