Greece, the Hidden Centuries: Turkish Rule From the Fall of Constantinople to Greek Independence

by David Brewer

  For an account of the war may I suggest my own book The Flame of Freedom (in the USA The Greek War of Independence), and its bibliography for other studies. In English the classic histories of the period by participants are by the acerbic George Finlay and by the more balanced Thomas Gordon, both works entitled History of the Greek Revolution. Also in English are the lively and perceptive firsthand accounts by Samuel Howe in An Historical Sketch of the Greek Revolution and in his Letters and Journals. For diplomacy see Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh; and Temperley, The Foreign Policy of Canning.

  1 Pouqueville, Histoire de la régénération de la Grèce, 4 vols, Paris, 1825, vol. II, pp. 325–37

  2 Gordon, vol. II, p. 305

  3 Argenti, The Massacres of Chios, p. 26

  4 Gordon, vol. I, p. 222

  5 Kolokotrones, p. 254

  6 Howe, An Historical Sketch, pp. 78–9

  7 Trikoúpis, vol. III, pp. 34–5

  8 Gordon, vol. II, p. 174

  9 Howe, Letters and Journals, p. 90

  10 Gordon, vol. II, p. 283

  11 Gordon, vol. I, p. 183

  12 Webster, p. 376

  13 Temperley, p. 329

  14 Temperley, p. 349

  15 Woodhouse, Navarino, London, 1964, pp. 53–4

  Chapter 23: One Man’s War – Nikólaos Kasomoúlis (pp. 256–67)

  References to Kasomoúlis are to his two-volume Enthimímata Stratiotiká (Military Reminiscences), written in somewhat idiosyncratic Greek helpfully amended and annotated by Iánnis Vlachoyánnis. Karaïskákis’ trial is covered in detail, with a strong pro-Karaïskákis slant, in Ilías Papasteriópoulos, I Dhíki tou Karaïskáki (The Trial of Karaïskákis) referred to below as Dhíki.

  1 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 133

  2 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 160

  3 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 218

  4 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 203

  5 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 296

  6 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 341

  7 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 343

  8 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 393

  9 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 456

  10 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 455

  11 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 221

  12 Kolokotrones, p. 141

  13 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 265

  14 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 363

  15 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 448

  16 Dhíki, pp. 71–2

  17 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 383

  18 Kasomoúlis, vol. I, p. 387

  19 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, p. 94

  20 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, p. 192

  21 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, p. 249

  22 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, p. 243

  23 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, p. 270 and n. 8

  24 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, pp. 289–90

  25 Kasomoúlis, vol. II, pp. 670–1

  Chapter 24: Some Conclusions (pp. 268–74)

  For Seferis see the excellent biography by Roderick Beaton, George Seferis. The Anglicised form of his name was used by Seferis himself and is adopted here. Other quotations of Seferis are from the periodical Agenda of winter 1969 and Philip Sherrard, The Wound of Greece.

  1 Cartledge, pp. 12–13

  2 Kolokotrones, tr. Edmonds, p. 139

  3 Sherrard, p. 97

  4 Beaton, p. 276

  5 Leigh Fermor, pp. 103, 100

  6 Agenda, p. 54

  7 Sherrard, p. 112

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  Beaton, R., George Seferis, Yale, 2003.

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  Plates

  1 Sultan Mehmed II (ruled 1451–81), the conqueror of Constantinople, and Yennádhios Scholários, the first Greek patriarch under Turkish rule. Their discussions were amicable and wide ranging.

  2 Sultan Suleyman I (ruled 1520–66), known as ‘the Magnificent’ or ‘the Lawgiver’, school of Titian, c.1530–40, In Suleyman’s reign Ottoman power was at its height.

  3 Turkish high art. A late-sixteenth-century flask of rock crystal, gold, emerald and ruby.

  4 By contrast, Turkish torture by bastinado (beating the soles of the feet), from a late-sixteenth-century Austrian illuminated manuscript.

  5 Boys conscripted by the devshirme, or child-collection, being paraded in their new uniforms. Also Austrian, late sixteenth century.

  6 ‘Greece – The Wounded Patriot’, by F.P. Stephanoff: a scene from the war of independence. The palm trees in the background suggest that the Greeks are resisting Ibrahim’s 1825 invasion from Egypt. One foreground object is a Bible, and the picture encapsulates the three sources of Greek inspiration – family, religion and fighting spirit.

  Dressed to kill

  7 A Cretan warrior of Sphakiá from the Venetian period.

  8 A janissary colonel of the early nineteenth century.

  9 Nikólaos Gízis, ‘Education in the Time of Slavery’, showing the supposedly secret school, with an armed guard in the shadows on the right.

  10 The Venetian mortar shell that wrecked the Parthenon in 1687.

&nbs
p; 11 A watchful Greek shipmaster and

  12 his somnolent crew, early nineteenth century.

  13 A girl of Chíos, by George Rumpf, dated c.1768–9. Travellers often commented on the striking dress and saucy manner of the Chíos girls.

  14 By contrast, a rather more sedate girl of Náxos.

  15 Extracting Lemnian earth. A woodcut of 1575 from A. Thevet, Cosmographie Universelle (Paris, 1575). The Greeks doing the extracting, holding banners and crosses, are just visible in the middle distance. The Turks doing the exporting are prominent in the foreground.

  16 The importance of going to church. The priest on the tower beats the wooden símantron to summon the faithful, while devils beguile those who stay in bed. Early nineteenth-century wall painting from a village church in Pílion.

  17 A Balkan brigand, armed to the teeth, by Carl Haag.

  Two prophets of revolution

  18 Rígas Pheréos.

  19 Adhamántios Koraḯs.

  20 Greece as a destitute and oppressed maiden, standing beside a ruined statue of Homer. An illustration from Koraḯs’ work Trumpet Call to War – though Koraḯs thought the war of independence was premature.

  Dramatisation of the war of independence, then and later.

  21 A The bereaved mother prepares to commit suicide at the fall of Mesolongi (de Lansac, 1828).

  22 Angels in brigand dress attend the birth of Kolokotrónis (Thémis Tsirónis, 1986).