Turks Enter Constantinople

Today’s installment concludes Ottomans Conquer Constantinople,
our selection from History of Greece from the Conquest by the Romans to the Present Times by George Finlay published in 1864.

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Previously in Ottomans Conquer Constantinople.

Time: May 29, 1453
Place: Constantinople

Before the dawn of day, on the morning of May 29, 1453, the signal was given for the attack. Column after column marched forward and took up its ground before the portion of the wall it was ordered to assail. The galleys, fitted with towers and scaling-platforms, advanced against the fortifications of the port protected by the guns on the bridge. But the principal attack was directed against the breach at the gate of St. Romanus, where two flanking towers had fallen into the ditch and opened a passage into the interior of the city. The gate of Charsias and the quarter of Blachern were also assailed by chosen regiments of janissaries in overwhelming numbers. The attack was made with daring courage, but for more than two hours every point was successfully defended. In the port, the Italian and Greek ships opposed the Turkish galleys so effectually that the final result appeared to favor the besieged. But on the land side, one column of troops followed the other in an incessant stream. The moment a division fell back from the assault, new battalions occupied its place. The valor of the besieged was for some time successful, but they were at last fatigued by their exertions, and their scanty numbers were weakened by wounds and death. Unfortunately, Justiniani, the protostrator or marshal of the army, and the ablest officer in the place, received a wound which induced him to retire on board his ship to have it dressed. Until that moment he and the Emperor had defended the great breach with advantage; but after his retreat Sagan Pacha, observing that the energy of the defenders was relaxed, excited the bravest of the janissaries to mount to the assault. A chosen company led by Hasan of Ulubad, a man of gigantic frame, first crossed the ruins of the wall, and their leader gained the summit of the dilapidated tower which flanked the breach. The defenders, headed by the emperor Constantine, made a desperate resistance. Hasan and many of his followers were slain, but the Janissaries had secured the vantage-ground, and, fresh troops pouring in to their aid, they surrounded the defenders of the breach. The Emperor fell amid a heap of slain, and a column of janissaries rushed into Constantinople over his lifeless body.

About the same time another corps of the Ottomans forced an entrance into the city at the gate of the Circus, which had been left almost without defense, for the besieged were not sufficiently numerous to guard the whole line of the fortifications, and their best troops were drawn to the points where the attacks were fiercest. The corps that forced the gate of the Circus took the defenders of the gate of Charsias in the rear and overpowered all resistance in the quarter of Blachern.

Several gates were now thrown open, and the army entered Constantinople at several points. The cry that the enemy had stormed the walls preceded their march. Senators, priests, monks, and nuns, men, women, and children, all rushed to seek safety in St. Sophia’s. A prediction current among the Greeks flattered them with the vain hope that an angel would descend from heaven and destroy the Mohammedans, in order to reveal the extent of God’s love for the orthodox. St. Sophia’s, which for some time they had forsaken as a spot profaned by the Emperor’s attempt at a union of the Christian world, was again revered as the sanctuary of orthodoxy, and was crowded with the flower of the Greek nation, confident of a miraculous interposition in favor of their national pride and ecclesiastical prejudices.

The besiegers, when they first entered the city, fearing lest they might encounter serious resistance in the narrow streets, put every soul they encountered to the sword. But as soon as they were fully aware of the small number of the garrison, and the impossibility of any further opposition, they began to make prisoners. At length they reached St. Sophia’s, and, rushing into that magnificent temple, which could with ease contain twenty thousand persons, they performed deeds of plunder and violence not unlike the scenes which the crusaders had enacted in the same spot in 1204. The men, women, and children who had sought safety in the building were divided among the soldiers as slaves, without any reference to their rank or respect for their ties of blood, and hurried off to the camp, or placed under the guard of comrades, who formed a joint alliance for the security of their plunder. The ecclesiastical ornaments and church plate were poor indeed when compared with the immense riches of the Byzantine cathedral in the time of the crusaders; but whatever was movable was immediately divided among the soldiers with such celerity that the mighty temple soon presented few traces of having been a Christian church.

While one division of the victorious army was engaged in plundering the southern side of the city, from the gate of St. Romanus to the Church of St. Sophia, another, turning to the port, made itself master of the warehouses that were filled with merchandise, and surrounded the Greek troops under the grand duke Notaras. The Greeks were easily subdued, and Notaras surrendered himself a prisoner. About midday the Turks were in possession of the whole city, and Mohammed II entered his new capital at the gate of St. Romanus, riding triumphantly past the body of the emperor Constantine, which lay concealed among the slain in the breach he had defended. The Sultan rode straight to the Church of St. Sophia, where he gave the necessary orders for the preservation of all the public buildings. Even during the license of the sack, the severe education and grave character of the Ottomans exerted a powerful influence on their conduct, and on this occasion there was no example of the wanton destruction and willful conflagrations that had signalized the Latin conquest. To convince the Greeks that their orthodox empire was extinct, Mohammed ordered a mullah to ascend the bema and address a sermon to the Muslims, announcing that St. Sophia was now a mosque set apart for the prayers of the true believers. To put an end to all doubts concerning the death of the Emperor, he ordered Constantine’s head to be brought and exposed to the people of the capital, from whence it was afterward sent as a trophy to be seen by the Greeks of the principal cities in the Ottoman empire.

This ends our series of passages on Ottomans Conquer Constantinople by George Finlay from his book History of Greece from the Conquest by the Romans to the Present Times published in 1864. This blog features short and lengthy pieces on all aspects of our shared past. Here are selections from the great historians who may be forgotten (and whose work have fallen into public domain) as well as links to the most up-to-date developments in the field of history and of course, original material from yours truly, Jack Le Moine. – A little bit of everything historical is here.

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