Page 278 - Beholding Liberty!

Document of the Community of Samos, with reference
to the Provisional Constitutino of the island (Samos, 12 June 1822)
Archives of the Greek Regeneration, vol. 1, no 544 [pp. 544-545]
Library of the Hellenic Parliament [cat. no ΙΙ.2.14]
Letter of captain Panourgias to captain Nikitas
(Salona, 23 July 1823)
Archives of the Greek Regeneration, vol. 17, no 131 [p. 59]
Library of the Hellenic Parliament [cat. no ΙΙ.3.15]
26. Already in the era of the Gospels, the term Έλλην/Έλληνες/Hellene/ Hellenes meant pagan/partaker of secular education: «You are not Hellenes, you are not impious, heretics, atheists; rather you
are pious, orthodox christians», Kosmas Aitolos was saying
to his audience (see, Menounos 1979: 115-116, in Politis 2009: 33, note 3).
27. The term was mainly used
by the Greeks who lived outside the Turkish-occupied territory,
cf. the Latin Graecus, from which the corresponding names in the European languages were derived. See, Mackridge 2014: 74-76; Katsiardi-Hering et al. 2018.
28. In the Constitution of Astros (1823) the factor of language is set
for the first time as a prerequisite of nationality, not for the indigenous, but for the expatriates: more precisely, it is mentioned that, those who come from abroad,
can be naturalized as Greek citizens, if «their father’s language is the Greek language» and believe in Christ.
Έλληνες/Hellenes, which in pre-revolutionary times was mainly used by scholars already in the Late Byzantine period, but, nevertheless, had not been on the people’s lips,26 that chose the widely used in the centuries of the Turkish Occupation Romios or/and Graekos.27 Furthermore, the defined criteria of citizenship entail nationality and religion, but not language;28 as a result there are included not only the Greek-speaking, but also the Al- banian-speaking, Vlach-speaking etc. inhabitants of the revolted regions. As Politis (2009: 33) remarks, «The national consciousness was one of the gains of the Revolution: with the outbreak of the Struggle the revolted Christians changed name all of a sudden. While they were called Christians, Romioi or Moreans, Rumeliots, Cre- tans and the like, their name turned into Hellenes/Greeks». This is obviously a development inextricably linked with the emergence of the institution of the nation-state in the European area.
The style encountered in letters of citizens to the Administration is similar: in a document of the Samos Community, in which reference is made to the local regime (Samos, 12 June 1822, AGR, vol. 1, pp. 544-545), we read: «Οποίας και πόσης αρρήτου χαράς και αμυθήτου αγαλλιάσεως ενεπλήσθημεν, ιδόντες ότι η σεβαστή υπερτάτη Διοίκησις του ήδη ανακαινιζομένου Γένους ημών έρριψε τέλος το κηδεμονικώτατον αυτής όμμα και εις την νήσον ταύτην [...]/With which unspoken joy and unthinkable jubilation we were filled, when we saw that the revered supreme Administration of our already under restoration Nation turned its most caring glance at this island, too [...]». The passive past tense ενεπλήσθημεν, the second aorist participle ιδόντες, as well as the accumulation of adjective phrases (αρρήτου χαράς και αμυθήτου αγαλλιάσεως, σεβαστή υπερτάτη Διοίκησις, ανακαινιζομένου Γένους, κηδεμονικώτατον όμμα) construct a strongly scholarly context.
Evidently, the local idiom of Samos, which belongs to the northern dialectic group, becomes conspicuous by its absence, as the recorder sought absolute linguistic homogeneity with the deemed as written norm.
Even fighters familiar to each other record their speech via their secretaries in the same high register: in- dicative is the letter of captain Panourgias to captain Nikitas, on the topic of the situation in the province of Salona (Salona, 23 July 1823, AGR, vol. 17, p. 59), where we identify, among other things, ancient-like clause structures, as the indirect object in dative («ο κοινός φίλος κύριος Πεταλάς σοι γράφει εκτεταμένως/the com- mon friend mister Petalas writes to thee extensively»), a structure that in the spoken lanuage had already been restructured in the Hellenistic Koine and replaced by a prepositional equivalent (εις < σε + ΟΦ), purpose clauses introduced by διά («να φθάσης εις Γραβιάν όσον τάχος με όλας σου τας δυνάμεις, διά να ιατρεύσωμεν τα συμβάντα της επαρχίας ταύτης των Σαλώνων/reach Gravia as soon as possible with all your forces, in order to remedy those that took place in this province of Salona»), the ancient relative pronoun όστις et al.
However, even in these scholarly-rendered texts, wording and structures of the spoken language often intrude. For instance, in the letter of the commanders-in-chief in the siege of Lalas (16 June 1821, AGR, vol. 1, p. 334),
278 BEHOLDING LIBERTY!