are today put on display in
Venice.
Foundation of Byzantium (Greek: Μίλ(λ)ιον), a mile-marker monument Constantinople was founded by the Roman emperor
Constantine I (272–337) in 324 Apart from this, little is known about this initial settlement. 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 () in around 657 BC, It is said that the first Argives, after having received this prophecy from Pythia, Blessed are those who will inhabit that holy city, a narrow strip of the Thracian shore at the mouth of the Pontos, where two pups drink of the gray sea, where fish and stag graze on the same pasture, set up their dwellings at the place where the rivers Kydaros and Barbyses have their estuaries, one flowing from the north, the other from the west, and merging with the sea at the altar of the nymph called Semestre" The city maintained independence as a city-state until it was annexed by
Darius I in 512 BC into the
Persian Empire, as he considered the site the optimal location to construct a
pontoon bridge crossing into Europe, given that 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. Byzantium was never a major influential city-state like
Athens,
Corinth, or
Sparta; however, on the other hand, the city enjoyed relative peace and steady growth as a prosperous trading city due to its fortunate location. The site lay astride the land route from
Europe to
Asia and the
seaway from the
Black Sea to the
Mediterranean, and had in the
Golden Horn an excellent and spacious harbor. Already then, in Greek and early Roman times, Byzantium was famous for the strategic geographic position that made it difficult to besiege and capture, and its position at the crossroads of the Asiatic-European trade route over land and as the gateway between the Mediterranean and Black Seas made it too valuable a settlement to abandon, as Emperor
Septimius Severus later realized when he razed the city to the ground for supporting
Pescennius Niger's
claimancy. It was a move greatly criticized by the contemporary consul and historian
Cassius Dio, who stated that Severus had destroyed "a strong Roman outpost and a base of operations against the barbarians from Pontus and Asia." He would later rebuild Byzantium towards the end of his reign, in which it would be briefly renamed
Augusta Antonina, fortifying it with a new city wall in his name, the Severan Wall.
324–337: The refoundation as Constantinople Church in Istanbul, which was secularized and today serves as a museum and concert hall. presents a representation of the city of Constantinople as tribute to an enthroned Mary and Christ Child in this church mosaic.
Hagia Sophia, . struck by Constantine I to commemorate the founding of Constantinople. Constantine had altogether more colorful plans. Having restored the unity of the Empire and, being in the course of major governmental reforms as well as of
sponsoring the consolidation of the Christian church, he was well aware that Rome was an unsatisfactory capital. Rome was too far from the frontiers, and hence from the armies and the imperial courts, and it offered an undesirable playground for disaffected politicians. Yet it had been the capital of the state for over a thousand years, and it might have seemed unthinkable to suggest that the capital be moved to a different location. Nevertheless, Constantine identified the site of Byzantium as the right place: a place where an emperor could sit, readily defended, with easy access to the
Danube or the
Euphrates frontiers, his court supplied from the rich gardens and sophisticated workshops of Roman Asia, his treasuries filled by the wealthiest provinces of the Empire. Constantinople was built over six years and ceremonially 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 program 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 a 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. is a Greek
Eastern Orthodox Church located in the outer courtyard of
Topkapı Palace in Istanbul. It is one of the few churches in
Istanbul that has not been converted into a mosque. Constantine laid out a new square at the center of old Byzantium, naming it the
Augustaion (Greek: Augustaeum). The new senate-house (or Curia) was housed in a basilica on the east side. On the south side of the great square was erected the
Great Palace of the Emperor with its imposing entrance, the
Chalke, and its ceremonial suite known as the
Palace of Daphne. Nearby was the vast
Hippodrome for
chariot races, seating over 80,000 spectators, and the famed
Baths of Zeuxippus. At the western entrance to the Augustaion was the
Milion, a vaulted monument from which distances were measured across the Eastern Roman Empire. From the Augustaion led a great street, the
Mese, lined with colonnades. As it descended the First Hill of the city and climbed the Second Hill, it passed on the left the
Praetorium or law-court. Then it passed through the oval
Forum of Constantine, where there was a second Senate-house and a
high column with a statue of Constantine himself in the guise of
Helios, crowned with a halo of seven rays and looking toward the rising sun. From there, the Mese passed on and through the
Forum Tauri and then the
Forum Bovis, and finally up the Seventh Hill (or Xerolophus) and through to the Golden Gate in the
Constantinian Wall. After the construction of the
Theodosian Walls in the early 5th century, it was extended to the new
Golden Gate, reaching a total length of seven
Roman miles. After the construction of the Theodosian Walls, Constantinople consisted of an area approximately the size of Old Rome within the Aurelian walls, or some 1,400 ha.
337–529: Constantinople during the Barbarian Invasions and the fall of the West was the last
Roman emperor who ruled over an undivided empire (detail from the Obelisk at the
Hippodrome of Constantinople). , completed by Roman emperor Valens in the late 4th century AD The importance of Constantinople increased, but it was gradual. From the death of Constantine in 337 to the accession of
Theodosius I, emperors had been resident only in the years 337–338, 347–351, 358–361, 368–369. Its status as a capital was recognized by the appointment of the first known Urban Prefect of the City Honoratus, who held office from 11 December 359 until 361. The urban prefects had concurrent jurisdiction over three provinces each in the adjacent dioceses of Thrace (in which the city was located), Pontus, and Asia, comparable to the 100-mile extraordinary jurisdiction of the prefect of Rome. The emperor
Valens, who hated the city and spent only one year there, nevertheless built the Palace of
Hebdomon on the shore of the
Propontis near the
Golden Gate, probably for use when reviewing troops. All the emperors up to
Zeno and
Basiliscus were crowned and acclaimed at the Hebdomon. Theodosius I founded the
Church of John the Baptist to house the skull of the saint (today preserved at the
Topkapı Palace), put up a memorial pillar to himself in the Forum of Taurus, and turned the ruined temple of
Aphrodite into a coach house for the
Praetorian Prefect;
Arcadius constructed a new forum named after himself on the Mese, near the walls of Constantine. After the shock of the
Battle of Adrianople in 378, in which Valens and the flower of the Roman armies were 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.
Uldin, a prince of the
Huns, appeared on the Danube about this time and advanced into Thrace, but he was deserted by many of his followers, who joined with the Romans in driving their king back north of the river. Subsequently, several new walls were erected to defend the city, and the fleet on the Danube was improved. , now in the
Great Palace Mosaic Museum in
Istanbul After the
barbarians overran the Western Roman Empire, Constantinople became the indisputable capital city of the Roman Empire. Emperors were no longer peripatetic between various court capitals and palaces. They remained in their palace in the Great City and sent generals to command their armies. The wealth of the eastern Mediterranean and western Asia flowed into Constantinople.
527–565: Constantinople in the Age of Justinian is the oldest surviving map of the city, and the only one that predates the Turkish conquest of it in 1453. commissioned the current
Hagia Sophia after the previous one was destroyed in the
Nika riots of 532. It was converted into a mosque in 1453 when the Ottoman Empire captured the city, while it served as a museum from 1935 to 2020, when it was converted back to a mosque. The Emperor
Justinian I (527–565) was greatly respected for his successes in war, for his legal reforms and for his public works. It was from Constantinople that his expedition for the reconquest of the former Diocese of Africa set sail on or about 21 June 533. Before their departure, the ship of the commander
Belisarius was anchored in front of the Imperial palace, and the Patriarch offered prayers for the success of the enterprise. After the victory, in 534, the
Temple treasure of Jerusalem, looted by the Romans in
AD 70 and taken to
Carthage by the
Vandals after their sack of Rome in 455, was brought to Constantinople and deposited for a time, perhaps in the
Church of St Polyeuctus, before being returned to
Jerusalem in either the
Church of the Resurrection or the New Church. Chariot racing had had significant importance in Rome for many centuries. In Constantinople, the hippodrome became, over time, increasingly a place of political significance. It was where (as a shadow of the popular elections of old Rome) the people by acclamation showed their approval of a new emperor, and also where they openly criticized the government, or clamored for the removal of unpopular ministers. It played a crucial role during the riots and in times of political unrest. The Hippodrome provided a space for a crowd to be responded to positively or where the acclamations of a crowd were subverted, resorting to the riots that would ensue in the coming years. In the time of Justinian's reign, public order in Constantinople became a critical political issue. Throughout the late Roman and early Byzantine periods, Christianity was resolving fundamental questions of identity, and the dispute between the
Chalcedonians and the
non-Chalcedonians became the cause of serious disorder, expressed through allegiance to the chariot-racing parties of the Blues and the Greens. The partisans of the Blues and the Greens were said to affect untrimmed facial hair, head hair shaved at the front and grown long at the back, and wide-sleeved tunics tight at the wrist; and to form gangs to engage in night-time muggings and street violence. At last, these disorders took the form of a major rebellion of 532, known as the
"Nika" riots (from the battle-cry of "Conquer!" of those involved). The
Nika Riots began in the Hippodrome and finished there with the onslaught of over 30,000 people, according to Procopius, those in the blue and green factions, innocent and guilty. This came full circle in the relationship within the Hippodrome between the power and the people during the time of Justinian. The dedication took place on 26 December 537 in the presence of the emperor, who was later reported to have exclaimed, "O
Solomon, I have outdone thee!" Hagia Sophia was served by 600 people, including 80 priests, and cost 20,000 pounds of gold to build. Justinian also had Anthemius and Isidore demolish and replace the original
Church of the Holy Apostles and Hagia Irene, built by Constantine, with new churches under the same dedication. The Justinianic Church of the Holy Apostles was designed in the form of an equal-armed cross with five domes and ornamented with beautiful mosaics. This church was to remain the burial place of the emperors from Constantine himself until the 11th century. When the city fell to the Turks in 1453, the church was demolished to make room for the tomb of Sultan
Mehmed II the Conqueror. Justinian was also concerned with other aspects of the city's built environment, legislating against the abuse of laws prohibiting building within of the sea front, in order to protect the view. During Justinian I's reign, the city's population reached approximately 500,000 people. However, the social fabric of Constantinople was also damaged by the onset of the
Plague of Justinian between 541 and 542 AD. It resulted in the death of approximately 40% of the city's inhabitants. Lasting two months, the plague is noted to have caused widespread civil disruption, including the inability of the population to bury the dead and attend relatives' funerals. ) that protected Constantinople during the
medieval period Survival, 565–717: Constantinople during the Byzantine Dark Ages In the early 7th century, the
Avars and later the
Bulgars overwhelmed much of the
Balkans, threatening Constantinople with attack from the west. Simultaneously, the
Persian
Sassanids overwhelmed the Prefecture of the East, penetrating deep into
Anatolia.
Heraclius, son of the
exarch of Africa, set sail for the city and assumed the throne. He found the military situation so dire that he is said to have contemplated withdrawing the imperial capital to Carthage, but relented after the people of Constantinople begged him to stay. The citizens lost their right to free grain in 618 when Heraclius realized that the city could no longer be supplied from Egypt as a result of the Persian wars: the population fell substantially as a result. , a medieval Byzantine Greek Orthodox church in Istanbul's
Edirnekapı quarter, was converted into Kariye Mosque in 1500 and again in 2024, after serving as the Chora Museum from 1945 to 2020. While the city withstood a
siege by the Sassanids and Avars in 626, Heraclius campaigned deep into Persian territory. Eventually, he managed to briefly restore the status quo in 628, when the Persians surrendered all their conquests. However, the Byzantine Empire was soon threatened by a new adversary, as it became one of the primary targets of Arab invaders, who expanded their empire across the vast majority of the
Middle East and
North Africa, through a series of conquest campaigns, historically known as the
Early Muslim conquests. Constantinople was besieged by the invading armies of the Arab
Umayyad Caliphate firstly from
674 to 678, and secondly from
717 to 718. The
Theodosian Walls kept the city impenetrable from the land, while a newly discovered incendiary substance known as
Greek fire allowed the
Byzantine navy to destroy the Arab fleets and keep the city supplied. In the second siege, the second ruler of
Bulgaria,
Khan Tervel, rendered decisive help. He was called the
Saviour of Europe.
717–1025: Constantinople during the Macedonian Renaissance (886–912) adoring
Jesus Christ.
Mosaic above the Imperial Gate in the
Hagia Sophia. In the 730s
Leo III carried out extensive repairs of the Theodosian walls, which had been damaged by frequent and violent attacks; this work was financed by a special tax on all the subjects of the Empire. Theodora, widow of the Emperor
Theophilus (died 842), acted as regent during the minority of her son
Michael III, who was said to have been introduced to dissolute habits by her brother Bardas. When Michael assumed power in 856, he became known for excessive drunkenness, appeared in the hippodrome as a charioteer and burlesqued the religious processions of the clergy. He removed Theodora from the Great Palace to the Carian Palace and later to the
monastery of Gastria, but, after the death of Bardas, she was released to live in the palace of St Mamas; she also had a rural residence at the Anthemian Palace, where Michael was assassinated in 867. In 860, an
attack was made on the city by a new principality set up a few years earlier at
Kiev by
Askold and Dir, two
Varangian chiefs: Two hundred small vessels passed through the Bosporus and plundered the monasteries and other properties on the suburban
Princes' Islands.
Oryphas, the admiral of the Byzantine fleet, alerted the emperor Michael, who promptly put the invaders to flight; but the suddenness and savagery of the onslaught made a deep impression on the citizens. In 980, the emperor
Basil II received an unusual gift from Prince
Vladimir of Kiev: 6,000
Varangian warriors, which Basil formed into a new bodyguard known as the
Varangian Guard. They were known for their ferocity, honour, and loyalty. It is said that, in 1038, they were dispersed in winter quarters in the
Thracesian Theme when one of their number attempted to violate a countrywoman, but in the struggle she seized his sword and killed him; instead of taking revenge, however, his comrades applauded her conduct, compensated her with all his possessions, and exposed his body without burial as if he had committed suicide. However, following the death of an Emperor, they became known also for plunder in the Imperial palaces. Later in the 11th century the Varangian Guard became dominated by
Anglo-Saxons who preferred this way of life to subjugation by the
new Norman kings of England. in Constantinople – the image of Christ Pantocrator on the walls of the upper southern gallery, Christ being flanked by the Virgin Mary and John the Baptist, The
Book of the Eparch, which dates to the 10th century, gives a detailed picture of the city's commercial life and its organization at that time. The corporations in which the tradesmen of Constantinople were organised were supervised by the Eparch, who regulated such matters as production, prices, import, and export. Each guild had its own monopoly, and tradesmen might not belong to more than one. It is an impressive testament to the strength of tradition how little these arrangements had changed since the office, then known by the Latin version of its title, had been set up in 330 to mirror the urban prefecture of Rome. In the 9th and 10th centuries, Constantinople had a population of between 500,000 and 800,000. , Istanbul
Iconoclast controversy in Constantinople In the 8th and 9th centuries, the
iconoclast movement caused serious political unrest throughout the Empire. The emperor
Leo III issued a decree in 726 against images, and ordered the destruction of a statue of Christ over one of the doors of the Chalke, an act that was fiercely resisted by the citizens.
Constantine V convoked a
church council in 754, which condemned the worship of images, after which many treasures were broken, burned, or painted over with depictions of trees, birds or animals: One source refers to the
church of the Holy Virgin at
Blachernae as having been transformed into a "fruit store and aviary". Following the death of her husband
Leo IV in 780, the empress
Irene restored the veneration of images through the agency of the
Second Council of Nicaea in 787. The iconoclast controversy returned in the early 9th century, only to be resolved once more in 843 during the regency of Empress
Theodora, who restored the icons. These controversies contributed to the deterioration of relations between the
Western and the
Eastern Churches.
1025–1081: Constantinople after Basil II In the late 11th century catastrophe struck with the unexpected and calamitous defeat of the imperial armies at the
Battle of Manzikert in Armenia in 1071. The Emperor
Romanus Diogenes was captured. The peace terms demanded by
Alp Arslan, sultan of the Seljuk Turks, were not excessive, and Romanus accepted them. On his release, however, Romanus found that enemies had placed their own candidate on the throne in his absence; he surrendered to them and suffered death by torture, and the new ruler,
Michael VII Ducas, refused to honour the treaty. In response, the Turks began to move into Anatolia in 1073. The collapse of the old defensive system meant that they met no opposition, and the empire's resources were distracted and squandered in a series of civil wars. Thousands of
Turkoman tribesmen crossed the unguarded frontier and moved into Anatolia. By 1080, a huge area had been lost to the Empire, and the Turks were within striking distance of Constantinople.
1081–1185: Constantinople under the Komneni under
Manuel I, from the upper gallery of the
Hagia Sophia, Constantinople. Emperor
John II (1118–1143) is shown on the left, with the
Virgin Mary and infant
Jesus in the centre, and John's consort
Empress Irene on the right. , also known as the Church of Theotokos Pammakaristos (Greek: Θεοτόκος ἡ Παμμακάριστος, "All-Blessed Mother of God"), is one of the most famous Greek Orthodox Byzantine churches in
Istanbul. Under the Komnenian dynasty (1081–1185), Byzantium staged a remarkable recovery. In 1090–91, the nomadic
Pechenegs reached the walls of Constantinople, where Emperor Alexius I with the aid of the
Kipchaks annihilated their army. In response to a call for aid from
Alexius, the
First Crusade assembled at Constantinople in 1096, but declining to put itself under Byzantine command set out for
Jerusalem on its own account.
John II built the monastery of the Pantocrator (Almighty) with a hospital for the poor of 50 beds. With the restoration of firm central government, the empire became fabulously wealthy. The population was rising (estimates for Constantinople in the 12th century vary from some 100,000 to 500,000), and towns and cities across the realm flourished. Meanwhile, the volume of money in circulation dramatically increased. This was reflected in Constantinople by the construction of the Blachernae palace, the creation of brilliant new works of art, and general prosperity at this time: an increase in trade, made possible by the growth of the Italian city-states, may have helped the growth of the economy. It is certain that the
Venetians and others were active traders in Constantinople, making a living out of shipping goods between the Crusader Kingdoms of
Outremer and the West, while also trading extensively with Byzantium and
Egypt. The Venetians had factories on the north side of the Golden Horn, and large numbers of westerners were present in the city throughout the 12th century. Toward the end of
Manuel I Komnenos's reign, the number of foreigners in the city reached about 60,000–80,000 people out of a total population of about 400,000 people. In 1171, Constantinople also contained a small community of 2,500 Jews. In 1182, most Latin (Western European) inhabitants of Constantinople
were massacred. In artistic terms, the 12th century was a very productive period. There was a revival in the
mosaic art, for example: Mosaics became more realistic and vivid, with an increased emphasis on depicting three-dimensional forms. There was an increased demand for art, with more people having access to the necessary wealth to commission and pay for such work.
1185–1261: Constantinople during the Imperial Exile mosaic of Saint Anthony, the desert Father '', by
Eugène Delacroix, 1840 ,
Empire of Nicaea,
Empire of Trebizond, and the
Despotate of Epirus. The borders are very uncertain. On 25 July 1197, Constantinople was struck by a
severe fire which burned the Latin Quarter and the area around the Gate of the Droungarios () on the Golden Horn. Nevertheless, the destruction wrought by the 1197 fire paled in comparison with that brought by the Crusaders. In the course of a plot between
Philip of Swabia,
Boniface of Montferrat and the
Doge of Venice, the
Fourth Crusade was, despite papal excommunication, diverted in 1203 against Constantinople, ostensibly promoting the claims of
Alexios IV Angelos brother-in-law of Philip, son of the deposed emperor
Isaac II Angelos. The reigning emperor
Alexios III Angelos had made no preparation. The Crusaders occupied
Galata, broke the
defensive chain protecting the
Golden Horn, and entered the harbour, where on 27 July they breached the sea walls: Alexios III fled. But the new Alexios IV Angelos found the Treasury inadequate, and was unable to make good the rewards he had promised to his western allies. Tension between the citizens and the Latin soldiers increased. In January 1204, the
protovestiarius Alexios Murzuphlos provoked a riot, it is presumed, to intimidate Alexios IV, but whose only result was the destruction of the great statue of
Athena Promachos, the work of
Phidias, which stood in the principal forum facing west. In February 1204, the people rose again: Alexios IV was imprisoned and executed, and Murzuphlos took the purple as
Alexios V Doukas. He made some attempt to repair the walls and organise the citizenry, but there had been no opportunity to bring in troops from the provinces and the guards were demoralised by the revolution. An attack by the Crusaders on 6 April failed, but a second from the Golden Horn on 12 April succeeded, and the invaders poured in. Alexios V fled. The Senate met in
Hagia Sophia and offered the crown to
Theodore Lascaris, who had married into the
Angelos dynasty, but it was too late. He came out with the Patriarch to the
Golden Milestone before the Great Palace and addressed the
Varangian Guard. Then the two of them slipped away with many of the nobility and embarked for Asia. By the next day the Doge and the leading Franks were installed in the Great Palace, and the city was given over to pillage for three days.
Sir Steven Runciman, historian of the Crusades, wrote that the sack of Constantinople is "unparalleled in history". For the next half-century, Constantinople was the seat of the
Latin Empire. Under the rulers of the Latin Empire, the city declined, both in population and the condition of its buildings.
Alice-Mary Talbot cites an estimated population for Constantinople of 400,000 inhabitants; after the destruction wrought by the Crusaders on the city, about one third were homeless, and numerous courtiers, nobility, and higher clergy, followed various leading personages into exile. "As a result Constantinople became seriously depopulated," Talbot concludes. , Istanbul The Latins took over at least 20 churches and 13 monasteries, most prominently the Hagia Sophia, which became the cathedral of the Latin Patriarch of Constantinople. It is to these that E.H. Swift attributed the construction of a series of flying buttresses to shore up the walls of the church, which had been weakened over the centuries by earthquake tremors. However, this act of maintenance is an exception: for the most part, the Latin occupiers were too few to maintain all of the buildings, either secular and sacred, and many became targets for vandalism or dismantling. Bronze and lead were removed from the roofs of abandoned buildings and melted down and sold to provide money to the chronically under-funded Empire for defense and to support the court; Deno John Geanokoplos writes that "it may well be that a division is suggested here: Latin laymen stripped secular buildings, ecclesiastics, the churches." Buildings were not the only targets of officials looking to raise funds for the impoverished Latin Empire: the monumental sculptures which adorned the Hippodrome and fora of the city were pulled down and melted for coinage. "Among the masterpieces destroyed, writes Talbot, "were a Herakles attributed to the fourth-century B.C. sculptor
Lysippos, and monumental figures of Hera, Paris, and Helen." The Nicaean emperor
John III Vatatzes reportedly saved several churches from being dismantled for their valuable building materials; by sending money to the Latins "to buy them off" (
exonesamenos), he prevented the destruction of several churches. According to Talbot, these included the churches of Blachernae,
Rouphinianai, and St. Michael at Anaplous. He also granted funds for the restoration of the
Church of the Holy Apostles, which had been seriously damaged in an earthquake. Nicaea and Epirus both vied for the imperial title, and tried to recover Constantinople. In 1261, Constantinople was
captured from its last Latin ruler,
Baldwin II, by the forces of the
Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos under the command of Caesar
Alexios Strategopoulos.
1261–1453: Palaiologan Era and the Fall of Constantinople enters Constantinople. Painting by
Fausto Zonaro. Although Constantinople was retaken by
Michael VIII Palaiologos, the Empire had lost many of its key economic resources, and struggled to survive. The
palace of Blachernae in the north-west of the city became the main Imperial residence, with the old Great Palace on the shores of the
Bosporus going into decline. When Michael VIII captured the city, its population was 35,000 people, but, by the end of his reign, he had succeeded in increasing the population to about 70,000 people. The Emperor achieved this by summoning former residents who had fled the city when the crusaders captured it, and by relocating Greeks from the recently reconquered
Peloponnese to the capital. Military defeats, civil wars, earthquakes and natural disasters were joined by the
Black Death, which in 1347 spread to Constantinople, exacerbated the people's sense that they were doomed by God. Castilian traveler and writer
Ruy González de Clavijo, who saw Constantinople in 1403, wrote that the area within the city walls included small neighborhoods separated by orchards and fields. The ruins of palaces and churches could be seen everywhere. The aqueducts and the most densely inhabited neighborhoods were along the coast of the Marmara Sea and Golden Horn. Only the coastal areas, in particular the commercial areas facing the Golden Horn, had a dense population. Although the Genoese colony in Galata was small, it was overcrowded and had magnificent mansions. By May 1453, the city no longer possessed the treasure troves of Aladdin that the Ottoman troops longingly imagined as they stared up at the walls.
Gennadios Scholarios, Patriarch of Constantinople from 1454 to 1464, was saying that the capital of the Empire, that was once the "city of wisdom", became "the city of ruins". When the
Ottoman Turks captured the city (1453) it contained approximately 50,000 people. Tedaldi of Florence estimated the population at 30,000 to 36,000, while in Chronica Vicentina, the Italian Andrei di Arnaldo estimated it at 50,000. The plague epidemic of 1435 must have caused the population to drop. Constantinople was conquered by the
Ottoman Empire on 29 May 1453. Mehmed II intended to complete his father's mission and conquer Constantinople for the Ottomans. In 1452 he reached peace treaties with Hungary and Venice. He also began the construction of the Boğazkesen (later called the Rumelihisarı), a fortress at the narrowest point of the Bosphorus Strait, in order to restrict passage between the Black and Mediterranean seas. Mehmed then tasked the Hungarian gunsmith Urban with both arming Rumelihisarı and building a cannon powerful enough to bring down the walls of Constantinople. By March 1453 Urban's cannon had been transported from the Ottoman capital of Edirne to the outskirts of Constantinople. In April, having quickly seized Byzantine coastal settlements along the Black Sea and Sea of Marmara, Ottoman troops in Rumelia and Anatolia assembled outside the Byzantine capital. Their fleet moved from Gallipoli to nearby Diplokionion, and the sultan himself set out to meet his army. The Ottomans were commanded by 21-year-old Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II. The conquest of Constantinople followed a seven-week siege which had begun on 6 April 1453. The Empire fell on 29 May 1453. The number of people captured by the Ottomans after the fall of the city was around 33,000. The small number of people left in the city indicates that there could not have been many residents there. The primary concern of Mehmed II in the early years of his reign was the construction and settlement of the city. However, since an insufficient number of Muslims accepted his invitation, the settlement of 30 abandoned neighborhoods with the inhabitants of formerly conquered areas became necessary. solidifying
Islamic rule in Constantinople. Mehmed's main concern with Constantinople had to do with consolidating control over the city and rebuilding its defenses. After 45,000 captives were marched from the city, building projects were commenced immediately after the conquest, which included the repair of the walls, construction of the citadel, and building a new palace. Mehmed issued orders across his empire that Muslims, Christians, and Jews should resettle the city, with Christians and Jews required to pay
jizya and Muslims pay Zakat; he demanded that five thousand households needed to be transferred to Constantinople by September. Two centuries later, Ottoman traveler
Evliya Çelebi gave a list of groups introduced into the city with their respective origins. Even today, many quarters of
Istanbul, such as
Aksaray,
Çarşamba, bear the names of the places of origin of their inhabitants. The
Tanzimat reforms (1839-1876) and subsequent Ottoman modernization initiatives introduced new municipal institutions, secular legal codes, and European architectural fashions to the city. The imperial household itself signalled a stylistic shift when
Sultan Abdülmecid I commissioned the European-style
Dolmabahçe Palace (built 1843-1856) and shifted major ceremonial functions toward the
Bosphorus waterfront. At the same time, the district of
Pera/Beyoğlu and the Genoese quarter of
Galata grew into a distinctively cosmopolitan zone of foreign embassies, banks, hotels and cafes, with a
Turkish-Levantine urban culture. The stresses of war and diplomatic crisis in the early twentieth century - culminating in the
First World War, the empire's defeat, and the Allied occupation of the city after 1918 - brought dramatic political and demographic change. Allied forces entered
Constantinople in November 1918 and maintained an occupation that formally lasted until 1923. The final collapse of the Ottoman constitutional order accelerated the city's transformation. The
Turkish War of Independence (1919-1923) ended with the abolition of the sultanate in 1922 and the exile of
Mehmed VI; the new
Republic of Turkey was proclaimed in 1923 and the capital was moved to
Ankara as part of a deliberate program to build a new, secular, and more centrally planned state. Constantinople, long known in Turkish speech as "
Istanbul" or vernacularly as "
Stamboul", remained the country's largest city and commercial hub. However, its political centrality was reduced as republican institutions, ministries and diplomatic missions were centered in Ankara. == Culture ==