CONSTANTINE I 



1555 



CONSTANTINOPLE 



He died in 337 near Nicomedia, and the em- 

 pire was divided among his three sons, Con- 

 stantine, Constantius and Constans. This act 

 was considered a grave political error, for it 

 made three weak governments out of one of 

 growing strength. 



Arch of Const antine, a famous triumphal 

 arch erected in Rome in 315 in memory of 

 the victory of Constantine the Great over 

 Maxentius, another Roman emperor. To-day 

 it is the best preserved of ancient Roman 

 monuments. The finest parts were either taken 

 or copied from the Arch of Trajan, however, 

 so do not properly represent the victories of 

 Constantine. 



CONSTANTINE I (1868- ), king of 

 Greece, the son and successor of George I, 

 'who was assassi- 

 nated at Salo- 

 niki, in 1913, to- 

 wards the close 

 of the Balkan 

 struggle which be- 

 gan in 1912. Con- 

 stantine was born 

 at Athens, was 

 brought up in the 

 Orthodox Greek 

 faith, and was 

 educated at Ber- 

 lin and Leipzig. 

 He was given a 

 thorough military 

 training, and 

 commanded the 

 Greek forces 



against Turkey in the unhappy war of 1897. 

 His failure in that struggle made him ex- 

 tremely unpopular, but he more than re- 



CONSTANTINE I 



His endeavor to remain 

 neutral in the War of the Na- 

 tions gave rise to many pain- 

 ful experiences. 



deemed his reputation by his brilliant service 

 in the Balkan Wars, especially by his capture 

 of Saloniki and Janina from the Turks. He 

 came to the throne a national hero, and as 

 a result of the treaties of London (May 20, 

 1913) and of Bucharest (August 10, 1913), 

 ruled over territory twice as great as that 

 which his father had governed (see BALKAN 

 WARS). 



At the beginning of the War of the Nations, 

 in 1914, King Constantine was confronted by 

 peculiarly-difficult problems. Greek independ- 

 ence was originally won by the aid of Great 

 Britain and the allied powers, and there was 

 a strong feeling among the Greeks that their 

 country should join them. King Constantine, 

 on the contrary, was said to be strongly pro- 

 German, though he himself insisted that he 

 was neutral. His sympathies were doubtless 

 influenced by his own education in Germany, 

 and by his wife, Queen Sophia, who is a sister 

 of Emperor William II. It is interesting to 

 note, however, that Constantine is related by 

 blood to the royal families of Russia and 

 Great Britain. His father, King George I, was 

 a brother of Queen Alexandra, the wife of 

 King Edward VII and mother of King George 

 V of Great Britain. Another sister of King 

 George of Greece was Princess Dagmar, who 

 married Czar Alexander III and became the 

 mother of Czar Nicholas II. Constantine's 

 mother, also a Russian, was a first cousin of 

 Czar Alexander III. Allied pressure upon 

 Greece drove him from the 

 throne June 12, 1917, and he 

 took refuge in Switzerland. 

 His second son, Alexander, 

 succeeded him. For addi- 

 tional details, see article 

 GREECE, subtitle History. 



Gate to m 

 Mosque of Suleiman! | Sultan's Palace 



ONSTANTINOPLE , kon stan tino'- 

 p'l, the capital and largest city of the Turkish 

 Empire, and one of the oldest cities of the 

 world. It crowns a hilly promontory on the 

 frontier of Europe, Ut the southern end of the 



long, narrow Bosporus, which joins the Black 

 Sea and the Sea of Marmora, and separates 

 Turkey in Europe from Asiatic Turkey, across 

 the strait. The view of Constantinople from 

 the sea is one of striking beauty. Small won- 



