![Constantinople imperial district](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Constantinople_imperial_district.png)
The Covered Hippodrome ( el, ) was a covered courtyard that served as an antechamber to the
Great Palace of Constantinople
The Great Palace of Constantinople ( el, Μέγα Παλάτιον, ''Méga Palátion''; Latin: ''Palatium Magnum''), also known as the Sacred Palace ( el, Ἱερὸν Παλάτιον, ''Hieròn Palátion''; Latin: ''Sacrum Palatium''), was th ...
in
Istanbul, Turkey
Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...
. The French scholar
Rodolphe Guilland Rodolphe Joseph Guilland (Lons-le-Saunier, 1888 – Saint-Marcellin, Isère, 5 October 1981) was a French Byzantinist.
Life
Born in 1888, he completed his thesis on Nikephoros Gregoras (a biography in 1926, and his edited correspondence in 1927), a ...
also equated it with the emperors' private hippodrome. It lay on the southeastern corner of the palace complex, and connected the
Palace of Daphne
The Palace of Daphne ( el, Δάφνη) was one of the major wings of the Great Palace of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire (modern Istanbul, Turkey). According to George Codinus, it was named after a statue of the nymph Daphne, b ...
in the north with the later lower palace complex around
Bucoleon
The Palace of Boukoleon ( el, Βουκολέων) or Bucoleon was one of the Byzantine palaces in Constantinople (present-day Istanbul in Turkey.) The palace is located on the shore of the Sea of Marmara, to the south of the Hippodrome and eas ...
in the south, through the gate of Skyla. It played a great role in imperial ceremonies, and is not to be confused with the far larger adjacent
Hippodrome of Constantinople
Sultanahmet Square ( tr, Sultanahmet Meydanı) or the Hippodrome of Constantinople ( el, Ἱππόδρομος τῆς Κωνσταντινουπόλεως, Hippódromos tēs Kōnstantinoupóleōs; la, Circus Maximus Constantinopolitanus; t ...
, which in
Byzantine
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
sources was often distinguished as the "uncovered" () Hippodrome. From the 9th to the 11th centuries, it was also the site of one of the Byzantine capital's highest courts, the tribunals of the "judges of the Hippodrome" () and of the "judges of the ''
velum
Velum may refer to:
Human anatomy
* Superior medullary velum, anterior medullary velum or valve of Vieussens, white matter, in the brain, which stretches between the superior cerebellar peduncles
** Frenulum of superior medullary velum, a sligh ...
''" ().
Sources
*
*
External links
3D reconstruction at the Byzantium 1200 project
Great Palace of Constantinople
{{Byzantine-stub