This book explores seminal moments in the biography of a contested medieval monument between ca. 500 CE and 1600 CE. Justinian’s triumphal column was the tallest, freestanding column of the pre-modern world and was crowned by the largest metal, equestrian sculpture created anywhere in the world before 1699. This book demonstrates that the colossal, the exceptional, and the stationary can contribute to our understanding of a global middle ages. The monument’s reach was as wide as possible for any stationary object. In order to explore the monument’s changing discursive signification across centuries and cultures, I draw upon anthropological approaches. These analyze an object’s changing valuations within a broader cultural and societal framework from the moment of its creation to the end of its existence. Any moment of substantial human engagement with an object can define a period in its biography. This study is also devoted to the horseman’s agency. Although it may seem peculiar that an inanimate object could possess agency, both medieval observers and modern anthropological studies of material culture urge us to take this notion seriously. Medieval observers fervently believed that the horseman acted.

During the Renaissance the bronze horseman acquired new meaning as an object of revered antiquity. It spoke to Renaissance antiquarians who dedicated themselves to empiricism, scholarly inquiry, and a quest to recover the ancient past. When an influential early Italian humanist ascended scaffolding to inspect and draw the famous monument in Constantinople, he announced a major discovery that would initiate a new stage in the monument’s biography. Cyriac of Ancona exposed Justinian’s centuries-old "secret": the bronze horseman was originally created for a Theodosian emperor. His discovery was a triumph of antiquarian empiricism, demonstrating that inscriptions could uncover lost truths and correct the errors of the past. This was a paradigm shift in the study of the past. A drawing from Cyriac's circle became the main visual source for reconstructing the horseman’s appearance. It has continued to shape the monument in scholarly imagination to the present day. This chapter also examines representations of Justinian's bronze horseman in Notitia Dignitatum and views of Constantinople by Cristoforo Buondelmonti.

Justinian turned the greatest domestic challenge of his reign (the Nika riots) into a spectacular opportunity for promoting his gloria. He constructed the last imperial forum in Constantinople on the ruins and foundations of the old Augoustaion. Hagia Sophia was the first major element of the new vision to be constructed (532–37 CE), while the triumphal column was the last (ca. 543 CE). No ruler in the premodern era would surpass Justinian’s spectacular accomplishments of either Hagia Sophia or the triumphal column. Justinian deliberately appropriated a colossal equestrian sculpture from the forum of Theodosios. While rulers before him commissioned great equestrian monuments, only he chose to place an equestrian monument at the top of a triumphal column. Like the colossal statues of his predecessors, Constantine and Theodosios, the equestrian Justinian also faced east. The bronze horseman came to command the city’s skyline and define the image of Constantinople. This awesome statement of power became a towering reminder of Justinian and his seemingly boundless might.