From the historian's notes

Constantinople, 1453

Turkey · Europe/Middle East (ambiguous) · May 1453 · spring

What it was medium-high

a shrunken capital of perhaps 40,000 to 50,000, with orchards and fields between its quarters inside walls built for many times thatByzantion, refounded by Constantine in 330

That year

• The Ottoman siege: a giant bronze bombard batters the land walls by day, and the defenders pack the breaches with earth, timber and barrels by night since 6 April 1453 highthe end of the empire
• Ottoman ships are dragged overland on greased rollers behind Galata into the Golden Horn, past the harbour chain 22 April 1453 highthe harbour no longer safe
• A lunar eclipse, read by everyone as an omen 22 May 1453 higha city reading the sky
• The final assault; the City falls 29 May 1453 highthe end of Byzantium
• Galata, the Genoese town across the Golden Horn, stays neutral and hands over its keys peacefully after the fall early June 1453 highthe town that survives

Who held it high

the Roman (Byzantine) Empire, reduced to the City and a few outpostsEmperor Constantine XI PalaiologosSultan Mehmed II built a fortress on the Bosphorus last year to close the strait; his army has besieged the City since early April

Its name high

Konstantinoupolis; usually just the City (he Polis)Written in Greek

The date, there high

6961the Byzantine world era, counted from the Creation, the year beginning on 1 SeptemberChurch bells and the semantron, a wooden board struck to call the hours of prayer; the Sultan's guns keep their own hours.

Money medium

the silver stavratoncopper tornesiabread costs more every week

Weather medium

May: warm days, cool nights, sea fog on some morningsa heavy fog on the night of 24-25 May, and a strange light around the great dome that the City took as an omen

Things

Objectsthin silver stavrata; icons carried in procession; earth-filled barrels and baskets for the wallsFoodrationed bread; fish from the Horn; wineClothwool and linen; silk for those who still have itGetting abouton foot; small boats across the HornIn the airgunpowder smoke; wet earth at the breaches; the sea

What she'd hear

Greek; Venetian and Genoese Italian among the merchants and defenders; Turkish beyond the walls.

Where she could stand

• the land walls — the triple walls across the peninsula, breached near the St Romanus gate and patched with earth and barrels
• the Hippodrome — the old racecourse, half quarry now, its starting gates empty since the bronze horses were taken to Venice in 1204
• the Golden Horn and its chain — the harbour, closed by a boom of timber and iron from the City to Galata
• Galata — the walled Genoese town across the Horn, with its tall stone tower
• the great church of Holy Wisdom — the domed church at the City's tip

Researched for this card · confidence high