-by Umberto Eco
“O Constantinople, Constantinople!
Mother of churches, princess of religion,
guide of perfect opinions, nurse of all learning,
now you have drunk from the hand of God the cup of fury,
and burned in a fire far greater than
that which burned the Pentapolis!
What envious
and implacable demons have poured
down on you the intemperance
of their intoxication,
what mad and odious Suitors
have lighted your nuptial torch?
O mother, once clad in gold
and imperial purple, now befouled
and haggard. And robbed of your children,
like birds imprisoned in a cage,
we cannot find the way
to leave this city that was ours,
nor the strength to remain here,
but instead, sealed within many errors,
we roam like vagrant stars!”
* * *
from' Baudolino', by Umberto Eco
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