Essay About Great City Of Constantinople And Greek City-States

Constantinople Case
The great city of Constantinople originally came from Greek origins. Around the 800s BCE, Greek city-states started to become over populated and thus started the first of the Greek expansion era. Around 667 BCE the Byzas, who were inhabitants of the Greek city-state of Megara decided to go seek guidance from the Oracle of Delphi. The Oracle instructed these Byzas to go and colonize a coastal land to the west of Greece. The Byzas then founded a seaport at the opening of the Black sea and called it Byzantium. This land was located on a European peninsula nearly touching the Middle East. This Greek city-state lasted from 667 BCE till around the first century BCE before it came under non-Christian Roman rule. Byzantium the city itself lasted for a few more hundreds years before a very important Roman Emperor emerged. Emperor Constantine came around the 300s CE and made Christianity the main religion through the Edict of Milan in 313 CE. This was the first time in history that Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Along with changing the religion of the empire Constantine then decided to change the capitol of the Roman Empire to a more beautiful city and far less corrupt. This city was Byzantium and was renamed by Emperor Constantine I and was called Constantinople in honor of himself. The new capitol had many new advantages than that of the old capitol. This new capitol was located in a more hostel area than Rome but the city itself was very easy to fortify. Since it sat on a peninsula facing the sea, it was very easy to hold this city off from foreign invaders. The geographical area allowed Constantinople to last for hundreds of years to come. Not only did the city benefit from a very strategic military location, it also benefited from a very important economic location. The traders of Constantinople became very rich because they were able to control the trade routes between Europe and the Eastern world. They also could control the shipping