How istanbul got its name

Augusta Antonina is the short term name of the city, which was named by the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus in honor of his son Antonius. After Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror conquered the city in , the city was declared the fourth capital of the Ottoman Empire, and Constantinople continued to be used for a long time.

After the Republic of Turkey was established on 29 October , foreigners continued to use the name Constantinople instead of Istanbul for 7 more years. Kostantiniyye is the Arabic form of Constantinople. It is the most known and most used name in the Islamic world.

Istanbul has a settlement history of , years, a metropolitan history of around years, and a capital history of years. Throughout the century, it has been the sole ruler of the region in its wide geography from the Danube River in the west to the Persian Empire in the east.

It is believed that Neolithic and Chalcolithic people lived around the lake during this period. Megara residents are accepted as the first significant settlers. Istanbul was founded as an ancient Greek city-state called Byzantion during this period.

Soon it grew stronger. It was captured by the Roman Empire. The establishments of the present Istanbul were laid in the seventh century BC.

By displaying a city-state structure for a long time, Byzantium became a dominant power in the entire ancient Greek region thanks to economic development due to its strategic location. In this period, Istanbul will be Byzantium, Latinized, and become one of the important cities of the Roman Empire as Byzantium, its name will change and it will become the capital of the Roman Empire as Constantinople. Byzantion passed into the hands of the Roman Empire in BC. Especially during the Emperor Vespasian period, its name is Byzantium in Latin.

In , he was punished and severely damaged by the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus for making an agreement with the Persian Emperor Pescennius; the city is rebuilt throughout. It was declared the capital of the Roman Empire by Constantine I in Constantinople, which replaced Rome with its invasion and collapse, becomes the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, the successor state of the Roman Empire, which was divided into two in During this period, Istanbul will become the capital of the Byzantine Empire as Constantinople.

Constantinople became the capital of the state in , which was first established as the Eastern Roman Empire and later became the Byzantine Empire after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire. Constantinople is also the brightest and richest city in the world in the early Middle Ages. Constantinople, which was occupied by Latins between , became a part of the Latin Empire. It was the capital of the Byzantine Empire until after the Latin rule. The name, however, did not stick.

The name was derived from the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, who made the city the capital of his empire AD to It was a common name and became official. The derivative of Konstantiniyye was used by Arabs and Persians, while the Ottomans utilised it in money and official correspondence.

Constantinopolis was the prevalent name used throughout Roman and Byzantine times, and the West used it for much longer than that, even when the city was under Ottoman rule from AD Famously, the Ottoman Empire used the variant of Konstantiniyye until the establishment of the Republic of Turkey.

It simply means I Sten Pol meaning within the city, probably meaning within the old city walls. Locals in Constantinople referred to the city as I Sten Pol within the city from the 10th century, as evidenced in Armenian and Arabic sources without the initial I- and Ottoman sources, too. Ottoman sultans did not get stuck on names - there was, though, one exception.

The city - in reference - is the city within city walls. That is the main mistake nowadays. In during the reign of Justinian I , riots destroyed the city.

But it was rebuilt and outstanding structures such as Hagia Sophia stand as monuments to the golden age of Byzantines. Istanbul's latter history is full intrigues and sieges, it was besieged by the Arabs in the 7th and 8th centuries and by the Barbarians in the 9th and 10th, but ruled by the Fourth Crusade between who destroyed and sacked all the wealth.

After this, Constantinople did not regain its former richness nor strength. Renamed Islambol, the city became the capital of the Ottoman Empire. Between 15th and 16th centuries, sultans built many mosques and public buildings, topping the population again around half million by the mid 's, Istanbul was a major cultural, political, and commercial center. In A. Constantinople stood as the seat of the Byzantine Empire for the next 1, years, enduring periods of great fortune and horrific sieges, until being overrun by Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire in In B.

Thanks to the pristine natural harbor created by the Golden Horn, Byzantium or Byzantion grew into a thriving port city. Over the following centuries, Byzantium was alternately controlled by the Persians , Athenians, Spartans and Macedonians as they jockeyed for power in the region.

After defeating his rival Licinius to become sole emperor of the Roman Empire in A. Constantine set about expanding the territory of old Byzantium, dividing it into 14 sections and constructing a new outer wall. He lured noblemen through gifts of land, and transferred art and other ornaments from Rome for display in the new capital.

Its wide avenues were lined by statues of great rulers like Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar , as well as one of Constantine himself as Apollo. The emperor also sought to populate the city through offering residents free food rations. With a system of aqueducts already in place, he ensured access to water through the widening city by the construction of the Binbirdirek Cistern.

It would be governed by Roman law, observe Christianity and adopt Greek as its primary language, although it would serve as a melting pot of races and cultures due to its unique geographic location straddling Europe and Asia.

Justinian I, who reigned from to A. He launched successful military campaigns that helped the Byzantines reclaim territories lost with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century, expanding its borders to encircle the Mediterranean Sea. Additionally, Justinian established a uniform system of law with the Justinian Code, which would serve as a blueprint for civilizations to come.

He was the first emperor of the Isurian dynasty. Similarly, Basil I who ruled from to A. Constantinople endured for more than 1, years as the Byzantine capital in large part due to the protective wall completed under Theodosius II in A double set of walls was added after a series of earthquakes in the mid-fifth century, the inner layer standing some 40 feet high and studded with towers that reached another 20 feet.