easy intercourse by natives between the capital and the provinces. Most of the commerce of the city is in hands of foreigners and of Armenian and Greek merchants. Turks have little if anything to do with trade on a large scale. “The capital,” says a writer in the Konstantinopler Handelsblatt of November 1904, “produces very little for export, and its hinterland is small, extending on the European side only a few kilometres—the outlet for the fertile Eastern Rumelia is Dedeagach—and on the Asiatic side embracing the Sea of Marmora and the Anatolian railway district. Even part of this will be lost to Constantinople when the Anatolian railway is connected with the port of Mersina and with the Kassaba-Smyrna railway. Some 750 tons of the sweetmeat known as ‘Turkish delight’ are annually exported to the United Kingdom, America and Rumelia; embroideries, &c., are sold in fair quantities to tourists. Otherwise the chief articles of Constantinople’s export trade consist of refuse and waste materials, sheep’s wool (called Kassab bashí) and skins from the slaughter-houses (in 1903 about 3,000,000 skins were exported, mostly to America), horns, hoofs, goat and horse hair, guts, bones, rags, bran, old iron, &c., and finally dogs’ excrements, called in trade ‘pure,’ a Constantinople speciality, which is used in preparing leather for ladies’ gloves. From the hinterland comes mostly raw produce such as grain, drugs, wool, silk, ores and also carpets. The chief article is grain.”
The average value of the goods passing through the port of Constantinople at the opening of the 20th century was estimated at about £T 11,000,000. From the imperfect statistics available, the following tables of the class of goods imported and exported, and their respective values, were drawn up in 1901 by the late Mr Whittaker, The Times correspondent.
| Imports. | |
| Manufactured goods (cotton, woollen, silk, &c.) | £T[1] 3,500,000 |
| Haberdashery, ironmongery | 90,000 |
| Sugar | 500,000 |
| Petroleum | 400,000 |
| Flour | 400,000 |
| Coffee | 300,000 |
| Rice | 250,000 |
| Cattle | 100,000 |
| Various | 850,000 |
| | |
| Total | £T 7,000,000 |
| Exports. | |
| Cereals | £T 1,000,000 |
| Mohair | 800,000 |
| Carpets | 700,000 |
| Silk and cocoons | 500,000 |
| Opium | 400,000 |
| Gum tragacanth | 150,000 |
| Wool | 100,000 |
| Hides | 100,000 |
| Various | 250,000 |
| | |
| Total | £T 4,100,000 |
About 40% of the import trade of Constantinople is British. According to the trade report of the British consulate, the share of the United Kingdom in the value of £7,142,000 on the total imports to Constantinople during the year 1900–1901 was £1,811,000; while the share of the United Kingdom in the value of £2,669,000 on the total exports during the same year was £998,000. But it is worthy of note that while British commerce still led the way in Turkey, the trade of some other countries with Turkey, especially that of Germany, was increasing more rapidly. Comparing the average of the period 1896–1900 with the total for 1904, British trade showed an increase of 33%, Austro-Hungarian of nearly 60%, Germany of 130%, Italian of 98%, French of 8%, and Belgian of nearly 33%. The shipping visiting the port of Constantinople during the year 1905, excluding sailing and small coasting vessels, was 9796, representing a total of 14,785,080 tons. The percentage of steamers under the British flag was 37.1; of tonnage, 45.9.
Administration.—For the preservation of order and security, the city is divided into four divisions (Belad-i-Selassi), viz. Stamboul, Pera-Galata, Beshiktash and Scutari. The minister of police is at the head of the administration of the affairs of these divisions, and is ex-officio governor of Stamboul. The governors of the other divisions are subordinate to him, but are appointed by the sultan. Each governor has a special staff of police and gendarmery and his own police-court. In each division is a military commander, having a part of the garrison of the city under his orders, but subordinate to the commander-in-chief of the troops guarding the capital.
The municipal government of the four divisions of the city is in the hands of a prefect, appointed by the sultan, and subordinate to the minister of the interior. He is officially styled the prefect of Stamboul, and is assisted by a council of twenty-four members, appointed by the sultan or the minister of the interior. All matters concerning the streets, the markets, the bazaars, the street-porters (hamals), public weighers, baths and hospitals come under his jurisdiction. He is charged also with the collection of the city dues, and the taxes on property. The city is furthermore divided into ten municipal circles as follows. In Stamboul: (1) Sultan Bayezid, (2) Sultan Mehemet, (3) Djerah Pasha (Psamatia); on the European side of the Bosporus and the northern side of the Golden Horn: (4) Beshiktash, (5) Yenikeui, (6) Pera, (7) Buyukderé; on the Asiatic side of the Bosporus: (8) Anadol Hissar, (9) Scutari, (10) Kadikeui. Each circle is subdivided into several wards (mahalleh). “The outlying parts of the city are divided into six districts (Cazas), namely, Princes’ Islands, Guebzeh, Beicos, Kartal, Kuchuk-Chekmedjé and Shilé, each having its governor (kaimakam), who is usually chosen by the palace. These districts are dependencies of the ministry of the interior, and their municipal affairs are directed by agents of the prefecture.”
In virtue of old treaties, known as the Capitulations (q.v.), foreigners enjoy to a large extent the rights of exterritoriality. In disputes with one another, they are judged before their own courts of justice. In litigation between a foreigner and a native, the case is taken to a native court, but a representative of the foreigner’s consulate attends the proceedings. Foreigners have a right to establish their own schools and hospitals, to hold their special religious services, and even to maintain their respective national post-offices. No Turkish policeman may enter the premises of a foreigner without the sanction of the consular authorities to whose jurisdiction the latter belongs. A certain measure of self-government is likewise granted to the native Christian communities under their ecclesiastical chiefs.
Bibliography.—On Constantinople generally, besides the regular guide-books and works already mentioned, see P. Gyllius, De topographia Constantinopoleos, De Bosporo Thracio (1632); Du Cange, Constantinopolis Christiana (1680); J. von Hammer, Constantinopolis und der Bosporos (1822); Mordtmann, Esquisse topographique de Constantinople (1892); E. A. Grosvenor, Constantinople (1895); van Millingen, Byzantine Constantinople (1899); Paspates, Βυζαντιναὶ Μελέται (1877); Scarlatos Byzantios, Ἡ Κωνσταντίνου πὁλις (1851); E. Pears, Fall of Constantinople (1885), The Destruction of the Greek Empire (1903); Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; Salzenberg, Altchristliche Baudenkmale von Konstantinopel; Lethaby and Swainson, The Church of Sancta Sophia; Pulgher, Les Anciennes Églises byzantines de Constantinople; Labarte, Le Palais impérial de Constantinople et ses abords. (A. van M.)
CONSTANTINOPLE, COUNCILS OF. Of the numerous ecclesiastical
councils held at Constantinople the most important are
the following:
1. The second ecumenical council, 381, which was in reality only a synod of bishops from Thrace, Asia and Syria, convened by Theodosius with a view to uniting the church upon the basis of the Orthodox faith. No Western bishop was present, nor any Roman legate; from Egypt came only a few bishops, and these tardily. The first president was Meletius of Antioch, whom Rome regarded as schismatic. Yet, despite its sectional character, the council came in time to be regarded as ecumenical alike in the West and in the East.
The council reaffirmed the Nicene faith and denounced all opposing doctrines. The so-called “Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed,” which has almost universally been ascribed to this council, is certainly not the Nicene creed nor even a recension
- ↑ A Turkish lira = 18 shillings (English).
