Hippodrome of Constantinople 1953–1976. Hippodrome of Constantinople The Hippodrome of Constantinople () was a circus that was the sporting and social centre of Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire. Today it is a square named "Sultanahmet Meydanı" ("Sultan Ahmet Square") in the Turkish city of Istanbul, with a few fragments of the original structure surviving. The word "hippodrome" comes from the Greek "hippos" (), horse, and "dromos" (δρόμος), path or way. For this reason, it is sometimes also called "Atmeydanı" ("Horse Square") in Turkish. Horse racing and chariot racing were popular pastimes in the ancient world and hippodromes were common features of Greek
Timeline of the name "Palestine" strong similarity between the word Palestine and the Greek word "palaistês" (wrestler/rival/adversary), which has the same meaning as the word "Israel". This was expanded by David Jacobson to theorize the name being a portmanteau of the word for Philistines with a direct translation of the word Israel into Greek (in concordance with the Greek penchant for punning on place names. a. †Coele-Syria b. †Syria Palaestina c. †Achaemenid Empire Timeline of the name "Palestine" This article presents a list of notable historical references to the name Palestine as a place name in the Middle East throughout the history of the region,