Chalcedon
Chalcedon ( or ;
, sometimes transliterated as "Chalkedon") was an ancient maritime town of Bithynia, in Asia Minor. It was located almost directly opposite Byzantium, south of Scutari (modern Üsküdar) and it is now a district of the city of Istanbul named Kadıköy. The name "Chalcedon" is a variant of Calchedon, found on all the coins of the town as well as in manuscripts of Herodotus's "Histories", Xenophon's "Hellenica", Arrian's "Anabasis", and other works. Except for a tower, almost no above-ground vestiges of the ancient city survive in Kadıköy today; artifacts uncovered at Altıyol and other excavation sites are on display at the Istanbul Archaeological Museum.
Council of Chalcedon
The near-immediate result of the council was a major schism. The bishops that were uneasy with the language of Pope Leo's Tome repudiated the council, saying that the acceptance of two "physes" was tantamount to Nestorianism. Pope Dioscorus of Alexandria advocated miaphysitism and had dominated the Council of Ephesus. Churches that rejected Chalcedon in favor of Ephesus broke off from the rest of the Eastern Church in a schism, the most significant among these being the Church of Alexandria, today known as the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. The rise of the "so-called" Monophysitism in the East (as branded by the West) was led by the Copts of Egypt. This must be regarded as the outward expression of the growing nationalist trends in that province against the gradual intensification of Byzantine imperialism, soon to reach its consummation during the reign of Emperor Justinian.
A significant effect on the Orthodox Christians in Egypt, was a series of persecutions by the Roman (later, Byzantine) empire forcing followers of the Eastern Orthodox Church to claim allegiance to Leo's Tome, or Chalcedon. This led to the martyrdom, persecution and death of thousands of Egyptian saints and bishops till the Arab Conquest of Egypt. As a result, The Council of Chalcedon is referred to as "Chalcedon, the Omnious" among Coptic Egyptians given how it led to Christians persecuting other Christians for the first time in history. Coptic Orthodox Christians continue to distinguish themselves from followers of Chalcedon to this day. Although the theological differences are seen as limited (if non-existent), it is politics, the subsequent persecutions and the power struggles of a rising Roman Empire, that may have led to the Great Schism, or at least contributed significantly to amplifying it through the centuries.