Message from @KhromosomeKing
Discord ID: 531997306925613066
Why?
joe rogan meme
Oh now I get it
Ye bastard
>when you don't even like your identity since you have no friends and don't like anything and now everyone thinks it's trendy to be a 'le epic outsider misfit xD' so now you can't even be you without people thinking you're just being fake
leave me alone
I'm a day late
However
Now is the ***t i m e***
570 years ago today in 1449 A.D, Constantine Dragases Palaiologos, was crowned as the last Emperor and Autocrat of the East Roman Empire. His reign would last no more than four years yet his fateful final stand against the Ottoman Empire at the fall of Constantinople would become the stuff of legends (Emperor pictured astride his pale Arabian mare facing down the Turkish army).
Born in 1405 A.D, Constantine XI was the eighth child of Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos and his Serbian wife, Helena Dragaลก. Growing up in Constantinople under the supervision of his parents, Constantine rose to manhood at the centre of an empire whose golden age had long since past and over whom the spectre of extinction loomed bleakly. Yet this did not deter Constantine. Prior to becoming Emperor he proved himself a most capable ruler and statesman, reigning as regent over the Imperial capital whilst his brother, John VIII, was attending the Council of Florence. Thereafter he acquitted himself well as the Despot of Morea. Ruling from the palace of Mistra, not far from the ancient city of Sparta, he had his first confrontation with the Ottoman Turks, then under the leadership of Sultan Murad II, after he annexed their vassal state of the Duchy of Athens. Enraged by the Byzantine's obstinacy, Murad predictably marched south in 1446 A.D and brought his pitiless wrath to bear upon the Greeks, smashing down the walls of Hexamilion before enslaving and selling off much of the population. Thereafter reduced to an Ottoman vassal, Constantine had learned firsthand not only how powerful the Turks had become but also how mercilessly cruel they could be to their vanquished enemies.
In October 1448 A.D, Emperor John VIII died childless. The months which followed saw a typical scramble for power ensue then between Constantine and his brother Demetrios who drew much support by asserting that there should still be no peace or union between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. Constantine however had the support of his mother Helena and also of Murad, whom had been asked to arbitrate the affair. As Constantine was technically Murad's vassal, the Sultan naturally chose his own man to rule in the old Roman stronghold.
Within two years however Murad had died and was succeeded by his 19 year old son, Mehmed II, who was hell-bent on sweeping away the last vestiges of the broken Byzantine Empire into the shadows of history once and for all. Constantine perceived the gravity of the threat being posed to him and his people and began to prepare for war. To thwart his young opponent, the Emperor threatened to release a contender to the Ottoman throne. Mehmed took this as Constantine breaking the peace and began building a fortress on the Western side of the Bosphorus to seal Constantinople off from the Black Sea to complement a fortress built half a century before on the eastern side by Sultan Bayezid I. With a siege now inevitable, Constantine began repairing the old Theodosian walls, restocked the supply of food in the city as best as possible and mobilised as many able-bodied men as could be mustered into the comparatively tiny
Imperial army for one final glorious stand against the tide of history that awaited them. The city had withstood over a dozen sieges before by almost as many powers that had since come and gone yet this would be the last one it was to bear witness. Calls for aid were sent out to the heart of European Christendom but few answered the pleas and even fewer Byzantines were enthused by such measures, the memory of their humiliation at the hands of the Latin Empire of the Fourth Crusade still cut deep. Constantine's own chief minister was reputed to have said that it would be "Better to see the turban of the Turks reigning in the centre of the City than the Latin mitre."
Constantine had but 7,000 men to defend a city of over 50,000 souls against a great army of over 80,000 commanded by Mehmed, 10,000 of whom were elite janissaries. Isolated, abandoned, and hopelessly outnumbered, the Byzantine soldiers stood by their Emperor to face whatever end that destiny had in store for them. Constantine himself was said to have manned the walls and fought side by side against the coming onslaught. For fifty three days the Turks hammered at the walls of the city with all their deafening artillery and all their limitless legions and for fifty three days the Byzantines bravely beat them back and endured every assault. At the end of May 1453 A.D then came the fateful day as the Ottoman army swarmed over the weakest point in the defences and flooded into the city. Seeing that the hour of doom had come at last, Constantine is said to have remarked that "The city is fallen and I am still alive." With that he cast off his imperial raiment so as not to be distinguished from his troops, drew his sword, 'dismounted from his white Arabian mare, plunged into the fray, and disappeared."
So ended the last remnant of the Roman Empire founded by Augustus Caesar 1479 years before in 27 B.C. Constantine however would live on in legend, with prophecies arising that before the battle's ending an angel descended to the earth and rescued him by turning him to marble and hiding him beneath the Golden Gate where he would lie in waiting to eventually reclaim the city from the Turks and restore Constantinople to the Orthodox Christians.
You got too much time on your hands
.
We need a history channel
That's the real fucking deal, especially if you had to type it all out by hand instead of copying and pasting
I thought we had one?
Yeah <#480908859326595122>
that is mainly used for abandoned shit
@ThatGuyWithPaste
Turns out I'm retarded
Not a surprise, honestly
that was a good feel
when ur not a mod but u have keque in ur friends list
same
wEIRd fLeX BuT oK
I want keque in my friends list
Thats a bit gay but ok
Oh ok
Such a beautiful man
Inside and outside
Good pub