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Entry 150 of 240War

The Fall of Constantinople

1453 CE/Eastern Mediterranean/Ottoman Empire
Today Istanbul, Turkey (then Byzantine Constantinople)Span End of the Byzantine Empire · 1453 CE

For over a thousand years the walls of Constantinople had made it nearly impregnable — until the Ottomans battered them down with enormous gunpowder cannon, extinguishing the Byzantine Empire, the last living fragment of Rome. The blast marked the moment gunpowder rendered the old world of castle walls obsolete. It also cut Europe off from the overland routes east, spurring it to seek a sea path to Asia — the search that would soon send ships across the Atlantic.

◆ Worth knowingThe Ottomans' largest cannon was so huge it took 60 oxen to haul and could fire only a few times a day — but its stone balls, weighing over half a ton, cracked walls that had held for a thousand years.
◆ The mechanismMilitary-technological disruption

A weapon or tactic upends the prevailing balance of power and renders an old defensive or offensive order obsolete.

Also: Trade-route shift · Imperial overstretch

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