The Byzantine Empire can be traced to 330 A.D., when the Roman emperor Constantine I dedicated a “new Rome” on the site of the Greek colony: Byzantium. The western half of the Roman Empire fell in 476, the eastern half survived for 1,000 more years, with a tradition of art, literature and learning and serving as a military buffer between the states of Europe and the threat of invasion from Asia. The Byzantine Empire fell in 1453.