Tsargrad

For the Russian television channel, see Tsargrad TV.

Tsarigrad or Tsargorod, also Czargrad and Tzargrad, is a Slavic name for the city or land of Constantinople (present-day Istanbul in Turkey), the capital of the Byzantine Empire. It is rendered in several ways depending on the language, for instance:

• Old East Slavic: Цѣсарьградъ, romanized: Tsěsarĭgradŭ;
• Church Slavonic: Царьгра̀дъ, romanized: Tsarĭgràdŭ;
• Belarusian: Царгорад, romanized: Tsarhorad;
• Russian: Царьгра́д, romanized: Tsar'grád;
• Ukrainian: Царгород, romanized: Tsarhorod;
• South Slavic languages: Carigrad / Tsarigrad or Цариград, depending on their alphabets;
• Czech: Cařihrad;
• Slovak: Carihrad;
• Polish: Carogród.

Selim II with the "crown of Tsarigrad", in a 1757 illustration by Wallachia's Constantin Săidăcar ot Mogoșoaia

Tsargrad is an Old Church Slavonic translation of the Greek Βασιλὶς Πόλις. Combining the Slavonic words tsar for "caesar / emperor" and grad for "city", it meant "imperial city". According to Per Thomsen, the Old East Slavic form influenced an Old Norse appellation of Constantinople, Miklagard (Мikligarðr).

Bulgarians also applied the word to Tarnovgrad (Tsarevgrad Tarnov, "Imperial City of Tarnov"), one of the capitals of the tsars of the Bulgarian Empire, but after the Balkans came under Ottoman rule, the Bulgarian word has been used exclusively as another name of Constantinople.

As the zeitgeist which spawned the term has faded, the word Tsargrad is now an archaic term in Russian. It is however still used occasionally in Bulgarian, particularly in a historical context. A major traffic artery in Bulgaria's capital Sofia carries the name Tsarigradsko shose ("Tsarigrad Road"); the road begins as the Tsar Osvoboditel Boulevard and continues into the main highway that leads southeast to Istanbul. The name Tsarigrad is also retained in word groups such as tsarigradsko grozde ("Tsarigrad grapes", meaning "gooseberry"), the dish tsarigradski kyuftentsa ("small Tsarigrad koftas") or sayings like "One can even get to Tsarigrad by asking". In Slovene it is still largely used and often preferred over the official name. People also understand and sometimes use the name Carigrad in Bosnia, Croatia, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The Romance language Romanian borrowed the term as Țarigrad, due to the long tradition of Church Slavonic in Romania, but it is an archaic usage now that has been replaced by Constantinopol and Istanbul. Nowadays, a village in Moldova is called Țarigrad.

See also

• Names of Istanbul
• Constantinople
• Third Rome