Hellas Reborn: The Modern
Greek Nation-State
A Balkan Problem of Identity
 Greece as part of the Roman Empire and its
continuance in the Byzantine Empire
 ‘Romeic’ identity: Rhomaioi
 Doctrinal schisms (Greek Orthodox vs. Roman
Catholic)
 May 29, 1453: Fall of Constantinople to Ottoman
Turks
“Greekness” and the Ottoman Past:
‘Oriental’ or ‘Occidental’?
“…uncertainty gave Greece’s accession to the European Community as
its tenth member in 1981 a particular significance, for, aside from the
perceived economic and political benefits of accession, it seemed to set
the seal in an unambiguous way on her ‘Europeanness’. The Greek
national movement had been remarkable in that it was the first to
develop in a non-Christian environment, that of the Ottoman empire.
One hundred and fifty years later, Greece’s full membership of the
European Community was significant in that she was the first country
with a heritage of Orthodox Christianity and Ottoman rule and with a
pattern of historical development that marked her out from the existing
members to enter the Community.”
~ Richard Clogg, Concise History of Greece
Steps Towards a Greek Nation
 1748: Birth of Adamantios Korais at Smyrna,
intellectual giant in Greek national revival.
 1806: Publication of Elliniki Nomarkhia,
important polemical text of Greek national
movement.
 1814: Philiki Etairia (Friendly Society) formed
at Odessa, lays groundwork for war of
independence.
Birth Pangs
 1821 (February): Greek army commanded by General
Alexandros Ypsilantis invades Moldavia
 1821(March): Rebellion in the Peloponnesus
 1822: Proclamation of first constitution of an
independent Greece
 1827 (July): Treaty of London--England, France, and
Russia agree to ‘peacefully interfere’ in securing Greek
autonomy
 1832: Convention of London: monarchical and
independent Greece of King Otto (of Bavaria)
Greece in the 19th-Century
 1834: Athens replaces Nauplion as capital
 1844: Promulgation of New Constitution
 1862: Army Coup dethrones Otto
 1863: Ascension of King George I
 1897: Greeks defeated in thirty-day war
against Ottoman Turks arising from
rebellion in Crete
Letter of
commendation,
Philiki Etaria
Megali Idea and Tourkokratia: Greek
Irrendentism
 1910: Eleftherios Venizelos becomes Prime Minister
 1912: First Balkan War--Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria and
Montenegro attack Ottoman empire
 1913: King George I assassinated in Salonica;
succeeded by King Constantine I
 Second Balkan War--Greece and Serbia repel
Bulgarian attack; Treaty of Bucharest (August) =
Macedonia largely shared by Greece and Serbia
 1916: Venizelos establishes provisional government in
Salonica
 1917: Constantine leaves Greece (June); succeeded by
his son, Alexander
Expansion of Greek State, 1832 - 1947
Military Offensive and Disaster
 1919 (May): Landing of Greek troops at Izmir
(Smyrna)
 1920: Treaty of Sevres = Greece “of the two
continents and the two seas”
 1921: Greeks advance on Ankara; checked at
the Battle of the Sakarya River
 1922: Greek armies driven from Asia Minor
(August/September). Greeks evacuate Smyrna
September 8
Richard Clogg on Greek Failure in
Asia Minor
“The chaotic rout of the Greek forces in
Asia Minor at the hands of the Turkish
nationalists under Mustafa Kemal
(Ataturk) signalled the collapse of the
‘Great Idea’ and an ignominious end to
Greece’s ‘civilising mission’ in the Near
East.”
Modern Greece in the Drama of
Modern Europe
 1930: Ankara Convention begins reconciliation with
Turkey
 1936: Communists control government; death of
Venizelos; Dictatorship of General Metaxas established (4
August 1936-January 1941)
 1941: German invasion of Greece; foundation of National
Liberation Front (EAM)
 1943-4: Civil war and army mutinies
 1946: Restoration of King George II
 1949: Communists Party announces formal cessation of
hostilities; end of civil war
General Ioannis Metaxas, Dictator 1936-41
1950-early 2000s: Greece in the
World Today
 1947 (March): Truman Doctrine results in massive
military and economic assistance to Greece
 1951: Member of NATO
 Troubles in Cyprus (enosis [union])

1974: Turkish invasion of Cyprus (US’s role (?) and the
‘Green Line’)
 1981: Member of European Community
 Dependence on Tourist Dollars; Trading on
Classical Past (?); Olympic Games (Athens
awarded Summer Games in 2004)
The Cultural Politics of the Metaxas
Regime (1936-1941)
“In imitation of Hitler’s Third Reich Metaxas
elaborated the notion of the ‘Third Hellenic
Civilisation’. The first was that of ancient Greece,
the second that of medieval Byzantium, the third
being an amalgam of the essentially contradictory
values of both which would enshrine and perpetuate
the values of his regime.”
~Clogg, Concise History of Greece
Cultural Politics
Ancient Greece
in
Modern Greece
Topographies of Hellenism: The
Burden of the Past?
“A recurring question in Neohellenism’s debate about its
national fate concerns the physical depth and expanse of
its cultural terrain. In this discussion, Greeks link the
fate of their territory to the literary and artistic heritage
of classical Greece. Furthermore, they attempt to specify
the physical features of this inheritance. Then they set
their administrative sights on embracing the larger
geographical territory that reveals traces of these
features.”
~ Artemis Leontis, Topographies of Hellenism: Mapping
the Homeland
Benedict Anderson’s Imagined
Communities
Nation as an ‘imagined community,’
imagined as inherently limited and
sovereign. Nationalism grew out of the
systems of religious community and the
dynastic realm and was made possible by
mass communications and print
capitalism (“community in anonymity…is
the hallmark of modern nations”)
Barth on Ethnic Strategies
Ethnic identities are socio-cultural constructions; they are
not primordial, but rather fluid, attitudinal, and selective.
“It seems first of all to be quite clear that any concept of
ethnic group defined on the basis of ‘cultural content’ will
not suffice as a tool for the analysis of ethnicity in its various
interactional contexts. Only when ethnic distinction,
stratification, or dichotomization are part of the individual’s
or group’s strategies for preserving or increasing control of
resources, social status or other values is a meaningful
interpretation feasible.”
~ Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Culture Difference
Academy of Athens, 1886
Adamantios Korais and the Vision of
Classical Greece
“For the first time the nation surveys the hideous spectacle of
its ignorance and trembles in measuring with the eye the
distance separating it from its ancestors’ glory. This painful
discovery, however, does not precipitate the Greeks into
despair: We are the descendants of Greeks, they implicitly
told themselves, we must try to become again worthy of the
name, or we must not bear it.”
~before a Parisian audience in 1803