Constantine XI Palaiologos

Constantine XI Palaiologos was the last emperor of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. On 29 May 1453, during the Ottoman Siege of Constantinople, he personally led the defending forces, estimated at about 7000, against an Ottoman force numbering up to ten times that, dying in the ensuing combat. His death marked the end of the Roman Empire, which had survived in the East as the Byzantine Empire for nearly a millineum after the collapse of the Western provinces in AD 476.