The History Book

138

I

n 1453, the Ottoman Turks

attacked and took the city of

Constantinople, the capital

of the Byzantine Empire. The loss

of this millennium-old Christian

empire, which had once stretched

virtually all the way around the

Mediterranean, was a profound

shock to the Christian world. As

if to symbolize the Muslim victory

Sancta Sophia, one of the greatest

cathedrals in Christendom, was

converted into a mosque.

The Ottoman Turks had already

conquered much of the surrounding

territory before Sultan Mehmet II

(1432–1481) laid siege to the city

and bombarded it with heavy

artillery. Having breached its walls,

his army of more than 80,000 men

then overwhelmed the small force

IN CONTEXT

FOCUS

The Ottoman Empire

BEFORE

1071 Turkish forces inflict

a significant defeat on the

Byzantine Empire at the Battle

of Manzikert.

1389 The Ottomans defeat

the Serbs at Kosovo, making

possible Ottoman advance

into Europe.

1421 Murad II comes to the

Ottoman throne and plans

extensive conquests.

AFTER

1517 The Ottomans conquer

Mameluke Egypt.

1571 The Ottoman navy

suffers a crushing defeat

at Lepanto.

1922 The empire ends with the

foundation of modern Turkey.

AS MY CITY

FALLS, I

SHALL FALL

WITH IT

THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE (1453)

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139

See also: Belisarius retakes Rome 76–77 ■ Muhammad receives the divine revelation 78–81 ■

The founding of Baghdad 86–93 ■ The fall of Jerusalem 106–07 ■ The Young Turk Revolution 260–61

inside. Constantine XI, the last

Byzantine emperor, was killed, and

with the fall of the city, his empire

ended. Constantinople then became

the capital of the Ottoman Empire,

which lasted until 1922.

A weakening empire

The Byzantine Empire was already

in terminal decline by the time

Constantinople was taken. It had

shrunk to include only the capital

city, some land to its west, and

the southern part of Greece. The

decline began at the Battle of

Manzikert (1071), during which

the army of the Turkish Seljuk

dynasty drove the Byzantines out

of their crucial territory in Anatolia.

From this point, rival claims for the

Byzantine crown, disputes over

tax, loss of trade revenue, and poor

military leadership all contributed

to the contraction of the empire.

In 1203, the Fourth Crusade—

a western European expedition

originally intended to conquer

Jerusalem—became entangled in

the empire’s politics. Some of the

crusade leaders pledged to help

restore the deposed Byzantine

Emperor Isaac II Angelos in return

for support for their expedition.

They were initially successful:

Angelos’ son was crowned as co-

emperor but, in 1204, he in turn

was deposed by a popular uprising.

The Byzantine senate elected a

young noble, Nicolas Canabus, as

emperor, and he refused to back the

crusaders. Denied their promised

payments, the crusaders and their

allies, the Venetians, responded

with a ruthless attack on the city.

They raped and killed civilians,

looted churches, and demolished

priceless works of art. Constantinople

was all but destroyed.

Rise of the Ottomans

Before capturing Constantinople,

the Ottoman Empire had already

expanded from Anatolia into the

Balkans. Afterward, in the 16th

century, it expanded into the

eastern Mediterranean, along the

banks of the Red Sea, and into

North Africa. The defeat of the

Mamelukes in Egypt in 1536, and

THE EARLY MODERN ERA

[Blood flowed] like

rainwater in the gutters

after a sudden storm.

Nicolò Barbaro

Eyewitness to the fall

of Constantinople (1453)

wars against the Safavids, one

of Persia’s most significant ruling

dynasties, gave the Ottomans

control of a whole swathe of the

Arab Middle East.

The Ottoman Empire was a

Muslim State and the sultans saw it

as their duty to promote the spread

of Islam. Nevertheless it tolerated

Christians and Jews in a subsidiary

status and made extensive use of

slaves. Many languages were

spoken and faiths followed within

its domains, but it dealt with the

potentially conflicting religious and

political differences by setting up

vassal (subordinate) states in some

regions. Territories such as

Transylvania and the Crimea paid

tribute (made regular payments)

to the emperor, but they were not ❯❯

When lighted tapers were put to the

“innumerable machines” ranged along

a four-mile section of the city walls, the

world’s first concerted artillery barrage

exploded into life.

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