the “sky boxes” inhabited by the emperor and his retinue. The folds of the drapery
are graceful but stylized. The hairstyles are caps. The ensemble is meant to preach
eternal truths: the highness of imperial power and its transcendence of time and place.
Plate 1.8: Base of the Hippodrome Obelisk (c.390). Nothing illustrates changing imperial artistic tastes so
well as this carving, placed right in the middle of the most imperial part of Constantinople. It was inspired
more by the style of Plate 1.6 than by the traditional classical style of Plate 1.4.