Almost 50 years ago Reinhard Stewig published Byzantium-Constantinople-Istanbul.[1]
Mavi Boncuk |
".... the Anatolian and Balkan Peninsula - have enabled the natural courses of the Bosporus to establish itself as a crossroads for maritime traffic travelling from eastern Europe to the Near East through the Mediterranean and for land based traffic moving from south-eastern Europe to south-western Asia via the Thrace and Anatolia corridors, which are immediately located on the Bosporus. This key geographical position helped Constantinople and Istanbul, both settlements along the Bosporus, to each become the capital of a global empire over two long historical periods, the eras of the Eastern Roman and Byzantine Empires and the Ottoman Empire. As these states were rising and falling in and around the Bosporus, the potential for long-distance maritime and terrestrial traffic has Seen varied use. It has varied from the maritime expansion of the ancient Greeks into the Black Sea to the supplying of ancient Athens with grain in the opposite direction, from Sabotage within the expanding regions of the Ottoman Empire along the north shore of the Black Sea to the closing of the Bosporus for foreign ships and the use of the Bosporus as a supply line for the Crimean War (1853-1856), from the transportation of grain from southern Russia to the British Isles in the 19th century to today's huge oil shipments from the Caspian Sea via the Bosporus. As for the terrestrial routes between south-eastern Europe and south western Asia via the Bosporus, for a long if not constant period they were the vital supply line between the military fronts on the Balkans with those on the Euphrates in the Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman periods. Even in the First World War they were used to connect the Eastern Front of the German Reich with the near eastern front of the Ottoman Empire. Only the first three of the crusades, in 1096, 1147 and 1189, used the overland route through the Balkans and Anatolia across the Bosporus. "
SOURCE Traffic functions of the Bosporus - Verkehrsfunktionen des Bosporus | Stewig, Reinhard|2006
[1] Stewig, Reinhard: Byzantium - Constantinople - Istanbul. A contribution to the city problem. In 1964.in German Volume XXII, Issue 2 | Number of pages96
Byzanz, Konstantinopel, Istanbul ein Beitrag zum Weltstadtproblem
Schriften des Geographischen Instituts der Universität Kiel
Geographisches Institut der Universität Kiel in Kiel | Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel
Published by the Institute of Geography of the University of Kiel
ISSN 0723-9874
The booklets can be obtained by: Department of Geography, CAU
Monika Höller | E: Hoeller (at) geographie.uni-kiel.de
Ludewig-Meyn-Str. 14
D-24118 Kiel Phone: +49431880 3433 Fax: +49431880 4658
See also:Proposal for including Bursa, the cradle city of the Ottoman Empire, in the UNESCO world heritage inventory
by Reinhard Stewig; World Heritage Committee.
English | Geographisches Institut der Universität Kiel, 2004.
Mavi Boncuk |
".... the Anatolian and Balkan Peninsula - have enabled the natural courses of the Bosporus to establish itself as a crossroads for maritime traffic travelling from eastern Europe to the Near East through the Mediterranean and for land based traffic moving from south-eastern Europe to south-western Asia via the Thrace and Anatolia corridors, which are immediately located on the Bosporus. This key geographical position helped Constantinople and Istanbul, both settlements along the Bosporus, to each become the capital of a global empire over two long historical periods, the eras of the Eastern Roman and Byzantine Empires and the Ottoman Empire. As these states were rising and falling in and around the Bosporus, the potential for long-distance maritime and terrestrial traffic has Seen varied use. It has varied from the maritime expansion of the ancient Greeks into the Black Sea to the supplying of ancient Athens with grain in the opposite direction, from Sabotage within the expanding regions of the Ottoman Empire along the north shore of the Black Sea to the closing of the Bosporus for foreign ships and the use of the Bosporus as a supply line for the Crimean War (1853-1856), from the transportation of grain from southern Russia to the British Isles in the 19th century to today's huge oil shipments from the Caspian Sea via the Bosporus. As for the terrestrial routes between south-eastern Europe and south western Asia via the Bosporus, for a long if not constant period they were the vital supply line between the military fronts on the Balkans with those on the Euphrates in the Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman periods. Even in the First World War they were used to connect the Eastern Front of the German Reich with the near eastern front of the Ottoman Empire. Only the first three of the crusades, in 1096, 1147 and 1189, used the overland route through the Balkans and Anatolia across the Bosporus. "
SOURCE Traffic functions of the Bosporus - Verkehrsfunktionen des Bosporus | Stewig, Reinhard|2006
[1] Stewig, Reinhard: Byzantium - Constantinople - Istanbul. A contribution to the city problem. In 1964.in German Volume XXII, Issue 2 | Number of pages96
Byzanz, Konstantinopel, Istanbul ein Beitrag zum Weltstadtproblem
Schriften des Geographischen Instituts der Universität Kiel
Geographisches Institut der Universität Kiel in Kiel | Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel
Published by the Institute of Geography of the University of Kiel
ISSN 0723-9874
The booklets can be obtained by: Department of Geography, CAU
Monika Höller | E: Hoeller (at) geographie.uni-kiel.de
Ludewig-Meyn-Str. 14
D-24118 Kiel Phone: +49431880 3433 Fax: +49431880 4658
See also:Proposal for including Bursa, the cradle city of the Ottoman Empire, in the UNESCO world heritage inventory
by Reinhard Stewig; World Heritage Committee.
English | Geographisches Institut der Universität Kiel, 2004.