Tag Archives: Ottoman Empire

May 29: A Day of Contrasts

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The fall of Constantinople in 1453 signaled a shift in history and the end of the Byzantium Empire. Roger Crowley’s readable and comprehensive account of the battle between Mehmet II, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, and Constantine XI, the 57th emperor of Byzantium, illuminates the period in history that was a precursor to the current conflict between the West and the Middle East.

May 29? A day of infamy and a day of celebration!

May 29, 1453 – The city of Constantinople was captured by the Turks, who renamed it Istanbul. This marked the end of the Byzantine Empire as Istanbul became the capital of the Ottoman Empire.

May 29, 1660 – The English monarchy was restored with Charles II on the throne after several years of a Commonwealth under Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell.

Known as “Black Monday,” the day that Constantinople fell to the Turks, was a tragedy of epic proportions. The Ottoman Empire, established in the newly-conquered territory, allowed Jews and Christians to practice their religion but with great difficulty. Many were killed for their faith. The treatment of the Greeks and the Armenians by the Ottomans is said to have inspired Hitler’s plans for the Final Solution; “Who speaks today of the extermination of the Armenians?” Hitler asked, just a week before the September 1, 1939 invasion of Poland. An excellent study of the heartbreaking events of Black Monday can be found here.

King Charles I, the Martyr, was King of England, Scotland and Ireland from 1625 until his execution on 30 January 1649 by Oliver Cromwell, a stern and rigid Puritan. Cromwell ruled until his death from natural causes in 1658 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. The Royalists returned to power along with King Charles II in 1660, and they had Cromwell’s corpse dug up, hung in chains, and beheaded. Charles II was one of the most popular and beloved kings of England, known as the Merry Monarch in reference to both the liveliness and hedonism of his court and the general relief at the return to normality after over a decade of rule by Cromwell and the Puritans.

Also on May 29, 1913 – Igor Stravinsky’s ballet score The Rite of Spring receives its premiere performance in Paris, France, provoking a riot.

Black Monday, 1453

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Hagia Sophia, the great cathedral of Holy Wisdom, was built by the emperor Justinian and was the largest dome in the world until the Astrodome was built. The minarets were added by the Turks when they converted the cathedral into a mosque after they captured the city in 1453.

Hagia Sophia, the great cathedral of Holy Wisdom, was built by the emperor Justinian and was the largest dome in the world until the Astrodome was built. The minarets were added by the Turks when they converted the cathedral into a mosque after they captured the city in 1453.

May 29, 1453. It was a Monday and lived on as “Black Monday” in Orthodox territory because that was the day that the great city of Constantinople fell to the Turks. Byzantium came crashing to a halt and the Ottoman Empire arose from its ashes, ruling much of the Middle East as well as portions of Central and Eastern Europe until it ceased to exit in 1923.

The conquest of Constantinople reinforced Byzantine expectations that the world was about to end. Byzantine churchmen calculated that the world would be 7,000 years old on September 1, 1492 and would therefore end on that day. They thought the Turks were the forerunners of the Antichrist and the Turkish conquest of New Rome, the official title of the city, the beginning of the last period of world history.

The art of the Seljuq Turks is currently on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, through July 24. Among the treasures displayed there are the harpy pitcher (see below). Harpies, birds with the heads of human women, are an image the Turks inherited from the classical Greeks. The Turks associated harpies with the astrological sign of Gemini and brought happiness in their wake. They were considered protective creatures. Spotting one was a good omen. This is all in marked contrast with the classical perception of harpies as wicked, dangerous creatures who delighted in abducting and torturing their victims.

Harpy pitcher