Greece History

Effective family research requires some understanding of the historical events that may have affected your family and the records about them. Learning about wars, governments, laws, migrations, and religious trends may help you understand political boundaries, family movements, and settlement patterns. These events may have led to the creation of records such as land and military documents that mention your family.

The eastern Mediterranean is called one of the cradles of civilization. From 3000–2000 B.C. a Minoan civilization flourished on the island of Crete. From 1400–1100 B.C. the Myceans established kingdoms in Peloponnesus. Following that was a period of strong city-states. A fusion of the Greek and Persian cultures under Alexander the Great created the Hellenistic civilization. Some subsequent key dates and events in the history of Greece are as follows:

B.C. 146: Rome conquered Greece

A.D. 285: Rome divided with two capitals one in Rome and one in Byzantium (Greek city later renamed Constantinople)

1453: Constantinople fell to the Turks and became the capital of the Ottoman Empire

1821: Greek war of independence against Ottoman rule began

1827: Greek independence achieved

1832:Monarchy established over Greece

1863: Ionian Islands ceded to Greece by Great Britain

1881: Thessaly and part of Epirus ceded to Greece by Turkey

1913: Crete, Macedonia, and the Aegea Islands ceded to Greece by Turkey

1918: Western Thrace ceded to Greece by Bulgaria

1920: Eastern Thrace and part of Asia Minor granted to Greece

1923: Eastern Thrace and part of Asia Minor returned to Turkey

1947 : Dodecanese Islands ceded to Greece by Italy

1973: Monarchy abolished; Greece declared a republic

1981: Greece became tenth member of the European Community

The Family History Library has some published national, regional, and local histories for Greece. You can find histories in the Family History Library Catalog under one of the following:

EUROPE - HISTORY

GREECE - HISTORY

GREECE, [COUNTY] - HISTORY

GREECE, [COUNTY], [CITY] - HISTORY

You can easily find general histories for Greece at local public libraries or in major research libraries.

Local Histories
Local histories can also be valuable sources for family history research. They describe the settlement of the area and the founding of churches, schools, and businesses. You may also find lists of soldiers and civil officials. Even if your ancestor is not listed, information on other relatives may be included that will provide important clues for locating the ancestor. A local history may also lead to clues for other records to search. In addition, you should study and enjoy local histories for the background information they can provide about your family’s lifestyle and the community in which your family lived.

The Family History Library has some local histories for towns in Greece. Similar histories are often available at major public and university libraries and archives, as well. Local town halls usually have such histories or can direct you to the source where you can obtain them. Bibliographies that list local histories are available for some areas in Greece. These are listed in the Family History Library Catalog under:

GREECE - BIBLIOGRAPHY

GREECE, [COUNTY] - BIBLIOGRAPHY

GREECE - HISTORY - BIBLIOGRAPHY

GREECE, [COUNTY] - HISTORY - BIBLIOGRAPHY

Calendar Changes
The Gregorian calendar is the calendar in common use in the world today. It is a correction of the Julian calendar that had been in use since A.D. 46. Leap years had been miscalculated in the Julian calendar. By 1582, the calendar was 10 days behind the solar year. The Julian calendar changed to the Gregorian calender in Greece in 1923–1924, at which time the calender was changed 13 days to bring it in line with the solar year. Some records kept during Ottoman rule or kept by Greek communities in Asia Minor used the Ottoman calendar, which calculates time from the “flight of Mohammad” on 16 July 622. It is a lunar calendar and the first day of the year varies considerably from year to year. To make this equate to our modern calendar, 622 years must be added to the Ottoman calendar (for example, 1200 Islamic corresponds to 1822–1823 Gregorian). For exact correspondences of dates, use conversion tables such as in the following book:

Freeman-Grenville, G.S.P. The Muslim and Christian Calendars. New York. NY, USA: Oxford University Press, 1963. Tables for the conversion of Muslim and Christian dates from the Hajra to the year A.D. 2000.

A wonderful conversion calendar that converts days from our modern Gregorian calendar to the Julian and Muslim calendars and vice versa is found at the following Internet websites:


 * http://www.calendarhome.com/converter/
 * http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/
 * http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/JulianDate.html

When the French Empire under Napoleon controlled parts of Greece, such as the Ionian islands, another calendar was introduced. This calendar, based on the founding of the French Republic, used a system of months unrelated to the regular calendar. You may find some records that use that calendar. If so, see French Republican Calendar.