IMC 2007: Sessions

Session 1613: The Fall of Constantinople

Thursday 12 July 2007, 11.15-12.45

Moderator/Chair:	Peter Lock, School of Historical & Geographical Studies, University College of York St John
Paper 1613-b	The Fall of Constantinople in 1453 in the Post-Byzantine Popular Literature (Language: English) Aphrodite Papayianni, Department of History, Classics & Archaeology, Birkbeck, University of London Index terms: Byzantine Studies, Folk Studies, Language and Literature - Greek
Paper 1613-c	Ottoman Expansion and the Impact of the Fall of Constantinople in the Aegean (Language: English) Christopher Wright, Hellenic Institute, Royal Holloway, University of London Index terms: Byzantine Studies
Abstract	Paper b: Since its foundation, the city of Constantinople was the political, ecclesiastical, commercial and cultural centre of the Byzantine world. The aim of the paper is to examine the reaction of the Greeks to the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, as it is reflected in the Greek popular literature of the post-Byzantine era. Paper c: The fall of Constantinople initiated a new phase in the growth of the Ottoman Empire, bringing in its wake the beginning of Ottoman maritime expansion and the extinction of many of the enclaves of Christian rule which had hitherto managed to weather the establishment of Turkish domination. This paper examines how the repercussions of the city’s fall in the Aegean basin reflect this emerging transformation, as initial Ottoman disinterest in directly governing the territories now inherited from Byzantium and the fresh agreements with the sultan secured by alarmed Christian rulers formed the brief prologue to a new wave of aggression.