All language subtitles for Byzantium.A.Tale.Of.Three.Cities.S01E01.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-ETHiCS

SIMON: [VOICEOVER] Every holy city
has a founding myth.

Istanbul's story begins with the legend

of a sea voyage
by a Greek King named Byzas,

son of the sea god Poseidon,

who was said to have arrived here
for the first time

over two and half thousand years ago.

King Byzas went to see the Delphic Oracle

and the Oracle told him, "You will build
a great city opposite the blind."

He was bewildered and mystified
by this Delphic utterance.

But anyway, he set sail

and he only understood its meaning

when he sailed right down here
into the Golden Horn,

for on one side he saw a Greek settlement

and on the other side he saw
the perfect strategic position

for a great city
but with no city built there.

He understood immediately
that they must have been blind

to build it in the wrong place.

He went to the right place
and he started to build.

[VOICEOVER] Byzas gave his name
to the city he founded

and the empire
it ultimately became... Byzantium.

Here a metropolis was built
which would itself become a legend,

the bridge of continents,
the battleground of faiths.

And along with Jerusalem and Rome,

one of the greatest holy cities
in the world.

For 26 centuries
this is the view that you saw

when you arrived at this famous city.

This is how you caught
your first glimpse of its palaces,

its churches, its temples.

Conquerors and pilgrims,

traders and travellers
came here for its power,

its holiness and its pleasure.

No wonder they called it
the city of the world's desire.

[HORN TOOTS]

[VOICEOVER] Today,
Istanbul's skyline is defined

by the minarets of the Muslims
who've made this city their own.

[MUEZZIN CALLING]

The air is filled with the calls to prayer

for a mainly Islamic population.

But this is only the latest manifestation

of this multi-dimensional,
ever-changing city.

Before them, the temples and churches
of Greek, Roman and Christian gods

dominated these streets.

It was in Constantinople

that the Virgin Mary was said to have
defended the city on the ramparts.

It was here that the Muslim armies
burst into the Christian city.

These are the streets
that have been the battleground

for some of the fiercest
political and religious conflicts

of the last two millennia.

[VOICEOVER] Istanbul has been
the focus of passion

for the believers of two world religions.

And I've come here with the questions
of both historian and traveller,

to examine the fabric of a place

which has been the sacred
imperial capital of two empires,

one Islamic, one Christian,

and yet started out as little more
than a humble fishing village.

In this series, I want to find out
just how Byzantium

became the very definition
of heaven-blessed legitimacy,

when it began with no claims
at all to divine favour.

[VOICEOVER] Since its founding,

Istanbul has been a city
with many different identities.

And with each one has come
a different name.

First it was called Byzantium

and then it was renamed Constantinople,

after the Roman Emperor,
Constantine the Great.

And now it's Turkish, it's Istanbul.

But whatever you call it,

it's still the same
utterly extraordinary place.

[VOICEOVER] And if you walk
around Istanbul today,

it's this most recent phase
of the city's history

that takes centre stage,
its mosques, its minarets.

But if you look a little more closely,

sometimes in rather surprising places,

you can begin to glimpse
this city's forgotten past.

All over Istanbul,
its earliest history lies in ruins.

Every now and then,
a broken pillar or a crumbling wall

will give a hint of a lost world.

Many of the earliest remains
date back to the 4th century AD,

when it was a Roman city.

But to get a glimpse
of the people who first lived here,

you have to get below the surface,

quite literally.

[WATER TRICKLING]

Under one of Istanbul's busiest streets,

is one of its greatest treasures,

a cavernous underworld
known as the Basilica Cistern,

a place which gives us
a fascinating insight

into this city's Greek origins.

As a historian, as a traveller,

I take a delight
in the secret lives of cities,

in the hidden world under the streets,

where there are gems that explain so much.

This is definitely one of them.

There is an underground Istanbul.

It's full of hundreds of water cisterns

and this is the largest of them.

It was built in 537 AD

by one of the greatest
of the Byzantine emperors, Justinian.

He wanted to make the city
impregnable against siege

and for that it needed a water supply.

And this is it

but as you can see,
Justinian never did anything by halves!

[VOICEOVER] It's an extraordinary
feat of engineering.

Constructed by 7,000 Roman slaves,

12 rows of 28 columns
stretch away in every direction.

But as well as being
an important Roman site,

there are also traces here of the city's
even more ancient Greek, pagan past.

Right at the back,
tucked away from immediate view,

are two gargantuan carved heads.

This is Medusa,

one of the most seductive but terrifying
characters of Greek mythology,

one of the Gorgon sisters,
famed for her beauty.

And she was in love with Perseus,
the son of Zeus.

But so was the goddess Athene,

who jealously devised a most
terrible punishment for her rival.

Her hair was turned to snakes
and her gaze would turn a man to stone.

Perseus chopped off her head

and used it as his own personal
weapon of mass destruction,

to destroy his enemies.

Now, there might be a reason
she's here like this.

Medusa's head was often used
to ward off evil spirits

and she was deliberately placed
sideways or upside down

because you didn't want to risk
catching her gaze.

She might turn you to stone.

[VOICEOVER] No-one knows exactly where
these macabre heads originally came from.

But it's clear
from their haphazard positioning

that they weren't specially crafted
for this cistern.

And on further inspection,
it's not just them.

SIMON: If you look closely
at these pillars,

you'll see that actually
none of them are the same.

And in many cases, the bases,
the capitals, don't even match.

And that's because the builders
of this place took bits and pieces

from different epochs
of the city's earlier history.

Now, there are Roman parts

but there are also,
most interestingly, Greek parts

and that's exciting
because these are the last vestiges

of the original Greek town of Byzantium.

[VOICEOVER] The diversity
of all the pieces

that make up this beautiful cistern

is a wonderful illustration
of the origins of this city.

It shows how a spectacular
world capital like this was crafted

from early and obscure beginnings,

by borrowing, commandeering

and stealing the stones and stories
of earlier towns and empires.

And in its earliest incarnation,
this city was far from being sacred.

[INDISTINCT CHATTER]

For its first millennium,
Byzantium was just a fishing port

founded by Greek traders.

And rather than being renowned
for its holiness,

this was a place famed for its
drunken and licentious inhabitants.

The Byzantines were notorious
in the ancient world

for their hard drinking
and easy-going morals.

"They're besotted with drink,"
wrote one shocked traveller.

And worse than that, "they rent out
their marriage bed-chambers

"with their wives still in them."

Perhaps an early version
of a Byzantine bed and breakfast.

[VOICEOVER] A traveller to Greek Byzantium
in the 7th century BC

could never have imagined that this
sleazy port would one day become

one of the pre-eminent
Christian cities in the world.

So what changed?

Well, in the first century BC,

this part of the world had fallen
under Roman control.

And in 196 AD, Byzantium
backed the wrong side

in a Roman civil war

and was taken by
the Emperor Septimus Severus

after a bloody siege.

Septimus rebuilt it as a Roman town.

And Byzantium would probably have
remained an affluent Greek fishing port

had it not been
for the accession of an emperor

who was probably the most
influential ruler in world history.

He left Rome and made Byzantium
his world capital and holy city.

[VOICEOVER] On 11th May 330 AD,

these streets were feverish
with excitement.

Everybody in Byzantium was
rushing to the Hippodrome,

the entertainment centre of the city.

The Emperor Constantine was in town
for a spectacular celebration.

[VOICEOVER] This was their
final destination.

The Hippodrome.

430 metres long and 120 metres wide.

SIMON: It's hard to imagine how impressive
this once was

but I'm standing
in Constantine's new Hippodrome,

a vast oval stadium

with a track around the centre
for chariot racing.

High, tiered stands,

big enough to hold 100,000 baying fans.

Down there,
Constantine sat in the Imperial Box

linked to the Imperial Palace

and he'd imported huge, new obelisks
to stand in the middle,

ready for this special occasion.

[VOICEOVER] Constantine was dedicating
the old town of Byzantium to a new god

and what a dedication ceremony it was,

a magnificent procession,

in which the imperial statues
of deified emperors were held aloft,

as they made their way round
the packed stadium.

This was the moment that marked
a whole new era for Byzantium,

in which the city would no longer be
on the periphery of world history.

It would be dramatically reinvented

as the imperial capital
of the entire Roman Empire.

And all at the whim of
one extraordinary man, Constantine,

a blunt-faced but visionary warlord

who hailed this metropolis
as his "new Rome".

It was a daring move.

After a thousand years of grandeur,
triumph and sanctity,

Constantine was turning his back on Rome

and betting everything
on a faraway Greek fishing port.

[VOICEOVER] So why had this emperor
made such a geographical switch?

Constantine was a pragmatic power broker

and he had good strategic reasons
to make Byzantium his new base.

The thriving heart of the Roman Empire
was now in the east,

far from Rome,
and its chief enemy was Persia,

so Byzantium, straddling Europe and Asia,

was perfectly placed to rule both.

But that wasn't the only reason.

20 years before this dedication ceremony,

Constantine had experienced
a dramatic conversion to Christianity,

in the midst of a civil war
to control the Western Empire.

The night before the decisive battle
for the city of Rome,

he had a vision
of a Christian sign in the sky

and the words,
"by this sign thou shalt conquer",

and when he did conquer,
he embraced Christianity.

It was a decision
that would change world history.

[VOICEOVER] The traditional view is
that Constantine wanted to create

a pure, Christian metropolis,
untainted by paganism,

totally unlike Rome.

And for that he chose Byzantium,
and he called it Constantinopolis,

the city of Constantine.

[VOICEOVER] He's remembered as one of
the greatest heroes of Christian history,

the saintly ruler whose conversion
transformed a minor sect

into the dominant faith in the West.

Or at least,
that's how the story usually goes.

But here in the city he made his own,
there are intriguing clues

which suggest a more surprising view
of this emperor and his motives.

This is one of Istanbul's
most majestic mosques

but in the 4th century
this whole area was dominated

by the greatest Christian monument
in Constantinople.

Dedicated to the Holy Apostles,

it was built by Constantine
in readiness for his own death.

I'm meeting historian
and archaeologist Jonathan Bardill,

who believes it gives us
a fascinating insight

into Constantine's real convictions.

SIMON: Jonathan,
what stood here originally?

Um, well, this site consisted
of two buildings,

the church, a cruciform church,

and Constantine's mausoleum,

a circular building
with a dome on the top.

On the inside of the mausoleum
around the edge were a number of niches

and those niches contained tombs
for the 12 Apostles.

So presumably Constantine had
the intention of gathering

the relics of the Apostles to put inside.

What does this tell us
about Constantine himself?

Well, the striking thing about it

is that bang in the middle
of the tombs of the 12 Apostles,

Constantine placed a 13th tomb

and that was his own sarcophagus.

Some scholars have suggested

that what Constantine was trying
to say by doing that

is that he was the 13th Apostle.

I think he was trying to say
something much more radical.

SIMON: [VOICEOVER] It's this mysterious
13th sarcophagus that may hold the key

to the emperor's true
and possibly heretical beliefs.

But there has been much controversy
about its exact location.

Some claim
it's one of these vast sarcophagi

now outside the Istanbul Museum,

which once contained
the remains of Byzantine emperors.

But Jonathan thinks
it's somewhere else entirely.

This building stands on the site

of what was the oldest church in Istanbul,

built by Constantine,
and dedicated to Holy Peace.

And hidden away in its neglected
courtyard may lie the answer.

So this is what I think is the last resting place
of Constantine the Great.

That's exciting.
Now, tell me why you think that?

Well, a number of reasons.

The first one is that if you look,

you can see that there are holes
drilled into the sarcophagus.

SIMON: Yeah.

Well, we know that Constantine's
sarcophagus was covered

with a splendid cover
interwoven with gold,

according to one author.

Now, I suspect that what these holes are
are places for brackets

in which a curtain of woven material
could have been attached.

But what I think is really
the clincher is round the corner.

If we look at the gable end
of the sarcophagus

you can see this symbol

and the best way
to explain it, in my mind,

is that it actually represents
Constantine's standard,

the standard that we know
he took into battle

that was based on the cross,
with the Chi Rho monogram,

the symbol of Jesus Christ,
in a wreath on the top.

So what does that mean?

Well, you have to remember

that this sarcophagus was in the middle
of the relics of the 12 Apostles.

I don't think Constantine
was claiming to be a 13th apostle.

I think he was claiming
to be Jesus Christ.

Wow! That's quite a claim.

It is, but perhaps not so extraordinary
in the context of late emperors,

many of whom thought that they were
close to being divinities.

But clearly some people thought this
was a particularly blasphemous claim.

And we know that because it seems
that Constantius, his son,

actually reorganised the burial site

to make sure that Constantine was
no longer in the middle of the Apostles.

He clearly felt
that the claim was much too great

and too close to heresy,
he had to change it.

SIMON: [VOICEOVER]
It's a controversial theory.

Constantine was baptised on his deathbed,

confirming his Christian faith.

He clearly believed in the Christian God.

But perhaps he was still very much part

of the pagan world of deified
emperors in which he grew up.

Whatever the idiosyncrasies
of Constantine's personal beliefs,

his embrace of Christianity had
changed the city's fortunes forever.

In life, he'd created the Christian
city of Constantinople.

In death, by choosing to be buried here,

he was making a powerful statement

about how important the city had become.

[VOICEOVER] But Constantinople's
meteoric rise to power was not unchallenged.

This might now be
the political heart of the empire

and home to its emperors,

but in terms of its status
as pre-eminent sacred city,

Constantinople had powerful rivals.

Alexandria in Egypt and Antioch in Syria

had far stronger claims to holiness.

And it was here, on the site of Constantine's
Church of Holy Peace,

that in the summer of 381 AD,

a fight to consolidate this city's
sacred power and status played out.

When a general named Theodosius,
a devout Christian, was elected emperor,

he was determined to impose
Christianity as the state religion,

one faith, one empire.

But first he had to settle
the raging controversy

that threatened to tear apart
all of Christendom,

was Christ man or was he God?

[VOICEOVER] So he called a council.

But as the bishops gathered
from across the empire,

Theodosius faced a major obstacle.

Although political power now lay
in Constantinople, the new Rome,

an imperial capital,

religious decisions were still
very much the prerogative

of the old Rome.

To avoid his orders being challenged
by the Western Papacy at every turn,

Theodosius needed to concentrate
secular and sacred power in one place

and to do that, he needed to elevate
Constantinople's holy status,

so it could challenge
Rome's sacred authority.

But that wasn't going to be easy.

The city was in thrall to a heresy.

It was the work of a charismatic
Egyptian priest named Arius,

whose ideas struck at the heart
of the Christian faith.

He passionately denied
the divinity of Christ,

claiming instead that Jesus was
a mere human.

For early Christians,
this was a matter of life and death.

If Arius was right
and Jesus was just human,

then his death wouldn't be enough
to save us from our sins.

To do that, Jesus had to be
both human and divine.

Those were the stakes,
salvation or damnation.

[VOICEOVER] Arius's beliefs
sent shockwaves through the church

and he was condemned as a heretic.

He came to a rather messy end.

While walking through the streets
in the centre of Constantinople,

Arius was taken short, and to his horror,

his intestines, liver and spleen
haemorrhaged out

in a heretical splurge.

His enemies might well say

that this faecal end was
no more than a just comment

on his appalling ideas.

[VOICEOVER] But his ideas
didn't die with him.

They spread like wildfire
across the Christian world.

Theodosius was determined to crush
this heresy once and for all.

First he sacked
the Arian Bishop of Constantinople.

[VOICEOVER] And then
the Council condemned Arianism,

affirming that Jesus was both God and man.

With Constantinople free of heresy,

the way was clear for Theodosius
to turn his attention to the city's promotion.

Theodosius persuaded the Council to
vote Constantinople up the hierarchy

of Christian cities,

so that now it would be second
only to Rome itself.

The Bishop of Constantinople, it declared,

shall have the prerogative of honour
after the Bishop of Rome

because Constantinople is the new Rome.

[VOICEOVER] This was the moment
that Constantinople's status

as one of the world's most important
holy cities was confirmed,

challenging even Rome's pre-eminence

as the centre of power
in the Christian world.

Unsurprisingly, it wasn't popular.

Many people still regarded
Constantinople as an old Greek fishing port

with barely 50 years of Christian history.

While Antioch, Alexandria,
and, of course, Rome

had been founded by Jesus's own disciples.

They had far more distinguished
Christian histories than Constantinople.

Papal representatives weren't
even present at the conference,

so Rome received news
of Constantinople's promotion by letter,

which it rejected outright.

Alexandria voted against it

and the Bishop of Antioch
couldn't have made his view clearer.

He dropped dead
in the middle of the conference.

[VOICEOVER] As the bishops dispersed,
Theodosius had achieved his aim,

to centralise secular
and religious power in one place.

But Constantinople's supremacy
would be frequently contested

during the next 800 years

and provoke rivalries and tensions
with other Christian cities

that would never heal.

In the wake
of the Council of Constantinople,

the emperors could now promote
a state Christianity,

one empire, one God,
all ruled from one capital.

Constantinople itself had been
officially proclaimed a holy city.

Just like Rome.

Well, not quite.

While Rome had St Peter's

and Jerusalem had
the Church of the Holy Sepulchre,

Constantinople still lacked
the sort of sacred landmark

that defines a city.

[VOICEOVER] It was to take
an imperial couple of soaring ambition,

whose reign was a story of vanity,
revolution and sexual scandal,

to raise the church that still
dominates this city,

Hagia Sophia.

The Emperor, Justinian
and his wife, Theodora

came to power in the early 6th century.

And tucked away
down this quiet back street

is one of the first churches
they commissioned.

Nicknamed Little Hagia Sophia
because of its similarities

to their much grander masterpiece,

it gives us a fascinating insight
into the unique fusion

of holiness, power and prestige
that is peculiarly Byzantine.

In the 16th century,
the building was turned into a mosque

and since its conversion,

much of the original decoration
has disappeared

but there are still glimpses
of how it once looked.

Look at these columns here,
at the top of them is a circular stamp

and that is actually the imperial monogram
of Justinian and Theodora.

But even more exciting,
though very hard to see,

is the Greek inscription
around this colonnade

which tells us a lot about how
this particular Emperor and Empress

wanted to portray themselves,

wanted to be remembered by history.

[VOICEOVER] And from the words
inscribed here,

you'd think they were paragons
of Christian godliness.

The inscription reads,

"the sceptred Justinian
builds this splendid abode

"for the servant of Christ."

But it really heaps lavish praise
on Theodora.

"Theodora, the God-crowned,

"adorned with piety,

"toils ceaselessly
to nourish the destitute".

This Theodora was clearly
a paragon of Christian virtue.

[VOICEOVER] But the reality
was more complicated.

Justinian and Theodora had
spectacularly risen to power

from backgrounds that were
neither pious nor imperial.

Religious buildings have always
projected the glory

of the kings who built them.

Justinian and Theodora followed suit.

But they did so more magnificently
than anyone else.

And they had good reasons
to parade their piety.

They both had histories
they were keen to rewrite.

[VOICEOVER] The main source for the lives
of Justinian and Theodora

are the books
of a 6th-century writer, Procopius.

And his work offers a far more
lurid insight into their past.

Procopius was one of the court
historians of the Imperial couple

and he wrote several books
in praise of their glorious deeds.

But he also wrote this,
The Secret History,

and it tells
what he really thought of them.

One has to approach it a bit like
a Byzantine tabloid newspaper.

Probably about 75% of it is true.

And it portrays Justinian
as a knave and a poltroon,

greedy, vindictive, and puny.

But it really goes to town on Theodora.

She was born a daughter of one of
the Hippodrome's bear masters.

As a teenager
she became a burlesque showgirl.

She was notorious for her
erotic enthusiasm,

taking on entire dinner parties
of guests and, Procopius adds,

all the servants.

[VOICEOVER] Roman law banned men
of senatorial rank from marrying actresses

but Justinian was so in love with Theodora

that he had the law changed.

Their relationship was to last
over 20 years.

And when Theodora was reborn as Empress,

she and her husband humourlessly
and sanctimoniously embraced their role

as sacred rulers
of the entire Christian world.

Theirs was a partnership that would endure

some of the most deadly crises faced
by any emperor.

And the greatest battle they fought
wasn't against a foreign power.

It was against their own city.

It started with a riot
and it ended with a bloodbath

and the building
of the most splendid church

in the entire Roman Empire.

And it all unfolded right here.

[VOICEOVER] In 532 this was the site
of a bloody rebellion

that almost led to Justinian
and Theodora's downfall,

only five years after
they'd claimed power.

The main show at the Hippodrome was
the chariot racing.

There were two main teams,
the Greens and the Blues,

whose savage rivalry divided the city,

and often broke out
into open gang warfare.

Justinian sentenced some Blues
and some Greens to death for murder.

But in doing so, he united
the two factions against him,

an unpopular decision
for an unpopular Emperor.

That night at the Hippodrome,
the Emperor was booed

and the mob rose in open revolution.

[VOICEOVER] The rebels quickly seized
control of the streets,

hailed a new Emperor
and set fire to the imperial district.

In the chaos,
Justinian was besieged in his palace.

Justinian was about to flee
but Theodora gave him courage.

She said it was better to die
in imperial purple

than it was to live without it.

Together, they summoned
their favourite general, Belisarius,

and he and his soldiers stormed
the Hippodrome and killed 30,000 people.

They were buried where they fell.

[VOICEOVER] Justinian,
the shrewdest of leaders,

converted the tragedy
into his own triumph.

Justinian regarded
his victory over the rebels

as evidence of divine providence,

and out of the ashes,
he started to raise the building

that more than any other
has come to define

the sacred and imperial prestige
of the city.

[VOICEOVER] It was, of course,
Hagia Sophia,

the Church of the Holy Wisdom.

And it was like nothing
that Constantinople had ever seen before.

The interior was studded with
four acres of golden glass cubes.

The columns were transported
from Egypt and Ephesus.

But its crowning glory was
its incredible dome,

curving 110 feet from east to west

and soaring 180 feet
above the marble floor.

The historian Procopius marvelled

that it "does not appear to rest
upon a solid foundation

"but to cover the place beneath

"as though it were suspended from
heaven by the fabled golden chain."

This is utterly splendid
and it really takes the breath away.

But that was the point.

Size mattered to Justinian

and when he commissioned his architect,
he asked for two things.

He wanted it to be huge
and he wanted it to be unique

and as you can see, he got both.

You might say this is an example
of megalomaniac gigantism

but if so, it's the most successful
example in world history.

I think it's the most wonderful
building in Europe.

It's just lovely to be here.

[VOICEOVER] For the next 900 years,

this was the supreme temple
of Orthodox Christianity,

and the seat of the Patriarch
of the Eastern church,

the equivalent of the Pope in Rome.

More than that, it was the largest religious
building in the Christian world.

The church was dedicated
on 27th December 537

and it was a clear statement
of Justinian's renewed grip on power

and on Constantinople's claim
to rule the world.

[VOICEOVER] Although his reign
had started inauspiciously,

Justinian enjoyed astonishing success.

Rome and the Western Empire
had long since fallen to the Barbarians.

But he and Theodora had set out to recover

the lost territories of the Roman Empire

and they'd succeeded,
even taking Rome itself.

In the process,
they created a Byzantine Empire.

Centred around his crown, his city,
his Hagia Sofia,

Justinian believed
that he had united Christendom

as Universal Emperor
and Jesus's regent on earth.

But it wasn't to last.

In 548, the Empress Theodora died
and Justinian never recovered.

He reigned for another 20 years

but it would have been better
if he'd died with her.

The Persians invaded,
Slavs and Huns marauded.

The treasury was empty.

And earthquakes cracked the dome
of his beloved St Sophia.

Overall, the Empire was overstretched

and the Emperor was old and hated.

[VOICEOVER] The Emperor died aged 83,
having reigned for more than 38 years,

and was laid to rest in Constantine's
Church of the Holy Apostles,

next to Theodora.

Justinian's reign was judged
rather harshly by contemporaries.

"He caused nothing but noise
and troubles," said one,

"and he should be judged in hell."

But in truth, he had made this city
the envy of the world.

As one Russian visitor later put it,

"You do not know if you are
in heaven or on earth.

"For on earth there is surely
no such splendour and beauty

"and we have not words to describe this.

"We know only that here
God dwells among men."

[VOICEOVER] Justinian had continued
to realise Constantine's vision

of Constantinople as the new Rome.

He built more than 40 churches

and the city now had its own St Peter's.

But it still lacked the very thing

that gave Rome its claim
to be the pre-eminent holy city.

Its own protector and saint.

St Peter's was built
over the final resting place

of the bones of Saint Peter himself,
Jesus's closest disciple,

and it based its sacred legitimacy
on that.

Constantinople had
an amazing collection of relics

but it just couldn't top Rome.

[VOICEOVER] It took a desperate
and unprecedented crisis

in the early 7th century

to finally deliver a heavenly guardian
the city could call its own.

And it was no mere Apostle.

It was the Mother of God herself.

After Justinian,
the Empire almost fell apart.

Generals seized power in bloody coups,

mobs rioted, and the entire East
fell to the Persians.

But in 626, Constantinople faced
its most deadly threat.

A coordinated assault

that would first have been glimpsed
from the Roman walls

that stretch right across
Istanbul's land boundary.

For the Byzantines, manning
these very walls on 29th July 626,

it must have seemed
like every nightmare had come true.

For they faced not one
besieging army but three,

by both land and by sea.

Before them here, they faced the Avars,

a vast horde of ferocious horsemen
from the Eurasian steppes.

Over there, the glistening breast plates of
the magnificent cavalry of Persia.

But most alarmingly of all,
here on the Golden Horn,

the water was dark

with the ships of the shaggy-haired
Slavs from the north.

It must have seemed as if the whole world

had come to destroy Constantinople.

For those trapped inside,
it must have been truly terrifying.

[VOICEOVER] As the battle began,
catapults hurled rocks.

Siege towers were deployed

and siege engines smashed
against the walls.

The city's water supply was cut off
as the enemy destroyed the aqueduct.

And off the coast
the Slav fleet began its approach.

For ten days the Byzantine capital
faced formidable attack.

Constantinople was surely doomed.

Their best general, the heroic Emperor
Heraclius, wasn't even in the city,

he was far in the east,
fighting the Persians.

It must have seemed
as if there was no way out.

[VOICEOVER] The General
and the Orthodox Patriarch,

to whom Heraclius had
delegated power in his absence,

took control.

In desperation, General Bonus
launched the Byzantine fleet

to stop the advance on the water,

whilst on land the Patriarch Sergios
began a petitioning of the divine.

[SINGING]

The Patriarch led the desperate people

in procession around the walls,

holding icons of Christ chanting hymns,

and begging for the intercession
of the Virgin Mary.

Only she could save the city.

[VOICEOVER] And what happened next,
did indeed appear miraculous.

Eyewitness accounts suggest that
the Patriarch's prayers were answered.

The Khan of the Avars was amazed
to see a woman on the ramparts,

leading the defence of the city.

But it wasn't just any woman,
it was the Virgin Mary herself

and she'd come to save Constantinople.

[VOICEOVER] Against the odds,
the Byzantine navy defeated the Slavs,

whose fleet was scattered by a storm.

The Avars and the Persians retreated.

And all over the city shrines
dedicated to the Virgin Mary sprang up,

celebrating her role
as guarantor of imperial victory.

Constantinople now had a protector
to rival Rome's.

But the glory of Heraclius' dynasty
was short-lived

and stained by his depraved
and incompetent descendants.

And the most monstrous was Justinian II,

notorious for his sadism,
degeneracy and extortion,

as well as his rows with Rome.

In 795 he was overthrown

and his punishment typifies
the merciless politics

and elaborate cruelty

that was coming to define Byzantine rule.

And it was in a part of the Hippodrome

few ever get to see,
directly below the stadium,

that Justinian's hideous punishment began.

I'm especially excited to see this
because this is the Sphendone,

in effect, backstage at the chariot racing
under the Hippodrome.

The Hippodrome was so enormous
that it had a large substructure

where they used to marshal
the charioteers and the horses

before they went out
into the stadium to race and die.

But this place also had an especially dark
and gruesome role in Byzantine life,

and that's why I'm especially
enthralled to see what it's like.

Wow! What a place!

[VOICEOVER] This labyrinth of passages
snakes beneath the arena

where Justinian II was led in chains.

He was about to endure
one of those horrible punishments

that really epitomised the vicious
and labyrinthine nature of politics

that today we describe
with one word, "Byzantine".

First he had his nose cut off,
sliced through.

And that is a practice
known in Greek as "rhinokepia".

And then he had his tongue amputated,
"elinguation", it's called.

Now, Byzantine emperors were meant
to be physically perfect

and so the idea here

was that Justinian II should never
be allowed to reign again.

[VOICEOVER] He was banished
but like a villain in a horror film,

he just kept coming back.

In 705, he returned to power.

Now known as Emperor Slit-Nose,

he wore a golden mask
to hide his deformity.

He needed an interpreter
to translate his tongueless gruntings

and once again, he reigned with terror.

And it wasn't long
before he was again absolutely hated.

He was overthrown
and this time they took no chances.

He didn't just lose his nose,
he lost his head, too.

[VOICEOVER] After Justinian's comeback,

fallen emperors no longer lost
their noses or tongues.

From now on,
they were either blinded or killed.

And as Constantinople's resources
were squandered

on grotesque emperors and palace coups,

the Byzantines were losing their empire

to a dynamic new force

that would threaten the very existence,

not just of the city,
but of Christendom itself.

[MUEZZIN CALLING]

SIMON: The armies
of the new revelation of Islam,

commanded by Mohammed's successors,
burst out of the Arabian peninsula

and invaded the Byzantine Middle East.

By 638, they'd taken Jerusalem
and most of the Eastern Roman Empire.

In 717 they were at the gates
of Constantinople in massive force

and settled down to besiege the city.

[VOICEOVER] The Byzantines measured
divine favour by success in war,

so the energetic gallop of the Arab
armies raised difficult questions.

"Was the city cursed?"

"Had the Christian God forsaken them
to back the followers of Mohammed?"

"And if so, why?"

Twice the Byzantines
managed to survive sieges of the city

but for how long?

It had been a close-run thing

and for one emperor in particular,
Leo III, too close.

He saw imperial military weakness
as a sign of God's displeasure

and a symptom of the people's
passion for holy images, icons.

Bizarre as it may seem,

the battle of the icons would be
the most rabid and vicious controversy

in the entire history
of an empire obsessed with religion.

[VOICEOVER] In modern Istanbul,
only a tiny surviving pocket

of the Eastern Orthodox Christians
who once dominated Constantinople

still live and worship here.

Once the city
was almost entirely Christian

and they now make up less than 1%
of its population.

This is their Patriarchal church,

an 18th-century building
dedicated to St George.

They may no longer rule this city

but their ancient rituals
still reverberate

with echoes of the religious conflicts
of the Byzantine Christian world.

It was a world where believers
were renowned for their devotion to icons,

holy images usually painted onto wood

and showing Jesus, Mary or the saints.

SIMON: But they weren't just pictures.

For Byzantines they were sacred
and powerful in their own right.

They were windows onto the divine.

[VOICEOVER] Their veneration
is still a defining part

of this mystical Orthodox tradition.

Every Orthodox church has an icon screen

separating the nave from the altar.

The images are processed
and kissed by the holy Patriarch

and the faithful follow suit.

But in 726, Leo III decided

the veneration of these holy objects
had gone too far.

Their cult had reached
fever pitch proportions,

they were credited with healings

and people scraped off their paint,
drinking it like medicine.

And in some cases, icons even served
as godparents at baptisms.

For Leo and his like-minded bishops,

the issue was whether such extreme
veneration was acceptable to God.

After all, the second
of the Ten Commandments

clearly stated that graven images
shouldn't be worshipped.

The empire's military losses
to the Muslims,

who banned all use
of images in their worship,

led Leo to a controversial conclusion.

Perhaps it was the intense
attachment to these icons

that was causing the empire's defeats.

Leo ordered the destruction
of all the holy images

and the punishment of anyone
who refused to obey him.

[VOICEOVER] Reminders of the violence

of what became known as "iconoclasm"

can be found
in the Istanbul Archaeology Museum.

What we have here are two stone icons,

from the Church of St Polyeuctos,

one of the most magnificent
in Constantinople.

And you can see immediately

that the faces have been
completely chiselled off.

You can just about tell
that this is the Virgin and Child,

this is an Apostle.

But otherwise, the features are gone.

And from looking at this
you can just get a sense

of the savage violence of iconoclasm.

Now, these are stone but if they
were wooden icons, they were burnt.

If they were statues, they were smashed.

If they were fine mosaics
they were plastered over.

[VOICEOVER] And it wasn't just images
that suffered.

Those who defended their sacred icons

had to endure even greater torment.

Monks who refused to hand over their icons
were taken to the Hippodrome,

made to hold hands with harlots

and then spat at
by a baying iconoclasmic mob.

Monasteries were raided

and churches who refused
to hand over their images

were attacked by the imperial police,

where the resisting monks
were put to the sword.

[VOICEOVER] The battle over holy images
raged for an entire century

with a ferocity
that finally burnt itself out.

And it was the icon lovers who prevailed.

Their victory is commemorated here
in Hagia Sophia,

in spectacular works of religious art.

And I'm meeting art historian,
Robin Cormack,

to learn more about
what led to iconoclasm's demise.

Robin, why did iconoclasm end?

Well, when iconoclasm ended in the 840s,
the political climate had changed.

The Arabs had moved their capital
to Baghdad,

there was no longer a Muslim threat.

The theological position had changed.

The churchmen who had been opposed
to images had all moved on.

A new group came in, so there was
an alignment of politics and the church

to bring the icons back and they did it.

SIMON: [VOICEOVER] On Easter Sunday, 867,

the triumph of the holy images
was celebrated

and Hagia Sophia was transformed
by new and splendid mosaics,

inaugurated in a magnificent service
of thanksgiving.

The great day of celebration
after iconoclasm came

with the unveiling of the Virgin and Child
that we can see today.

The Emperors were here.

The public was here
and the Patriarch gave a sermon

pointing up into the apse there,

and he said, "this is the beginning,
the first day of Orthodoxy."

And around the apse was the inscription,

of which we can see the first words
and the last words.

And they said, "The images
which the heretics cast down,

"pious emperors restored again."

SIMON: [VOICEOVER] It was a moment
that altered the whole way

in which this church spoke to its people.

Symbolic crosses were replaced by glorious
figurative images of the Christian story.

And it wasn't just the building.

The end of iconoclasm

defined the whole nature
of Eastern Orthodox worship.

The Byzantine church
became once more identified by images.

Free of the wasteful frenzy of iconoclasm,

the empire, led by a run
of brilliant soldier emperors,

recovered, expanded and thrived.

But the conflict over holy images
had caused lasting damage,

not just to the icons of the city,

but to the relationship between
the Eastern and Western churches.

Throughout the controversy,

the Western church had fully
defended the use of icons,

contributing to an ever-deepening rift.

Ever since Constantine had made it
his new Rome,

the two cities had been rivals.

But for the last 50 years,
they'd been outright enemies.

They disagreed on the powers of the Papacy

and arcane questions
of ritual and doctrine.

And iconoclasm had just made things
even worse.

[VOICEOVER] In 1054,
matters came to a head.

On July 16th, Papal legates burst
into the service here in Saint Sophia

and laid a sentence of
excommunication right on the altar.

[VOICEOVER] Although no one
could've foreseen it,

this would alter the course
of Constantinople's future

and ultimately lead to catastrophe
for this holy city.

[VOICEOVER] Seven centuries after
Constantine's transformation of this holy city,

Constantinople faces fresh onslaughts,

from the Muslim Turks and from Rome.

[THEME MUSIC PLAYING]