Millet Legacies in a National Environment: Political Elites and Muslim Communities in Greece, 1830s-1923

This chapter explores the relations between Greece’s political elites and its Muslim communities from the country’s foundation as an independent state to the end of the Anatolian War (1919-1922). These relations have ranged from estrangement and enmity, in times of war, to coexistence by necessity, in times of peace. Though shaped in a post-Ottoman environment and driven by contemporary dynamics, these relations were also influenced by experiences under the Ottoman millet system in two major ways: a) By emphasising religion in one’s self-identity, this system set the foundations for a close interconnection between Orthodox Christianity and Greek national identity, which in turn justified policies of exclusion, persecution, extermination and expulsion of Muslims in the process of crafting Modern Greece; b) it served as a base on which Greek political elites organised and administered the country’s Muslim communities.