When was Constantinople established?
Constantinople
Constantinople (; ) was the capital city of the Roman/Byzantine Empire (330–1204 and 1261–1453), and also of the brief Crusader state known as the Latin Empire (1204–1261), until finally falling to the Ottoman Empire (1453–1923). It was reinaugurated in 324 from ancient Byzantium as the new capital of the Roman Empire by Emperor Constantine the Great, after whom it was named, and dedicated on 11 May 330. The city was located in what is now the European side and the core of modern Istanbul.
History of Europe
When Emperor Constantine had reconquered Rome under the banner of the cross in 312, he soon afterwards issued the Edict of Milan in 313 (preceded by the Edict of Serdica in 311), declaring the legality of Christianity in the Roman Empire. In addition, Constantine officially shifted the capital of the Roman Empire from Rome to the Greek town of Byzantium, which he renamed Nova Roma – it was later named Constantinople ("City of Constantine").
Nicaea
After the fall of Constantinople to the Fourth Crusade in 1204, and the establishment of the Latin Empire, Nicaea escaped Latin occupation and maintained an autonomous stance. From 1206 on, it became the base of Theodore Laskaris, who in 1208 was crowned emperor there and founded the Empire of Nicaea. The Patriarchate of Constantinople, exiled from Constantinople, also took up residence in the city until the recapture of Constantinople in 1261. Although Nicaea was soon abandoned as the primary residence of the Nicaean emperors, who favoured Nymphaion and Magnesia on the Maeander, the period was a lively one in the city's history, with "frequent synods, embassies, and imperial weddings and funerals", while the influx of scholars from other parts of the Greek world made it a centre of learning as well.
Turkey
In 324, Constantine I chose Byzantium to be the new capital of the Roman Empire, renaming it New Rome. Following the death of Theodosius I in 395 and the permanent division of the Roman Empire between his two sons, the city, which would popularly come to be known as Constantinople, became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. This empire, which would later be branded by historians as the Byzantine Empire, ruled most of the territory of present-day Turkey until the Late Middle Ages; although the eastern regions remained in firm Sasanian hands up to the first half of the seventh century. The frequent Byzantine-Sassanid Wars, as part of the centuries long-lasting Roman-Persian Wars, fought between the neighbouring rivalling Byzantines and Sasanians, took place in various parts of present-day Turkey and decided much of the latter's history from the fourth century up to the first half of the seventh century.
Constantinople
In the 9th and 10th centuries, Constantinople had a population of between 500,000 and 800,000.
University of Constantinople
The original school was founded in 425 by Emperor Theodosius II with 31 chairs for law, philosophy, medicine, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music, rhetoric and other subjects, 15 to Latin and 16 to Greek. The university existed until the 15th century.
Constantine College, York
Constantine College is the newest College of the University of York and was founded in 2014. It was named after the Roman emperor Constantine the Great, who was proclaimed Augustus in York in 306 AD.
Apostolic see
This Council of Nicaea, being held in 325, of course made no mention of Constantinople, a city which was only officially founded five years later, at which point it became the capital of the Empire. But the First Council of Constantinople (381) decreed in a canon of disputed validity: "The Bishop of Constantinople, however, shall have the prerogative of honour after the Bishop of Rome; because Constantinople is New Rome." A century after the Council of Chalcedon (451) and the ensuing schism between those who accepted it and those who rejected it, Eastern Orthodox Christianity wove these two sources together to develop the theory of the Pentarchy: "[F]ormulated in the legislation of the emperor Justinian I (527–565), especially in his Novella 131, the theory received formal ecclesiastical sanction at the Council in Trullo (692), which ranked the five sees as Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem." Earlier, the Council of Ephesus decreed in 431 that the Church of Cyprus should be autocephalous, against the claims of Antioch, the capital of the Roman diocese of the East, of which Cyprus was part.
Greek refugees
After the founding of Constantinople by the first Christian Roman Emperor Constantine the Great in 330, Asia Minor, the major part of the Greek East, became the most important region of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. For the centuries to follow, the area was the main manpower and wheat source of the state. Numerous invasions and epidemics (especially the Plague of Justinian) devastated the area in various times. However, Asia Minor remained densely populated, compared to the rest of the Medieval world and held the bulk of the empire's Greek speaking orthodox Christian population. Thus, many renowned Greek-speaking figures who lived during this time were Asia Minor Greeks, including Saint Nicholas (270-343), John Chrysostomos (349-407), Isidore of Miletus (6th century), and Basilios Bessarion (1403-1472). The Greek speaking Christian population began to decline with the invasions of the Muslim Seljuq Turks in the 11th century. The establishment of the Seljuk Empire deprived the Byzantines of a large part of Asia Minor. The Fall of Constantinople on May 29, 1453, and the subsequent fall in 1461 of the Greek Empire of Trebizond, located along the eastern Black Sea coast, marked the end of Greek sovereignty in Asia Minor.
Byzantine art
Two events were of fundamental importance to the development of a unique, Byzantine art. First, the Edict of Milan, issued by the emperors Constantine I and Licinius in 313, allowed for public Christian worship, and led to the development of a monumental, Christian art. Second, the dedication of Constantinople in 330 created a great new artistic centre for the eastern half of the Empire, and a specifically Christian one. Other artistic traditions flourished in rival cities such as Alexandria, Antioch, and Rome, but it was not until all of these cities had fallen - the first two to the Arabs and Rome to the Goths - that Constantinople established its supremacy.
Walls of Constantinople
Already by the early 5th century however, Constantinople had expanded outside the Constantinian Wall, in the extramural area known as the "Exokionion" or "Exakionion". The wall survived during much of the Byzantine period, even though it was replaced by the Theodosian Walls as the city's primary defence. An ambiguous passage refers to extensive damage to the city's "inner wall" from an earthquake on 25 September 478, which likely refers to the Constantinian wall, and Theophanes the Confessor reports renewed earthquake damage in 557. It appears that large parts survived relatively intact until the 9th century: the 11th-century historian Kedrenos records that the "wall at Exokionion", likely a portion of the Constantinian wall, collapsed in an earthquake in 867. Only traces of the wall appear to have survived in later ages, although Van Millingen states that some parts survived in the region of the "İsakapı" until the early 19th century. The recent construction of Yenikapı Transfer Center has unearthed a section of the foundation of the wall of Constantine.
City
In the remnants of the Roman Empire, cities of late antiquity gained independence but soon lost population and importance. The locus of power in the West shifted to Constantinople and to the ascendant Islamic civilization with its major cities Baghdad, Cairo, and Córdoba. From the 9th through the end of the 12th century, Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire, was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe, with a population approaching 1 million. The Ottoman Empire gradually gained control over many cities in the Mediterranean area, including Constantinople in 1453.
Manuel I Komnenos
The empire that Manuel inherited from his father had undergone great changes since the foundation of Constantinople by Constantine I eight centuries before. In the time of his predecessor Justinian I (527–565), parts of the former Western Roman Empire had been recovered including Italy, Africa and part of Spain. However, the empire had diminished greatly following this, the most obvious change had occurred in the 7th century: the soldiers of Islam had taken Egypt, Palestine and much of Syria away from the empire irrevocably. They had then swept on westwards into what in the time of Constantine had been the western provinces of the Roman Empire, in North Africa and Spain. In the centuries since, the emperors had ruled over a realm that largely consisted of Asia Minor in the east, and the Balkans in the west. In the late 11th century the Byzantine Empire entered a period of marked military and political decline, which had been arrested and largely reversed by the leadership of Manuel's grandfather and father. Yet the empire that Manuel inherited was a polity facing formidable challenges. At the end of the 11th century, the Normans of Sicily had removed Italy from the control of the Byzantine Emperor. The Seljuk Turks had done the same with central Anatolia. And in the Levant, a new force had appeared – the Crusader states – which presented the Byzantine Empire with new challenges. Now, more than at any time during the preceding centuries, the task facing the emperor was daunting indeed.
New Rome
New Rome (Greek: Νέα Ῥώμη, "Nea Romē"; Latin: "Nova Roma") was a name sometimes used to describe the new city that the Roman Emperor Constantine created as his new imperial capital on the European coast of the Bosphorus strait. The city was known as Byzantium prior to his rededication, and as Constantinople thereafter, until the 20th century, when it was renamed Istanbul. 'New Rome' was never an official title, but was sometimes used as a laudatory description of the city, which was often compared with Rome in many ways.
History of the Byzantine Empire
This history of the Byzantine Empire covers the history of the Eastern Roman Empire from late antiquity until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453 AD. Several events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the transitional period during which the Roman Empire's east and west divided. In 285, the emperor Diocletian (r. 284–305) partitioned the Roman Empire's administration into eastern and western halves. Between 324 and 330, Constantine I (r. 306–337) transferred the main capital from Rome to Byzantium, later known as "Constantinople" ("City of Constantine") and "Nova Roma" ("New Rome"). Under Theodosius I (r. 379–395), Christianity became the Empire's official state religion and others such as Roman polytheism were proscribed. And finally, under the reign of Heraclius (r. 610–641), the Empire's military and administration were restructured and adopted Greek for official use instead of Latin. Thus, although it continued the Roman state and maintained Roman state traditions, modern historians distinguish Byzantium from ancient Rome insofar as it was oriented towards Greek rather than Latin culture, and characterised by Orthodox Christianity rather than Roman polytheism.
History of the city
From the 9th through the end of the 12th century, Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire, was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe, with a population approaching 1 million. Following the Byzantine–Ottoman wars and other conflicts, the Ottoman Empire gained control over many cities in the Mediterranean area, including Constantinople in 1453.
Treaty of Constantinople (1800)
The negotiations and mutual rivalties between Russia, the Porte, and the Islanders, led to the signing of the Treaty of Constantinople on 21 March 1800, which created the first autonomous Greek state since the Fall of the Byzantine Empire.
Fall of Constantinople
Byzantium is a term used by modern historians to refer to the later Roman Empire. In its own time, the Empire ruled from Constantinople (or "New Rome" as some people call it, although this was a laudatory expression that was never an official title) was considered simply as "the Roman Empire." The fall of Constantinople led competing factions to lay claim to being the inheritors of the Imperial mantle. Russian claims to Byzantine heritage clashed with those of the Ottoman Empire's own claim. In Mehmed's view, he was the successor to the Roman Emperor, declaring himself "Kayser-i Rum", literally "Caesar of Rome", that is, of the Roman Empire, though he was remembered as "the Conqueror". He founded a political system that survived until 1922 with the establishment of the Republic of Turkey.
Great Palace of Constantinople
When Constantine I moved the Roman capital to Constantinople in 330, he planned out a palace for himself and his heirs. The palace was located between the Hippodrome and Hagia Sophia. It was rebuilt and expanded several times during its history. Much of the complex was destroyed during the Nika riots of 532 and was rebuilt lavishly by the emperor Justinian I. Further extensions and alterations were commissioned by Justinian II and Basil I. However, it had fallen into disrepair by the time of Constantine VII, who ordered its renovation. From the early 11th century onwards the Byzantine emperors favored the Palace of Blachernae as an imperial residence, though they continued to use the Great Palace as the primary administrative and ceremonial center of the city. It declined substantially during the following century when parts of the complex were demolished or filled with rubble. During the sack of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade, the Palace was plundered by the soldiers of Boniface of Montferrat. Although the subsequent Latin emperors continued to use the Palace complex, they lacked money for its maintenance. The last Latin emperor, Baldwin II, went as far as removing the lead roofs of the Palace and selling them.
Fall of Constantinople
With the capture of Constantinople, Mehmed II had acquired the "natural" capital of its kingdom, albeit one in decline due to years of war. The loss of the city was a crippling blow to Christendom, and it exposed the Christian west to a vigorous and aggressive foe in the east. The Christian re-conquest of Constantinople remained a goal in Western Europe for many years after its fall to the House of Osman. Rumors of Constantine XI's survival and subsequent rescue by an angel led many to hope that the city would one day return to Christian hands. Pope Nicholas V called for an immediate counter-attack in the form of a crusade. When no European monarch was willing to lead the crusade, the Pope himself decided to go, but his early death stopped this plan. As Western Europe entered the 16th century, the age of Crusading began to come to an end.
History of the Eastern Orthodox Church
After the Sack of Constantinople in 1204 AD by Roman Catholic Crusaders as part of the fourth crusade, much of Asia Minor was brought under Roman Catholic rule and the Latin Empire of the East was established. As the conquest by the European crusaders was not exclusive to the fourth crusade, many various kingdoms of European rule were established. After the fall of Constantinople to the Latin West, the Empire of Nicaea was established, which was later to be the origin of the Greek monarchy that defeated the Latin forces of Europe and re-established Orthodox Monarchy in Constantinople and Asia Minor.
History of architecture
The Byzantine Empire gradually emerged as a distinct artistic and cultural entity from the Roman Empire after AD 330, when the Roman Emperor Constantine moved the capital of the Roman Empire east from Rome to Byzantium (later renamed Constantinople and now called Istanbul). The empire endured for more than a millennium, dramatically influencing Medieval and Renaissance-era architecture in Europe and, following the capture of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in 1453, leading directly to the architecture of the Ottoman Empire.
Istanbul
Various economic and military policies instituted by Andronikos II, such as the reduction of military forces, weakened the empire and left it vulnerable to attack. In the mid-14th-century, the Ottoman Turks began a strategy of gradually taking smaller towns and cities, cutting off Constantinople's supply routes and strangling it slowly. On 29 May 1453, after an eight-week siege (during which the last Roman emperor, Constantine XI, was killed), Sultan Mehmed II "the Conqueror" captured Constantinople and declared it the new capital of the Ottoman Empire. Hours later, the sultan rode to the Hagia Sophia and summoned an imam to proclaim the Islamic creed, converting the grand cathedral into an imperial mosque due to the city's refusal to surrender peacefully. Mehmed declared himself as the new "Kaysar-i Rûm" (the Ottoman Turkish equivalent of Caesar of Rome) and the Ottoman state was reorganized into an empire.
Battle of Constantinople (922)
The Battle of Constantinople was fought in June 922 at the outskirts of the capital of the Byzantine Empire, Constantinople, between the forces of the First Bulgarian Empire and the Byzantines during the Byzantine–Bulgarian war of 913–927. In the summer the Byzantine Emperor Romanos I Lekapenos sent troops under the commander Saktikios to repel another Bulgarian raid at the outskirts of the Byzantine capital. The Byzantines stormed the Bulgarian camp but were defeated when they confronted the main Bulgarian forces. During his flight from the battlefield Saktikios was mortally wounded and died the following night.
Constantine XI Palaiologos
Previously serving as regent for his brother John VIII 1437–1439, Constantine succeeded his brother, who died in Constantinople of natural causes in 1448, as Emperor following a short dispute with his younger brother Demetrios. Despite the mounting difficulties of his reign, contemporary sources generally speak respectfully of Constantine. Constantine would rule for just over 4 years, his reign culminating in the Ottoman siege and conquest of Constantinople, the imperial capital, under Sultan Mehmed II. Constantine did what he could to organize the defenses of the city, stockpiling food and repairing the old Theodosian walls, but the reduced domain of the Empire and the poor economy meant that organizing a force large enough for the defense of the city was impossible. Constantine led the defending forces, numbering approximately 7,000, against an Ottoman army numbering around 10 times that and died in the ensuing fighting.
Architecture of Istanbul
The most important monuments of Roman architecture in the city include the Column of Constantine (), which was erected in 330 by Constantine the Great for marking the declaration of the new capital city of the Roman Empire and contained several fragments of the True Cross and other artifacts belonging to Jesus Christ and Virgin Mary, the "Mazulkemer Aqueduct", the Valens Aqueduct, the Column of the Goths in Gülhane Park, the Milion which served for calculating the distances between Constantinople and other cities of the Roman Empire, and the Hippodrome of Constantinople which was built following the model of the Circus Maximus in Rome.
Column of Constantine
The Column of Constantine (, from ' 'hooped' and ' 'stone'), also known as the Burnt Stone or the Burnt Pillar, is a Roman monumental column constructed on the orders of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great in 330 AD. It commemorates the declaration of Byzantium (renamed by Constantine as Nova Roma) as the new capital city of the Roman Empire. The column is located on the Street of the Janissaries ("Yeniçeriler Caddesi") in the neighborhood (named after the column) of Çemberlitaş, central Istanbul, along the old Road to the Imperial Council ("Divan Yolu") between the Hippodrome of Constantinople (now Sultanahmet Square) and the Forum of Theodosius (now Beyazıt Square).
Christian monasticism before 451
Solitary spots, according to Basil, should be chosen as sites for monasteries. Nevertheless, they soon found their way into cities. According to one scholar, at least fifteen monasteries were founded at Constantinople in the time of Constantine the Great; but others affirm that the three most ancient ones only dated back to the time of Theodosius (375-95). In 518 there were at least fifty-four monasteries in Constantinople. Their names and those of their rulers are given in a petition addressed by the monks of Constantinople to Pope Hormisdas in 518.
Constantinople
According to Pliny the Elder in his "Natural History", the first known name of a settlement on the site of Constantinople was "Lygos", a settlement likely of Thracian origin founded between the 13th and 11th centuries BC. The site, according to the founding myth of the city, was abandoned by the time Greek settlers from the city-state of Megara founded "Byzantium" (, "Byzántion") in around 657 BC, across from the town of Chalcedon on the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus.
Roman emperor
The line of Roman emperors in the Eastern Roman Empire continued unbroken at Constantinople until the capture of Constantinople in 1204 by the Fourth Crusade. In the wake of this action, four lines of Emperors emerged, each claiming to be the legal successor: the Empire of Thessalonica, evolving from the Despotate of Epirus, which was reduced to impotence when its founder Theodore Komnenos Doukas was defeated, captured and blinded by the Bulgarian Emperor Ivan Asen III; the Latin Empire, which came to an end when the Empire of Nicaea recovered Constantinople in 1261; the Empire of Trebizond, whose importance declined over the 13th century, and whose claims were simply ignored; and the Empire of Nicaea, whose claims based on kinship with the previous emperors, control of the Patriarch of Constantinople, and possession of Constantinople through military prowess, prevailed. The successors of the emperors of Nicaea continued until the fall of Constantinople in 1453 under Constantine XI Palaiologos.
Rise of the Ottoman Empire
In April 1453, Mehmed laid siege to Constantinople. Although the city's defenders, led by Giovanni Giustiniani under Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos's (1448–53) authority, put up a heroic defense, without the benefit of outside aid their efforts were doomed. The formerly impregnable land walls were breached after two months of constant pounding by Mehmed's heavy artillery. In the predawn hours of 29 May 1453, Mehmed ordered an all-out assault on the battered ramparts. After a brief but vicious melee at the walls in which Giustiniani was severely injured coupled with Ottoman troops breaching the walls through a sally port door left open, the Ottoman troops were able to breach the walls and rout the defenders. According to Christian sources, Emperor Constantine died bravely rushing into the oncoming Ottoman troops not to be seen again. However, according to Ottoman sources such as Tursun Beg he threw off his mantle and attempted to flee before being cut down by an injured Ottoman soldier. The Ottoman Army broke through and swept over the city. Constantinople, for a millennium considered by many Europeans the divinely ordained capital of the Christian Roman Empire, fell to Mehmed and was transformed into what many Muslims considered the divinely ordained capital of the Islamic Ottoman Empire. The fabled city's imperial legacy lived on. After the conquest, the sultan had his grand vizier Çandarlı Halil Pasha killed. His following four granviziers were of devshirme origin. During the growth of the Empire Turks seldom were appointed to the high positions.Following the capture of Constantinople, Mehmed built the Topkapı Palace in 1462 and moved the Ottoman capital there from Adrianople. Mehmed had himself titled "Kaiser-i-Rum", or "Roman Caesar", and modelled the state after the old Byzantine Empire, thinking of himself as the successor to the Roman throne. Later, when he invaded Otranto, his goal was to capture Rome and reunite the Roman Empire for the first time since 751. Justinian's cathedral of Hagia Sophia was converted into an imperial mosque, as eventually were numerous other churches and monasteries. The rights of non-Muslim inhabitants were protected to ensure continuity and stability for commercial activities. Never fully recovered from the sack of 1204, and suffering from Byzantium's two centuries of near poverty, Constantinople by the time of Mehmed's conquest was but a hollow shell of its former self. Its population had dwindled, and much property was either abandoned or in a state of disrepair. The sultan immediately began to repopulate the city. Civic and private properties were offered to the public to entice much-needed skilled artisans, craftsmen, and traders of all religions and ethnicities back to the city. Newly conquered Constantinople rapidly grew into a multiethnic, multicultured, and bustling economic, political, and cultural center for the Ottoman state, whose distant frontiers guaranteed it peace, security, and prosperity.
Treaty of Constantinople (1533)
The Treaty of Constantinople () was signed on 22 July 1533 in Constantinople (Istanbul) by the Ottoman Empire and the Archduchy of Austria.
Constantinople
Constantine's foundation gave prestige to the Bishop of Constantinople, who eventually came to be known as the Ecumenical Patriarch, and made it a prime center of Christianity alongside Rome. This contributed to cultural and theological differences between Eastern and Western Christianity eventually leading to the Great Schism that divided Western Catholicism from Eastern Orthodoxy from 1054 onwards. Constantinople is also of great religious importance to Islam, as the conquest of Constantinople is one of the signs of the End time in Islam.The city provided a defence for the eastern provinces of the old Roman Empire against the barbarian invasions of the 5th century. The 18-meter-tall walls built by Theodosius II were, in essence, impregnable to the barbarians coming from south of the Danube river, who found easier targets to the west rather than the richer provinces to the east in Asia. From the 5th century, the city was also protected by the Anastasian Wall, a 60-kilometer chain of walls across the Thracian peninsula. Many scholars argue that these sophisticated fortifications allowed the east to develop relatively unmolested while Ancient Rome and the west collapsed.
İzmit
Nicomedia remained as the eastern (and most senior) capital of the Roman Empire until Licinius was defeated by Constantine the Great in 324. Constantine mainly resided in Nicomedia as his interim capital city for the next six years; until in 330 he declared the nearby Byzantium as "Nova Roma", which eventually became known as Constantinople. Constantine died in a royal villa at the vicinity of Nicomedia in 337. Owing to its position at the convergence of the Asiatic roads leading to the new capital, Nicomedia retained its importance even after the foundation of Constantinople.
Constantinople
After the shock of the Battle of Adrianople in 378, in which the emperor Valens with the flower of the Roman armies was destroyed by the Visigoths within a few days' march, the city looked to its defences, and in 413–414 Theodosius II built the 18-metre (60-foot)-tall triple-wall fortifications, which were not to be breached until the coming of gunpowder. Theodosius also founded a University near the Forum of Taurus, on 27 February 425.
Constantinople
In 1204, however, the armies of the Fourth Crusade took and devastated the city, and its inhabitants lived several decades under Latin misrule. In 1261 the Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos liberated the city, and after the restoration under the Palaiologos dynasty, enjoyed a partial recovery. With the advent of the Ottoman Empire in 1299, the Byzantine Empire began to lose territories and the city began to lose population. By the early 15th century, the Byzantine Empire was reduced to just Constantinople and its environs, along with Morea in Greece, making it an enclave inside the Ottoman Empire; after a 53-day siege the city eventually fell to the Ottomans, led by Sultan Mehmed II, on 29 May 1453, whereafter it replaced Edirne (Adrianople) as the new capital of the Ottoman Empire.
Rise of the Ottoman Empire
The foundation and rise of the Ottoman Empire is a period of history that started with the emergence of the Ottoman principality in , and ended with the conquest of Constantinople on May 29, 1453. This period witnessed the foundation of a political entity ruled by the Ottoman Dynasty in the northwestern Anatolian region of Bithynia, and its transformation from a small principality on the Byzantine frontier into an empire spanning the Balkans and Anatolia. For this reason, this period in the empire's history has been described as the Proto-Imperial Era. Throughout most of this period, the Ottomans were merely one of many competing states in the region, and relied upon the support of local warlords and vassals to maintain control over their realm. By the middle of the fifteenth century the Ottoman sultans were able to accumulate enough personal power and authority to establish a centralized imperial state, a process which was brought to fruition by Sultan Mehmed II (r. 1451-1481). The conquest of Constantinople in 1453 is seen as the symbolic moment when the emerging Ottoman state shifted from a mere principality into an empire, marking a major turning point in its history.
Roman emperor
The Tetrarchy ultimately degenerated into civil war, but the eventual victor, Constantine the Great, restored Diocletian's division of Empire into East and West. He kept the East for himself and founded his city of Constantinople as its new capital. Constantine's own dynasty was also soon swallowed up in civil war and court intrigue until it was replaced, briefly, by Julian the Apostate's general Jovian and then, more permanently, by Valentinian I and the dynasty he founded in 364. Though a soldier from a low middle-class background, Valentinian was made emperor by a conclave of senior generals and civil officials.
Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople
The see of Byzantium, whose foundation was later ascribed to Andrew the Apostle, was originally a common bishopric. It gained importance when Emperor Constantine elevated Byzantium to a second capital alongside Rome and named it Constantinople. The see's ecclesiastical status as the second of five Patriarchates were developed by the Ecumenical Councils of Constantinople in 381 and Chalcedon in 451.
Battle of Chrysopolis
A year later, Constantine's nephew the younger Licinius also fell victim to the emperor's anger or suspicions. In defeating his last foe, Licinius, Constantine became the sole emperor of the Roman empire; the first such since the elevation of Maximian to the status of augustus by Diocletian in April 286. After his conquest of the eastern portion of the Roman Empire Constantine made the momentous decision to give the east its own capital, and the empire as a whole its second. He chose the city of Byzantium — renamed "Constantinopolis" — as the site of this new foundation.Primary sources
Greece in the Roman era
The definitive Roman occupation of the Greek world was established after the Battle of Actium (31 BC), in which Augustus defeated Cleopatra VII, the Greek Ptolemaic queen of Egypt, and the Roman general Mark Antony, and afterwards conquered Alexandria (32 BC), the last great city of Hellenistic Greece. The Roman era of Greek history continued with Emperor Constantine the Great's adoption of Byzantium as "Nova Roma", the capital city of the Roman Empire; in AD 330, the city was renamed Constantinople; afterwards, the Byzantine Empire was a generally Greek-speaking polity.
Constantine the Great
Licinius' defeat came to represent the defeat of a rival centre of pagan and Greek-speaking political activity in the East, as opposed to the Christian and Latin-speaking Rome, and it was proposed that a new Eastern capital should represent the integration of the East into the Roman Empire as a whole, as a center of learning, prosperity, and cultural preservation for the whole of the Eastern Roman Empire. Among the various locations proposed for this alternative capital, Constantine appears to have toyed earlier with Serdica (present-day Sofia), as he was reported saying that ""Serdica is my Rome"". Sirmium and Thessalonica were also considered. Eventually, however, Constantine decided to work on the Greek city of Byzantium, which offered the advantage of having already been extensively rebuilt on Roman patterns of urbanism, during the preceding century, by Septimius Severus and Caracalla, who had already acknowledged its strategic importance. The city was thus founded in 324, dedicated on 11 May 330 and renamed "Constantinopolis" ("Constantine's City" or Constantinople in English). Special commemorative coins were issued in 330 to honor the event. The new city was protected by the relics of the True Cross, the Rod of Moses and other holy relics, though a cameo now at the Hermitage Museum also represented Constantine crowned by the tyche of the new city. The figures of old gods were either replaced or assimilated into a framework of Christian symbolism. Constantine built the new Church of the Holy Apostles on the site of a temple to Aphrodite. Generations later there was the story that a divine vision led Constantine to this spot, and an angel no one else could see led him on a circuit of the new walls. The capital would often be compared to the 'old' Rome as "Nova Roma Constantinopolitana", the "New Rome of Constantinople".
East–West Schism
The bishop of Byzantium was under the authority of the metropolitan of Heraclea when in 330 Roman Emperor Constantine I moved his residence to this town, which, rebuilt on a larger scale, became known as Constantinople. Thereafter, the bishop's connection with the imperial court meant that he was able to free himself from ecclesiastical dependency on Heraclea and in little more than half a century to obtain recognition of next-after-Rome ranking from the First Council of Constantinople (381), held in the new capital. No Western bishop took part in this council, and the Latin Church recognized it as ecumenical only in the mid-6th century. It decreed: "The Bishop of Constantinople, however, shall have the prerogative of honour after the Bishop of Rome; because Constantinople is New Rome", thus raising it above the sees of Alexandria and Antioch. This has been described as sowing the seed for the ecclesiastical rivalry between Constantinople and Rome that was a factor leading to the schism between East and West. The website of the Orthodox Church in America says that the Bishop of Byzantium was elevated to Patriarch already in the time of Constantine.
Egypt (Roman province)
The reign of Constantine also saw the founding of Constantinople as a new capital for the Roman Empire, and in the course of the 4th century the Empire was divided in two, with Egypt finding itself in the Eastern Empire with its capital at Constantinople. Latin, never well established in Egypt, would play a declining role with Greek continuing to be the dominant language of government and scholarship. During the 5th and 6th centuries the Eastern Roman Empire, today known as the Byzantine Empire, gradually transformed itself into a thoroughly Christian state whose culture differed significantly from its pagan past.
Europe
In the east a resurgent Byzantine Empire recaptured Crete and Cyprus from the Muslims and reconquered the Balkans. Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe from the 9th to the 12th centuries, with a population of approximately 400,000. The Empire was weakened following the defeat at Manzikert and was weakened considerably by the sack of Constantinople in 1204, during the Fourth Crusade. Although it would recover Constantinople in 1261, Byzantium fell in 1453 when Constantinople was taken by the Ottoman Empire.
Timeline (TV series)
"The Fall of Constantinople" was the fourth of the six 'history as news' episodes to be shown by PBS in 1989, focusing on the final destruction of the Byzantine Roman Empire when Ottoman Sultan Mehmet (the Conqueror) conquered Constantinople in 1453AD. Reporters Owen of Canarfon (Robert Bathurst), Siboletto of Zimbabwe (Fran Dorn), Louis de Jaen (Inaqui Aierra) & Selim Karasi (Engin Cezzar) report from both sides of the conflict, moderated by anchorman Steve Bell who reveals the events that have led up to this final destruction of an empire that has lasted for more than 1500 years.
Christianity in the 4th century
Constantine erected a new capital at Byzantium, a strategically placed city on the Bosporus. He renamed his new capital "Nova Roma" ("New Rome"), but the city would become known as Constantinople. The Second Ecumenical Council, held at the new capital in 381, elevated the see of Constantinople to a position ahead of the other chief metropolitan sees, except that of Rome. Mentioning in particular the provinces of Asia, Pontus and Thrace, it decreed that the synod of each province should manage the ecclesiastical affairs of that province alone, except for the privileges already recognized for Alexandria and Antioch.
Ancient history
The Roman Empire underwent considerable social, cultural and organizational change starting with reign of Diocletian, who began the custom of splitting the Empire into Eastern and Western halves ruled by multiple emperors. Beginning with Constantine the Great the Empire was Christianized, and a new capital founded at Constantinople. Migrations of Germanic tribes disrupted Roman rule from the late 4th century onwards, culminating in the eventual collapse of the Empire in the West in 476, replaced by the so-called barbarian kingdoms. The resultant cultural fusion of Greco-Roman, Germanic and Christian traditions formed the cultural foundations of Europe.
Treaty of Constantinople (1800)
The Treaty of Constantinople of was concluded between the Ottoman Empire and the Russian Empire, and heralded the creation of the Septinsular Republic, the first autonomous Greek state since the Fall of the Byzantine Empire.
Constantinople
Constantinople was the largest and richest urban center in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea during the late Eastern Roman Empire, mostly as a result of its strategic position commanding the trade routes between the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea. It would remain the capital of the eastern, Greek-speaking empire for over a thousand years. At its peak, roughly corresponding to the Middle Ages, it was the richest and largest European city, exerting a powerful cultural pull and dominating economic life in the Mediterranean. Visitors and merchants were especially struck by the beautiful monasteries and churches of the city, in particular the Hagia Sophia, or the Church of Holy Wisdom. According to Russian 14th-century traveler Stephen of Novgorod: "As for Hagia Sophia, the human mind can neither tell it nor make description of it."
Treaty of Constantinople (1897)
The Treaty of Constantinople was a treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Greece signed on 4 December 1897 following the Greco-Turkish War of 1897.
Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople
The (arch)bishopric of Constantinople has had a continuous history since the founding of the city in 330 AD by Constantine the Great. After Constantine the Great had enlarged Byzantium to make it into a second capital city in 330, it was thought appropriate that its bishop, once a suffragan of the Exarch of Thrace and Macedonia, the Metropolitan of Heraclea, should be elevated to an archbishopric. For many decades the heads of the church of Rome opposed this ambition, not because anyone thought of disputing their first place, but because they defended the 'Petrine principle' by which all Patriarchates were derived from Saint Peter and were unwilling to violate the old order of the hierarchy for political reasons.
In 381, the First Council of Constantinople declared that "The Bishop of Constantinople shall have the primacy of honour after the Bishop of Rome, because it is New Rome" (canon iii). The prestige of the office continued to grow not only because of the obvious patronage of the Byzantine Emperor but because of its overwhelming geographical importance.
Walls of Constantinople
Like Severus before him, Constantine began to punish the city for siding with his defeated rival, but soon he too realized the advantages of Byzantium's location. During 324–336 the city was thoroughly rebuilt and inaugurated on 11 May 330 under the name of "Second Rome". The name that eventually prevailed in common usage however was Constantinople, the "City of Constantine" (Gk. Κωνσταντινούπολις, "Konstantinoupolis"). The city of Constantine was protected by a new wall about 2.8 km (15 "stadia") west of the Severan wall. Constantine's fortification consisted of a single wall, reinforced with towers at regular distances, which began to be constructed in 324 and was completed under his son Constantius II (r. 337–361). Only the approximate course of the wall is known: it began at the Church of St. Anthony at the Golden Horn, near the modern Atatürk Bridge, ran southwest and then southwards, passed east of the great open cisterns of Mocius and of Aspar, and ended near the Church of the Theotokos of the Rhabdos on the Propontis coast, somewhere between the later sea gates of St. Aemilianus and Psamathos.
Constantine the Great and Christianity
The accession of Constantine was a turning point for early Christianity. After his victory, Constantine took over the role of patron of the Christian faith. He supported the Church financially, had an extraordinary number of basilicas built, granted privileges (e.g., exemption from certain taxes) to clergy, promoted Christians to high-ranking offices, returned property confiscated during the Great Persecution of Diocletian, and endowed the church with land and other wealth. Between 324 and 330, Constantine built a new imperial capital at Byzantium on the Bosporos, which would be named Constantinople for him. Unlike "old" Rome, the city began to employ overtly Christian architecture, contained churches within the city walls, and had no pre-existing temples from other religions.
Constantinople
From the mid-5th century to the early 13th century, Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe. The city was also famed for its architectural masterpieces, such as the Greek Orthodox cathedral of Hagia Sophia, which served as the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the sacred Imperial Palace where the Emperors lived, the Galata Tower, the Hippodrome, the Golden Gate of the Land Walls, and the opulent aristocratic palaces lining the arcaded avenues and squares. The University of Constantinople was founded in the fifth century and contained numerous artistic and literary treasures before it was sacked in 1204 and 1453, including its vast Imperial Library which contained the remnants of the Library of Alexandria and had over 100,000 volumes of ancient texts. It was instrumental in the advancement of Christianity during Roman and Byzantine times as the home of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople and as the guardian of Christendom's holiest relics such as the Crown of Thorns and the True Cross.
Constantinople was famed for its massive and complex defences. The first wall of the city was erected by Constantine I, and surrounded the city on both land and sea fronts. Later, in the 5th century, the Praetorian Prefect Anthemius under the child emperor Theodosius II undertook the construction of the Theodosian Walls, which consisted of a double wall lying about to the west of the first wall and a moat with palisades in front. This formidable complex of defences was one of the most sophisticated of Antiquity. The city was built intentionally to rival Rome, and it was claimed that several elevations within its walls matched the 'seven hills' of Rome. Because it was located between the Golden Horn and the Sea of Marmara the land area that needed defensive walls was reduced, and this helped it to present an impregnable fortress enclosing magnificent palaces, domes, and towers, the result of the prosperity it achieved from being the gateway between two continents (Europe and Asia) and two seas (the Mediterranean and the Black Sea). Although besieged on numerous occasions by various armies, the defences of Constantinople proved impregnable for nearly nine hundred years.
Episcopal polity
Shortly after the Roman Emperor Constantine I legalized Christianity in 321, he also constructed an elaborate second capital of the Roman Empire located at Byzantium and renamed it Constantinople, in 324. The single Roman Empire was divided between these two autonomous administrative centers, Roman and Constantinopolitan, West and East, Latin speaking and Greek speaking. This remained the status quo through the fourth century. A deep chasm developed between the East and West, becoming critical around 350, known as the Arian, or Nicene controversy. The Eastern Christian Churches were thought by Constantine to believe against the Trinity; that Christ was lesser than God. Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, France, believed that the Eastern Church should be given the opportunity to, at least, be educated on the subject. Constantine, in his wisdom, and upset by disagreement, banished Hilary to the East. Hilary perfected his Greek language skills while in exile, and determined the great divide between Rome and the East was actually not a disagreement at all, and was merely a linguistic ignorance on the part of his Latin speaking contemporaries. This truth became known in the West, though some differences lingered. Hilary of Poitiers later became St. Hilary, Doctor of the Church, for exposing the true Christian beliefs of the Eastern Church. Many of Hilary's writings were lost to time.
Constantinople
As the largest and wealthiest city in Europe during the 4th–13th centuries and a centre of culture and education of the Mediterranean basin, Constantinople came to be known by prestigious titles such as "Basileuousa" (Queen of Cities) and "Megalopolis" (the Great City) and was, in colloquial speech, commonly referred to as just "Polis" () 'the City' by Constantinopolitans and provincial Byzantines alike.
Byzantine Empire
In 330, Constantine moved the seat of the Empire to Constantinople, which he founded as a second Rome on the site of Byzantium, a city strategically located on the trade routes between Europe and Asia and between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Constantine introduced important changes to the Empire's military, monetary, civil and religious institutions. In regards to his economic policies he has been accused by certain scholars of "reckless fiscality", but the gold solidus he introduced became a stable currency that transformed the economy and promoted development.
Constantine II of Constantinople
Constantine II (Greek: Κωνσταντῖνος, "Kōnstantinos"), (? – 7 October 767) was the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople from 754 to 766. He was an iconoclast and a successor of Anastasius of Constantinople, but he was deposed and jailed after the discovery of Constantine Podopagouros' plot against the Emperor Constantine V in June 766, in which the patriarch was later implicated.
History of Europe
In the 4th century, the emperors Diocletian and Constantine were able to slow down the process of decline by splitting the empire into a Western part with a capital in Rome and an Eastern part with the capital in Byzantium, or Constantinople (now Istanbul). Whereas Diocletian severely persecuted Christianity, Constantine declared an official end to state-sponsored persecution of Christians in 313 with the Edict of Milan, thus setting the stage for the Church to become the state church of the Roman Empire in about 380.
Treaty of Constantinople (1736)
Treaty of Constantinople was a treaty between Ottoman Empire and Afsharid Persia signed on 24 September 1736, ending the Afsharid–Ottoman War (1730–35).
First Council of Constantinople
The First Council of Constantinople ( commonly known as , "Second Ecumenical"; or ) was a council of Christian bishops convened in Constantinople in AD 381 by the Roman Emperor Theodosius I. This second ecumenical council, an effort to attain consensus in the church through an assembly representing all of Christendom, except for the Western Church, confirmed the Nicene Creed, expanding the doctrine thereof to produce the Niceno–Constantinopolitan Creed, and dealt with sundry other matters. It met from May to July 381 in the Church of Hagia Irene and was affirmed as ecumenical in 451 at the Council of Chalcedon.
Byzantine Empire under the Constantinian and Valentinian dynasties
Byzantium under the Constantinian and Valentinian dynasties was the earliest period of the Byzantine history that saw a shift in government from Rome in the west to Constantinople in the East within the Roman Empire under emperor Constantine the Great and his successors. Constantinople, formally named Nova Roma, was created on the site of the old Greek Byzantium, which is the origin of the historiographical name for the Eastern Empire, which self-identified simply as the "Roman Empire".
Imperial Library of Constantinople
The Imperial Library of Constantinople, in the capital city of the Byzantine Empire, was the last of the great libraries of the ancient world. Long after the destruction of the Great Library of Alexandria and the other ancient libraries, it preserved the knowledge of the ancient Greeks and Romans for almost 1,000 years. A series of unintentional fires over the years and wartime damage, including the raids of the Fourth Crusade in 1204, impacted the building itself and its contents. The library continued in substantial form until the city of Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman Empire on 29 May 1453 when the library's considerable surviving contents were destroyed or lost. The library was founded by Constantius II (reigned 337–361 AD) who established a Scriptorium so that the surviving works of Greek literature could be copied for preservation. The Emperor Valens in 372 employed four Greek and three Latin calligraphers. The majority of Greek classics known today are known through Byzantine copies originating from the Imperial Library of Constantinople.
First Council of Constantinople
The First Council of Constantinople (381) was the first appearance of the term 'New Rome' in connection to Constantinople. The term was employed as the grounds for giving the relatively young church of Constantinople precedence over Alexandria and Antioch ('because it is the New Rome').
Treaty of Constantinople (1454)
The Treaty of Constantinople was signed on April 18, 1454 between the Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Venice. It was the first treaty signed by the Turkish Sultan following the capture of Constantinople in 1453. It effectively ended Venetian aspirations to eliminate the Ottoman Empire or to conquer Constantinople on behalf of Christendom. The treaty gave the Republic of Venice freedom to trade in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Battle of Constantinople (1147)
The Battle of Constantinople in 1147 was a large-scale clash between the forces of the Byzantine Empire and the German crusaders of the Second Crusade, led by Conrad III of Germany, fought on the outskirts of the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. The Byzantine emperor Manuel I Komnenos was deeply concerned by the presence of a large and unruly army in the immediate vicinity of his capital and of the unfriendly attitude of its leaders. A similarly sized French crusader army was also approaching Constantinople, and the possibility of the two armies combining at the city was viewed with great alarm by Manuel. Following earlier armed clashes with the crusaders, and perceived insults from Conrad, Manuel arrayed some of his forces outside the walls of Constantinople. A part of the German army then attacked and was heavily defeated. Following this defeat the crusaders agreed to be quickly ferried across the Bosporus to Asia Minor.
Constantinople
Constantinople was built over six years, and consecrated on 11 May 330. Constantine divided the expanded city, like Rome, into 14 regions, and ornamented it with public works worthy of an imperial metropolis. Yet, at first, Constantine's new Rome did not have all the dignities of old Rome. It possessed a proconsul, rather than an urban prefect. It had no praetors, tribunes, or quaestors. Although it did have senators, they held the title "clarus", not "clarissimus", like those of Rome. It also lacked the panoply of other administrative offices regulating the food supply, police, statues, temples, sewers, aqueducts, or other public works. The new programme of building was carried out in great haste: columns, marbles, doors, and tiles were taken wholesale from the temples of the empire and moved to the new city. In similar fashion, many of the greatest works of Greek and Roman art were soon to be seen in its squares and streets. The emperor stimulated private building by promising householders gifts of land from the imperial estates in Asiana and Pontica and on 18 May 332 he announced that, as in Rome, free distributions of food would be made to the citizens. At the time, the amount is said to have been 80,000 rations a day, doled out from 117 distribution points around the city.
Early Christianity
Constantinople came into prominence only after the early Christian period, being founded officially in 330, five years after the First Council of Nicaea, though the much smaller original city of Byzantium was an early center of Christianity largely due to its proximity to Anatolia.
Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople
The Council of Chalcedon in 451 established Constantinople as a patriarchate with ecclesiastical jurisdiction over Asia Minor (the dioceses of Asiane and Pontus) and Thrace as well as over the barbaric territories, non-converted lands outside the defined area of the Western Patriarchate (Old Rome) and the other three patriarchates, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, gave it appellate jurisdiction extraterritorially over canon law decisions by the other patriarchs and granted it honours equal to those belonging to the first Christian see, Rome, in terms of primacy, Rome retaining however its seniority (canon xxviii). Leo I refused to accept this canon, basing himself on the fact that it was made in the absence of his legates. In the 6th century, the official title became that of "Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome, and Ecumenical Patriarch."
History of Istanbul
The city, known alternatively in Ottoman Turkish as "Ḳosṭanṭīnīye" ( after the Arabic form ) or Istanbul (while its Christian minorities continued to name it Constantinople), was the capital of the Ottoman Empire from its conquest in 1453 until the empire's collapse in 1922.
Byzantine architecture
The Byzantine era is usually dated from 330 CE, when Constantine the Great moved the Roman capital to Byzantium, which became Constantinople, until the fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1453. However, there was initially no hard line between the Byzantine and Roman empires, and early Byzantine architecture is stylistically and structurally indistinguishable from Roman architecture. This terminology was introduced by modern historians to designate the medieval Roman Empire as it evolved as a distinct artistic and cultural entity centered on the new capital of Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) rather than the city of Rome and its environs.
Europe
The empire continued to expand under emperors such as Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius, who spent time on the Empire's northern border fighting Germanic, Pictish and Scottish tribes. The Empire began to decline in the 3rd century, particularly in the west. Christianity was legalised by Constantine I in 313 AD after three centuries of imperial persecution. Constantine also permanently moved the capital of the empire from Rome to the city of Byzantium, which was renamed Constantinople in his honour (modern-day Istanbul) in 330 AD. Christianity became the sole official religion of the empire in 380 AD, and in 391-392 AD, the emperor Theodosius outlawed pagan religions. This is sometimes considered to mark the end of antiquity; alternatively antiquity is considered to end with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD; the closure of the pagan Platonic Academy of Athens in 529 AD; or the rise of Islam in the early 7th century AD.
History of Turkey
In 324, Constantine I chose Byzantium to be the new capital of the Roman Empire, renaming it New Rome. Following the death of Theodosius I in 395 and the permanent division of the Roman Empire between his two sons, the city, which would popularly come to be known as Constantinople became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. This, which would later be branded by historians as the Byzantine Empire, ruled most of the territory of what is today Turkey until the Late Middle Ages, while the other remaining territory remained in Sassanid Persian hands.
Istanbul
Following the conquest of Constantinople, Mehmed II immediately set out to revitalize the city, by then sometimes called Istanbul. He urged the return of those who had fled the city during the siege, and resettled Muslims, Jews, and Christians from other parts of Anatolia. He demanded that five thousand households needed to be transferred to Constantinople by September. From all over the Islamic empire, prisoners of war and deported people were sent to the city: these people were called "Sürgün" in Turkish (). However, many people escaped again from the city, and there were several outbreaks of plague, so that in 1459 Mehmet allowed the deported Greeks to come back to the city. He also invited people from all over Europe to his capital, creating a cosmopolitan society that persisted through much of the Ottoman period. Plague continued, however, to be essentially endemic in Constantinople for the rest of the century, as it had been from 1520, with a few years of respite between 1529 and 1533, 1549 and 1552, and from 1567 to 1570; epidemics originating in the West and in the Hejaz and southern Russia. Population growth in Anatolia, however, allowed Constantinople to replace its losses and maintain its population of around 500,000 inhabitants down to 1800. Mehmed II also repaired the city's damaged infrastructure, including the whole water system, began to build the Grand Bazaar, and constructed Topkapı Palace, the sultan's official residence. With the transfer of the capital from Edirne (formerly Adrianople) to Constantinople, the new state was declared as the successor and continuation of the Roman Empire.
Alexander of Constantinople
Alexander of Constantinople (; c. 240/245 – c. 340) was a bishop of Byzantium and the first Archbishop of Constantinople (the city was renamed during his episcopacy). Scholars consider most of the available information on Alexander to be legendary.
Constantinople
The city maintained independence as a city-state until it was annexed by Darius I in 512 BC into the Persian Empire, who saw the site as the optimal location to construct a pontoon bridge crossing into Europe as Byzantium was situated at the narrowest point in the Bosphorus strait. Persian rule lasted until 478 BC when as part of the Greek counterattack to the Second Persian Invasion of Greece, a Greek army led by the Spartan general Pausanias captured the city which remained an independent, yet subordinate, city under the Athenians, and later to the Spartans after 411 BC. A farsighted treaty with the emergent power of Rome in which stipulated tribute in exchange for independent status allowed it to enter Roman rule unscathed. This treaty would pay dividends retrospectively as Byzantium would maintain this independent status, and prosper under peace and stability in the Pax Romana, for nearly three centuries until the late 2nd century AD.
Hippodrome of Constantinople
Although the Hippodrome is usually associated with Constantinople's days of glory as an imperial capital, it actually predates that era. The first Hippodrome was built when the city was called Byzantium, and was a provincial town of moderate importance. In AD 203 the Emperor Septimius Severus rebuilt the city and expanded its walls, endowing it with a hippodrome, an arena for chariot races and other entertainment.
History of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire was founded by Osman I. As sultan Mehmed II conquered Constantinople (today named Istanbul) in 1453, the state grew into a mighty empire. The Empire reached its apex under Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century when it stretched from the Persian Gulf in the east to Hungary in the northwest; and from Egypt in the south to the Caucasus in the north. The empire came to an end in the aftermath of its defeat by the Allies in World War I. The empire was abolished by the Government of the Turkish Grand National Assembly in Ankara in November 1922 following the Turkish War of Independence (1919–23).
Byzantine Empire under the Constantinian and Valentinian dynasties
Constantine was acclaimed as emperor by the army at Eboracum (modern-day York) after his father's death in 306 AD, and he emerged victorious in a series of civil wars against Emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become sole ruler of both west and east by 324 AD. The age of Constantine marked a distinct epoch in the history of the Roman Empire. He built a new imperial residence at Byzantium and renamed the city Constantinople after himself. This marks the beginning of Byzantine history.
Ottoman conquest of Adrianople
Adrianople, a major Byzantine city in Thrace, was conquered by the Ottomans sometime in the 1360s, and eventually became the Ottoman capital, until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
Ancient Rome
The West responded with the Crusades, eventually resulting in the Sack of Constantinople by participants of the Fourth Crusade. The conquest of Constantinople in 1204 fragmented what remained of the Empire into successor states; the ultimate victor was the Empire of Nicaea. After the recapture of Constantinople by Imperial forces, the Empire was little more than a Greek state confined to the Aegean coast. The Byzantine Empire collapsed when Mehmed the Conqueror conquered Constantinople on 29 May, 1453.
History of the East–West Schism
After the sole emperor of all the Roman Empire Constantine built the new imperial capital at Byzantium, a strategically placed city on the Bosporus. He renamed his new capital "Nova Roma" ("New Rome"), but the city would become known as Constantinople. The centre of gravity in the empire was fully recognised to have completely shifted to the eastern Mediterranean. Rome lost the Senate to Constantinople and lost its status and gravitas as imperial capital, see also Fall of Rome.
Soon the local bishop was elevated to Patriarch under Constantine, as Metrophanes of Byzantium
The patriarchs of Constantinople often tried to adopt an imperious position over the other patriarchs. In the case of Nestorius, whose actual teaching is now recognised to be not overtly heretical, although it is clearly deficient, (Saint Cyril called it 'slippery'), other patriarchs were able to make the charge of heresy stick and successfully had him deposed. This was probably more because his Christology was delivered with a heavy sarcastic arrogance which matched his high-handed personality.
In the fourth century, when the Roman emperors (reigning in Constantinople) were trying to control the Church, theological questions ran rampant throughout the Roman Empire. The influence of Greek speculative thought on Christian thinking led to all sorts of divergent and conflicting opinions. Theology was also used as a weapon against opponent bishops, because being branded a heretic was the only sure way for a bishop to be removed by other bishops—incompetence was not sufficient grounds for removal.
Third Rome
After the fall of Constantinople in 1453 AD, Mehmed II declared himself "Kayser-i Rum", literally "Caesar of Rome". The claim was recognized by the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople, but not by Roman Catholic Western Europe. Gennadios (Georgios Scholarios), a staunch enemy of the West, had been enthroned Patriarch of Constantinople with all the ceremonial attributes of Byzantium by Mehmed himself acting as Roman Emperor and in turn Gennadios recognized Mehmed as successor to the throne. Mehmed's claim rested with the concept that Constantinople was the seat of the Roman Empire, after the transfer of its capital to Constantinople in 330 AD and the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Mehmed also had a blood lineage to the Byzantine Imperial family; his predecessor, Sultan Orhan I had married a Byzantine princess, and Mehmed may have claimed descent from John Tzelepes Komnenos. During that period the Ottoman Empire also destroyed Otranto and its people, and Mehmed II was planning on taking Rome itself when the Italian campaign was cut short by his sudden death. The title fell into disuse after his death, but the imperial bodies created by Mehmed II lived on for centuries to come.
Ancient Rome
He was defeated by the Franks and the Alamanni during 306–308. In 324 he defeated another tetrarch, Licinius, and controlled all the empire, as it was before Diocletian. To celebrate his victories and Christianity's relevance, he rebuilt Byzantium and renamed it Nova Roma ("New Rome"); but the city soon gained the informal name of Constantinople ("City of Constantine"). The reign of Julian, who under the influence of his adviser Mardonius attempted to restore Classical Roman and Hellenistic religion, only briefly interrupted the succession of Christian emperors. Constantinople served as a new capital for the Empire. In fact, Rome had lost its central importance since the Crisis of the Third Century—Mediolanum was the western capital from 286 to 330, until the reign of Honorius, when Ravenna was made capital, in the 5th century.
Byzantine Empire
Constantinople by this stage was underpopulated and dilapidated. The population of the city had collapsed so severely that it was now little more than a cluster of villages separated by fields. On 2 April 1453, Sultan Mehmed's army of 80,000 men and large numbers of irregulars laid siege to the city. Despite a desperate last-ditch defence of the city by the massively outnumbered Christian forces (c. 7,000 men, 2,000 of whom were foreign), Constantinople finally fell to the Ottomans after a two-month siege on 29 May 1453. The last Byzantine emperor, Constantine XI Palaiologos, was last seen casting off his imperial regalia and throwing himself into hand-to-hand combat after the walls of the city were taken.
Christian culture
The dedication of Constantinople as capital in 330 AD created a great new Christian artistic centre for the Eastern Roman Empire, which soon became a separate political unit. Major Constantinopolitan churches built under Constantine and his son, Constantius II, included the original foundations of Hagia Sophia and the Church of the Holy Apostles. As the Western Roman Empire disintegrated and was taken over by "barbarian" peoples, the art of the Byzantine Empire reached levels of sophistication, power and artistry not previously seen in Christian art, and set the standards for those parts of the West still in touch with Constantinople.
Istanbul
The establishment of Constantinople served as one of Constantine's most lasting accomplishments, shifting Roman power eastward as the city became a center of Greek culture and Christianity. Numerous churches were built across the city, including the Hagia Sophia which was built during the reign of Justinian the Great and remained the world's largest cathedral for a thousand years. Constantine also undertook a major renovation and expansion of the Hippodrome of Constantinople; accommodating tens of thousands of spectators, the hippodrome became central to civic life and, in the 5th and 6th centuries, the epicenter of episodes of unrest, including the Nika riots. Constantinople's location also ensured its existence would stand the test of time; for many centuries, its walls and seafront protected Europe against invaders from the east and the advance of Islam. During most of the Middle Ages, the latter part of the Byzantine era, Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest city on the European continent and at times the largest in the world.
Constantine the Great
The age of Constantine marked a distinct epoch in the history of the Roman Empire. He built a new imperial residence at Byzantium and renamed the city Constantinople (now Istanbul) after himself (the laudatory epithet of "New Rome" came later, and was never an official title). It became the capital of the Empire for more than a thousand years, with the later eastern Roman Empire now being referred to as the Byzantine Empire by historians. His more immediate political legacy was that he replaced Diocletian's tetrarchy with the principle of dynastic succession by leaving the empire to his sons. His reputation flourished during the lifetime of his children and for centuries after his reign. The medieval church upheld him as a paragon of virtue, while secular rulers invoked him as a prototype, a point of reference, and the symbol of imperial legitimacy and identity. Beginning with the Renaissance, there were more critical appraisals of his reign, due to the rediscovery of anti-Constantinian sources. Trends in modern and recent scholarship have attempted to balance the extremes of previous scholarship.
Classical Anatolia
Roman control of Anatolia was strengthened by a 'hands off' approach by Rome, allowing local control to govern effectively and providing military protection. In the early 4th century, Constantine the Great established a new administrative centre at Constantinople, and by the end of the 4th century a new eastern empire was established with Constantinople as its capital, referred to by historians as the Byzantine Empire from the original name, Byzantium.
Istanbul
The Ottomans quickly transformed the city from a bastion of Christianity to a symbol of Islamic culture. Religious foundations were established to fund the construction of ornate imperial mosques, often adjoined by schools, hospitals, and public baths. The Ottoman Dynasty claimed the status of caliphate in 1517, with Constantinople remaining the capital of this last caliphate for four centuries. Suleiman the Magnificent's reign from 1520 to 1566 was a period of especially great artistic and architectural achievement; chief architect Mimar Sinan designed several iconic buildings in the city, while Ottoman arts of ceramics, stained glass, calligraphy, and miniature flourished. The population of Constantinople was 570,000 by the end of the 18th century.
History of the Byzantine Empire
Constantinople by this stage was underpopulated and dilapidated. The population of the city had collapsed so severely that it was now little more than a cluster of villages separated by fields. On 2 April 1453, the Sultan's army of some 80,000 men and large numbers of irregulars laid siege to the city. Despite a desperate last-ditch defense of the city by the massively outnumbered Christian forces (c. 7,000 men, 2,000 of whom were foreign), Constantinople finally fell to the Ottomans after a two-month siege on 29 May 1453. The last Byzantine emperor, Constantine XI Palaiologos, was last seen casting off his imperial regalia and throwing himself into hand-to-hand combat after the walls of the city were taken.
History of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II cemented the status of the Empire as the preeminent power in southeastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean. After taking Constantinople, Mehmed met with the Orthodox patriarch, Gennadios and worked out an arrangement in which the Orthodox Church, in exchange for being able to maintain its autonomy and land, accepted Ottoman authority. Because of bad relations between the latter Byzantine Empire and the states of western Europe as epitomized by Loukas Notaras's famous remark "Better the Sultan's turban than the Cardinal's Hat", the majority of the Orthodox population accepted Ottoman rule as preferable to Venetian rule.
Papal primacy
The event that is often considered to have been the first conflict between Rome and Constantinople was triggered by the elevation of the see of Constantinople to a position of honour, second only to Rome on the grounds that, as capital of the eastern Roman empire, it was now the "New Rome". This was promulgated in the First Council of Constantinople (381) canon 3 which decreed: "The Bishop of Constantinople, however, shall have the prerogative of honour after the Bishop of Rome because Constantinople is New Rome." It has been asserted by many that the Council of Rome, a synod held by Pope Damasus I in the following year, 382, protested against this raising of the bishop of the new imperial capital, just fifty years old, to a status higher than that of the bishops of Alexandria and Antioch, and stated that the primacy of the Roman see was established by no gathering of bishops but by Christ himself. Thomas Shahan says that, according to Photius too, Pope Damasus approved the council of Constantinople, but he adds that, if any part of the council were approved by this pope, it could have been only its revision of the Nicene Creed, as was the case also when Gregory the Great recognized it as one of the four general councils, but only in its dogmatic utterances. In Catholic doctrine, no council, regardless of who summoned it or who presided over it, is ecumenical unless it is confirmed or at least recognized as such by the pope.
Walls of Constantinople
Galata, then the suburb of "Sykai", was an integral part of the city by the early 5th century: the "Notitia Urbis Constantinopolitanae" of ca. 425 names it as the city's 13th region. It was probably fortified with walls in the 5th century, and under Justinian I it was granted the status of a city. The settlement declined and disappeared after the 7th century, leaving only the great tower (the "kastellion tou Galatou") in modern Karaköy, that guarded the chain extending across the mouth of the Golden Horn. After the sack of the city in 1204, Galata became a Venetian quarter, and later a Genoese extraterritorial colony, effectively outside Byzantine control. Despite Byzantine opposition, the Genoese managed to surround their quarter with a moat, and by joining their castle-like houses with walls they created the first wall around the colony. The Galata Tower, then called "Christea Turris" ("Tower of Christ"), and another stretch of walls to its north were built in 1349. Further expansions followed in 1387, 1397 and 1404, enclosing an area larger than that originally allocated to them, stretching from the modern district of Azapkapı north to Şişhane, from there to Tophane and thence to Karaköy. After the Ottoman conquest, the walls were maintained until the 1870s, when most were demolished to facilitate the expansion of the city. Today only the Galata Tower, visible from most of historical Constantinople, remains intact, along with several smaller fragments.
Constantine XI Palaiologos
Murad decided in favor of Constantine, and on 6 January 1449 Constantine was crowned in the cathedral at Mistra by the local bishop. It was rare, but not unprecedented, for an emperor to be crowned in a provincial city. Michael VIII Palaiologos, founder of the dynasty of Palaiologos, had been crowned at Nicaea, Asia Minor. John Cantacuzene was crowned at Adrianople, Thrace. Both held a second coronation ceremony at Constantinople, performed by the patriarch.
Western Roman Empire
Constantius II focused most of his power in the East. Under his rule, the city of Byzantium – only recently re-founded as Constantinople – was fully developed as a capital. At Constantinople, the political, economic and military control of the Eastern Empire's resources would remain safe for centuries to come. The city was well fortified and located at the crossroads of several major trade and military routes. The site had been acknowledged for its strategic importance already by emperors Septimius Severus and Caracalla, more than a century prior.
Bosporus
On 29 May 1453, the then-emergent Ottoman Empire conquered the city of Constantinople following a lengthy campaign wherein the Ottomans constructed fortifications on each side of the strait, the Anadoluhisarı (1393) and the Rumelihisarı (1451), in preparation for not only the primary battle but to assert long-term control over the Bosporus and surrounding waterways. The final 53-day campaign, which resulted in Ottoman victory, constituted an important turn in world history. Together with Christopher Columbus's first voyage to the Americas in 1492, the 1453 conquest of Constantinople is commonly noted as among the events that brought an end to the Middle Ages and marked the transition to the Renaissance and the Age of Discovery.
Great Palace of Constantinople
The Great Palace of Constantinople (, "Méga Palátion"; Latin: "Palatium Magnum", Turkish: "Büyük Saray"), also known as the Sacred Palace (, "Hieròn Palátion"; Latin: "Sacrum Palatium"), was the large Imperial Byzantine palace complex located in the south-eastern end of the peninsula now known as Old Istanbul (formerly Constantinople), in modern Turkey. It served as the main royal residence of the Eastern Roman or Byzantine emperors from 330 to 1081 and was the center of imperial administration for over 690 years. Only a few remnants and fragments of its foundations have survived into the present day.
History of Istanbul
Constantine’s conversion to Christianity a few years earlier, in 312, had set the Roman Empire onto Christianization, and in 381, during the reign of Theodosius I, the official state religion of the Roman Empire became Christianity, which turned Constantinople into a thriving religious center. After the end of his reign in 337, Constantine declared his three sons as joint heirs of the Roman Empire in a system of co-emperorship. Unfortunately, the sons couldn’t govern together peacefully and their war raged rivalry split the empire on the north-south line along the Balkan Peninsula. The territory was officially split in 395 when Theodosius I (ruled, 379-395) died leaving his son Arcadius emperor of the eastern half of the empire and his other son Honorius emperor of the western half.
Istanbul
Constantinople began to decline continuously after the end of the reign of Basil II in 1025. The final blow was given by the conquest of Villardouin and Enrico Dandolo in 1204 during the Fourth Crusade, where the City was sacked and pillaged. The city subsequently became the center of the Latin Empire, created by Catholic crusaders to replace the Orthodox Byzantine Empire. Hagia Sophia was converted to a Catholic church in 1204. The Byzantine Empire was restored, albeit weakened, in 1261. Constantinople's churches, defenses, and basic services were in disrepair, and its population had dwindled to a hundred thousand from half a million during the 8th century. After the reconquest of 1261, however some of the city's monuments were restored, and some, like the two Deisis mosaics in Hagia Sofia and Kariye, were created.