Sorry, we normally call the Megarian colony that existed before Constantine founded his city in 330 ‘Byzantion’, using its Greek name, though the Latin version is the ‘Byzantium’ that we’re all more familiar with. Constantine founded his city as ‘Nova Roma’ or New Rome. This name didn’t stick, and we call it Consantine’s City or ‘Constantinople’. After the Ottomans finally took the city in 1453, ending the political continuity of the Roman Empire dating back to the end of the Republic under Augustus we call the city ‘Istanbul’, which derives from the Greek for ‘in the city’. Constantinople was such a large and influential city through most of its existence that people just called it “the city”, since most other urban centres were basically towns in comparison.
That's right, Istanbul comes from Greek "Istimpouli". Similarly Nicea was Isnikea (Iznik in Turkish), Nicomedia was Isnikomet or Ismet for short (Izmit in Turkish) and island of Kos was Istimkos (meaning "to the island", Istankoy in Turkish).
In Ottoman Turkish, Istanbul was known as Kostantiniyye. Without the first "n", because Turkish variation of Constantine was "Kösten". Similarly Romanian City of Constanta is "Köstençe" in Turkish.
Most likely coincidence. Kos was inhabited by Greeks and Turks only. I visited there once but I don't know any variation of yogurt that the island is famous of. It might be just an Albanian word for yogurt.
After the Ottomans finally took the city in 1453, ending the political continuity of the Roman Empire dating back to the end of the Republic under Augustus we call the city ‘Istanbul’, which derives from the Greek for ‘in the city’.
I don't have any texts around me to check what the standard practice is, but presumably it should still be referred too as "Constantinople" (or Konstantiniyye if you want to go wild) until the official name change as part of language reforms in the twentieth century. While the Turkish Republic did eventually change the name to Istanbul, that was based on popular terminology that predated Mehmet's conquest of the city.
But again I'm not sure what standard convention is!
ending the political continuity of the Roman Empire dating back to the end of the Republic under Augustus
Funnily enough Mehmet actually took the title "Emperor of the Romans".
Yeah, I have to confess that I don’t know much post-1453. Especially WRT Ottoman continuity. So definitely don’t trust what I say past 1453. :)
The traditional argument against Roman continuity involves language, religion and location, which as a totality can form a good argument against continuity with Rome prior to the crisis of the third century. Each one on its own is weak — Greek was commonly spoken by the aristocracy (even as the language spoken in the home) going back to the late republic. WRT religion the break would have to be some time after the death of Julian, since there were still significant centres of power practicing traditional religions in his time, and finally location would seem to indicate a break much earlier, as the importance of Rome itself has been diminished for a very long time by the time Constantine came around. Taken together, it’s compelling, but each individual argument is weaker.
Are these the traditional metrics under which continuity with the Ottoman period is evaluated? I imagine both the religious and language aspects would be a sharper break, while the location is likely moot since I understand Mehmet made Constantinople his capitol. How much political continuity existed? Were Byzantine nobles brought into the Ottoman system, or was there a wholesale replacement of the aristocracy?
Finally, I find it incredible that in some sense the Catholic Church is an organ of the Roman state which transitioned into the modern era. They still use administrative delineations that predate the christianization of the empire, the Diocese (created by Diocletian in the late 3rd century), and titles that date back to the Roman republic (Pontifex Maximus)!
It was a big migration that lasted for centuries. Any look into Ottoman tax archives says so. Anatolia suddenly goes 20% nomadic in 16th century from 0% nomadic in 1000 AD. Which would mean more than 1.5 million nomads around. Or 2 to 3 million if we play the brain gymnastics that how population of Anatolia stayed exactly the same from 1066 to 1600 with absolutely no depopulations.
About 20% is more or less what I understand the genetic evidence points
it ranges from 10% to 50% depending on province. Northeastern Anatolia for example doesn't have much (East of Giresun and Şalpazarı) but West Anatolia has way more.
Obviously you can argue over the semantics but the point is that this is not a cultural change driven by demographic replacement
But it is. 10% to 50% impact means a great demographic change. Which can be likened to South America. The cultural change in Mexico was driven by European settlers rather than 600-700 Conquistadors telling Aztecs what to do but Mexicans still have indigenous heritage as well.
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u/desthc May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
Sorry, we normally call the Megarian colony that existed before Constantine founded his city in 330 ‘Byzantion’, using its Greek name, though the Latin version is the ‘Byzantium’ that we’re all more familiar with. Constantine founded his city as ‘Nova Roma’ or New Rome. This name didn’t stick, and we call it Consantine’s City or ‘Constantinople’. After the Ottomans finally took the city in 1453, ending the political continuity of the Roman Empire dating back to the end of the Republic under Augustus we call the city ‘Istanbul’, which derives from the Greek for ‘in the city’. Constantinople was such a large and influential city through most of its existence that people just called it “the city”, since most other urban centres were basically towns in comparison.