The Fall of Constantinople in 1453 brought an end to the Byzantine Empire when Ottoman Turkish forces under Mehmed II breached the city's defenses, with Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos dying in the fighting. A garrison of roughly seven thousand men had held the Theodosian walls for over a month against a force more than ten times their size before the city fell. The event ended an unbroken imperial line stretching back to Augustus, closing over a millennium of continuous Roman succession in the East.
What each episode says
Episode 1 (2 mentions)
Brownworth marks 1453 as the end of Byzantine history, with Emperor Constantine Palaiologos dying in the streets of Constantinople fighting the Turks. This event ends the 137-emperor unbroken line stretching from Augustus.
Episode 17 (1 mention)
Brownworth opens the conclusion by referencing the fall of Constantinople and Constantine XI's heroic last stand, noting that seven thousand men held the Theodosian walls for over a month against more than ten times their number. He laments that the West failed to memorialize this as 'the final gift of the bastion of Christianity.'
“Stubbornly held out for seven years after the fall of Constantinople”
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