Plausibility Check: Taking Constantinople by Sea

During the late 16th century, would a large fleet (we'll just use the fleet from Lepanto: 206 galleys, 6 galleasses, ~30,000 troops and 1800 cannon) be able to sail through the straits, into the Golden Horn, break down the walls with broadsides, and take the city by storm, or would it just be a horrendous, murderous death trap for the attackers?
 
I think it would be suicidal. A large fleet would have it numerical advantage negated when fighting through a narrow strait, and the defending Turkish fleet would be supported by large shore batteries, including the massive Dardanelles Gun.
 

TinyTartar

Banned
This would be difficult for a few reasons. First, you need to eliminate the Ottoman fleet. Drawing them into battle might be easy in the Aegean, however, but even if you decimate the entire Ottoman fleet, and get into the Sea of Marmara, Constantinople is going to be defended by A LOT of troops, way too many to take the city with a fleet and some spare soldiers. The Ottomans could levy massive armies basically up until after their wars with Catherine, and for this attack to have any chance at success, the Austrians or whoever need to have cleared much of the Balkans of Ottomans and taken down a fair amount of them. A joint attack has a chance to succeed, but a fleet alone? No way.
 
IF the Ottoman fleet can be drawn out and annihilated and IF a larger army starts causing trouble in Ottoman Europe, drawing away the main Ottoman army, and then defeating it, then they have a sliver of a chance of success.

Although I'm sure it would be easier to land the army in Anatolia and just cut off the city from all directions, save the north (though a nominal Polish force could provide a northern blockade if the Ottoman fleet is gone), rather than trying to storm the city.
 
The way I'm picturing it, the Ottomans have stripped their defenses of Constantinople to take another crack at Vienna, and they still haven't recovered after the defeat at Lepanto.
 
Amphibious assaults aren't particularly easy even in the best of times, and certainly aren't easy in this time period. Look at the length of the various sieges of that period; Crete held out for decades, and of course Malta repelled an Ottoman assault. The city would never be completely denuded, and even a reasonably small force could hold out long enough for Ottoman reinforcements to come. That's especially the case because resupplying the attackers would probably be even more difficult than resupplying the defenders in this scenario.

Nor could you realistically count on a surprise attack; an army that size would draw attention.
 
Were there less heavily fortified ports on the Aegean that could be taken by storm? Thessalonica's entire population was perhaps half the number of marines in the fleet, and isn't far from Constantinople (though of course the rough terrain of Greece increases the practical distance).

From there, could the Holy League's army overcome the walls of Constantinople by land, assuming the Austrians keep the main Turkish army bogged down along the Danube? They're quite famous, and held out well against Ottoman guns in the mid 15th century, but would they be able to stand up to late 16th century artillery?
 

TinyTartar

Banned
Would the presence of a large Christian and Jewish population within the city assist matters, say opening a gate at the right time?

The Jewish population descended largely from refugees from, you guessed it, Spain, the only power with the ability to carry out this kind of thing in the time period.

The Christian population were mostly Greek Orthodox Christians or Italian Merchants, neither of whom would benefit from the fall of the Sublime Porte.

Now, having an Ottoman Sultan in OTL be super oppressive to these groups, like some of the incompetent later Sultans were, would be something to look at, but the Ottomans up until this period in time had mostly pretty good rulers and were at the peak of their power.
 
During the late 16th century, would a large fleet (we'll just use the fleet from Lepanto: 206 galleys, 6 galleasses, ~30,000 troops and 1800 cannon) be able to sail through the straits, into the Golden Horn, break down the walls with broadsides, and take the city by storm, or would it just be a horrendous, murderous death trap for the attackers?

You know in order to bring a wall down you need to keep fire concentrated on a fairly narrow zone so that repeated ball strikes first soften the outer face and then carve a channel into the wall with provokes a collapse? That unlike batteries on land ships move? They bob with the current, they shift with the wind and they rise and fall according to the tide?

Getting into said death trap is going to be quite the challenge.
 
You know in order to bring a wall down you need to keep fire concentrated on a fairly narrow zone so that repeated ball strikes first soften the outer face and then carve a channel into the wall with provokes a collapse? That unlike batteries on land ships move? They bob with the current, they shift with the wind and they rise and fall according to the tide?

Getting into said death trap is going to be quite the challenge.

Could you have put that more condescendingly? [By the way, I'm well aware of the 3-1 rule regarding coastal vs naval artillery.]

Regardless, an alternative to breaking through the walls themselves was to to attack the gates (the Ever Victorious Army used this as standard procedure when assaulting walled cities in China); Constantinople had dozens of gates facing the sea on both north and south faces. These fortifications had been previously overcome by the Venetians during the Fourth Crusade, and they didn't have the benefit of massed gunpowder weapons to multiply their offensive power.
 
Could you have put that more condescendingly? [By the way, I'm well aware of the 3-1 rule regarding coastal vs naval artillery.]

Regardless, an alternative to breaking through the walls themselves was to to attack the gates (the Ever Victorious Army used this as standard procedure when assaulting walled cities in China); Constantinople had dozens of gates facing the sea on both north and south faces. These fortifications had been previously overcome by the Venetians during the Fourth Crusade, and they didn't have the benefit of massed gunpowder weapons to multiply their offensive power.

Not without consciously trying no...since that was not however my intention my apologies.

The problem here though is not the ratio of artillery but that your artillery is not up to the job due to the constraints on its accuracy.

That said you may be able to attempt some kind of escalade under covering fire from the ships...I am not quite sure what kind of fighting tops they could have improvised...I don't believe they were standard on galleys but even hoisting boats up to the upper masts might give handgunners a good field of fire against the defenders.
 
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