Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire was the eastern continuation of the Roman Empire after the division of the Roman world in AD 395. Its capital, Constantinople, occupied a strategic position between Europe and Asia, allowing it to control major trade routes. Although its inhabitants considered themselves Romans, historians later adopted the name "Byzantine" from Byzantium, the ancient city on which Constantinople was built.

The empire reached its greatest territorial extent in the 6th century under Emperor Justinian I, who reconquered parts of Italy, North Africa and southern Spain. Christianity, especially in its Eastern Orthodox tradition, became central to public life, while Greek gradually replaced Latin as the main language of government and culture.

For more than a thousand years, the Byzantine Empire preserved many elements of Roman law, administration and classical learning while developing its own distinctive art, architecture and religious traditions. Its churches, decorated with mosaics and crowned by large domes, influenced many neighboring cultures.

Constantinople became one of the world's largest and wealthiest cities during the Middle Ages, protected for centuries by its powerful defensive walls. Despite repeated wars against Persians, Arabs, Bulgarians, Seljuk Turks and later the Ottoman Turks, the empire endured until 1453, when Constantinople was captured by the Ottomans. Its legacy deeply shaped Eastern Europe, Orthodox Christianity and the transmission of ancient knowledge to later generations.