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the evidence that later buildings had used the bricks created by the Romans in their own construction, I laughed at the thought of recycling before it was‘ a thing’.
Allied with Rome, Byzantium was coveted by many an emperor, and when Constantine The Great came to power in the fourth century he set about converting the now great city to Christianity and making it his own. Nova Roma came into being as the eastern most capital of the Roman Empire, although most local people referred to their home as Constantinople, a name that remained for almost two thousand years.
In those two thousand years a lot happened. Christianity became the prominent religion, although Greek traditions remained, a change that saw many churches constructed. One such church remains to this day, the Hagia Sophia.
Completed in 537 AD the Hagia Sophia was the last of three such buildings constructed on its site within the old quarter of Istanbul. It remained relatively untouched following the traditions of Eastern rite religious beliefs through to the fifteenth century, even during the
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