If the Hippodrome of Constantinople still stood in Instanbul
Thursday, 13 Mar 2025
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Very interesting in the lower half: how the building in the foreground is basically built on top of the ruins of the hippodrome.
My hometown (near the other end of the Roman Empire) is now 12m higher than it was 2000 years ago. It’s built on 12m of historical rubble, much of it Roman. You cannot dig a hole without encountering ruins.
The dimensions in the above picture are wrong.
Never realized how the Hagia Sophia is like right there, even though I’ve seen hundreds of photos of it.
How many hippos did it hold?
Nika, nika, nika!
Well, let’s just build it again.
every time i see the words instanbul or constantinople, this runs through my head
[Istanbul (Not Constantinople) by the muppets](https://youtu.be/20uXjti9h4I?feature=shared)
wow thats amazing but where did they get the hippos from?
I don’t know much history about europe but why did they destroy it (I don’t know if it was actually destroyed or not) ?
So the Hippodrome was basically six Colosseums in length?
They still had chariot races there up until the 12th century
The last time I was in Istanbul my hotel room had a direct view on the lower part of the hippodrome. You can actually see the hotel in the bottom of the picture
This reminds me of when they took out the baseball diamond at my community park and put in a small rec center building.
Did they flood that for mock naval battles?
they should totally rebuild it
The obelisks are still there! I love seeing them every time I visit Istanbul
A religious chap in the minaret at the back could get a smashing free view of the racing. Prime seating.
“If it still stood in Istanbul”
Sad that they moved it to New Jersey, it looked better in Istanbul imho
But why did Constantinople get the works?
NASCAR would be racing in Turkey
sorry to say but Hagia Sofia looks far less impressive then. :/
we need to bring these chariot races back.
Don’t even like NASCAR, just a dumb USer.
Wow, can you imagine walking through the ancient streets of Istanbul and stumbling upon the Hippodrome, still standing tall and proud after all these centuries? I’d love to see a recreation of what it would look like, maybe with some CGI or a rendering of what it would look like if it had been preserved. Does anyone know if there are any plans to restore it to its former glory?
Istanbul not Constantinople.
Erdogan would heavily Islamicize it. So every pillar would have a minar. And the centre of the Hippodrome would have the world’s loudest louspeaker for Azaan.
Listen to Fall of Civilisations – Byzantine Empire, for more on this (podcast). It’s incredible.
There isn’t even a plaque, or a sign post…
It should
We should bring back jousting/ chariot fighting and other Spartan-like fighting.
All those ego puss boys that care more about their pride than logical argument can go there to fight and die so they don’t reproduce.
Make Constantinople Roman Again!