unhistorical:

May 29, 1453: Constantinople (and the Byzantine Empire) falls to the Ottoman Empire.

The Byzantine Empire outlasted its Western counterpart by nearly a millennium, and it was taken only thrice between its founding and fall - twice in the 13th century, and for the third and last time in 1453 to the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II.

 The Ottomans lay siege to the city for over fifty days with a force of probably 80,000 soldiers (to Constantinople’s 7,000-strong army). The final assault began on May 26, and Constantinople’s famous walls - walls that had repelled attacks by the Rus’, the Persians, the Arabs, and even the Ottomans themselves decades earlier - were finally breached by Mehmed’s cannons. Emperor Constantine XI, who fought with his defenders to the last, is said to have either died in combat or hanged himself as Mehmed’s men approached. 

The capture of Constantinople was not only important strategically but symbolically as well. Justinian and Theodora’s great Orthodox basilica the Hagia Sofia was thereafter transformed into a mosque, though locals were allowed to keep their own religions. Although some attempts were made by Christian leaders like Pope Pius II, who lamented that with the capture of Constantinople “Homer and Plato have died a second death”, to take the city back, most were backed by nothing more than words. The Pope might have been pleased to know, however, that the scholars who subsequently fled the city with their ancient Greek texts may have helped nourish the fledgling Renaissance.

Untitled: The Adhan (Call to Prayer)

muhsn:

  • Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar,
    (God is the greatest, God is the greatest)

    Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar
    (God is the greatest, God is the greatest)

    Ash-hadu an’ la ilaha ill Allah,
    (I bear witness that there is no God but Allah)

    Ash-hadu an’ la ilaha ill Allah,
    (I bear witness that there…

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