Istanbul Guide

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The Bosphorus Bridge The first bridge built over the Bosphorus opened in 1973 and was initially named after the waterway. It was renamed Martyrs of July 15 Bridge after the attempted coup d’état in 2016. History Constantinople

threatened by the forces of Attila the Hun, ordered that an even wid er, more formidable circle of walls be built around the city. Encircling all seven hills of the city, the walls were completed in 413, only to be brought down by a series of earthquakes in 447. They were hastily re built in a mere two months – the rapid approach of Attila and the Huns acting as a powerful stimulus. The Theodosian walls successfully held out invaders for the next 757 years and still stand today, though they are in an increasingly dilapidated state of repair. Theodosius died in 450 and was succeeded by a string of emperors, including the most famous of all Byzantine emperors, Justinian the Great. A former soldier, he and his great general Belisarius reconquered Anatolia, the Balkans, Egypt, Italy and North Africa. They also success fully put down the Nika riots of 532, killing 30,000 of the rioters in the Hippodrome in the process. Three years before taking the throne, Justinian had married Theo dora, a strong-willed former courtesan who is credited with having great influence over her husband. Together, they further embellished Constantinople with great buildings, including SS Sergius and Bacchus, now known as Küçük (Little) Aya Sofya, Hagia Eirene (Aya İrini) and Hagia Sophia (Aya Sofya), which was completed in 537. From 565 to 1025, a succession of warrior emperors kept invaders such as the Persians and the Avars at bay. Though the foreign armies often managed to get as far as Chalcedon (the present-day suburb of Kadıköy), none were able to breach Theodosius’ land walls. The Arab armies of the nascent Islamic empire tried in 669, 674, 678 and 717–18, each time in vain. In 1071 Emperor Romanus IV Diogenes (r 1068–1071) led his army to eastern Anatolia to do battle with the Seljuk Turks, who had been forced out of Central Asia by the encroaching Mongols. However, at Manzikert (Malazgirt) the Byzantines were disastrously defeated, the emperor captured and imprisoned, and the former Byzantine heartland of Anatolia thus thrown open to Turkish invasion and settlement. Soon the Seljuks had built a thriving empire of their own in central Anatolia, with their capital first at Nicaea and later at Konya. As Turkish power was consolidated to the east of Constantinople, the power of Venice – always a maritime and commercial rival to Constan tinople – grew in the West. This coincided with the launch of the First Crusade and the arrival in Constantinople of the first of the Crusaders in 1096. Soldiers of the Second Crusade passed through the city in 1146 during the reign of Manuel I, son of John Comnenus II ‘the Good’ and his empress, Eirene, both of whose mosaic portraits can be seen in the gallery at Aya Sofya.

527 Justinian takes the throne; his

548 Theodora dies; during her reign she was known for granting women more rights in divorce cases, allowing women to own property, and enacting the death penalty for rape.

565 Justinian dies; his lasting memorial is the church of Hagia Sophia (Aya Sofya), which would be the centre of Eastern Orthodox Christianity for many centuries.

620 Heraclius I (r 610–41) changes the official

introduction of heavy taxes leads to the Nika riots of 532 and half of the city is destroyed.

language of the eastern empire

from Latin to Greek, inaugurating what we now refer to as ‘The Byzantine Empire’.