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Constantinople
Constantinople (Greek: Κωνσταντινούπολις; Latin: Constantinopolis) was the capital city of the Roman Empire (which historians name the Byzantine Empire) and then the capital of the Ottoman Empire (1453–1922). The city was in the Balkans, on a peninsula in the Bosphorus, the strait between Europe and Asia Minor.
The Roman emperor, Constantine the Great, built the city in the same place as an older city: Byzantium. In Constantinople's place is now Istanbul, in Turkey.
History
For centuries the city was not very large, and was called Byzantium. Constantine the Great renamed it for himself and made it his capital. In medieval times different sides tried to conquer it including Crusaders. Constantinople was the capital city of the Latin Empire (1204–1261). In 1453 the Ottoman sultan Mehmet the Conqueror took control of Constantinople.
Over time, the city's short name in Greek: Πόλις Pólis 'city' became the name Istanbul. This name became the city's official name in 1930, during the government of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.
Related pages
Other websites
- Monuments of Byzantium Archived 2006-02-18 at the Wayback Machine - Pantokrator Monastery of Constantinople
- Mosaics of Hagia Sophia - The Deesis Mosaic from Hagia Sophia
- Constantinoupolis on the web Select internet resources on the history and culture of Constantinople
- Info on the name change from the Foundation for the Advancement of Sephardic Studies and Culture
- Welcome to Constantinople Archived 2005-07-15 at the Wayback Machine, documenting the monuments of Byzantine Constantinople, compiled by Robert Ousterhout, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
- Constantinople, from History of the Later Roman Empire, by J.B. Bury
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