http://www.kemo.gr/archive/papers/Karra.doc

For those who can read Greek this is an excellent article on the names "Constantinople-Istanbul". Sorry but I have no time to translate it but I can give a very short summary:

The article basically summarizes a great work by the famous -and extremely popular in Greece- English Byzantine scholar Steven Runciman
(Steven Runciman, Constantinople- Istanbul, στην Revue des Études sud-est européennes 7, (1969))

Through a meticulous study of Greek, Islamic and Western European sources he notes that the Greeks themselves started using shorter versions of the admittedly unpractical term "Konstantinoupolis" already by the 5th cetury: "Polis", "Basilis" etc.

In the meantime Arabs and Selcuks echoed these shorter versions but consistently refered to the City as "Konstantiniya", a name that was holyfied by the Prophet himself, and actually survived down to 1923 as the official name of the city. In demotic Greek, "Mpolin", "Istimbolin" and "Stamboul" became the most commonly used terms many centuries before the Ottoman conquest, much more the official renaiming in Republican times.

"The irony is that now that the Turks have abandoned a name sanctified by the Prophet, in order to use a name derived from Demotic Greek, Greeks are hugely dissatisfied with a name, which in fact was the one used by their Byzantine ancestors. But schauvinism has a tendency to ignore history" the article concludes.

Fig. 1. An envelope (circa 1921) sent from a Sephardi named Vitali Isaac Salti of Constantinople. This card demonstrates the usage of both Stamboul, and Constantinople. A common practice prior to the formation of the modern Republic of Turkey.


http://www.sephardicstudies.org/istanbul.html

In the preface, on page xiv, of The Fall of Constantinople 1453, Runciman apologizes to his Turkish friends for refering to the city as Constantinople and not Istanbul! So biased is this historan for the perceived insults to Sunni muslim pride.

Great Great post !!!

I’ve actually got the book! Brought it via Amazon three years ago. But Nikephoros is correct about what he wrote in the preface, which after re-reading I can recall raising an eyebrow and thinking, “OMG, what did I buy!”. It wasn’t a necessary inclusion and it did hint at biasness. But in all fairness to the author I did find it a balanced read; the part when the city fell made the hairs on my back rise.

As this was a random pick from Amazon, if I had read this somewhere

The irony is that now that the Turks have abandoned a name sanctified by the Prophet, in order to use a name derived from Demotic Greek, Greeks are hugely dissatisfied with a name, which in fact was the one used by their Byzantine ancestors. But schauvinism has a tendency to ignore history

I would have not brought the book. But as I stated, that I did enjoy the book and found it balanced, but this article does have some inconsistencies IMO worth highligthing.

Istanbul, it is believed, or perhaps most likely, derived from the Greek “Is tin poli”or “to the city”. The first time I heard this was in Greek school back in the 80's while studying Byzantine history. Our teacher’s point was though it’s no longer called Konstantinoupolis it’s modern name does have Greek origins. So I can’t agree with his charge of “chauvinism”. So I’m skeptical on this author’s attack on an apparent Modern Greek biases since Poli or Polis had always been the short name for Constantinople and still is amongst Modern Greeks. So which Greek actually denies this?

Also, the Greek spoken during the Byzantine years was Romaic, right? Dimotic came afterwards during the Turkish period. If I’m wrong, please correct me. So I’m also skeptical on this part:

In demotic Greek, "Mpolin", "Istimbolin" and "Stamboul" became the most commonly used terms many centuries before the Ottoman conquest, much more the official renaiming in Republican times.

In all honesty I can’t see reliable Greek sources, especially during the Byzantine period, showing μπоλιν, Ιστανμπούλ, Εσταμπόλ or especially Σταμπούλ. The article you posted the link to makes no mention of μπоλιν, unless I missed it, and the footnotes state Ιστανμπούλ and Εσταμπόλ are Sephardic terms, which means they would have been used in the 15th century rather then “many centuries before the Ottoman conquest”.



BTW the city also went by the name of Islambol as well during the Ottoman period.

My mistake: by "demotic Greek" I tried to translate "Ελληνικό Δημώδη Λόγο" which is not quite the same with "Δημοτική", even though the Romeika you mentioned is very very close to the language we speak today.

The whole passage is:
«Η ειρωνεία είναι ότι τώρα που οι Τούρκοι εγκατέλειψαν μία ονομασία καθαγιασμένη από τον Προφήτη για να χρησιμοποιήσουν μία ονομασία που προέρχεται από τον ελληνικό δημώδη λόγο, οι Έλληνες είναι έντονα δυσαρεστημένοι με την ονομασία αυτή, η οποία στην πραγματικότητα είναι αυτή που χρησιμοποιούσαν οι Βυζαντινοί τους πρόγονοι. Ο σωβινισμός όμως έχει την τάση να αγνοεί την Ιστορία »

As for your mistrust towards Runciman's analysis of primary sources I do not have enough knowledge to take sides but I tend to think of him rather than you as an authority on the matter

Finally the fact that he "apologizes" to the Turks does not, in my opinion show that he is not objective. Quite the opposite it shows that although a philhellen he is also an objective historian and not a mouthpiece of Greek nationalism.


By the way the the Runciman's article was not part of the book, you mentioned, but a seperate article written during the Greek dictatorship when the whole "It is Constantinople not Istanbul" thing re-emerged as common Greek position, along with other similar things such as " it is hellenic coffe not turkish". Actually, some junta guy whose name escapes me proposed the name "byzantinos kafes" which thank god, never quite made it to Greek parlance. But refering to coffe as "Greek coffe is a heritage of the dictatorship...

He obviously is an authority but doesn't mean he can't be wrong or can be prone to errors. You should have stated from the beginning that quote relates to the junta, not the best times for Greeks and their concept of the "third great Greek civilisation" will be widely mocked today by contemporary Greeks.

And I think I can challenge his analysis if he claims that "Stamboul" was a term used by Greeks "many centuries before the Ottomans". But going by that article he did not. And the author of that article used other terms, which you insinuated were from the Byzantine period when the footnotes clearly state they were used in Sephardic lore, which means they do not date from the Byzantine period. Also, nowhere did I find the word Mpolin, unless I missed it. So why did you include it?

I already stated I have the book and have read it, finding it quite balanced. Now that I think of it, maybe the "apology" was due to his brutal description of the fall of the city once the siegers-come-conquerors entered it.

I think you make some fair points and the real shame is that I do not have access to the Runciman article, only to this review by Karra, translated and summarized by me. The problem is that this runs the risk of becoming radio-arbyla, broken telephone" which is a criticism I accept.

But here's the quotation about Mpolin from a non-Greek source:

Ο Άραβας Γεωγράφος αλ-Μασ'ούντι (al-Mas'udi), ο οποίος έζησε τον 10ο αιώνα και δεν γνώριζε ελληνικά, μας λέει πως οι Έλληνες " την εποχή που γράφομε την αποκαλούν ‘Μπόλιν’, ή εάν θέλουν να δείξουν πως είναι η πρωτεύουσα της αυτοκρατορίας, λόγω του μεγέθους της, λέγουν ‘Ιστανμπόλιν’, και όχι ‘Konstantiniya’. Μόνο οι Άραβες την λένε έτσι !"

and later on:

Γράφει λοιπόν ο Γιόχαν Σίλτμπεργκερ στα παλαιά του γερμανικά, 25 χρόνια πριν από την άλωση της Πόλης, και πέντε χρόνια πριν από τη γέννηση του Πορθητή , "Constantinopel hayssen die Crichen Istimboli und die Thùrcken hassende Stanboul" (Οι Έλληνες ονομάζουν την Κωνσταντινούπολη "Ιστιμπόλη" και οι Τούρκοι την ονομάζουν "Σταμπούλ" !).

You are right that these are not Greek sources. But they are sources about everyday usage rather than formal speech, which is difficult to get from Doukas or other official historians.

I think a more correct version of my summary would be that:

The Greeks have been refering to to it as "Polis" already from the 5th century.
By middle Ottoman times all ethnic groups would refer to it in everyday parlance as Stambol, Stambul, Istanbul. (To this we can add as evidence many old rembetika recordings that refer to it as such in Greek).

There is an evident link bewteen "polis" and "Istimbolin" given the Greek pronounciation of "mp" ad "mb". But it is not clearly stated by the Karra article (maybe it is in the Runciman original) which period the change happened)

Finally, and this is the interesting thing, at least as early as the 19th century people would refer to it as Istambul/Stambol etc regardless of ethnic background in informal speech and Constantinople or Konstantinya on formal occasions.

Still I think it is a shame we do not have the original article by Runciman which would have been more thorough in quoting its sources.

These sources don't really prove anything. It seems from wherever you're getting you quotes from, they just digging into obscure historical records trying to find "evidence" to support an inconclusive theory.

Just to comment, re the Arab the reference to mpolis this could be a case of the word polis being lost in translation. And the example with the German source, well, it states that Stamboul was used by the Turks and not the Greeks (Οι Έλληνες ονομάζουν την Κωνσταντινούπολη "Ιστιμπόλη" και οι Τούρκοι την ονομάζουν "Σταμπούλ"), which doesn't quite tally with your post: In demotic Greek, "Mpolin", "Istimbolin" and "Stamboul" became the most commonly used terms

And also, did you notice both sources refer to "Έλληνες"

Instead of trying to find inconsistencies in my translations and summary I think you should focus on the gist of this posting, which is:

"Istanbul" and "Polh" are practically the same word or at least as close "Munchen" and "Munich", "Venice" and and "Venecia" or "London" and "Londino". Historically Ottomans had no problem with teh word "Konstantinye", they actually prefered it to Istanbul, and Greeks in eveyday speach would use both Polh and Stamboul. It started being a political issue only in the 60s under the auspicies of the Greek dictatorship and continued by PASOK's nationalist discourse. It is an asbolutely absurd controversy.

I would say Istanpoli is closer to polis than Istanbul, which is obviously the Turkish interpretation of the former. So I do con-*test*-('") your claim that Istanbul was the name used by Greeks until 1967.

AFAIK Ataturk made Istanbul the official name in the early 30's. Konstantinye was obviously closer to the Greek Constantinople whereas Istanbul was furthest. And even in this forum the mere mention of the C word is met with disdain, including claims of Greek irredentist intent. Even Runciman had to openly "apologise" to his Turkish friends for referring to the poli by it's historic Greek name in his book. So the over-sensitivity isn't on our side.

abdestler go away

Why does it matter? Istanbul or Constantiopole? Both names represent the same thing and they are both beautiful names. If people are irked because of this then it is their problem. Hahahahahahah, Greeks will continue to call it by its greek name and the turks by its turkish name. What is the big deal?

um, hi kardeş, are you endorsing my post?