GREECE 



2607 



GREECE 



victims, and there was no one who could take 

 his place. For twenty-five years the struggle 

 went on, Athens almost constantly losing 

 ground, but determined not to give up. The 

 expedition to Sicily in 415 B. c. under Alcibiades 

 (which see) and Nicias turned out so disas- 

 trously that Sparta thought its victory was won, 

 but the Athenians held out until 404 B. c., when 

 they were compelled to accept the most hu- 

 miliating terms of peace. 



Sparta was now the head of the Grecian 

 states, and it proved such a hard master that 

 at length the other states revolted, under the 

 leadership of Thebes (see EPAMINONDAS). The 

 Spartans were defeated at Leuctra in 371 B. c., 

 and until 362 B. c., when Epaminondas was 

 killed, Thebes was the foremost state in 

 Greece. 



Period of Foreign Rule. To the north of 

 Greece a strong ruler, Philip of Macedon, had 

 firmly established his kingdom, and in the 

 disturbed conditions in which the Greek states 

 found themselves, he was able gradually to 

 extend his power southward. Demosthenes 

 at Athens thundered against him in his Philip- 

 pics, and at length the Greeks roused them- 

 selves to resist the invasions. At Chaeronea 

 in Boeotia they were defeated in 338 B. c., and 

 Greece became a part of the Macedonian Em- 

 pire. The Macedonians were themselves a 

 Hellenic people, and the Greeks were not 

 brought into entire subjection because their 

 intellectual superiority was clearly recognized 

 by Philip and by his greater son, Alexander 

 the Great. 



After the death of Alexander the Greek 

 states had a troubled existence, struggling con- 

 stantly but vainly to throw off the yoke of 

 Macedonia, but in 146 B. c. they passed under 

 the rule of another conqueror. With the cap- 

 ture and burning of Corinth in that year 

 Rome became supreme over the Greek states, 

 and for a time they prospered under a mild 

 and just government. A revolt in 22 B. c. 

 brought down on them the vengeance of Rome, 

 and several of the great cities were practically 

 destroyed. From that destruction they never 

 entirely recovered, though under the Roman 

 emperors Greece regained a certain prosperity 

 and was recognized as an intellectual center. 

 Christianity made rapid progress, and the pic- 

 turesque paganism gradually died out. New 

 importance came to the province when, in 

 A. D. 330, Constantine the Great moved his capi- 

 tal to the old city of Byzantium, which he 

 rechristened Constantinople (see CONSTANTINE) . 



In 395 the Roman Empire was divided into the 

 Eastern and the Western empires, and Greece 

 was a part of the former until the fall of Con- 

 stantinople in 1453 (see BYZANTINE EMPIRE) 

 gave the country to the Turks. 



Under the Turkish rule, which lasted almost 

 four centuries, the Greeks sank into a pitiable 

 condition, but their devotion to their Church 

 and their interest in the local self-government 

 that was allowed them helped to preserve 

 their feeling of nationality. In the early years 

 of the nineteenth century this feeling seemed 

 to grow more intense, and in 1821 a war for 

 independence broke out under Alexander 

 Ypsilanti. To check the revolt the Turks 

 resorted to their usual weapons, massacre and 

 wholesale execution, nor were the Greeks much 

 more humane in their methods. Champions of 

 the determined people sprang up on all sides, 

 the English poet Byron being the most nota- 

 ble, and in 1827 England, Russia and France 

 gave Greece their open support. The great 

 naval Battle of Navarino, fought on October 

 20, 1827, resulted in the complete defeat of the 

 Turkish fleet, and Greece became an independ- 

 ent kingdom. 



The Modern Kingdom. In 1832 Otto of 

 Bavaria was made king, and while his rule was 

 far from despotic, the Greeks were much dis- 

 appointed because he did not proclaim a con- 

 stitution as they had expected him to do. He 

 was forced in 1843 to yield to the strong pop- 

 ular demand, and-fc constitution went into 

 effect the next year. This did not lessen 

 Otto's unpopularity, however, and in 1862 he 

 was compelled to abdicate, largely because he 

 had not taken an active part in the Crimean 

 War and won for Greece an increase in terri- 

 tory. Prince George of Denmark was chosen 

 by the national assembly as king, and in 1863 

 he began his reign, which continued for hall" 

 a century. In 864 England gave up to Greece 

 the Ionian Islands, and after the Congress of 

 Berlin in 1878 the country was further enlarged 

 by the accession of Thessaly. 



In January, 1897, Greece went to the aid of 

 the Christians in Crete who were rebelling 

 against Turkish rule and seeking annexation 

 to Greece, and the result was complete defeat 

 for the Greeks. They were compelled to pay 

 a huge indemnity to Turkey, and to give up 

 their claims on Crete, which did not come 

 under the Greek flag until 1913, after thr 

 Balkan wars. This struggle broke out in 1912 

 between Turkey and the Balkan states, and 

 Greece profited largely by the success of the 



