issue was mainly fought out on sea; the conflicts which had never ceased in the Aegean since the coming of the Italians now grew fiercer than ever; Greek ships and sailors were frequently requisitioned for the Turkish fleets, and the damage done to the Greek seaboard by the belligerents and by fleets of adventurers and corsairs brought about the depopulation of many islands and coast-strips. The conquest of the Aegean by the Ottomans was completed by 1570; but Venice retained Crete till 1669 and never lost Corfu until its cession to France in 1797.
In 1684 the Venetians took advantage of the preoccupation of Turkey on the Danube to attack the Morea. A small mercenary army under Francesco Morosini captured the strong places with remarkable ease, and by 1687 had conquered almost the whole peninsula. In 1687 the invaders also captured Athens and Lepanto; but the former town had soon to be abandoned, and with their failure to capture Negropont (1688) the Venetians were brought to a standstill. By the peace of Karlowitz (1699) the Morea became a possession of Venice. The new rulers, in spite of the commercial restrictions which they imposed in favour of their own traders, checked the impoverishment and decrease of population (from 300,000 to 86,000) which the war had caused. By their attempts to cooperate with the native magistrates and the mildness of their administration they improved the spirit of their subjects. But they failed to make their government popular, and when in 1715 the Ottomans with a large and well-disciplined army set themselves to recover the Morea, the Venetians were left without support from the Greeks. The peninsula was rapidly recaptured and by the peace of Passarowitz (1718) again became a Turkish dependency. The gaps left about this time in the Greek population were largely made up by an immigration from Albania.
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
independence. The decadence of the Ottoman empire,
which began with the retreat of the Turks from Vienna
The decadence
of Turkey.
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.
