Founded by the emperor Constantine the Great in AD 324 as "the new Rome," the city of Constantinople was to become the centre of the powerful, vast, heterogeneous Byzantine world. Until Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453, the city was the capital of an empire which stretched, at one time, from Gibraltar in the west to the banks of the Euphrates in the east. Astoundingly rich, this civilisation left behind it a legacy of magnificent art, architecture and literature, inspired by orthodox Christianity. Professor Mango's authoritative survey covers all the fundamental aspects of Byzantine culture and way of life-peoples, languages, society, the economy and trade, the disappearance and revival of cities monasticism and education.… (more)