Nicaea was from the beginning of the Christian history of the Roman Empire a very significant city. One could argue that the Council of Nicaea was, along with the foundation of Constantinople, an event which helped change the trajectory of Roman culture from the one many picture of the classical ancient Romans to the medieval “Byzantine” Romans. It took on extreme importance in later Byzantine history, being a primary target of the First Crusade, and peaking as the capital of the Byzantine Empire after the Fourth Crusade from 1204-1261. Today Iznik is a smaller town, but, it has many well preserved Byzantine ruins.
ANCIENT ORIGINS:
Mythologically speaking, the city was founded by Dionysos and Herakles, giving it a grand and illustrious origin story. However, it is believed the city was founded by Antigonos, but then refounded again by Lysimachos in 300B.C. Lysimachos named it after his wife Nikaia, and that is the name of the city in Greek even to this day, it is transliterated into Turkish as Iznik. It was not an especially important city at this point, not very much is known about it in the Hellenistic age, but the city ad a bright future ahead.
Nicaea came under Roman rule in 74B.C, and it would remain under Roman rule for most of its history. It was situated on good fertile land, and the Romans were good managers and facilitators of growth when it came to cities. It was situated along the main Roman road through Anatolia, which gave it economic vitality. It also had its lake as a resource for water and fish.
The city received imperial attention, a temple dedicated to Augustus and the imperial cult was built there. Vespasian had two Roman triumphal arches built to celebrate his victories. Hadrian spent the money needed to rebuild the city after a catastrophic earthquake in 120AD. Other than some civic construction, the city was one of the best examples of the benefits of the Pax Romana, and enjoyed a great period of three centuries or so. It would have been wealthy with prominent festivals, public games, large public buildings, colonnaded streets, a theatre, and other great amenities.
LATE ANTIQUITY AND A CHANGING REALITY:
Towards the end of the third century, the Romans felt the need to build large powerful walls to protect the city. This gave it an appearance more similar to what one might see today and in the Byzantine period. This was due to the fact that in the the 250’s, an arm of Goths broke into Anatolia, and sacked the rich but unprotected cities like Nicaea. The people of Nicaea had no choice but to flee, leaving most of their belongings behind for the Goths to take home. The Goths must have loved to find a city which they did not have to fight for, but still got all the spoils. The Goths also burned Nicaea, for good measure. So yes, the walls were a very necessary and pragmatic response to the changing realities of the Roman world going into the period of Late Antiquity.
These walls would be one of they key things which always kept Nicaea as an important city throughout Byzantine history. Witnesses always were impressed, even 800 years later during the First Crusade. The construction of sturdy walls can take some time, it seems they were finished during the reign of Claudius Gothicus around 268-270. There were 80 towers which were 13 meters tall, and the main wall was 5km in length and 9 meters tall. There was also a moat in front of the walls, making it extra challenging to besiege. The fact so much of the wall remains is a testament to the quality of engineering which went into the defenses of Nicaea.
During the early Christian era, pre-Constantine, there was persecution of Christians in the area. It was most severe at Nicomedia, however Nicaea had martyrs as well, such as Tryphon or Neophytos. There were even some female martyrs like Theodote, who was burned alive along with her own sons. Antonia was another, who was allegedly burned on a grill but still stubbornly held he faith until she was thrown into the lake to drown in a sack. However, the city would become central to the emergence of Christianity as the dominant force.
THE COUNCIL OF NICAEA:
The Council of Nicaea is almost certainly the most well-known moment in the history of Nicaea, it was a defining moment in Christian history as well as the history of the Roman Empire. Even today, the Council of Nicaea is known from history textbooks in schools. Constantine had tired of the internal disputes of the Church, and resolved to unify the Church with a synod of Bishops from east and west. The teachings of Arius was condemned, and the Nicene creed was agreed and council ended on August 25, 325AD after 3 months of deliberations.
THE MAIN BYZANTINE PERIOD:
THE FALL OF ANATOLIA AND NICAEA(1071-1081):
SELJUK PERIOD:
Nicaea fell under Seljuk occupation in 1081, before being liberated in 1097 by the joint forces of the Roman army under Alexios Komnenos and the army of the First Crusade.
KOMNENIAN RESTORATION:
THE CAPITAL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE:
The rise of Nicaea was unfortunately the product of the greatest catastrophe in all of Byzantine history, the Fourth Crusade(I have written a long article on that here) which took the city in April 1204AD. Constantinople had large parts of the city burned, it was systematically robbed of its wealth, women were raped, statues melted, relics stolen, churches desecrated, its population plummeted. The Roman State and Church was homeless, but they found themselves a new home in Nicaea.
Theodore Mesochites delivered a speech to Andronikos II Palaiologos in 1290 praising the city of Nicaea and its environs, but also capturing the feelings of the chaotic 13th century:
“In that time past, when the Roman state felt the balance swing to the other side, and was changed from its earlier prosperity, and when that city(Constantinople) which stood in front and had power over all others resolved to submit to its fate(1204); and the happiness of the whole empire was at once turned aside and thence fell sick with some parts being taken, others endangered, and others expecting to be, terrible things were everywhere at once; civil wars, assaults of the surrounding barbarians at the advantageous moment, and above all else, this greatest revolution of the affairs of the whole world seemed to be happening, and at the same time there was no small fear that the empire, and greater and more august than all these on earth, would be whole taken and destroyed. Would not have one feared that this city(Nicaea), that she might too be involved in these events, and feel the common fate together with the others? But she nobly resisted the tide of evil, or rather overcame and survived it, that she not only was set as a citadel for the whole Roman state, gladly welcoming the imperial presence which had come to her and giving it first the chance to survive and afterwards pursue its own affairs but, adding further to her benefactions she received the seat of religion, the well-ordered assembly of the church, truly the first and most complete security and bond of union of the affairs of our life, and she received learning itself, which like everything else, was wandering and in danger.”
Nicaea would prove to be the home the Romans needed, Vincent Puech tries to piece together what we know:
“The retreat of Theodore Laskaris to Asia Minor in 1204 is difficult to explain with any precision, although we do possess some clues. some clues. The Laskaris clan may have had its distant origins in the military world of the East, as the etymology of the name suggests: laskar means ‘warrior’ in Persian. What is more, a seal that certainly belonged to the future Theodore I betrays the links of the family with Asia Minor. Its legend mentions a Theodore Komnenos Laskaris, sebastos and protobesiarites: the relationship with the Komnenoi and the high status of both dignity and office strongly suggest that the owner was the future Emperor…the seal dates from before 1203, the year in which Theodore was made Despotes by Alexios III Angelos, who also married him to his daughter Anna, thus placing him next in line to the throne. The seal bears on its reverse the image of St. George Diasorites, a rarely used epithet. The main cult centre for St. George Diasorites was a monastery at Pyrgion in the upper valley of the Kaystros(in Anatolia). It is therefore very likely that Theodore Laskaris maintained some link with Asia Minot before 1203. In 1204 he was acknowledged as military leader(strategos) of northwestern Asia Minor(Bithynia) by the local population, according to Niketas Choniates. During the same period, however, Nicaea refused to recognize his power. He was not proclaimed Emperor until 1205 and not crowned until even later, in 1208, when a new Patriarch(of Constantinople, in exile) was finally elected.”
Mesochites included in his speech that: “When the Empire(Constantinople) was restored, Nicaea returned the glories it guarded(to Constantinople), yet still remains a great city with outstanding qualities.”
DISINTEGRATION AND FALL OF ANATOLIA:
THE FALL OF NICAEA:
In 1331, after a blockade of 2 years, it fell to the Turks. It had strong walls but hunger had forced surrender. A few years later the city was “practically deserted.” Because Nicaea surrendered, it was not violently sacked the way Constantinople was in 1453. However, it was still a terrible experience for the conquered. The Ottoman forces were looking for profits. Surely many of the local Romans would have been disturbed to see the sale of “many sacred books and icons, as well as the relics of two female saints.” Though the people were not killed or enslaved, they certainly would have lost control of their material possessions to the conquerors.
The thriving Roman city then “sank into temporary eclipse. Its condition at that time, which has implications for the last Byzantine period, was described by an indefatigable traveler, Ibn Battuta, who visited Yaznik (as he called it, using an Arbaic form of the Turkish name Ionic) in about 1335,” so four years after the city surrendered. Battuta took note of the city’s impressive fortifications, which had allowed it hold on for a while even as Roman imperial power in Anatolia faded. Though Battuta admired the walls, he “found the area within them practically deserted. The only inhabitants were a few of the Sultan’s men.” He also noted that the “buildings were dilapidated.”
“In its first years under the Ottomans, Nicaea thus barely maintained the appearance of a city. To some extent, this must have been due to the emigration which would have been continuous for the previous half century or more as the frontier moved ever closer and the Turkish raiders became more successful and ubiquitous. People naturally would leave to seek the apparent security of the capital (Constantinople) or the European provinces, while those who stayed behind faced not only attack but the constant disruption of agriculture which could only have brought a reduced supply of food.”
Another major aspect was the demographic decline of this major Christian city in Anatolia. “The Christian community declined rapidly, from natural causes as well as conversion to Islam, whether forced or chosen. Two letters from the Patriarch, written in 1338 and 1340 reveal a situation” where there were forced conversions and a visible loss of Christians in the city. “In spite of this gloomy picture, there were still some professing Christians in 1354 when Gregory Palamas arrived as a captive of the Turks. Since he was allowed considerable freedom of movement within the town, he enquired where the Christians lived and was directed to the neighborhood of the Monastery of ‘the blessed’ Hyacinth. He was delighted by what he found: a beautifully decorated church set in a cool courtyard shaded by abundant trees and containing a well. He took up his losing there.”
The city never reached its the heights it did in the medieval Roman world, but it did recover somewhat in later years. Ever since 1331 it is a place “more remarkable for its past than its present.”
NICAEA/IZNIK TODAY:
Today Iznik is a small town which seems to be more or less within the confines of the Roman walls of the city. It seems like a place which has great potential for tourists to visit, but it is not fully developed nor recognized internationally. It is #2 after Istanbul on my to-visit list in Turkey to see what is left of the Byzantine world.
There are ancient ruins from the classical Roman period, of the theater, remnants of the triumphal arches of Vespasian, but most if it is gone.
SOURCES:
Nicaea: A Byzantine Capital and Its Praises by Clive Foss
Identities and Allegiances in the Eastern Mediterranean After 1204 – Chapter 4: The Aristocracy and the Empire of Nicaea by Vincent Puech
shadowsofconstantinople.com 
