What happened first?

Hello guys, it’s been a while. This article is not so much of an article, is more like a game that I am thinking since the first lockdown.

I am always so confused about what happens first in history. We learn so many historical facts in school, but we don’t learn how to put them in order. Is it important though to put history in order? I think that it is. We can relate things this way, we can assume or come to a conclusion about how areas, strategies and people interact with each other.

In this article – game I am not going to give any advise on how to put historical facts in right order. I will just give you some events, mainly from the medieval period, and you try to arrange them correctly!

Let’s begin!

  • Cretan War (between Ottoman and Venetian Empire)
  • Fall of the western Roman Empire (commonly fall of Rome)
  • Byzantine Empire gives control of Thessaloniki to Venetians
  • Western Christians capture and destroy Constantinople
  • Terminating of byzantine fleet by Palaiologos’ dynasty
  • Ottomans capture Thessaloniki
  • The recapture of Constantinople by Vyzantine emperors
  • Fall of Constantinopole by Ottoman Empire
  • Battle of Kossovo (Ottomans – Serbians)
  • Fall of Cyprus after Venetian – Ottoman War
  • Fall of Gallipoli (first european area that was captured by Ottomans)
  • Athens chosen as the greek capital
  • East–West Schism (or the Great Schism)

How did you go? Even though I chose the events I did some mistakes!

  1. Fall of the western Roman Empire (commonly fall of Rome) 476
  2. East–West Schism (or the Great Schism) 1054
  3. Western Christians capture and destroy Constantinople 1204
  4. The recapture of Constantinople by Vyzantine emperors 1261
  5. Terminating of byzantine fleet by Palaiologos’ dynasty 1284
  6. Fall of Gallipoli (first european area that was captured by Ottomans) 1354
  7. Ottomans capture Thessaloniki 1387
  8. Battle of Kossovo (Ottomans – Serbians) 1389
  9. Byzantine Empire gives control of Thessaloniki to Venetians 1423
  10. Fall of Constantinopole by Ottoman Empire 1453
  11. Fall of Cyprus after Venetian – Ottoman War 1571
  12. Cretan War (between Ottoman and Venetian Empire) 1645-1669
  13. Athens chosen as the greek capital 1834

Some general comments about these years are that the crucial things happened before the captures of areas. For example, first happened the east – west Schism and after about 150 years Westerns captured Constantinopole. What did people who lived in Byzantine Empire think about Westerns the years between 1054 and 1204? and why?

Moreover, we see the growth of Ottomans much before the fall of Constantinopole at 1453, in parallel with the decline of the Byzantium. The termination of byzantine fleet means that the Byzantine empire run out of money. What are the consequences of that in the defense policy of Byzantium? And what happened to people who worked in fleet? I read that they ended up working for Ottomans. Ottomans were good soldiers, especially at cavalry, but they didn’t know how to fight at sea. You can imagine that the interaction between Ottomans and Byzantines helped the former to become better soldiers at naval battles.

Also, we see that Ottomans captured Gallipoli and after that they had some battles and victories. While studying about this era I thought that in school we stopped at the year 1453, but a lot happened after that. I mean Ottomans continued to capture areas and only in the end of 17th century stopped capturing areas and started to defend themselves.

Besides these, how was life in Ottoman Empire? What did Byzantines felt towards Ottomans and Westerns? Did ottoman war strategies have similarities with byzantine war strategies? How was life during the declines of empires? These are some interesting questions and I believe searching the answers is much more fun!

If you liked it , stay tuned! It follows who born first!