"The Incineration of New Babylon": The Fire Poem of Constantine Stilbes

In 1197 a cataclysmic fire swept through Constantinople. Emerging from warehouses along the Golden Horn, it engulfed multistorey mansions, monasteries, the Italian Quarter, and the church of the Theotokos Kyriotissa. The clergyman Konstantinos Stilbes recalled the devastation in a poetic lament for the suffering of the citizens of New Rome, pitiably transformed into a "New Babylon" scourged by God. This book presents the poem in English translation alongside the original Greek, and accompanied by a detailed commentary. Stilbes' poem sheds light on Constantinople's medieval topography and is a testament to the sophistication of Greek poetry on the eve of the Fourth Crusade.