Page 398 - Beholding Liberty!

Rigas Feraios (1757-1798)
BORN IN 1757 at Velestino of Thessaly, Rigas was taught his first lessons at Zagora of Pelio. After the Russo-Turkish Trea- ty of Kuchuk-Kainarji (1774), he departed for Constantinople, where he was educated in the environment of the Phanariots. Later on, he settled in Wallachia, undertaking the post of sec- retary to the local ruler Nikolaos Karatzas.
Of crucial importance was his first trip to Vienna, in 1790. In the Austrian city Rigas, along with the enjoyment of «grand life» in a cosmopolitan capital, he comes in contact with the Greek publishing circles and manages to publish a series of works, among which the New Political Administration, which contains the Revolutionary Proclamation, the Laws of Man, the Constitution and Thourios.
The moment has come, to put in action the revolutionary plan of Rigas, which was nothing else but the uprising of the en- slaved people of the Balkans against the Ottoman ruler. His printed in thousands of copies revolutionary material is put in boxes, so as to look like merchandise, and is sent from Vienna to Trieste, at that time a port of Austria. His plans though are put off: after the betrayal of the Greek merchant Dimitrios Oi- konomou he is arrested at Trieste, in the hotel where he was staying. Within the following days his seven companions are arrested too, and they are imprisoned in the Nebojša Tower. When the relevant edict (firman) came from Constantinople, the Greek revolutionaries were strangled and their dead bodies were thrown in the Danube (1798).
The national martyr Rigas remained in the popular memory as the «planter» par excellence of the liberty of the Greeks.
398 BEHOLDING LIBERTY!
ΙΙI.1.7
Karl Haupt (1860-1937)
Rigas chants the Thourios (War Song), 1901
coloured lithograph, 20 x 12.5 cm
signed and dated: Κ. Χάουπτ / 1901 (bottom right, on image) inscribed: Ο Ρήγας εξάπτει τον προς ελευθερίαν έρωτα των Ελλήνων (low centre) ΛΙΘ. ΡΟΥΦΑΓΑΛΗ Κ’ ΛΕΒΑΝΤΗ – ΑΘΗΝΑΙ (bottom left) Hellenic Parliament Art Collection, inv. n. 282
KARL HAUPT’S CHROMOLITHOGRAPH reproduces a scene from Peter von Hess’s iconographic series for the Munich Palace.
Set at night, Rigas Feraios is shown singing his Thourios, the patriotic song “Until when young men...”, which he com- posed as part of his revolutionary agenda. The listeners next to him are moved and seized by love for liberty, according to the inscription. Revolutionary songs, such as the also popu- lar “Come Children of the Greeks”, were an important medium for spreading the nationalist message of Rigas to the broad masses of the people, to whom the intellectual aspects of the Enlightenment were not accessible.
The inverted capital at the feet of Rigas evokes the Greek heri- tage, in contrast to the menacing castle, in the background, and the crescent against the sky, symbols of Ottoman oppression.
This popular print is a late reproduction of an image by Hess, also known as Rigas Sings the Thourios, released in various versions. Its lasting popularity attests to the interest in the early revolutionary figure of Rigas and his reception in popular culture.