İznik @ Travel Turkey

Turkey wants its Iznik pottery back from France
Turkey wants back its historical Iznik ceramics that were illegally transferred to France amid restoration works during the Ottoman Empire period. Iznik ceramics, named after Iznik town of the northwestern province of Bursa where the material ... March 18, 2011
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=turkey-wants-back-iznik-...

It served as the interim capital city of the Byzantine Empire between 1204 and 1261, following the Fourth Crusade in 1204, until the recapture of Constantinople by the Byzantines in 1261.

The city lies in a fertile basin at the eastern end of Lake İznik, bounded by ranges of hills to the north and south. It is situated with its west wall rising from the lake itself, providing both protections from siege from that direction, as well as a source of supplies, which would be difficult to cut off. The lake is large enough that it cannot be blockaded from the land easily, and the city was large enough to make any attempt to reach the harbour from shore-based siege weapons very difficult.

The city is surrounded on all sides by 5 km (3 mi) of walls about 10 m high. These are in turn surrounded by a double ditch on the land portions, and also include over 100 towers in various locations. Large gates on the three-landbound sides of the walls provide the only entrance to the city.

Today the walls are pierced in many places for roads, but much of the early work survives and as a result it is a major tourist destination.

According to some sources General Lysimachus in 301 BC renamed it Nicaea, in tribute to his wife Nicaea, a daughter of Antipater. According to another account, Nicaea was founded by men from Nicaea near Thermopylae, who had served in the army of Alexander the Great.

The city was built on an important crossroads between Galatia and Phrygia, and thus saw steady trade.

Christian Nicaea

In the reign of Constantine, 325, the celebrated First Council of Nicaea was held there against the Arian heresy, and the prelates there defined more clearly the concept of the Trinity and drew up the Nicene Creed. The doctrine of the Trinity was finalized at the Council of Constantinople in 381 AD which expressly included the Holy Ghost as equal to the Father and the Son. The first Nicene Council was probably held in what would become the now ruined mosque of Orchan. The church of Hagia Sophia was built by Justinian I in the middle of the city in the 6th century (modeled after the larger Hagia Sophia in Constantinople), and it was there that the Second Council of Nicaea met in 787 to discuss the issues of iconography.

The Church of the Dormition, the principal church of Nicaea was probably the most important Byzantine cathedral in Asia Minor. It was decorated with very fine mosaics from the 9th century. The church was destroyed by the Turks in 1922.

İznik remains a titular see of the Roman Catholic Church, Nicaenus; the seat has been vacant since the death of its last bishop in 1976.

Iznik Article on Wikipedia

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