Theodora

Two of the most famous mosaics from the ancient world, in the church of San Vitale in Ravenna, depict the sixth-century emperor Justinian and, on the wall facing him, his wife, Theodora (497-548). This majestic portrait gives no inkling of Theodora''s very humble beginnings or her improbable rise to fame and power. Raised in a family of circus performers near Constantinople''s Hippodrome, she aban...