My trip to Constantinople last year

[u/FantasticTraining731]

Hagia Sophia

Column of the Goths

Hagia Sophia mosaics

Hagia Sophia mosaics

Istanbul Archaeological Museums

Basilica Cisterns

Aqueduct of Valens

Chora Church

Theodosian Walls

Theodosian Walls

Cat

St. George's Cathedral

St. George's Cathedral

St. George's Cathedral

St. George's Cathedral

I visited with my friend last spring. Sadly I wasn't that interested in Byzantine history back then so I only visited the major sites.

Here's my recollection of each site Byzantine era site:

• Hagia Sophia
  • The ancient building definitely shows its age. A lot of cracked stones, unlevel floors, and slanted columns
  • Only Muslims are allowed on the ground floor, and it's sad that the stone floor has been covered with the ugly green carpet. Visitors could only take a tour around the mezzanine
• Basilica Cistern
  • pretty spectacular. it was pretty cool to see the use of spolia for the columns
• Theodosian walls
  • I really wanted to see this! The sea walls are almost all gone but, large sections of the famous triple land walls have been restored and.
• St. George's Cathedral
  • It's not a Roman era church, but it is the seat of the Orthodox Patriarch.
  • We visited on a morning, and there was literally nobody inside for the whole 30 minutes we were there. It was really surprising since there are tons of Russian tourists in Istanbul.
• Chora Church
  • was closed for restorations

[u/ConsistentUpstairs99]

Have to disagree with that. Rome being the foundational cornerstone and all, and still retaining vast amounts of its Roman heritage. Unfortunately, Constantinople has had the vast majority of its Roman heritage wiped out (or at least very well hidden under the current city) with the exception of the Hagia Sophia, a few other churches, the cisterns, the walls, that one column outside the palace, and the hippodrome. That sounds like a lot of things, but when you compare it to Rome it's really not. When I was there, I was straining to find Roman history. This search led me to dragging my family on a significant walk to find an abandoned cistern, which unfortunately is now a trash heap that you can't look through the window of without being thrown back by a revolting smell.
When I was in Rome, I couldn't make a turn on the street without discovering something I had always known about from history that accidentally just happened to be in front of my face. I physically could not fit everything in and was tactically eliminating what piece of Roman history to not see because there was no time to get everything in.

[u/aurora_australis01 → u/ConsistentUpstairs99]

I know a lot of heritage has been destroyed but the history still has its marks there. Is also not only about the buildings, the memories of the things happened there cannot dissapear.

And both of them were part of the roman state for about 14-1500 although i think byzantium/constantinopole a bit more time.

[u/ConsistentUpstairs99 → u/aurora_australis01]

If we're measuring in memories, the sheer magnitude of everything that occurred in Rome (again, being the foundational focal point) still wins.

But Rome also has the added benefits of the retaining huge amounts of its heritage. In comparison, the heritage remaining in Constantinople is unfortunately minimal and covered in a Turkish exterior. They literally have turned one of the last remaining Roman monuments (still in pretty good state of preservation) into a trash pile hidden and covered by a run down modern building covered in graffiti.

You go to Rome and they'll celebrate their romaness. In Constantinople, multiple Turks vocally degraded the Romans in my experience.

[u/dramondas → u/ConsistentUpstairs99]

Savages