place

Forum of Constantine

Byzantine Empire stubsFora of Constantinople
Keystone Constantine Forum Istanbul
Keystone Constantine Forum Istanbul

The Forum of Constantine (Greek: Φόρος Κωνσταντίνου) was built at the foundation of Constantinople immediately outside the old city walls of Byzantium. It marked the centre of the new city, and was a central point along the Mese, the main ceremonial road through the city. It was circular and had two monumental gates to the east and west. The Column of Constantine, which still stands upright and is known today in Turkish as Çemberlitaş, was erected in the centre of the square. The column was originally crowned with a statue of Constantine I (3. 306-337) as Apollo, but a strong gale in 1150 caused the statue and three of the column's upper drums to fall, and a cross was added in its place by the Byzantine emperor Manuel I Komnenos (r. 1143-1180). Otherwise the forum remained nearly intact until the Fourth Crusade in 1203–1204. The city's first Senate House lay on the north side of it. We know from the sources that the square was decorated with a number of antique statues, but it is impossible to determine their exact appearance and location. The Forum suffered major damage in a fire started by soldiers of the Fourth Crusade in 1203. After the Sack of 1204, the antique statues decorating the Forum were melted down by the Crusaders.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Forum of Constantine (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Forum of Constantine
Vezirhanı Caddesi, Istanbul

Geographical coordinates (GPS) Address Nearby Places
placeShow on map

Wikipedia: Forum of ConstantineContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 41.009 ° E 28.971 °
placeShow on map

Address

Çemberlitaş Otopark

Vezirhanı Caddesi
34120 Istanbul
Türkiye
mapOpen on Google Maps

Keystone Constantine Forum Istanbul
Keystone Constantine Forum Istanbul
Share experience

Nearby Places

Column of Constantine
Column of Constantine

The Column of Constantine (Turkish: Çemberlitaş Sütunu; Greek: Στήλη του Κωνσταντίνου Α΄; Latin: Columna Constantini) is a Roman monumental column built for Roman emperor Constantine the Great to commemorate the dedication of Constantinople on 11 May 330 AD. Built c. 328 AD, it is the oldest Constantinian monument in Istanbul and stood in the centre of the Forum of Constantine. It occupies the second-highest hill of the seven hills of Constantine's Nova Roma, the erstwhile Byzantium, and was midway along the Mese odos, the ancient city's main thoroughfare. The column shaft itself is composed of very large porphyry column drums set on a white marble pedestal that is no longer visible. The column once supported a bronze statue of the emperor holding a spear and wearing a seven-point radiate crown, probably nude, and possibly holding an orb. Its appearance probably referred to the Colossus of Rhodes and to the Colossus of Nero in Rome; all resembled the solar deities Helios or Apollo. The statue and column capital fell down after some eight centuries, and were replaced with a cross, since removed, and the inscribed white marble masonry capital visible today. The column's top is 34.8 m above the present-day ground level. Estimates of the original height of the column, without the statue, vary between 37 and 40 m; the monument as a whole would have been nearly 50 m tall. It may have been the largest Roman honorific column of all, rivalled only by the later Column of Theodosius, now demolished. Constantine's Column was taller than Trajan's Column and the Column of Marcus Aurelius; its size approached or exceeded the height of the Colosseum (48 m) and the internal height of the Pantheon (43 m) in Rome. The Turkish name Çemberlitaş, from çemberli 'hooped' and taş 'stone', was applied after renovations by the Ottomans in c. 1515, who added iron reinforcing hoops to the shaft, and the name became a synecdoche for the local area: Çemberlitaş. Bronze reinforcements had first been added as early as 416. The monument sustained fire damage in the 5th and 6th centuries; in 1779, another fire blackened the column, which subsequently became known as the Burnt Pillar. The column is where Yeniçeriler Caddesi ("Street of the Janissaries") adjoins the Divan Yolu ("Road to the Divan"); these streets connect Sultanahmet Square with Beyazıt Square and roughly follow the course of the old Mese odos. The Roman street led eastward to the Augustaion, the Hippodrome, Hagia Sophia, the Baths of Zeuxippus, and the Chalke Gate of the Great Palace. To the west the way led through the Forum of Theodosius to the Philadelphion and the walls of Constantinople. In Constantine's Forum itself the emperor built the original home of the Byzantine Senate.