Fall of Constantinople

Background Constantinople had been an imperial capital since its consecration in 330 under Roman emperor Constantine the Great . In the following eleven centuries, the city had been besieged many times but was captured only once: the Sack of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade in 1204. [ 1 ] The crusaders established an unstable Latin state in and around Constantinople while the remainder of the Byzantine Empire splintered into a number of successor states, notably Nicaea , Epirus and Trebizond . They fought as allies against the Latin establishments, but also fought among themselves for the Byzantine throne. The Nicaeans eventually reconquered Constantinople from the Latins in 1261, reestablishing the Byzantine Empire under the Palaiologos dynasty . Thereafter, there was little peace for the much-weakened empire as it fended off successive attacks by the Latins , Serbs , Bulgarians and Ottoman Turks . [ 2 ] [ page needed ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ] [ 5 ] [ page needed ] Between 1346 and 1349, the Black Death killed almost half of the inhabitants of Constantinople. [ 6 ] The city was further depopulated by the general economic and territorial decline of the empire, and by 1453, it consisted of a series of walled villages separated by vast fields encircled by the fifth-century Theodosian walls . By 1450, the empire was exhausted and had shrunk to a few square kilometers outside the city of Constantinople itself, the Princes' Islands in the Sea of Marmara and the Peloponnese with its cultural center at Mystras . The Empire of Trebizond, an independent successor state that formed in the aftermath of the Fourth Crusade, was also present at the time on the coast of the Black Sea . ^ Norwich (1997) , p. 304. ^ Norwich (1997) . ^ Cite error: The named reference O2kxx was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference ospbyzwar6001453 was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Mango (2002) . ^ Cite error: The named reference rCeS6 was invoked but never defined (see the help page ).

Read more on Wikipedia →

Legacy Legends Anachronistic fanciful depiction of the siege and fall of Constantinople in 1453 by Panagiotis Zographos , under the guidance of Yannis Makriyannis . On the left, Rigas Feraios is seen giving a speech to the soldiers, who are depicted wearing traditional Greek garments from the Greek War of Independence . On the right, the painting depicts Sultan Mehmed II and his men. There are many legends in Greece surrounding the Fall of Constantinople. It was said that the partial lunar eclipse that occurred on 22 May 1453 represented a fulfilment of a prophecy of the city's demise. [ 1 ] Four days later, the whole city was blotted out by a thick fog , a condition unknown in that part of the world in May. When the fog lifted that evening, a strange light was seen playing about the dome of the Hagia Sophia, which some interpreted as the Holy Spirit departing from the city. "This evidently indicated the departure of the Divine Presence, and its leaving the City in total abandonment and desertion, for the Divinity conceals itself in cloud and appears and again disappears." [ 2 ] For others, there was still a distant hope that the lights were the campfires of the troops of John Hunyadi who had come to relieve the city. It is possible that all these phenomena were local effects of the cataclysmic 1452/1453 mystery eruption which occurred around the time of the siege. The "fire" seen may have been an optical illusion due to the reflection of intensely red twilight glow by clouds of volcanic ash high in the atmosphere. [ 3 ] Another legend holds that two priests saying divine liturgy over the crowd disappeared into the cathedral's walls as the first Turkish soldiers entered. According to the legend, the priests will appear again on the day that Constantinople returns to Christian hands. [ 4 ] Another legend refers to the Marble Emperor (Constantine), holding that an angel rescued the emperor when the Ottomans entered the city, turning him into marble and placing him in a cave under the earth near the Golden Gate, where he waits to be brought to life again (a variant of the sleeping hero legend). [ 5 ] [ 6 ] However, many of the myths surrounding the disappearance of Constantine were developed later and little evidence can be found to support them even in friendly primary accounts of the siege. Cultural impact The siege of Constantinople (1453), French miniature by Jean Le Tavernier after 1455 Guillaume Dufay composed several songs lamenting the fall of the Eastern church, and the duke of Burgundy , Philip the Good , avowed to take up arms against the Turks. However, as the growing Ottoman power from this date on coincided with the Protestant Reformation and subsequent Counter-Reformation , the recapture of Constantinople became an ever-distant dream. Even France, once a fervent participant in the Crusades, became an ally of the Ottomans . Nonetheless, depictions of Christian coalitions taking the city and of the late Emperor's resurrection by Leo the Wise persisted. [ 7 ] 29 May 1453, the day of the fall of Constantinople, fell on a Tuesday, and since then Tuesday has been considered an unlucky day by Greeks generally. [ 8 ] Impact on the Renaissance Main article: Greek scholars in the Renaissance The migration waves of Byzantine scholars and émigrés in the period following the sacking of Constantinople and the fall of Constantinople in 1453 is considered by many scholars key to the revival of Greek and Roman studies that led to the development of the Renaissance humanism [ 9 ] [ better source needed ] and science . These émigrés were grammarians, humanists, poets, writers, printers, lecturers, musicians, astronomers, architects, academics, artists, scribes, philosophers, scientists, politicians and theologians. [ 10 ] [ better source needed ] They brought to Western Europe the far greater preserved and accumulated knowledge of Byzantine civilization. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica : "Many modern scholars also agree that the exodus of Greeks to Italy as a result of this event marked the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the Renaissance". [ 11 ] Renaming of the city Mehmed the Conqueror enters Constantinople. Painting by Fausto Zonaro . Ottomans used the Arabic transliteration of the city's name "Qosṭanṭīniyye" (القسطنطينية) or "Kostantiniyye", as can be seen in numerous Ottoman documents. Islambol ( اسلامبول , Full of Islam ) or Islambul ( find Islam ) or Islam(b)ol ( old Turkic : be Islam ), both in Turkish , were folk-etymological adaptations of Istanbul created after the Ottoman conquest of 1453 to express the city's new role as the capital of the Islamic Ottoman Empire. It is first attested shortly after the conquest, and its invention was ascribed by some contemporary writers to Mehmed II himself. [ 12 ] The name of Istanbul is thought to be derived from the Greek phrase īs tīmbolī(n) ( Greek : εἰς τὴν πόλιν , translit. eis tēn pólin , "to the City"), and it is claimed that it had already spread among the Turkish populace of the Ottoman Empire before the conquest. However, Istanbul only became the official name of the city in 1930 by the revised Turkish Postal Law. [ 13 ] [ 14 ] [ 15 ] Commemoration The Fall of Constantinople is commemorated and lamented in Greece, albeit in a limited way. In 2021, the President of Greece , Katerina Sakellaropoulou , laid a wreath at the statue of Constantine XI Palaiologos , in a small ceremony at the town of Mystras , Peloponnese , where Constantine ruled until moving to Constantinople in 1449. [ 16 ] ^ Cite error: The named reference L0Kni was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Kritovoulos (1954) , p. 59. ^ Cite error: The named reference nasakuwae was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Runciman (1965) , p. 147. ^ Cite error: The named reference 3otvo was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference hatzfallhec was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Mango (2002) , p. 280. ^ Cite error: The named reference QMrK6 was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference Byzantines in Renaissance Italy was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference v5gnl was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference Fall of Constantinople was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference istanbulunadlari was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference ZooPt was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference DwbQb was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference YEruk was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Cite error: The named reference Kaldellis was invoked but never defined (see the help page ).

Read more on Wikipedia →