The condition of the Greeks in the 18th century showed a great improvement which gave rise to yet greater hopes. Already in the 17th century the personal services of the subjects had been commuted into money contributions, and since 1676 the tribute of children fell into abeyance. The increasing use of Greek officials in the Turkish civil service, coupled with the privileges accorded to the Greek clergy throughout the Balkan countries, tended to recall the consciousness of former days of predominance in the Levant. Lastly, the education of the Greeks, which had always remained on a comparatively high level, was rapidly improved by the foundation of new schools and academies.
The long neglect which Greece had experienced at the hands of the European Powers was broken in 1764, when Russian agents appeared in the country with promises of a speedy deliverance from the Turks. A small expedition under Feodor and Alexis Orloff actually landed in the Morea in 1769, but failed to rouse national sentiment. Although the Russian fleet gained a notable victory off Chesme near Chios, a heavy defeat near Tripolitza ruined the prospects of the army. The Albanian troops in the Turkish army subsequently ravaged the country far and wide, until in 1779 they were exterminated by a force of Turkish regulars. In 1774 a concession, embodied in the treaty of Kuchuk Kainarji, by which Greek traders were allowed to sail under the protection of the Russian flag, marked an important step in the rehabilitation of the country as an independent power. Greek commerce henceforth spread swiftly over the Mediterranean, and increased intercourse developed a new sense of Hellenic unity. Among the pioneers who fostered this movement should be mentioned Constantine Rhigas, the “modern Tyrtaeus,” and Adamantios Coraës (q.v.), the reformer of the Greek tongue. The revived memories of ancient Hellas and the impression created by the French revolution combined to give the final impulse which made the Greeks strike for freedom. By 1800 the population of Greece had increased to 1,000,000, and although 200,000 of these were Albanians, the common aversion to the Moslem united the two races. The military resources of the country alone remained deficient, for the armatoli or local militias, which had never been quite disbanded since Byzantine times, were at last suppressed by Ali Pasha of Iannina and found but a poor substitute in the klephts who henceforth spring into prominence. But at the first sign of weakness in the Turkish dominion the Greek nation was ready to rise, and the actual outbreak of revolt had become merely a question of time.
Authorities.—General: G. Finlay, History of Greece (ed. Tozer, Oxford, 1877), especially vols. i., iv., v.; K. Paparrhigopoulos, Ἱστορία τοῦ Ἑλληνικοῦ ἔθνους (4th ed., Athens, 1903), vols. ii.-v.; Histoire de la civilisation hellénique (Paris, 1878); R. v. Scala, Das Griechentum seit Alexander dem Grossen (Leipzig and Vienna, 1904); and specially W. Miller, The Latins in the Levant (1908).
Special—(a) The Roman period: Strabo, bks. viii.-x.; Pausanias, Descriptio Graeciae; G. F. Hertzberg, Die Geschichte Griechenlands unter der Herrschaft der Römer (Halle, 1866-1875); Sp. Lampros, Ἱστορία τῆς Ἑλλάδος (Athens, 1888 sqq.), vol. iii.; A. Holm, History of Greece (Eng. trans., London, 1894-1898). vol. iv., chs. 19, 24, 26, 28 seq.; Th. Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire (Eng. trans., London, 1886, ch. 7); J. P. Mahaffy, The Greek World under Roman Sway, from Polybius to Plutarch (London, 1890); W. Miller, “The Romans in Greece” (Westminster Review, August 1903, pp. 186-210); L. Friedländer, “Griechenland unter den Römern” (Deutsche Rundschau, 1899, pp. 251-274, 402-430). (b) The Byzantine and Latin periods: G. F. Hertzberg, Geschichte Griechenlands seit dem Absterben des antiken Lebens (Gotha, 1876-1879), vols. i., ii.; C. Hopf, Geschichte Griechenlands im Mittelalter (Leipzig, 1868); J. A. Buchon, Histoire des conquêtes et de l’établissement des Français dans les États de l’ancienne Grèce (Paris, 1846); G. Schmitt, The Chronicle of Morea (London, 1904); W. Miller, “The Princes of the Peloponnese” (Quarterly Review, July 1905, pp. 109-135); D. Bikelas, Seven Essays on Christian Greece (Paisley and London, 1890); La Grèce byzantine et moderne (Paris, 1893), pp. 1-193. (c) The Turkish and Venetian periods: Hertzberg, op. cit., vol. iii.; K. M. Bartholdy, Geschichte Griechenlands von der Eroberung Konstantinopels (Leipzig, 1870), bks. i. and ii., pp. 1-155; K. N. Sathas, Τουρκοκρατουμένη Ἑλλάς (Athens, 1869); W. Miller, “Greece under the Turks” (Westminster Review, August and September 1904, pp. 195-210, 304-320; English Historical Review, 1904, pp. 646-668); L. Ranke, “Die Venetianer in Morea” (Historisch-politische Zeitschrift, ii. 405-502). (d) Special subjects: Religion. E. Hatch, The Influence of Greek Ideas and Usages upon the Christian Church (London, 1890). Ethnology. J. P. Fallmerayer, Geschichte der Halbinsel Morea während des Mittelalters (Stuttgart and Tübingen, 1830); S. Zampelios, Περὶ πηγῶν νεοελληνικῆς ἐθνότητος (Athens, 1857); A. Philippson, “Zur Ethnographie des Peloponnes” [Petermann’s Mitteilungen 36 (1890), pp. 1-11, 33-41]; A. Vasiljev, “Die Slaven in Griechenland” [Vizantijsky Vremennik, St Petersburg, 5 (1898), pp. 404-438, 626-670].
See also [Roman Empire, Later]; [Athens].
(M. O. B. C.)
c. Modern History: 1800-1908.
At the beginning of the 19th century Greece was still under Turkish domination, but the dawn of freedom was already breaking, and a variety of forces were at work which prepared the way for the acquisition of national The decadence of Turkey. independence. The decadence of the Ottoman empire, which began with the retreat of the Turks from Vienna in 1683, was indicated in the 18th century by the weakening of the central power, the spread of anarchy in the provinces, the ravages of the janissaries, and the establishment of practically independent sovereignties or fiefs, such as those of Mehemet of Bushat at Skodra and of Ali Pasha of Tepelen at Iannina; the 19th century witnessed the first uprisings of the Christian populations and the detachment of the outlying portions of European Turkey. Up to the end of the 18th century none of the subject races had risen in spontaneous revolt against the Turks, though in some instances they rendered aid to the sultan’s enemies; the spirit of the conquered nations had been broken by ages of oppression. In some of the remoter and more mountainous districts, however, the authority of the Turks had never been completely established; in Montenegro a small fragment of the Serb race maintained its independence; among the Greeks, the Mainotes in the extreme south of the Morea and the Sphakiote mountaineers in Crete had never been completely subdued. Resistance to Ottoman rule was maintained sporadically in the mountainous districts by the Greek klephts or brigands, the counterpart of the Slavonic haiduks, and by the pirates of the Aegean; the armatoles or bodies of Christian warriors, recognized by the Turks as a local police, often differed little in their proceedings from the brigands whom they were appointed to pursue.
Of the series of insurrections which took place in the 19th century, the first in order of time was the Servian, which broke out in 1804; the second was the Greek, which began in 1821. In both these movements the influence of Russian influence. Russia played a considerable part. In the case of the Servians Russian aid was mainly diplomatic, in that of the Greeks it eventually took a more material form. Since the days of Peter the Great, the eyes of Russia had been fixed on Constantinople, the great metropolis of the Orthodox faith. The policy of inciting the Greek Christians to revolt against their oppressors, which was first adopted in the reign of the empress Anna, was put into practical operation by the empress Catharine II., whose favourite, Orlov, appeared in the Aegean with a fleet in 1769 and landed in the Morea, where he organized a revolt. The attempt proved a failure; Orlov re-embarked, leaving the Greeks at the mercy of the Turks, and terrible massacres took place at Tripolitza, Lemnos and elsewhere. By the treaty of Kutchuk-Kainarji (July 21, 1774) Russia obtained a vaguely-defined protectorate over the Orthodox Greek subjects of Turkey, and in 1781 she arrived at an arrangement with Austria, known as the “Greek project,” for a partition of Turkish territory and the restoration of the Byzantine empire under Constantine, the son of Catharine II. The outbreak of the French Revolution distracted the attention of the two empires, but Russia never ceased to intrigue among the Christian subjects of Turkey. A revolt of the inhabitants of Suli in 1790 took place with her connivance, and in the two first decades of the 19th century her agents were active and ubiquitous.