16th-Century Constantinople

Timeline

1. 1453–1480Old city of Constantinople · Former Byzantine Empire territoryAfter the Ottoman conquest, the population plummeted amid the fighting, then rapidly recovered through migration and rebuilding. Hagia Sophia was converted into a mosque, Byzantine aristocratic property was confiscated, and Turkish-Balkan migrants moved in, beginning the Islamization of the city's religious and cultural landscape.
2. c. 1500–1520Golden Horn port district · Ottoman EmpireIn the early 16th century the city's population recovered to over 300,000, and the Golden Horn and Galata (a Genoese colony annexed after 1453) became hubs of Mediterranean–Black Sea trade. The Grand Bazaar and the guild system regulated handicrafts and commerce, and European envoys from Venice, France, and others maintained a permanent presence in Galata.
3. 1551–1560All of Constantinople · Ottoman EmpireIn the 1550s the capital's population was about 500,000, among the largest in the world. The Süleymaniye Mosque (completed 1557) reshaped the skyline, the Topkapı Palace was the political center, and the imperial council adjudicated provincial affairs. The city combined Islamic scholarship (medrese), Greek Orthodoxy (the Phanar quarter), and a Jewish community (Balat), embodying the character of a multiethnic imperial capital.
4. c. 1570–1600Asian shore of Constantinople (Üsküdar) · AnatoliaIn the late 16th century the city continued to expand toward the Asian shore and the north bank of the Golden Horn; aqueducts and public baths maintained the water supply, while plague and fires periodically struck the population. Galata became a district of European trading houses and diplomacy, and the city's status as the empire's administrative, religious, commercial, and cultural nexus continued into the 17th century.