Spolia

in Rome The practice of spoliation was common in late antiquity. Entire structures, including underground foundations, are known to have been demolished to enable the construction of new ones. According to Baxter, two churches in Worcester (one 7th century and one 10th) are thought to have been deconstructed so that their building stone could be repurposed by St. Wulstan to construct a cathedral in 1084. that in the 5th century crosses were inscribed on the stones of pagan buildings, as at Ankara, where crosses were inscribed on the walls of the Temple of Augustus and Rome. Foss suggests that the purpose of this was to ward off the daimones that lurked in stones that had been consecrated to pagan usage. Liz James extends Foss's observation in noting that statues, laid on their sides and facing outwards, were carefully incorporated in Ankara's city walls in the 7th century, at a time when spolia were also being built into city walls in Miletus, Sardis, Ephesus and Pergamum: "laying a statue on its side places it and the power it represents under control. It is a way of acquiring the power of rival gods for one's own benefit", James observes. "Inscribing a cross works similarly, sealing the object for Christian purposes". There has been considerable controversy over the use of Jewish gravestones as pavement materials in several Eastern European countries during and after The Holocaust, as well as by Jordan during its rule over East Jerusalem. ==Gallery==

File:THES-Heptapyrgion spolia 3.jpg|Fragments of Greek inscriptions in the masonry of the Ottoman Heptapyrgion (Yedikule) fortress (1431), Thessaloniki, Greece File:Iznik Wall at Lefke Gate 8254.jpg|Spolia in the city wall of İznik, Turkey, at Lefke Gate File:Bosra. Via colonnata - DecArch - 2-37.jpg|Ionic order column incorporated into a wall, Bosra, Syria File:Spolia - Baptistry of Neon - Ravenna 2016.jpg|Spolia at Ravenna Baptistery of Neon, Ravenna, Italy File:Beschadigd beeld en inscripties gemetseld in muur van kasteel in stad Gozo Belle statue mutilée & inscriptions encastrées dans le mur extérieur du Château de la Ville de Ghozo (titel op object) Voya, RP-T-00-494-10B.jpg|18th-century illustration of a Roman statue and inscriptions reused in the walls of the Cittadella, Gozo, Malta. The statue has since been removed and it is now in the Gozo Museum of Archaeology. File:Zadar Spolia St-Donatus.jpg|Roman spolia in the foundation of Church of St. Donatus in Zadar, Croatia File:Jewish headstones on Chuprynky Street, Lviv -02.jpg|Jewish headstones used as part of a wall in Lviv, Ukraine File:The-tetrarchs.jpg|Portrait of the Four Tetrarchs in the corner of St Mark's Basilica, in Venice, Italy, looted by Venetians from Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade File:PatrasCastleSpolia.jpg|Spolia from the Patras Castle File:Murad Agha Praying hall2.JPG|Prayer hall at the Murad Agha Mosque in Tajura, Libya, featuring reused Roman columns ==See also==