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1 Naming the Void: the Invention of Byzantium in the Greek Naming the Void: the Invention of Byzantium in the Greek Enlightenment Stratos Myrogiannis In this paper I set out to trace the historical process of the theoretical assimilation of Byzantium into Greek historical consciousness during the Greek Enlightenment. Due to the nature of the subject, I am going to present an overview rather than a detailed analysis. So far, the established view is that Byzantium as a historical era became a distinctive part of Greek history thanks to the remarkable work of two of the most prominent scholars of Greek Romantic historiography, that is, Spyridon Zambelios and chiefly Konstantinos Paparrigopoulos, the ‘ΖαμπελιοΠαπαρρηγοπούλειος σχολή’ as Koumanoudis called it, not without a refined sense of humour.1 I will try to revise this widespread stance by reviewing those works of the Greek Enlightenment which show an interest in history. Of course, it is undisputed that modern scientific historiography was only developed in the nineteenth century. Nevertheless, Greek-speaking intellectuals had already attempted to secularise and rearrange the history of Greek-speaking people by distancing themselves from the previous religious chronicles. In their efforts to construct a linear secularised history of the Greek genos, these scholars inevitably faced a historical void: the Greek Middle Ages. Next, I discuss what kind of answers they offered as potential solutions to this problem. Leaving aside the numerous religious chronicles which continued to circulate among the Greeks during the eighteenth century,2 I will start with Meletios (Michail Mitrou), the Archbishop of Athens. Meletios wrote a geographical work entitled Γεωγραφία Παλαιά και Νέα (1728), describing inter alia the history and geography of the Greek lands of his time. Stimulated by the antiquarian movement, which was widespread in Europe, he was the first modern geographer to chart the past of the Greek lands, thus offering a different interpretation in comparison to the religious chronicles. Meletios’s work is interesting because his otherwise old-fashioned historical narrative introduced a barely perceptible terminological shift, which in turn inaugurated a brand new historical canon. He called the Emperors of the Byzantine period, (that is, after the transfer of the capital from Rome to Constantinople in 330 AD and until the fall of the City in 1453), ‘Christian Kings of Constantinople’, as we can see in the following example which refers to a little village, called Katohi: ‘η Κατοχή, [η οποία] εις τον καιρόν των Βασιλέων Χριστιανών της Κωνσταντινουπόλεως ήτον Δεσποτάτον’. However, when 1 Dimaras (1994: 460) traces Koumanoudis’s term in 1851, not without hesitation. 2 Among the widely popular religious chronicles we can enumerate Βιβλίον Ιστορικόν by Dorotheos Monembasias (1631), Kigalas’s, Νέα Σύνοψις Διαφόρων Ιστοριών (1637), Efthymios’s, Χρονικόν του Γαλαξειδίου (1703) and Επιτομή της Ιεροκοσμικής Ιστορίας, compiled by Nektarios o Kris (1677). 1 he referred to the Roman Emperors he used the phrase ‘Emperors of the Romans’ as can be 3 seen in the next phrase: ‘Ιούλιος ο Αυτοκράτωρ των Ρωμαίων’. By splitting up Roman history he deprived the period of the ‘Christian Kings of Constantinople’ of its Roman attributes. The historical framework he deployed displays a linear account constructed by well-defined historical periods: Ancient times, the era of the Roman Empire, the era of the Christian Emperors of Constantinople and the period of Ottoman rule until his own time. 4 His originality is evident in his attempt to fill the gaps his antiquarian sources left concerning the Byzantine part of the historical account of the Greek lands. By starting from mythological elements he constructed a ‘historical genealogy’ of the Greek lands, if I am allowed to use such a concept. Our next stop will be one of the best known works of the Greek Enlightenment, the Γεωγραφία Νεωτερικὴ written collaboratively by Daniel Philippidis and Gregorios Konstantas (1791). Their historical schema of an uninterrupted Greek presence throughout history relied heavily on Meletios’s earlier attempt while at the same time they set out to fill the gaps the European antiquarian tradition left regarding Greek history and geography. It goes without saying that they focused on Greek antiquity in order to justify the existence of the modern Greeks based on their affinities with the ancients.5 The two writers held that the Greeks of 6 their time were ‘ἀπόγονοι τῶν παλαιῶν ἐκείνων καὶ περιφήμων Ἑλλήνων’. It is a common topos that the Greek Enlightenment stressed the affinities of the Greek-speaking people of the time with Greek antiquity. However, in order to draw such a linkage back to a distant past, they had to assimilate into their historical schema the eras lying in the middle. In order to do so, they borrowed a ready-made historical schema first used by Panckoucke in his Géographie Ancienne.7 They ‘baptized’ the period from the transfer of the capital from Rome to 8 Constantinople until 1453 ‘Αὐτοκρατορία τῶν Ἑλλήνων’. This is the first time during the Greek Enlightenment that this specific historical period is characterized as Hellenic.9 This ‘Hellenization’ process on the part of the two writers revealed a significant break with the previously held view of the Greek past. In Europe, Gibbon, among others, had condemned the Eastern Roman Empire for its corruption, theocratic government and parasitic 3 Mitrou 1728: 323. 4 Tolias (2004: 85) shares the same view, mentioning that from 1700 to 1850 geography in Greece projected the Ancient Greek world over the Modern Greek. Tolias, though, discloses only half of the picture. The Greek geographical works of the time invoked both Byzantium and antiquity within their historical framework. 5 Dimaras 1977: 6, 15, 53-56. 6 Philippidis 1791: 96 7 Koumarianou (1988: 103) points out that the historical overview they attached at the beginning of their work was borrowed from Panckouke’s Géographie Ancienne. 8 Philippidis 1791: 119. 9 Tabaki (1997: 156) also points out that Philippidis-Konstantas in their historical table preceding the main work ‘hellenized’ the Byzantine period unlike the conventional views of the Europeans on this issue. 2 organization. It is true that Gibbon’s history was not noted for its generosity to Christians10 since he disdained organized hierarchical religions.11 Philippidis and Konstantas reappropriated this negative European image of Byzantium in a new ‘Greek’ framework, giving it a positive meaning.12 This could only be done through a new perception of reality, which allowed them to change their views about the past. Hence they invented a new terminology for an already known historical period by reinterpreting the conventional views in a new social and linguistic context.13 They were the first ones to explicitly define the Byzantine Empire as being a Hellenic Empire through the means of ‘Hellenization’: ‘Δὲν εἶναι θαυμαστὸ λοιπὸν ἂν ἐκεῖνοι ὁποῦ ἐμετοίκησαν εἰς τὴν Κωνσταντινούπολι, ἄφησαν μὲ τὴν ὁλότη 14 καὶ τὴ γλῶσσα καὶ τὰ ἤθη τὰ Ῥωμάνικα, καὶ ἐξελληνίθηκαν’. Their points of reference were both Ancient Greece and the Byzantine era. In this way, they constructed their own interpretation of an ethnohistory through the projection of an uninterrupted historical schema.15 This kind of historical interpretation on the part of Philippidis and Konstantas might be considered a valid example of what Hobsbawm calls the invention of tradition.16 Towards the end of the eighteenth century the teacher and in many respects the mentor of the two writers of Γεωγραφία Νεωτερικὴ, Dimitrios Katartzis stressed the twofold equally important cultural heritage of the Greeks of his time. Katartzis argued that modern ῥωμηοί were descendants of the Ancient Greeks and the Romans through a linguistic and 17 cultural connection. In Συμβουλή στους νέους he elaborated on his comments on the history of 18 the Greeks by offering the cultural genealogy of the ῥωμηοί: Νὰ ποῦμε κι’ ἄλλο, ἀφ’ οὗ ἕνας Ῥωμῃὸς συλλογιστῇ μιὰ φορὰ πῶς κατάγεται ἀπὸ τὸν Περικλέα, Θεμιστοκλέα καὶ ἄλλους παρόμοιους Ἕλληνες, ἢ ἀπτοὺς συγγενεῖς τοῦ Θεοδόσιου, τοῦ Βελισάριου, τοῦ Ναρσῆ, τοῦ Βουλγαροκτόνου, τοῦ Σζιμισκὴ κ’ ἄλλων τόσων μεγάλων Ῥωμαίων, ἢ ἕλκει τὸ γένος του ἀπὸ κανέναν ἅγιο, ἢ ἀπὸ κανέναν τοῦ συγγενῆ, πῶς νὰ μὴν ἀγαπᾷ τοὺς ἀπογόνους ἐκεινῶν κ’ αὐτωνῶν τῶν μεγάλων 19 ἀνθρώπων; 10 Gay 1966: 210. 11 Vryonis 1971: 98. 12 In this sense, ‘Hellenization’ could be considered a means of reappropriation; Smith 2000: 58-59. 13 Skinner (1988: 63-64) refers to both social and linguistic conventions as ‘linguist context’. 14 Philippidis 1791: 143. 15 Smith (2007: 325-36) shows how ethnohistories shape the civic order of modern nations. 16 Hobsbawm (1983: 1-13) applies the term ‘invented tradition’ both to constructed traditions and those which emerged less traceably, an argument which has its deficiencies. The adoption of a new terminology on the part of the writers of Γεωγραφία Νεωτερική describes the constructed nature of their historical interpretation. 17 Kitromilides (1994: 152-55) argues that the diverse ethnicities under Ottoman rule were mainly recognized by their language. This linguistic similarity would provide the grounds for the construction of ethnohistories on the part of the Greek-speaking intelligentsia at the last quarter of the eighteenth century. 18 Kitromilides (2000: 215) and Koubourlis (2005: 147-48) also share the view that in this extract Katartzis illustrated one of the earliest manifestations of the theory of the historical continuity of the
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