Alexandros Rizos Rangavis

 

 

Alexandros Rizos Rangavis                           ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ ΡΙΖΟΣ ΡΑΓΚΑΒΗΣ

Born 1809 in Constantinople                       Died 1892 in Athens

 

                                                   Section One, Number 378

If the founding of the nation was the heritage of the revolutionary fighters, the organization, basis, and ideology was the job of the inheritors. (1)

 

Alexandros  Rizos Rangavis was a man of letters, a romantic poet of the First Athenian School of poets, a prose writer, a novelist, a professor, an archaeologist, and a diplomat (2)

So begins one of the many essays and panegyrics dedicated to this aristocratic and versatile writer who seemed to have had his finger in every cultural pie since his arrival in Greece in 1830. This is no doubt down to his own prodigious talent, but birth and the circumstances of the nascent Greek state provided him with the two essential ingredients for success: connections and opportunity. His connection to the Soutsos family was key but what really strikes me about Greece in the 1830s and on is how open it was to enthusiastic newcomers and how easy it was for someone of his class to work his way into the fabric of the civil service, academia, and diplomacy. You get the sense that, for people like Rangavis, Greece was an exhilarating experiment, -  a cultural petri dish where history, mythology, politics and literature could be mixed together, energized by their enthusiasm, and a coherent nation would magically coalesce.

If it did not always turn out that way, it was not for want of trying.

 

Alexandros Rizos Rangavis

His Life: 1809 to 1844

Εκ καταγώγης ειμι Φαναριωτής

(By birth I am a Phanariot)

 

Alexandros was born in Constantinople to Lakovos Rizos Rangavis and Zoe Lapithi, whose father dealt in precious stones. He was part of a wealthy and well connected family. Alexandros would spend his childhood years in comfort, most often in the Principality of Moldavia because his father worked for their cousin Alexandros Soutsos whose family had a history of leadership in the principalities. (3) Alexandros’ father was himself a man of letters who had translated many European works into Greek. As a child he had the best tutors at home and was exposed to the cultural life of Bucharest which offered plays in Greek and hosted works of the European Enlightenment at a time when Greek children in Athens had virtually no exposure to culture at all.

The idyll for princely Phanariots in the principalities came to an abrupt end in 1821 when Alexander Ipsilantis, another Phanariot - with the knowledge of Michael Soutsos, prince of Moldavia - invaded the principality as the first step in the Greek Revolution against the Ottomans.  The Porte had been dependent for centuries on Greek Phanariot civil servants but they never fully trusted this wealthy class that they had created in Constantinople to service their empire. In 1821, retaliation was swift and The Soutsos and the Rangavis family fled for their lives. The Rangavis clan settled in Odessa in Russia where there was already a large Greek community in residence and Alexandros was able to benefit from excellent tutors until he left for Munich to study at the Royal Military School there. His object was to become an officer and then head for Greece to help in the revolution.

A Civil Servant is Born

He spent four years in Germany and, along with the military training, was very much influenced by German romanticism. He graduated in 1829 as a second lieutenant in the artillery and, in 1930, came to Nauplio, then Greece’s capital, to do his bit. He was too late for the fighting; that phase was over although Athens was still under Turkish control, so his army stint ended after three months at which point he sought work in the civil service, a career that would not interfere with his ambitions to be a writer.

In the winter of 1831-2, Rangavis got his first ever glimpse of fabled Athens. He was on the Greek committee which had gone there from Nauplio to finalize its annexation to Greece. It must have been a shock – so provincial and tiny to have generated such a glorious history.

 

Athens in 1810 by Richard Temple before the devastation caused by the Greek Revolution. The Thisseon is on the far right and the columns from the Temple of Zeus on the far left. It could not even fill the walls built by the Ottomans in 1778.

Alexandros remained in Nauplio as an advisor to the Department of Education establishing the rules and curricula for middle schools and the proposed university. The rest of his family moved to Athens in 1833; he followed in 1834 in time to attend the marriage of his sister to count Adolpho Rozen. Although much is made of the fact that Greece had a king but no aristocratic court, the Phanariots with their venerable family names (many tracing back to Byzantine emperors), their money, and their ties to the princes in Moldavia and Wallachia, were happy to fill the ‘aristocracy gap’ and most lost no opportunity to display their families’ coats of arms to prove their exalted lineage.

 

The Coat of Arms of the Rizos Family. There is a reason why so many Greeks have double barreled last names: to show their ancestry. The crest of the Rizos family appears on Alexandros’grave in the First Cemetery.

1836 was a good year for Rangavis. He was put in charge of the committee responsible for producing school texts and, in the same year, was instrumental in the founding of the Athenian Archaeological Society, which is still going strong today. Its founding is worth a small digression because it offers an insight into how the elite functioned in Athens at that time.

 

Rangavis and Founding of the Athens Archaeological Society

 

As one historian noted, in 1836 Athens was a village that wanted to be a city. But it was growing far too fast for those who wanted to preserve its all important past. The classical Greek world was the very basis of the ideology of the new state and a concept that resonated sympathetically with European attitudes towards the new country. It would not do to have bits of that legacy disappearing piecemeal into the buildings being erected everywhere at the time. The preservation of any but the major archaeological sites had hardly even begun by the government which was overwhelmed with so many issues. Ancient sites were in ruins and prey to the constant depredations of enterprising stone masons. Something had to be done by leading citizens to help the government.  

 

The propylaia of the Acropolis in 1830. Note the bars. The tower was used as a jail.

 

The Tower of the Winds with Elgin’s clock- on the left: donated in 1814- to make up for his theft of the Parthenon marbles

A solution came in the persons of visiting Baron Constantinos Vellios of Vienna (4) and Kyriakos Pittakis, then director of the new Government Archaeological service in Athens. They proposed a private society which would reinforce government efforts and presented their idea to the Ministry of Education where Rangavis was working.  It was well received and Rangavis himself prepared the founding documents which were signed on Jan 6, 1837.

Vellios described that day in his diary and mentioned that, after signing, they took a stroll to meet poet Panayiotis Soutsos who signed, met the Austrian Consul who signed on the spot, met Rangavis’ father, Lakovos, who signed, and then politician Nikolaos Theocharis who added his name to the list as well.  Just like that. What a wonderfully small town Athens was back then!  The entire elite of Athens became enthusiastic members. The Society would have annual meetings, fees, publications, and a close liaison with the curator of artifacts. All artifacts found under their aegis would go to the Greek state.

 

 

In 1842 when this early photograph was taken, the state of the Parthenon and propylaia was still precarious.

In 1841, Rangavis married Caroline Skene, a Scottish woman whose father was a man of letters and a friend of romantic poet Sir Walter Scott.  Skene had brought his family to Athens for its healthy climate and the couple met.

Rangavis was then transferred to the Ministry of the Interior where his brief was large: to tackle the problem of brigandage - a huge issue at the time, to assist in draining Greece’s malarial swamps, and to prepare for the introduction of a railway system. There seemed to be nothing this young civil servant could not tackle.

1844: The Professor...

Home grown Greeks had become tired of the wealthy and more educated Greek outsiders who came into the new state. Many native born freedom fighters and others less well connected, regarded this new elite as not much better than carpetbaggers,  taking all of the important government positions with little concern for the problems facing the native population. It was a reaction that was bound to happen and it all came to a head in 1844 when a law was passed denying civil service posts to anyone born outside the boundaries of the new state.

Rangavis suddenly found himself without a job, - but not without resources.

IoannisKolletis had just become Prime Minister and Rangavis had been one of his supporters. Kolletis arranged a royal decree to be issued making Rangavis a professor of Archaeology at the University of Athens. Just like that.

It was a post which he would hold until 1867 and during that period he would contribute greatly to the field. During this period, he entered parliament (from 1856-9) as the university’s own representative – a seat in government that was considered vital at the time. Nor was it merely honorary:  during his stay in parliament, he served as Greece’s Minister of Foreign Affairs.

As a Writer

Throughout his youth and as a careerist, Rangavis was a prolific writer, publishing in Greek periodicals such as the Iris which began in 1834 and in Evterpis (Ευτέρπης) a periodical published by an old school friend, Grigorios Kambouroglou.  (5)

 

In 1847, he wrote a political comedy Koutroulis’ Wedding which satirized, among other things, the Greek slavish deference to all things foreign, the power of vested interests, corruption and bribery – all problems as easily recognized then as now. The play was considered topical enough for the Greek National Theatre to produce it in 2012. Political satire has had a long and popular history in Greece and human nature has not changed much since Rangavis’ day.

 

A scene from the 2012 production of  ‘Koutroulis’ Wedding’

Rangavis wrote prolifically in newspapers and journals, -  on antiquities, on literature – on just about everything (6) He was a novelist as well, writing The Notary of Argostoli in 1855, a potboiler of intrigue, love and murder –one of the earliest examples of crime fiction in Greece.

 

Still popular and available in English

 

His work was recognized abroad as well. In 1850 he became a member the London Literary Society. Perhaps it was as a poet he would have liked to be remembered; he was a member of the so called First Athenian School of writers, but he is not so read today because he chose to write in katharevousa (7), the purist language first proposed by Adamantios Korais, supported for decades by the elite in Athens, and championed by the First Athenian School.  Katharevousa was already being phased out in poetry and literature and replaced by demotic Greek by the time he died in 1892.

As a Diplomat  ....

In 1867 Rangavis resigned from the university and became a full time diplomat. He became the first Greek Ambassador to the United States just after the Lincoln Assassination. His brief was to gain American support for Cretan independence. In this he did not succeed because of the Munroe Doctrine, but he took a lively interest in America and wrote about his stay.

 

This book is still available

He attended the impeachment hearings against President Andrew Johnson with interest, expressed sympathy for the plight of native Americans, and even met Charles Dickens who was travelling in the United States at the time. He travelled as far afield as Chicago and Niagara Falls. It is an important document of the era.

Rangavis subsequently served in the embassies in Constantinople in 1869, Paris in 1871, and Berlin in 1874.

 

Rangavis in Berlin

He returned to Athens in 1874 to write his memoires of an amazing life. They were published after his death in 1894.

He and his wife had 10 children. Caroline died in 1878.

He died at home in 1892.

Summary

Alexandros Rangavis began his life as a privileged Phanariot and then dedicated his life to the betterment of the Greek state. He was a true renaissance man and dominated the Athenian scene, one way or another, for over 60 years. His ubiquity struck me so strongly, that this little ditty just wrote itself as I was working on this entry:

Rangavis, the Polymath

 

Rangavis, a diplomat, a star in rhyme or prose

A clever quick change artist who could take on any pose

And baffle all who gloss him; cause it seems no matter where

You check his era’s history, Rangavis was there!

Rangavis, Rangavis!  There is no other of his kind.

Math, and education might occupy his mind,

Then treaties and then artifacts:  his skill beyond compare.

Check papers of the era and - Rangavis was there!

He lurks in periodicals and books on all affairs.

Katharevousa his chosen form - alas it’s now so rare,

But look in any bookstore’: and Rangavis is there!

(Apologies to T.S. Eliot)

 

His Grave

 

Section One, Number 378

This family grave is rather austere, carved by the Malakates brothers and executed in what Filia and I call, for want of the proper technical term, a kind of soapy marble that is the hallmark of many old graves in the cemetery.

 

 

 

 

Footnotes

 

(1)_Google: docplayer.gr/11243927 for a PDF on Rangavis. The quote appears on page 16.

(2) From the introduction in https://homouniversalisgr.blogspot.com/2018/12/27-1809-16-1892.html

This site lists many of his publication in Chronological order and several of his poems.

(3) For the strange story of the Phanariots, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phanariots . These Ottoman civil servants were privileged on the one hand but vulnerable too. It seems odd, but you could be a Greek prince in the Ottoman territories of Moldavia and Wallachia, yet still lose your head on a Sultan’s whim.

(4) Constantinos Vellios of Vienna was yet another of Greece’s great benefactors.

 

(5) Grigorios Kambouroglou was the son of Dimitrios, the famous chronicler of Athens. He had been Rangavis’ school mate in Odessa as was Greek historian Constantinos Papparigopoulos.  It was a small world!

 

(6) He is perhaps most read today for his  Hellenic Antiquities (1842-55), his History of Modern Greek Literature (1877)  and his Archaeological Lexicon (1888-91). This latter was vital for archaeology in Greece because there were no Greek technical terms for the science. His novels were popular: The Notary of Argostoli, The Prince of the Morea, and his plays, such as Ducas, The 30 Tyrants, The Eve and his translations of the likes of Dante,  Goethe, and Shakespeare. His curiosity and interests were boundless.

(7) Katharevousa owes its existence to efforts to “purify” the language of foreign elements and to systematize its morphology by using ancient Greek roots and much classical inflection. It is exemplified in the classical odes, hymns, ballads, narrative poems, tragedies, and comedies of Rangavís. Many katharevousa elements have been incorporated into demotic, and today the two varieties have merged to form the language spoken and written today.