In 1204 the political elite of the Byzantine Empire faced for the first time in its centuries-long history the prospect of a forced relocation from Constantinople, the city of New Rome, to the former provinces. This move led to ruptures with the past and shaped the world in which Theodore Laskaris was born. The fall of Constantinople to the crusaders on the night of April 12, 1204, was traumatic and unexpected. Medieval Christians and Muslims were in rare agreement that Constantinople was a city of wonders. Its concentration of power and wealth was unparalleled: a population of as many as 400,000 inhabitants in the twelfth century, splendid palaces, spectacular public squares adorned with monuments of antiquity, and churches packed with holy relics.1 For centuries the Byzantines knew Constantinople as “the queen of cities,” “the eye of the inhabited world,” and “the navel of the earth” – just a few of the expressions of admiration for the metropolis of New Rome.