558 THE HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL EUROPE John Hunyadi, so that they agreed in 1444 to evacuate Ser- bia and Herzegovina and to yield Wallachia to Hungary. But the King of Poland, who also claimed the throne of Hungary, broke this treaty of peace in the hope of driving the Turks from Europe entirely. Instead, he was defeated and killed at Varna and the Turks recovered all that they had surrendered. In 1448 even Hunyadi was beaten, and Constantinople at last was taken in 1453 by Mohammed II (1451-1481). The Fall of Con- Byzantine emperor had agreed in 1438 to unite stantinople w - lt ^ t ^ e Western Church, but he received little aid from the Western powers, while the loyalty of the clergy and populace of Constantinople was lessened by this sub- mission, as they regarded it, to the Papacy. Mohammed II left the Christians their own language, religion, and customs, and they speedily restored the Greek Church. But the Byzantine Empire was forever at an end, and since 1453 Constantinople has been the capital of Turkey, and Jus- tinian's great church of St. Sophia has served as a Moham- medan mosque. In 1456, however, the Turks again failed to take Belgrade, which was relieved by an army of crusaders under John Further Hunyadi and a papal legate. Hunyadi died soon of Xham- after nis victory, but his son, Matthias Corvinus, med II W as elected King of Hungary, and the Bohemi- ans at the same time chose a native ruler, George of Podie- brad. But instead of uniting against the Turks these two national kings became embroiled in strife with each other. Meanwhile Trebizond had been conquered by the Turks, central and southern Greece had been occupied by them, and the Parthenon at Athens was converted into a mosque. Wallachia, Serbia, and Bosnia were also all in the hands of the Turks. Albania had held out since 1443 under its able leader Scanderbeg and then under his son, but with the fall of Scutari in 1479 its resistance was over. Thus the Turks held practically the entire Balkan Peninsula. Venice, to save its trading privileges in the East, made peace with them in 1479. The next year the Moslems made a vain attempt
