How did Byzantium look before it became Constantinople? 

Can you do some more videos about Constantinople and Rome please? What Constantinople looked like before the Theodosian walls were built, and explain why they were built, maintained & improved over their lifetime... when the Constantian walls were still the main defence of the city, and what they looked like. What Constantinople looked like before & shortly after Justinian the great's reign. What Constantinople looked like during Emperor Basil ii. What Constantinople properly looked like post 4th crusade = 1204 - 1453 AD. What Constantinople looked like post Ottoman conquest = 1453 - 1914. What Rome may've looked like before Romulus & Remus founded the city. What Rome may've looked like during the Roman kingdom and Etruscan era = 753 - 509 BC. What the city of Rome may've looked like during the republican era & Julius Caesar = 509 - 27 BC. What Rome may've looked like during Augustus's era = 27 BC - 14 AD. What Rome looked like during the reign of emperor Nero = pre and post fire in reconstruction of old & new buildings. What Rome may've looked like during Trajan & Hadrian's reign... during the peak of the golden age of the empire. What Rome looked like during the crisis of the 3rd century... in new building constructions of the city... especially with the Aurelian walls. What Rome looked like during Constantine's reign... from beginning till end. Or just combined into what Rome may've looked like during the whole imperial era... as it grew & developed = 27 BC - 476 AD. These are ideas I have suggested, and a gift for you in future videos in ideas to do next... hope it's all inspirational for things to come. 😎😉😊

Maiorianus, can you help me with some information? I am doing some research into Byzantium during the Early Empire, but can find almost no information. My main question is: How much of the city built by Septimius Severus has been found by archaeologists? Also, have any archaeological reports relating to this period been published? Thanks in advance.

Does that mean Constantine paved the way to decline

@@tarionmarsden157 no, he elevated the city immensely

no they don''t... sweeping claim

@@tarionmarsden157 What Constantine did was basically the equivalent of turning a place like Laguna Beach into Los Angeles.

It was more like a prosperous small town, occupying the tip of the golden horn. Septimius Severus destroyed it and rebuilt it as a proper Roman city. Constantine turned it into a proper metropolis and capital.

When Byzas of Megara consulted the oracle at Delphi about where he should start his colony he was told to build it opposite the city of the blind. As Byzas was exiting the sea of Marmara at the entrance of the Bosphorus straight, he came across Chalcedon and noticed that the peninsular opposite (the golden horn) made for a much more defendable and strategic position and realized he had found the place that the oracle was referring to.

Chalcedon 4 life. 6x6x6=216

Hello Edward, thanks a lot for your kind words, I am truly happy that you appreciate the beauty of Constantinople. Indeed, the city must have been a magnificent sight to behold.

personally i find Constantinople to be more interesting than Rome. The Byzantines had a really interesting history tbh

@@oddflexgaming4667 Thank you for the laugh.

@@oddflexgaming4667 Yeah Constantinople is way more interesting than Rome imo. New Rome> old Rome

@@tylerellis9097 I also like Antioch, Damascus, Ctesiphon, Edessa, Nineveh, omg I can name so many different cities that were completely overhauled by the Eastern Romans.

Hello Craig, thanks a lot, and Credit goes mostly to the amazing people of Byzantium 1200, a really excellent site with detailed reconstructions of Constantinople and Byzantium.

Hello Sobek, and thanks a lot for supporting the channel always in such a generous way. Seriously, amazing people like you make this work possible.

Thanks a lot :) Haha, yes, but luckily it was neither the Antonine, Cyprian or Justinian plague XD I am already a lot better now, thanks.

Nice, this is a city that I still have to visit. It must be fascinating to live in a place with such an amazing history!

@@Maiorianus_Sebastian yes. Even though the city is crowded and noisy, you can find a park, tea garden or other and the noise of the present fades away...there is a permanence here, a place that draws ouy my emotion good and bad. I believe that I resided in this part of the world in previous life iterations and I am home.

@@terrirogers7837 İstanbul da hangi ilçede yasiyorsunuz

Thanks so much for watching the videos and for donating to us again Franz! I really appreciate it :)

Hello good Sir, awesome, if I visit, I will let you know, thanks for the offer :)

Rome at its highest was 1 000 000 inhabitants. Athens in the 4th century BC was almost 400 000. A bit more than 5000.

Cities with 5000 people in have just about everything.

Thy Lord Speaketh

Hello Julius, no need to thank :) I am the one who thanks you for your generous support. Gratias Amicus !

The Russians also could have restored it a number of other times in wars with the Ottomans, including during WWI. By that point Russia supposedly wanted to bypass a Greek empire and instead annex Constantinople directly to legitimize Russia’s claim as the Orthodox Third Rome. Britain and France didn’t want Russia to annex it, so should Russia have captured it you may have seen it instead go to the Kingdom of Greece. Who knows, at that point maybe Greece declares itself an empire by virtue of holding the imperial city. In any case that all went down the drain after the events of 1917. The British then tried to make Constantinople an international city-state under a puppet Ottoman sultan but failed when the new Turkish republic beat the Greeks out of Anatolia and took control of Constantinople, deposing the sultan and renaming the city Istanbul.

Niger is Latin for "black." It didn't become derogatory until recently

nobody is willing to give up the real estate to bring up someone else's culture

@@yiannimil1 This is not correct. Beleive me that there are Turks that want that but just the politicians are not smart enough to understand how valuable to do this.

Then why did he invite all those senators to Constantinople, and help establish a second Senate?

@@histguy101 How much actual power did they have? It was to make his absolute rule look more like a natural continuation of the old freer ways.

Pescennius Normallatinwordforblack.

That's how you say the color black in Latin.

Well, I understand your point, but there are some considerations to be made : the Christians did not take inspiration from the Greek and Roman temples for their churches, but from roman civil building : the basilica. It was formerly a sort of hall of Justice. So it is not wrong to say that christianity created its own architecture language. On the contrary, the Greek or Roman Style building you are referring to in your message took their inspiration from the Antiquity, that is right, but this came with the Renaissance, when artists re-discovered heritage of the Antiquity. And that was long, long after the first centuries of Christian history.

@@heliedecastanet1882 The video is referring to all classical Greco-Roman architecture as "pagan architecture," not just temples. He even included "colonnaded streets," which Christian Romans obviously continued to build.

Cope, he died a Christian

@@Zeerich-yx9po So he was a Christian Emperor, none of what you said changes the fact he died a Christian

@@Zeerich-yx9po Dear Zeerich, you should read more about Constantine. The baptism, in the first centuries of Christian history, was not aimed for babies and children : it was first for adults. You could live as a Christian, and be baptized very old. The baptism was not a necessary condition for being a Christian. Concerning the coinage, it was a political choice not to impose Christian imagery, since Christians was not the majority of the Empire, and what Constantine favored the most was the unity of the Empire. So he always took in consideration the mentality and the culture around him. However, we could say that he was also a fine politician, and knew how to use the religion he had chosen in his favor. Christian, surely, but above all Emperor and man of power.

We keep saying that because it's correct. Greeks settled there. Thracians were Greek. Go learn some history and later speak. And if there weren't Greeks and Romans to lay the groundwork in the arts, sciences and so much more, you would probably sing right now in the trees, poor thing!!!!!

The use of "Roman" and "Greek" is not a matter of nationality. You are using concepts that did not exist in the ancient times (212 : Caracalla edited a law making all the citizens of the Empire Roman citizens, no matter their origins). It is a matter of culture. During the Roman Empire, there were two different cultural areas : the western part, which was culturally Roman, and the eastern part, which was Greek - note that the Greek culture was known as the most sophisticated one for culture, whereas the Roman one was more associated with politics and military matters. So, it is not a cliché if you use these terms : Greek and Roman. Even the Nabateans (arabe origin) from Palmyra considered and spoke of themselves as "Romans" (politically) and used Greek language, as well as Syrians, Hebrews, etc… So, don't worry : no one denies the richness and diversity in History 😉 These terms only describe a reality that people of those times really felt.

just be glad your turkoman ancestors picked christian rites and slavonic culture as their future. now push Thrakian roots for byzantine ( a term picked up by the west in the 1700s). same as the slavoalbanians of Skopia

And thank you Sir, for the kind donation. It really helps a lot with the work on this channel.