THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE

 

                        

 

The 29^th of May is a very sad day for all Greeks as it the anniversary of the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks.

 

The Byzantine Empire came to a dramatic end as the Turks breached Constantinople’s ancient, formidable walls after besieging the City for 55 days.  The Ottomans surrounded the City from land and sea while employing a constant cannon barrage of Constantinople’s walls.

 

The fall of Constantinople removed what was once a powerful defense of Christian Europe against the Muslim barbarians, allowing the uninterrupted Ottoman occupation of south-eastern Europe.

 

By the mid-15^th century the Turks with constant battles against their European neighbours and the Roman Catholic threats had diminished the Byzantine Imperial holdings to Constantinople and the area west of it.

Constantinople having suffered through several devastating sieges, the population had fallen 400.000 in the 12^th century to 40.000 by the 1450s.  Unfortunately the Schism of 1054 that exhilarated the separation of the Eastern and Western Churches and the Latin occupation of Constantinople entrenched a mutual hatred among Orthodox Byzantium and Catholic Europe.

 

In contrast to the Byzantines, the Ottoman Turks had extended their control over virtually all the Balkans and most of Anatolia, having conquered several Byzantine cities west of Constantinople in the latter half of the 14^th century.

 

Hungary was the permanently European threat to the Ottomans and Venice and Genoa controlled much of the Aegean and Black seas.

 

This year Greece is celebrating 200 years of freedom from the Ottoman Turks and almost   the whole world is celebrating with us.