The one great problem which found its solution in the age of Justinian was the transition from the square to the circle. Panoramic view of Hagia Sophia and its surroundings, including the Hippodrome. This new technical achievement, tried first in the church of St. George at Ezra. Syria, then in that of the Sts. Sergius and Bacchus at Constantinople, found its most perfect expression in the Hagia Sophia, this masterpiece of Christian architecture.
Innumerable descriptions praise the classical merit of the monument.
Polychrome marbles, elegant columns and fine wall revetments, gold vessels and ornaments, exquisite mosaics, the huge dome, half-domes, vaults and arches, the elaborately carved capitals, friezes and cornices, the arcades, the one hundred windows and the interplay of light and shade, all dissolve substance, filling the faithful with awe and delight and revealing to the beholder the everlasting beauty of perfection. Hagia Sophia View from the East. The most remarkable feature of the church, which belongs to the transitional type of domed basilica, is the huge dome supported by four massive piers. Some twenty years after the consecration of the church, a severe earthquake caused serious damages to the dome and the eastern half-dome. Reconstruction was entrusted to Isidorus the Younger.