Ivan III also had some connection to the Byzantine throne since he had married Sophia Palaiologina, a niece of Constantine XI, the last Byzantine emperor.
The idea took off under Ivan III (Ivan the Great), Grand Prince of Moscow, who greatly expanded his territory and laid the foundations of the Russian state. The basis for the claim was both theological (the unity of Eastern Orthodox Church) and political (the concept of the Moscow Prince as supreme sovereign and defender of Christian Orthodox nations). Mehmed’s claim rested with the concept that after the fall of the Western Roman Empire Constantinople, which he now ruled, had become the seat of the Roman Empire.įollowing the fall of Constantinople, Moscow became the main Orthodox Christian capital, giving rise to the concept of Moscow as the “Third Rome”. Religious traditions played an important part in establishing such connections, especially following the schism in 1054 between what are now the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.Īfter the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Mehmed II declared himself Kayser-i Rum, literally “Caesar of Rome”. The Eastern Roman Empire (aka the Byzantine Empire) continued for another thousand years until Constantinople was captured by the Ottoman forces under Mehmed II in 1453.Ĭlaims to be the successor of Rome have arisen from perceived connections to one or both of the Eastern and Western Empires. The Western Part collapsed in 476 AD (the traditionally accepted date) and in 480 AD, with the death of the Western Emperor Julius Nepos, Eastern Emperor Zeno became sole Emperor of the Empire.
The Emperor Diocletian divided the Empire into halves with the Eastern Empire governed out of Byzantium (later Constantinople) and the Western Empire governed from Rome. Learn more about each below.īy 285 AD the Roman Empire had grown so vast that it was no longer feasible to govern all the provinces from the central seat of Rome. The map above shows which countries have claimed to the the successor to the Roman Empire at some point in their history (so called Third Rome).
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