Greeks

Greeks
(Έλληνες)

File:Greeks.JPG Ioannis Kapodistrias • Pericles • El Greco • Alexander the Great
Total population
approx. 16,000,000
Regions with significant populations
Greece	10,196,539 (2001 census)
United States	1,291,381a (2005 census)
Cyprus	624,754 (2001 census)
United Kingdom	400,000 (estimated)
Australia	365,147 (2006 census)
Germany	320,000 (2006 estimate)
Canada	215,105 (2001 census)
Russia	97,827 (2002 census)
Ukraine	91,500 (2001 census)
Albania	58,785 (1989 census)
Brazil	40,000 (2008 estimate)
France	35,000 (2008 estimate)
Belgium	30,000 (2008 estimate)
Argentina	25,000 (2008 estimate)
Italy	25,000 (2008 estimate)
Georgia	15,166 (2002 census)
Serbia	15,000 (2008 estimate)
Sweden	14,000 (2008 estimate)
Kazakhstan	12,703 (2008 estimate)
Uzbekistan	9,500 (2008 estimate)
Switzerland	8,340 (2008 estimate)
Elsewhere	see Greek diaspora
Languages
Greek
Religion
Predominantly Greek Orthodox, with Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, Greek Muslim, Protestant, and Dodekatheic minorities.
a An estimated 3,000,000 claim Greek descent.

The Greeks (Greek: Έλληνες [ˈelines]) are a nation and ethnic group defined by a common language and culture who have populated Greece and the various historical centers of the Greek world from the 16th century BC to the present day. Today they are primarily found in the Balkan peninsula of southeastern Europe, the Greek islands, Cyprus, and the Greek diaspora.

Greek colonies and communities have been historically established in most corners of the Mediterranean but Greeks have always been centered around the Aegean coasts, where Greek has been spoken since antiquity. Until the early 20th century Greeks were uniformly distributed between the Greek peninsula, the western coast of Asia Minor, Pontus, Cyprus and Constantinople, regions which coincided to a large extent with the borders of the Byzantine Empire of the late 11th century and the Eastern Mediterranean areas of ancient Greek colonization. In the aftermath of the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) in 1923, a large-scale population exchange between Greece and Turkey transferred and confined ethnic Greeks almost entirely into the borders of the modern Greek state, where groups of Greek-speaking Indo-Europeans first established themselves about 1500 BC, and Cyprus. Other ethnic Greek populations can be found from Southern Italy to the Caucasus and in diaspora communities in a number of other countries. Today, the vast majority of Greeks are at least nominally adherents of Greek Orthodoxy.

History

Greek has been spoken in the Greek peninsula (i.e. the southern Balkan region) for over 3,500 years and in western Asia Minor for a little less. It has an almost unbroken literary history which makes it one of the oldest surviving branches of the Indo-European languages. From Ancient Greece the Greeks have inherited a sophisticated culture and language documented over three millennia.

Greece was the first modern state to be created in the Balkans when the Greeks liberated a part of their historic homelands from the Ottoman Empire. The large Greek Diaspora and merchant class were instrumental in transmitting the ideas of western Romantic nationalism and Philhellenism. These, together with the conception of Hellenism formulated during the last centuries of the Eastern Roman Empire, formed the basis of the Greek Enlightenment.

Mycenaean

Further information: Mycenaean Greece

The proto-Greeks arrived in the area now referred to as 'Greece' (the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula) at the end of the third millenium BC. There they mingled with the native pre-Hellenic populations and by the 16th century BC this fusion had created the civilization we call Mycenaean today. The Mycenaeans were the first Greek speaking people, as attested by the Iliad and Odyssey and later the decipherment of their Linear B script. The language behind the script was found to be an early form of Greek.

The Mycenaeans quickly penetrated the Aegean and by the 15th century BC had reached Rhodes, Crete, Cyprus and the shores of Asia Minor. From 1,200 BC the Dorians, another Greek speaking people, followed from Epirus. The Dorian Migration was followed by a poorly attested period of migrations, appropriately called the Greek Dark Ages, but by 800 BC the landscape of Classical Greece was discernible.

There are some elements of cultural continuity between the Greek Dark Ages or Early Iron Age (1100 BC - 750 BC), and the Archaic and Classical Greece (750 BC onwards) of the Polis. In the Odyssey and the Iliad, the Greeks of Prehistory are viewed as the forefathers of the early classical civilization of Homer's own time. Achilles and Odysseus were viewed by Greeks as prime-examples of the ideal citizen of a Polis.

The Mycenaean pantheon included many of the divinities attested in later Greek religion including Zeus, Poseidon, Athena, Artemis, Ares-"Enyalios", Hermes, Dionysus and Eilithyia. It was also influenced by the Minoan pantheon. There was some continuity of religion and cult from the Late Bronze Age into later Greek times.

Classical

Main article: Ancient Greece

Further information: Ancient Greek dialects and Greek tribes

The classical period of Greek civilization covers a time span from the early fifth century to the death of Alexander the Great, in 323 BC. It is so named because it set the standards by which Greek civilization would be judged in later eras. In that time Greeks contributed significantly to the future development of many arts and sciences creating a legacy of some influence to Western civilization. The ethnogenessis of the Greek nation is marked by the first Olympic Games in 776 BC when the idea of a common Hellenism of the various Greek speaking tribes was first translated into a shared cultural experience. Hellenism was always and supremely a matter of common culture.

Herodotus writes that the Athenians declared, before the battle of Plataea, that they would not go over to Mardonius, because in the first place, they were bound to avenge the burning of the Acropolis; and, secondly, they would not betray their fellow Greeks, to whom they were bound by:

• A common language (

ομόγλωσσον homoglosson – the use of one of the dialects of the Greek language),

• Common blood (

όμαιμον homaimon – descent from Hellen, son of Deucalion),

• Common shrines, statues and sacrifices (practice of the ancient Greek religion)
• Common habits and customs.

As Thucydides observes the name of Hellas spread from a valley in Thessaly to the Greek-speaking populations sometime after the compositions of Homer (the Panellenes of Iliad 2.530 are the troops of Thessaly, contrasting with the Achaeans) and not long before his own time. Hellen, combined into one group the smaller tribes that participated in the Delphic Amphictyon, such as the Aeolians, the Achaeans, and the Dorians.

As early as the 5th century BC, Isocrates, after speaking of common origin and religion, says: "the name Hellenes suggests no longer a race but a culture and education,... the title Hellenes is applied best to those who share our culture rather than to those who share our common blood". Following Alexander the Great's conquests, Greek became the lingua franca of the Eastern Mediterranean and was widely spoken by educated non-Greeks.

Kouros,Archaic period

However, while the Greeks of the Classical era understood themselves to belong to a common Greek ethnicity their first loyalty was to their city and they saw nothing incongruous about warring, brutally and often, with other Greek Polis'. The Peloponnesian War, a large scale Greek "civil" war between Athens and Sparta and their allies, is a notable such incident which highlights the lack of a common national (as opposed to ethnic) identity among Greeks. This local patriotism, (topikismos) remains a part of Greek culture.

Hellenistic

Further information: Hellenistic civilization

File:Cleopatra Bust.jpg

Bust of the queen Cleopatra Thea Philopator of Egypt

When Alexander the Great's armies overthrew the Persian Empire and spread Greek cutlure from the Adriatic to the Indian Ocean they were laying the foundations for a new era. The beginning of the Hellenistic age is usually placed at Elexander's death. This Hellenistic age, so called because it witnessed the partial hellenization of many non-Greek cultures and a combination of Greek, Middle Eastern and Indian elements, lasted until the conquest of Egypt by Rome in 30 BC.

That age saw a move of the Greeks towards larger cities and a reduction in the importance of the city-state in favour of larger cities which were parts of the still larger Kingdoms of the Diadochi. Greeks however remained aware of their past, chiefly through the study of the works of Homer and the Classical authors. An important factor in maintaining Greek identity was contact with barbarian (non-Greek) peoples which was deepened in the new cosmopolitan environment of the multiethnic Hellenistic Kingdoms. This led to a strong desire among Greeks to organize the transmission of Hellenic paideia to the next generation.

In the religious sphere, this was a period of profound change. The spiritual revolution that took place saw a waning of the old Greek religion, whose decline beginning in the 3rd century BC was not arrested and an introduction of new and varied religious movements from the East. The cults of deities like Isis and Mithra were introduced into the Greek world. In the Indo-Greek kingdoms of the East and the Greco-Bactrian a new Hellenized form of a local religion was spreading, Greco-Buddhism and Greco-Buddhist missionaries would play an important role in propagating it to China. Further East, the Greeks of Alexandria Eschate who introduced the cultivation of grapes to the Far East, became known to the Chinese as the Dayuan.

Roman

Main article: Byzantine Greeks

The 11th century Trebizond Gospel was commissioned by the Komnenoi family of Byzantine emperors.

The new Eastern Religions introduced into the Greek world paved the way for the expansion of Christianity among Roman era Greeks. Early Christianity was profoundly shaped by the Greek world of ideas and the Greek speaking Christians (the so called εξ ελλήνων χριστιανοί or Hellenists) formed the majority of the Early Church and provided most of the Greek Fathers. Eventually the word Hellene came to mean a Hellenic polytheist or a pagan in general and Greek speakers reffered to themselves as Rhomaioi (Romans in Greek, an ethnonym still in use today). Distinctions of ethnicity still existed in the Roman empire, but became secondary to religious considerations. The renewed empire used Christianity as a tool to maintain its cohesion and promoted a robust Roman national identity.

The Eastern Roman Empire (which was later misnamed by Western historians as the Byzantine Empire, a name that would have meant nothing to Greek speakers of the era) was dominated by Greek culture to such an extent that Emperor Heraclius (575 CE - 641 CE) finally decided to make Greek the Roman Empire's official language. From then on, the Roman and Greek cultures were virtually fused in the East into a single Greco-Roman world. By that time, the Latin West had began referring to the Eastern Roman Empire as Empire of the Greeks (Imperium Graecorum). Greek speakers at the time however referred to themselves as Rhomaioi (Romans) and were conscious and proud of their Roman Imperial and Christian religious heritages. The works of the Classical authors were transmitted to the present overwhelmingly thanks to those Roman Greeks who never stopped teaching Homer and the Classics and cultivated the philosophical schools of Platonism and Aristotelism for over two millennia, until the Fall of Constantinople in the 15th century.

The Roman Greeks contributed to Western Civilization by their preservation of the literature of the Classical era and subsequent dissemination of the knowledge during the Renaissance to which the influx of Greek scholars in the 15th century gave a major boost. To the Slavic world they contributed by the dissemination of literacy and Christianity. The most notable example of the later was the work of the two Rhomaioi brothers Saints Cyril and Methodius from Thessalonica, who are credited today with inventing the first Slavic alphabet.

Scenes of marriage and family life

A distinct Greek nationalism re-emerged in the 11th century within specific circles and became more forceful after the fall of Constantinople to the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade in 1204, and the establishment of a number of Greek kingdoms (such as the Empire of Nicaea and the Despotate of Epirus). When the empire was revived in 1261, it became in many ways a Greek national state. Adherence to Greek Orthodox rites and the Greek language, became the defining characteristic of it's people. That new notion of nationhood engendered a deep interest in the classical past. There was a powerful secularist tradition in this, culminating in the ideas of the Neo-Platonist Byzantine philosopher George Gemistus Plethon who wished to revive the ancient Greek religion. However it was the combination of Orthodoxy with a specifically Greek identity that shaped the Byzantine Greeks notions of themselves in the empire's twilight years.

Ottoman

Further information: Phanariotes

Hermes o Logios, Greek literary magazine of the 18th and 19th c.

Under the Ottoman Empire's millet system, religion was the defining characteristic of "national" groups (milletler), so the exonym "Greeks" (Rumlar from the name Rhomaioi) was applied by the Ottomans to all members of the Orthodox Church, regardless of their language or ethnic origin. Conversely, those who adopted Islam during that period were considered part of the same Muslim millet, regardless of their language or origin. The Greek speakers were the only ethnic group to actually call themselves Rhomaioi, (as opposed to being so named by others) and some even considered their ethnicity (genos) to be Hellenic. For most Greek speakers however the Hellenes were an ancient, semi-mythical race of giants to whom they were inferior in strength and achievement.

The roots of Greek success in the Ottoman Empire can be traced to the Greek tradition of education and the need of the Ottomans for skilled and educated negotiators as the power of their empire declined and they were compelled to rely on treaties more than force of arms. However it was the wealth of the extensive Greek merchant class that provided the material basis for the intellectual revival that was the prominent feature of Greek life in the half century and more leading to the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence in 1821. Impelled by the brand of local patriotism that has always been of feature of the Greek world they endowed libraries and schools. Not coincidentally, on the eve of 1821 the three most important centres of Greek learning, schools-cum-universities, were situated in Chios, Smyrna and Aivali, all three major centres of Greek commerce. Starting in the 15th century many Greeks sought better employment and education opportunities by leaving for the West, particularly Italy but also Central Europe and Germany as well as Russia.

Modern

Main articles: Diafotismos and Greek War of Independence

Greek heroine Manto Mavrogenous, by Adam Friedel, 1827.

This relationship between ethnic Greek identity and Greek Orthodox religion continued after the creation of the modern Greek state in 1830. According to the second article of the first Greek constitution of 1822 a Greek was defined as any Christian resident of the Kingdom of Greece, a clause removed by 1840. A century later, when the Treaty of Lausanne was signed between Greece and Turkey in 1923, the two countries agreed to use religion as the determinant for ethnic identity for the purposes of population exchange.

While the majority of Greeks today are descended from Greek speaking Rhomioi there are sizeable groups of ethnic Greeks who trace their descent to Aromanian-speaking Vlachs, Albanian-speaking Arvanites and Slavic-speaking Greeks. None of the latter groups were ever considered less Greek than the Rhomioi and their contribution to the liberation and foundation of the modern Greek state was decisive.

In many important respects, the Greek state adhered from its founding to remarkably secular principles. For instance, Jews were granted full citizens rights in 1830, the year Greece's independence was formally recognized, thus making Greece one of the first states in Europe with an emancipated Jewish community.

Today, the deeper integration of Greece into the Western strategic system and the effects of migration (both emigration from Greece in the 1950s and 1960s, and immigration into Greece in more recent years) have led to a perception of multiculturalism similar to that of Western European nations.

Identity

Greek heroine Laskarina Bouboulina, 1827 lithograph.

The terms used to define Greekness have varied throughout history. By Western standards, the term Greeks has traditionally referred to any native speakers of the Greek language, whether Mycenaean, Byzantine or modern Greek. While Byzantine Greeks called themselves Rhomioi, they valued the classical tradition, considered themselves the political heirs of Rome, and deemed themselves the ethnic, cultural, and literary heirs of ancient Greece. The use of the older self-descriptive ethnic term Hellenes begun to be revived during the era following the Greco-Latin clashes between the Greeks and the Western Crusaders in the 12th century. It regained some popularity through its use by late Byzantine Emperors and scholars such as Gemistus Pletho and Ciriaco Pizzicolli. It became fairly common with the emergence, in the late 18th century, of the nation-state and its gradual consolidation, but it was not until the early 19th century that its popular use was firmly re-established.

The Greeks today are a nation in the meaning of an ethnos (έθνος in Greek), defined by possessing Greek culture, and having a Greek mother tongue, rather than by citizenship, race, religion or by being subjects of any particular state. However, Greeks are also identified as a genos (γένος in Greek) in the sense that most share a common ancestry. The term Greek also referred to the Eastern Orthodox Christian inhabitants of the Rum Millet of the Ottoman Empire.

Polyonymity

Main article: Names of the Greeks

Family group on a funerary stele from Athens, National Archaeological Museum, Athens

Throughout the centuries, the Greeks have been known by a number of names, including:

• Hellenes (Έλληνες) - In mythology, Hellen, son of Deucalion and Pyrrha (the Greek equivalents of Adam and Eve and Noah), received from the nymph Orseis three sons, Aeolus, Dorus and Xuthus. Aeolus and Dorus, and two sons of Xuthus, Achaeus and Ion were the legendary founders, respectively, of the four principal tribes of Hellas, the Aeolians, Dorians, Achaeans and Ionians. Originally, only members of a small tribe in Thessaly were called Hellenes, but the term soon extended to the rest of the peninsula and came to encompass all Greek speakers. In early Christian times Hellene came to mean "pagan". It remains in Greece today, the primary national name.
• Greeks (Γραικοί) - In mythology, Graecus was the brother of Latinus and nephew of Hellen. It was the name of a Boeotian tribe (Graii lit. gray) that migrated to the Italian peninsula in the 8th century BCE and, probably through contact with natives there, came to represent all Greek speakers. Aristotle and Apollodorus mention that it was the name used by Greeks before adopting the name Hellenes. It was later re-borrowed as an ethnonym by the Greeks themselves.
• Rhomioi (Ρωμιοί) - Romans is the name by which the Byzantine Greeks called themselves during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages while the term Byzantine would have been meaningless to them. The name in antiquity signified the inhabitants of the city of Rome in Italy, but after Caracalla's decree and the gradual formation of a Roman national identity among imperial subjects, it soon lost its exclusive connection with the Latins. Later, while in the West the term Roman acquired a new meaning in connection with the church and the Pope of Rome the Greek form Romaioi remained attached to the Greeks of the Eastern Roman Empire who still call themselves by that name today. The term Roman (Ρωμαίος) represented for the Greeks their Roman citizenship and the word Romaioi came to represent the Greek inhabitants of the Byzantine Empire. Among Greeks it remains the most often used national name after Hellene and it is used by Turkey to signify the Greek Orthodox minority. It is found also in the Koran; Surah 30 is entitled Ar-Rum, variously translated as The Romans, Byzantines, or Greeks.
• Achaeans, Argives, and Danaans are names used interchangeably by Homer, to signify the Greek allied forces. Danaans is attested in the Aeneid phrase timeo Danaos et dona ferentes, (engl. beware of Greeks bearing gifts)
• Yavan or 'Javan', traditionally in Hebrew, Javan was the name of the tribe (and then the nation) which, according to the Torah, migrated from early Biblical times to establish the Balkan peninsula.
• Yona or Yavana, (Ίωνες), were names used by Indians who encountered Alexander the Great and his successors who ruled areas of Central Asia. Originally from the Persian Yauna, itself a transliteration of the Greek Ionia, is the name by which the Greeks are known in the East today. The term became established in Asia by the Persians, who were in contact with the Ionian tribes in western Asia Minor from the 6th century BC and extended the name to all Hellenes.

Genetic origins

Modern studies have constructed Greek genetic trees revealing a strong degree of homogeneity between Greeks from different geographical locations. Median networks revealed that most of the Greek haplotypes are clustered to the five known haplogroups and that a number of haplotypes are shared among Greeks and other European and Near Eastern populations. Within the loci studied, the genetic composition of the Greeks indicates a significantly low level of heterogeneity compared with other European populations. The levels of the R1a1 haplotype (used to trace possible Slavic ancestry) have been found to be less than 12% (by way of comparison the relevant percentage for Syria is 10% and Poland 60%), thus casting doubt on the thesis that Greeks have "mingled substantially" with Slavic people. Other studies point out the significant frequency drop of the same marker over the short geographic distance between Greece and its northern neighbours.

Modern scholars and scientists have supported the notion that there is a racial connection to the ancient Greeks. Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Paolo Menozzi, and Alberto Piazza, have found evidence of a genetic connection between the ancient and modern Greeks. Recent genetic analyses of Greek populations have provided evidence of statistically significant continuity between ancient and modern Greeks (low admixture attributed to genetic isolation due to physical barriers).

Modern and ancient

The most obvious link between modern and ancient Greeks is their language, which has a documented tradition from at least the 14th century BC to the present day, albeit with a break during the Greek Dark Ages. The Byzantinist Robert Browning, compares its continuity of tradition to Chinese alone.

Some authors in the West and Turkey have sugested that Greeks of today are not culturally or ethnically related to the Greeks of Antiquity. Notable among them was 19th century Austrian historian Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer. Fallmerayer's controversial (some say racist) views were later incorporated in Nazi theoretician Alfred Rosenberg's Der Mythus des 20es Jahrhunderts and found adherents in the Third Reich. who echoed them in their writings. Other Western authors say that it is Westerners who are the "true heirs" of Greece since Greeks today, whom they label "modern Greeks", are the product of "genetic dissonance".

Demographics

Main articles: Demographics of Greece and Demographics of Cyprus

Today Greeks are the majority ethnic group in the Hellenic Republic where they constitute 93% of that country's population and the Republic of Cyprus where they comprise 78% of the island's population (excluding Turkish settlers in the occupied part of the country). Greek populations have not traditionally exhibited high rates of growth; nonetheless the population of Greece has shown regular increase since the country's first census in 1828. Most of the population growth since the state's foundation has resulted from annexation of new territories and the influx of 1.5 million Greek refugees following the 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey. About 80% of the population of Greece is urban with 28% concentrated in the city of Athens.

Greeks from Cyprus have a history of emigration, usually to the English speaking world as a result of the island's colonization by the British Empire. Waves of emigration followed the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974, while the population decreased between mid-1974 and 1977 as a result of emigration, war losses and a temporary decline in fertility. After the ethnic cleansing of a third of the Greek population of the island in 1974 there was also an increase in the number of Greek Cypriots leaving, especially for the Middle East. This contributed to a decrease in population which tapered off in the 1990's. More than two thirds of the Greek population in Cyprus is urban.

There is a sizeable Greek minority of about 60,000 people, in Albania. The Greek minority of Turkey which numbered upwards of 200,000 people after the 1923 exchange has now dwindled to a few thousand, following the 1955Istanbul Pogrom and other state sponsored violence and discrimination. There are also smaller Greek minorities in the rest of the Balkan countries, the Levant and the Black Sea states, remnants of the Old Greek Diaspora (pre-19th century).

The New Greek Diaspora (post-19th century) has mainly been towards the Western, in particular the English-speaking, World. The Greek population outside Greece and Cyprus is around 5 million, though estimates vary. The trend towards migration to the (modern) West began in the 15th century and continues to this day as Greeks are attracted to the educational and professional opportunities available in the Western World. After Greece the second largest concentration of Greeks in one country is in the United States, while New York and Melbourne are among the largest "Greek" cities.

Diaspora

Main article: Greek diaspora

The total number of Greeks living outside Greece and Cyprus today is a contentious issue. Where Census figures are available it shows around 3 million Greeks outside of Greece and Cyprus. Estimates provided by the Council of Hellenes Abroad {SAE} put the figure at around 7 million worldwide. According to George Prevelakis of Sorbonne University the number is closer to just below 5 million. Integration, intermarriage and loss of the Greek language also influence the definition and self-definition of Greeks of the Diaspora.Important centres of the New Greek Diaspora today are Chicago, London, New York, Melbourne and Toronto. Recently a law was passed by the Hellenic Parliament that enables Diaspora Greeks to vote in the elections of the Greek state.

Old

Greek Diaspora 6th c. BC

In ancient times the trading and colonising activities of the Greek tribes and city states spread people of Greek culture, religion and language around the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins, especially in Sicily, southern Italy, Spain, the South of France and the Black sea coasts. Under Alexander the Great's Empire Greek ruling classes were established in the Middle East, India and in Egypt. The Hellenistic period is characterized by a new wave of Greek colonization which established Greek cities and Kingdoms in Asia and Africa. Under the Roman Empire movement of people spread Greeks across the Empire and in the eastern territories Greek became the lingua franca rather than Latin. The Roman Empire became Christianized in the fourth century AD, and in the Byzantine period practice of the Greek Orthodox form of Christianity became a defining hallmark of Greek identity.

New

Greek Diaspora 20th c.

During and after the Greek War of Independence, Greeks of the Diaspora were important in establishing the fledgling state, raising funds and awareness abroad. Greek merchant families already had contacts in other countries and during the disturbances many set up home around the Mediterranean (notably Marseilles in France, Livorno in Italy, Alexandria in Egypt), Russia (Odessa and St Petersburg), and Britain (London and Liverpool) from where they traded, typically in textiles and grain. Businesses frequently comprised the whole extended family, and with them they brought schools teaching Greek and the Greek Orthodox church. As markets changed and they became more established, some families grew their operations to become shippers, financed through the local Greek community, notably with the aid of the Ralli or Vagliano Brothers. With economic success the Diaspora expanded further across the Levant, North Africa, India and the USA.

In the twentieth century many Greeks left the traditional homelands for economic reasons resulting in large migrations from Greece and Cyprus to the United States, Great Britain, Australia, Canada, Germany and South Africa, especially after the Second World War (1939-45) the Greek Civil War (1946-49) and the Turkish Invasion of Cyprus in 1974.

Culture

Language

Main article: Greek language

from a 6th century Iliad

Greeks speak the Greek language, an Indo-European language which forms a branch in itself, although it is more closely related to Armenian (see also Graeco-Armenian) and the Indo-Iranian languages. It has the longest documented history of any language in the branch. Greek literature has a continuous history of nearly 3,000 years, and has been written in the Greek alphabet since the 9th century BCE.

Greek demonstrates several linguistic features that are shared with Romanian, Albanian and Bulgarian (see Balkan sprachbund), and has absorbed numerous foreign words (primarily of Western European or Turkish origin). Due to the movements of Philhellenism and the Neohellenic Enlightenment in the 19th century, which emphasized the modern Greeks' ancient heritage, these foreign influences were excluded from official use via the creation of Katharevusa, a somewhat artificial form of Greek purged of all foreign influence and words, as the official language of the Greek state. In 1976, however, the Greek parliament voted to make Dhimotiki (based on the dialect of the Peloponnese) the official language, making Katharevusa obsolete.

Greek has a wide variety of dialects of varying levels of mutual intelligibility, which in addition to official variety (Standard Modern Greek - Κοινή Νεοελληνική), include the Cypriot, Pontic, Cappadocian, Griko (Calabrian Greek) and Tsakonian (the only surviving representative of ancient Doric Greek) varieties. Yevanic, also known as Romaniote or Judeo-Greek, is the language of the Greek Jews (Romaniotes), and survives in small communities in Greece, New York and Israel.

In addition to Greek, many Greeks in Greece are bilingual in other languages. Such languages include Arvanitic, Aromanian (also known as Vlach), Slavic (also known as Dopia), Russian, Italian, English, and Turkish. In the Diaspora, Greeks also speak the languages of the areas in which they live. Some members of the Diaspora cannot speak Greek, but are still considered Greeks by ethnic origin or descent.

Religion

See also: Roman Catholicism in Greece, Islam in Greece, and Jews in Greece

from a 4th-century Bible

The majority of Greeks are Eastern Orthodox Christians, belonging to the Greek Orthodox Church. During the first centuries after Christ, the New Testament was originally compiled in Koine Greek language, which is mutually intelligible with modern Greek to a great extent, as most of the early Christians and Churhc Fathers were Greek speakers. While the Orthodox Church was always intensely hostile to the old religion it did help Greeks retain their sense of identity during the Ottoman rule through its use of Greek in the liturgy and its modest educational efforts. There are also small groups of ethnic Greeks adhering to other Christian denominations or religions. The main heterodox denominations in the Greek world are Greek Jews, Greek Catholics, Greek Muslims, Greek Evangelicalsand other Protestant groups.

About 2,000 people are members of Dodekatheism congregations. The leaders of the movement put the number much higher: from 100,000 or 200,000 (1%, 2% of the total) to 400,000 (4%) Recently, Neopagans have been subject to discrimination.

Art

Main article: Greek art

File:CallasVioletta1956.jpg

Maria Callas 1956

Greek art has a long and varied history. Greeks have made several contributions to the visual, literary and performing arts. In the West ancient Greek art was influential in shaping the Roman and later the modern Western artistic heritage. Following the Renaissance in Europe, the humanist aesthetic and the high technical standards of Greek art inspired generations of European artists. Well into the 19th century, the classical tradition derived from Greece played an important part the art of the Western World. In the East, Alexander the Great's conquests initiated several centuries of exchange between Greek, Central Asian and Indian cultures, resulting in Greco-Buddhist art, whose influence reached as far as Japan.

Byzantine Greek art, which grew from classical art, provided a stimulus to the art of many nations. It's influences can be traced from Venice in the West to Kazakhstan in the East and Byzantine art is one of the most striking features of that civilization.

In turn Greek art was influenced by Eastern Civilizations in Classical Antiquity and the new religion of Orthodox Christianity during Byzantine times while modern Greek art is heavily influenced by Western art. Notable Greek artists include Renaissance painter El Greco, nobel laureate poets George Seferis and Odysseas Elitis, soprano Maria Callas, and composer Vangelis.

Science

Further information: Greek mathematics, Medicine in ancient Greece, and Byzantine science

File:Nicholas negroponte.jpg

Nicholas Negroponte

The Greeks of the Classical era made several notable contributions to science and helped lay the foundations of modern scientific principles. The scholarly tradition of the Greek academies was maintained during Roman times with several academic institutions in Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria and other centres of Greek learning. Byzantine science was essentially classical science.

The Greek world has a long tradition of valuing and investing in padeia (education). Paideia was one of the highest societal values in the Greek and Hellenistic world while the first European institution described as a university was founded in 9th century Constantinople and operated in various incarnations until the city's fall to the Ottomans in 1453. The University of Constantinople was also Christian Europe's first secular institution of higher learning since no theological subjects were taught.

As of 2007 Greece had the eighth highest percentage of tertiary enrolment in the world (with the percentages for female students being higher than for male) while Greeks of the Diaspora are equally active in the field of education. Hundreds of thousands of Greek students attend Western universities every year while the faculty lists of leading Western universities contain a striking number of Greek names. Notable Greek scientists of modern times include Georgios Papanikolaou (inventor of the Pap test), Nicholas Negroponte,Constantin Carathéodory, Michael Dertouzos, and Dimitri Nanopoulos.

Symbols

National flag of Greece The national emblem of Greece The national emblem of Greece

The double-headed eagle flag of the Greek Orthodox Church The double-headed eagle flag of the Greek Orthodox Church The pre-1978 flag of Greece

The most widely used symbol used by Greeks is the flag of Greece, which features nine equal horizontal stripes of blue alternating with white representing the nine syllables of the Greek national motto "Ελευθερία ή θάνατος" (Eleftheria i thanatos – freedom or death), which was also the motto of the Greek War of Independence. The blue square in the upper hoist-side corner bears a white cross, which represents Greek Orthodox Christianity. The Greek flag is also widely used by the Greek community in Cyprus (which has officially adopted a neutral flag so as to ease ethnic tensions with the Turkish minority – see flag of Cyprus), and by the Greek minority in Albania, which has led to ethnic clashes with the ethnic Albanian majority.).

The pre-1978 (and first) flag of Greece, which features a Greek cross (crux immissa quadrata) on a blue background, is widely used as an alternative to the official flag, and they are often flown together. The national emblem of Greece features a blue escutcheon with a white cross totally surrounded by two laurel branches. A common design involves the current flag of Greece and the pre-1978 flag of Greece with crossed flagpoles and the national emblem placed in front.

Another highly recognizable and popular Greek symbol is the double-headed eagle, the imperial emblem of the Byzantine Empire and a common symbol in Eastern Europe. It is not currently part of the modern Greek flag or coat of arms, although it is officially the insignia of the Greek Army and the flag of the Church of Greece. It had been incorporated in the Greek coat of arms between 1925 and 1926.

Surnames

See: Greek surname

Greek surnames are most commonly patronymics. Occupation, characteristic and location/origin-based surnames names also occur. Prior to the introduction of written records in the 19th century, surnames were not formally maintained and could be changed by occupation or characteristic. After the advent of widespread written records, surnames have remained constant handed down from father to children.

Some surnames are prefixed with Papa-, indicating ancestry from a priest. Archi- and Mastro- signify "first" and "tradesman" respectively. Prefixes such as Konto-, Makro-, and Chondro-, describe body characteristics, such as "short", "tall/long" and "fat". "Gero-" and "Palaio-" signify "old" or "wise". Other prefixes include Hadji- which was an honorific deriving from the Arabic Hadj or pilgrimage, and indicate that the person had made a pilgrimage (in the case of Christians to Jerusalem) and Kara- which is attributed to the Turkish word for "black" deriving from the Ottoman era.

Most Greek patronymic suffixes are diminutives, which vary by region. The most common Hellenic patronymic suffixes are -poulos/-poulou (From Peloponessus, a suffix which means "the little", representing "the son of " i.e. "Michalopoulos", the "son of Michael" or "Papadopoulos", the "son of the priest"). The suffix -akis/-aki is associated primarily with Crete but also Mani, where it is rendered -akos/-akou, and the Aegean islands, is a patronymic signifying "little" and "son of". It became almost universal by the mid 20th century in Crete, but was only adopted there in the 19th century. The suffix -idis-ides/-idou or -iadis/-iadou is the oldest last name and clan form in use and is associated with Greeks originating in Asia Minor and the Pontus. It is also analogous to the English -son. Zeus, for example was also referred to as Cronides ("son of Cronus").

Sea

Main article: Greek shipping

6th century map by Cosmas Indicopleustes.

The traditional Greek homelands have been the Greek peninsula and the Aegean, the Black Sea and Ionian coasts of Asia Minor, the islands of Cyprus and Sicily and the south of the Italian peninsula. In Plato's Phaidon Socrates remarks that "we (Greeks) live like ants or frogs around a pond". This image is attested by the map of the Old Greek Diaspora, which corresponded to the Greek world until the creation of the Greek state in 1832. The sea and trade were natural outlets for Greeks since the Greek peninsula is rocky and does not offer good prospects for agriculture.

The sea has always been a defining feature of Greek culture, with numerous songs and poems about the sea and seascapes attested in Greek art. In war among the many battles that the Greek Nation was called to fight the most decisive one was the sea battle at Salamis which has been described as one of the most important battles in history. A notable Greek explorer was the 6th century merchant and later monk Cosmas Indicopleustes ("Cosmas who sailed to India"). In later times the Rhomioi plied the sea-lanes of the Mediterranean and controled trade untill an embargo imposed by the Roman Emperor on trade with the Muslims opened the door for the later Italian pre-eminence in trade.

The Greek shipping tradition recovered during the Ottoman rule when a substantial merchant middle class developed, aided in part by the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca (21 July, 1774) between the Ottoman Empire and the Russian Empire. It granted Russia some economic and political rights in the Ottoman Empire, such as allowing Ottoman Eastern Orthodox Christians to sail under the Russian flag. This was in effect a Russian guarantee on all Greek ships that flew the Russian flag, spurring the creation of a merchant marine on the three nautical islands of Hydra, Spetses and Psara. These sailors also played an important part in the Greek War of Independence.

Today, Greek shipping continues to prosper to the extent that Greece has the largest merchant fleet in the world, and many more ships under Greek ownership fly flags of convenience. The most notable shipping magnate of the 20th century was Aristotle Onassis, others being Yiannis Latsis, George Livanos, and Stavros Niarchos. A famous Greek poet of the 20th century was the Chinese-born seaman Nikos Kavvadias who expressed the spirit of Greek cosmopolitanism and effortless and unpretentious multiculturalism.

Timeline

The history of the Greek people is closely associated with the history of Greece, Cyprus, Constantinople, and Asia Minor. During the Ottoman rule of Greece, a number of Greek enclaves around the Mediterranean were cut off from the core, notably in Southern Italy, the Caucasus, Syria and Egypt. By the early 20th century, over half of the overall Greek-speaking population was settled in Asia Minor (now Turkey). During the 20th century, a huge wave of migration to the United States, Australia, Canada and elsewhere created a Greek diaspora.

Some key historical events have also been included for context, but this timeline is not intended to cover history not related to migrations. There is more information on the historical context of these migrations in History of Greece.

• 3rd millennium BC — Proto-Greek tribes migrate into the Balkans.
• 20th century BC — Greek settlements established on the Balkans
• 17th century BC — Decline of Minoan civilization, possibly due to the eruption of Thera. Settlement of Achaeans and Ionians, (Mycenaean civilization).
• 13th century BC — First colonies established in Asia Minor.
• 11th century BC — Doric tribes move into peninsular Greece.
• 9th century BC — Major colonization of Asia Minor.
• 8th century BC — First major colonies established in Sicily and Southern Italy.
• 6th century BC — Colonies established across the Mediterranean and the Black Sea
• 4th century BC — Campaign of Alexander the Great; Greek colonies established in newly founded cities of Ptolemaic Egypt and Asia.
• 2nd century BC — Conquest of Greece by the Roman Empire. Migrations of Greeks to Rome.
• 4th century — Establishment of Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. Migrations of Greeks throughout the Empire, mainly towards Constantinople.
• 7th century Slavic conquest of several parts of Greece, Greek migrations to Southern Italy take place. Byzantine Emperors capture main Slavic bodies and transfer them to Cappadocia. Bosphorus re-populated by Macedonian and Cypriot Greeks.
• 8th century Byzantine dissolution of surviving Slavic settlements in Greece and full recovery of the Greek peninsula.
• 9th century Retro-migrations of Greeks from all parts of the Empire (mainly from Southern Italy and Sicily) into parts of Greece that were depopulated by the Slavic Invasions (mainly western Peloponnesus and Thessaly).
• 13th century — Byzantine Empire dissolves, Constantinople taken by the Fourth Crusade; becoming the capital of the Latin Empire. Liberated after a long struggle by the Empire of Nicaea, but fragments remain separated. Migrations between Asia Minor, Constantinople and mainland Greece take place.
• 15th century — Conquest of Byzantium by the Ottoman Empire. Greek diaspora into Europe begins. Ottoman settlements in Greece. Phanariot Greeks occupy high posts in Eastern European millets.
• 1830s — Creation of the Modern Greek State. Immigration to the New World begins. Large-scale migrations from Constantinople and Asia Minor to Greece take place.
• 1913 — Macedonia partitioned; Unorganized migrations of Greeks, Bulgarians and Turks towards their respective states.
• 1914-1923 — Pontic Greek Genocide, approximately 353,000 Pontian Greeks killed
• 1919 — Treaty of Neuilly; Greece and Bulgaria exchange populations, with some exceptions.
• 1922 — The Destruction ofSmyrna (nowadays Izmir) more than 120 thousands Greeks killed.
• 1923 — Treaty of Lausanne; Greece and Turkey agree to exchange populations with limited exceptions of the Greeks in Constantinople, Imbros, Tenedos and the Muslim minority (mainly Greeks, Pomaks, Roms and Turks) of Western Thrace. 1,5 million of Asia Minor and Pontic Greeks settle in Greece, and some 450 thousands of Muslims settle in Turkey.
• 1940s — Hundred of thousands Greeks died from starvation during the Axis Occupation of Greece.
• 1947 — Communist regime in Romania begins evictions of the Greek community, approx. 75,000 migrate.
• 1948 — Greek Civil War. Tens of thousands of Greek communists and their families flee into Eastern Bloc nations. Thousands settle in Tashkent.
• 1950s — Massive emigration of Greeks to West Germany, the United States, Australia, Canada, and other countries.
• 1955 — Istanbul Pogrom against Greeks. Exodus of Greeks from the city accelerates; less than 2,000 remain today.
• 1958 — Large Greek community in Alexandria flees Nasser's regime in Egypt.
• 1960s — Republic of Cyprus created, as an independent Greek state, under Greek, Turkish and British protection. Economic emigration continues.
• 1974 — Turkish invasion of Cyprus. Almost all Greeks living in Northern Cyprus flee to the south and the United Kingdom.
• 1980s — Many civil war refugees were allowed to re-emigrate to Greece. Reverse migration of Greeks from Germany also begins.
• 1990s — Collapse of Soviet Union. Approx. 100,000 ethnic Greeks migrate from Georgia, Armenia, southern Russia and Albania to Greece.
• 2000 — Greece fully implements the Schengen Treaty.
• 2000s — Some statistics indicate the beginning of a trend of reverse migration of Greeks from the United States and Australia.

See also

• Aromanians
• Arvanites
• Demographics of Greece
• Demographics of Cyprus
• Greek American
• Greek Australian
• Greek Canadians
• Greek Cypriots
• Greek Diaspora
• Greeks in Great Britain
• Greeks in Hungary
• Greeks in Romania
• Greeks in Turkey
• Greek Mexican
• Greek Muslims
• Karamanlides
• List of Ancient Greeks
• List of Greek Americans
• List of Greeks
• Pontic Greeks
• Sarakatsani
• Slavophone Greeks
• Urums

References and Further Reading

• Paul Cartledge, The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization, 2000, T.V. Brooks, ISBN 1575000938
• Humphrey Davy Findley Kitto, The Greeks, 1991, Penguin Books, ISBN 0140135219
• Per Bilde , Conventional Values of the Hellenistic Greeks, 1997, Aarhus University Press, ISBN 8772885556
• Michael Grant, The Hellenistic Greeks: From Alexander to Cleopatra, 1990, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, ISBN 0297820575
• John Pentland Mahaffy, William Alexander Goligher, Hellenistic Greeks, 1928
• Stephen Xydis, Medieval Origins of Modern Greek Nationalism, Balkan Studies, Vol. 9 (1968), 1-20.
• Michael Herzfeld, Ours Once More: Folklore, Ideology, and the making of Modern Greece, 1982. ISBN 0292760183
• Victor Roudometof, From Rum Millet to Greek Nation: Enlightenment, Secularization, and National Identity in Ottoman Balkan Society, 1453-1821, Journal of Modern Greek Studies 16:1 (May 1998), pp. 11-48.
• Peter Mackridge, Eleni Yannakakis, eds., Ourselves and Others : The Development of a Greek Macedonian Cultural Identity since 1912, 1997. ISBN 1-85973-133-3.
• Peter Bien, Inventing Greece, Journal of Modern Greek Studies 23:2 (October 2005), pp. 217-234.
• John Koliopoulos, Thanos Veremis, Greece: The Modern Sequel : from 1831 to the Present,2002, ISBN 1850654638
• David Holden, Greece Without Columns: The Making of the Modern Greeks, 1972,ISBN 0397007795

External links

• Greeks on Greekness: The Construction and Uses of the Greek Past among Greeks under the Roman Empire, a conference on how Greeks imagined Greekness in relation to the past during the first two centuries of the Roman Empire.
• Transnational Communities Programme at the University of Oxford, includes papers on the Greek Diaspora