1715-1790 1822-1832






Greece 1790-1822



Although Napoleon contemplated partitioning the Ottoman Empire and undertook an expedition to Egypt in 1798, the Ottoman Empire survived the turbulent years of Napoleon's rule over France territorially unharmed.
Yet the island of CORFU had had a French administration 1807-1815; the remaining IONIAN ISLANDS, no longer Venetian, had been declared a British Protectorate (-1864, since 1815 joined by Corfu). While the reforms implemented by the French Revolution had not reached Greece as far as it was under Ottoman rule, they had gotten pretty close. In addition, the Greek emigrant community had experienced both the reforms and the enthusiastic expectations connected with them.
Romantic nationalism, like a fever, took a hold of Greece's intellectual community. An indicator how much the Orthodox church lost influence to patriotism is the fact that the number of babies given names of pre-christian, classic Greek heroes rose sharply. Patriots discussed the standardization and purification of Greek language.
RIGAS VELESTINLIS, in Vienna, printed a Greek translation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, as well as a text suggesting a new constitution for Rumelia, Asia Minor, the islands of the Aegaean Sea as well as for Moldavia and Wallachia. When entering Ottoman territory, he was arrested (1798), then sentenced and executed. Another patriotic publication was HELLENIC NOMARCHY (1806).
In 1814 the Friendly Society, in Greek PHILIKI ETAIRIA, was founded, the declared goal of which was a liberated motherland.

ALEXANDER YPSILANTIS, a Greek Phanariot, in 1821 lead a force consisting of Greek patriots, the so-called Holy Company or Sacred Band, from Russian Bessarabia across the Pruth River into Moldavia, to raise a major revolt. However the Moldavians were not inspired by the idea of resurrecting a Greek-Byzantian state; Ottoman forces were victorious in the BATTLE OF DRAGATSANI. Ypsilanti had to flee.
Meanwhile in 1820 Sultan Mahmud II. deposed ALI PASHA, pasha (governor) of the Vilayet of Ioannina and virtual ruler of the area since 1787; in 1822 he was assasinated.

In 1800-1802, LORD ELGIN, with a permit by the Sultan, removed the marble friezes from the PARTHENON on the Acropolis in Athens; they are now on display in the British Museum.






EXTERNAL
LINKS 		Biography of Rigas Velestinlis, from Alice in Theaterland
Hellenic Nomarchy : a Discourse of Freedom, by A.D. Karayiannis and D.D. Ithakissios
Biography of Ali Pasha, from infoplease, from Frosina
DOCUMENTS
REFERENCE Richard Clogg, A Concise History of Greece, Cambridge : UP 1992, KMLA Lib.Sign. 949.5 C643a
Article Greece, in : Encyclopaedia Britannica, Macropaedia, 15th edition, vol.20 pp.178-205, KMLA Lib.Sign. R 032 B862n v.20


This page is part of World History at KMLA
First posted on March 20th 2002, last revised on November 7th 2004

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