Constantinople has been the capital of 4 different empires during its long history. The Roman, Byzantine (or Eastern Roman), Latin and Ottoman empires all coveted the city due to its strategic and commercial importance.
The map above depicts the city as it would have looked during the Byzantine period, which ended in 1453 with the conquest of the city by the Ottoman Turks. Interestingly, no one in Constantinople at that time would have thought of themselves as living in the Byzantine Empire. Instead they viewed themselves as the direct descents of the Romans and continued to refer to their country as the Eastern Roman Empire or just Roman Empire right up until its demise.
Roman Emperor Constantine the Great made it the capital of the whole of the Roman Empire in 330 AD. Like Rome it was built on 7 hills and by the 10th century, the city had grown to be the largest and wealthiest city in Europe with perhaps as many as 500,000 people living it.
Due to its wealth, it made a tempting target for many foreign enemies. However, it was well defended with the double Theodosian Walls completed in 413 protecting it from attacks on land and the Sea Walls and chain to block attacks from the sea (both visible on the map above).
This meant the city survived as the capital of the Byzantine Empire until 1204, when it was first captured by Latin Crusaders in 1204. The crusaders were then in turn defeated by the Byzantines in 1261. They manged to hold on the city for another 200 years until 1453, when Ottoman cannon technology became advanced enough to breach the walls and the Byzantines Empire came to an end.
The summary above hardly does the city justice, so if you’d like to learn more, I highly recommend you have a look at:
- Constantinople: Capital of Byzantium
- Lost to the West: The Forgotten Byzantine Empire That Rescued Western Civilization
- The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Modern Library Classics)
Would you have liked to have lived in Constantinople? Why or why not?
Christos Nüssli says
After the 3rd century military anarchy, in AD 293, the government of the Roman Empire was reorganized and the power was split into several rulers, some of which supposedly held the supreme authority. This division of the government was not permanent and some subsequent emperors, Constantine the Great, Julian the Apostate and Theodosius I, managed to rule over the whole empire during the 4th century. Nevertheless, for various reasons, among which the Barbarian Invasions, we can assume that since about 438, the legal unity of the Empire had vanished and in 476, its western half had disappeared. In AD 500, only one emperor remained at Constantinople, or Byzantium, ruling over the eastern half of the Empire. However, the emperors residing at Constantinople continued to style themselves ‘Imperator Romanorum’ and to consider the Roman Empire as a whole until, to say the less, 1204 AD, official date of the partition of the lands of the Roman Empire (Partitio Terrarum Imperii Romaniae). During, these seven centuries, the official Latin name of the state was Roman Empire, Res Publica Romana, Πολιτεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων (Politeίa tôn Rhōmaíōn), Romania, Ῥωμανία, (Rhōmanía), Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, (Basileia tôn Rhōmaiōn), Αρχη τῶν Ῥωμαίων (Arche tôn Rhōmaíōn). This is attested by a wide range of medieval sources like Theophylact Simocatta, Theophanes the Confessor, Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, John Skylitzes, Anna Komnene, Geoffrey of Villehardouin and many other authors.