फ्रीदोम और डेथ (Ελευθερία η Θάνατος)

 

On 25th of March Greece celebrates its Independence Day! As a Greek I celebrate this Day and I will take you with me in a trip to the time and a visit to the place where the Greek War of Independence started. It is a trip to a one year-old monastery of Aghia Lavra in Kalavryta region. I visited this area a few months ago and I had the luck to see the First Flag of Greece, a treasure of my country. This flag is the witness of a bright moment at the world history... the moment that the revolution for freedom started for Greece.

The monastery of Aghia Lavra is tucked away among trees, 4,5km away from the town of Kalavrita. On the right-hand side of the monastery's court lies the little chapel where the Greek revolution against the Ottoman Empire was launched in 1821, blessed by the Bishop Paleon Patron Germanos during the religious celebrations of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.

The bullet ridden Banner of the Revolution is kept today in what is the third version the monastery since the revolution, the first having been burnt by Ibrahim pasha, and the second destroyed by an earthquake, various fires and the invasion of the German troops in 1943. Historical items that have been saved are the diamond-decorated Gospel, a gift from Aikaterini the Great, the sacerdotal vestments of Paleon Patron Germanos and his Bishop's crook. The collection also includes a considerable number of crosses made of precious stones and other items of religious worship. There is also a collection of paintings, the most important being the one of Saint Panteleimon dated back to the 1600. The Greek War of Independence (1821–1831), also known as the Greek Revolution, was a successful war waged by the Greeks to win independence for Greece from the Ottoman Empire. Independence was finally granted by the Treaty of Constantinople in July 1832 when Greece (Hellas) was recognized as a free country. The Greeks were the first of the subject peoples of the Ottoman Empire to secure recognition as a sovereign power.

It was March of 1821 and the Ottoman Empire ruled almost all of Greece, with the exception of the Ionian Islands since its conquest of the Byzantine Empire over the course of the 14th and 15th centuries. However, in the 18th and 19th centuries, as revolutionary nationalism grew across Europe (due, in part, to the influence of the French Revolution ), and the power of the Ottoman Empire declined, Greek nationalism began to assert itself and drew support from Western European "philhellenes". On March 25, 1821 (also the same day as the Greek Orthodox day of the Annunciation of the Theotokos ), the Greeks rebelled and declared their independence. The revolution began at   Aghia Lavra on March 1821 with a declaration by Archibishop Germanos of Old Patra.

The revolutionary flag was raised under the historic plane tree just outside the gate of the monastery. There is a plaque on this tree which explains what happened under this tree.

"The west wind caresses you and the playful breeze embrasses you As from Aghia Lavra's Sacred Monastery You shed freedom abroad" (From: The Flag, by I. Polemis) The Sacred Banner of Aghia Lavra, Greece's First Flag, is preserved in the Monastery of Aghia Lavra as a priceless treasure and heirloom of the highest national significance. It is the banner which Germanos, Bishop of Old Patra, raised at the Monastery in March of 1821, thereby signaling the beginning of the Greek Revolution. It was beneath this banner that the patriots made their solemn vows to liberate their enslaved country. A codex dating from 1703 and preserved in the Monastery tell us that the banner was made in Smyrna during the latter part of the 16th Century. The Hegemon of Moldavia donated it to Monastery, and it was originally used not as a banner but as the veil of the Beautiful Gate of the Monastery's iconostasis. It was taken down from its original place and used as the banner of the revolution, thus becoming the symbol of the Nation's liberation from the four hundred year-long yoke of slavery to the Ottoman Empire. It is a work of exceptional beauty and workmanship. it is 1,20 meters in length and 0,95 meters in width. On it is embroided the icon of the Dormition of the Mother of God. The icon is executed with deep religious emotion and inspiration.

During the patriot's first foray to liberate the town of Kalavryta a Turkish bullet pierced the banner and left its mark where the head of the angel on the left was. The faces are skillfully embroidered with fair-colored silk thread. the garments are executed with gold threads. The banner has undergone many vicissitudes. In 1772 it was seized and taken to Constantinople and from there to Moldo-Valachia. The Monastery of Aghia Lavra, with the help of Ecumenical Patriarch, was able to buy it back. In 1780, in order to save it from certain theft, the monks had it sent to Romylia. from there it found its way to Epirus, from whence the monks repurchased it. With the great significance it took for the Greeks as the banner of their national struggle for independence, it became in the eyes of the Turks a goad and an object of hate. Ibrahim Pasha called it "the cursed tag" and offered a generous bounty for its capture. the monks' piety and patriotism, however, preserved it from the flames lit by all the wars which Greece was to endure. Today the Sacred Banner is preserved in a special case. it is the pride and joy of the Monastery and for the inhabitants of the martyric eparchy of Kalavryta.

For the pilgrims and visitors to the historic Monastery of Aghia Lavra the banner is tangible proof of a great historical event: the Revolution of 1821 with its world-wide significance and ramifications. The banner is also a source of religious and national inspiration. It is a symbol. In it are harmoniously combined in a sacred unity the two great ideals of the Greek Nation: religion and motherland, Christianity and Hellenism. For two thousand years now Christianity and Hellenism have walked hand in hand the up-hill road of history. (The text about "The Sacred Banner" is  written by Dem. Velaoras and I have copied it  from the leaflet of Holy Metropolis of Kalavryta and Aigialeia with the title "The Banner of the Monastery of Aghia Lavra, Greece's first Flag")

The Independence War started on March 25, 1821. The fighting escalated throughout the mainland and many islands. Within a year the Greeks had captured Monemvassia, Navarino (modern Pylos), Nafplion and Tripolitsa in the Peloponnese, and Messolongi, Athens and Thebes. Greek independence was proclaimed at Epidaurus on 13 January 1822. The Turks retaliated with massacres in Asia Minor, most notoriously on the island of Chios, where more than 25,000 civilians were killed.

Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi. Eugène Delacroix, 1826.

The Western powers were reluctant to intervene, fearing the consequences of creating a power vacuum in south-eastern Europe, where the Turks still controlled much territory. But help did come from the philhellenes; aristocratic young men, recipients of a classical education, who saw themselves as the inheritors of a glorious civilization and were willing to fight to liberate its oppressed descendants. Philhellenes included Shelley, Goethe, Schiller, Victor Hugo, Alfred de Musset and Lord Byron. Byron arrived in Messolonghi an important center of resistance in January 1824 and died three months later of pneumonia. The prime movers of the revolution were the klephts Theodoros Kolokotronis (who led the siege of Nafplion) and Markos Botsaris; Georgios Koundouriotis (a ship owner) and Admiral Andreas Miaoulis, both from Hydra, Georgios Karaiskakis the Leader of Sterea Hellada and Demitrios Ypsilantis. Other heroes were: Georgios Karaiskakis, Odysseas Androutsos, Konstantinos Kanaris, Makriyannis, Papaflessas, Athanasios Diakos, Bouboulina, Manto Mavrogenous and many more. If you familiarize yourself with these names, walking along streets in Greece will take on a whole new meaning as a disproportionate number are named after these heroes.

The statue of Archibishop Germanos of Old Patra holding the flag with the phrase "ΕΛΕΥΘΕΡΙΑ Η ΘΑΝΑΤΟΣ" (FREEDOM OR DEATH)

The long list makes it clear that the cause was not lacking leaders; what was lacking was unity of objectives and strategy. Internal disagreements twice escalated into civil war, the worst in the Peloponnese in 1824. The sultan took advantage of this, called in Egyptian reinforcements, and by 1827 captured Modon (Methoni) and Corinth, and recaptured Navarino, Messolongi and Athens. At last the Western powers intervened, and a combined Russian, French and British fleet destroyed the Turkish-Egyptian fleet in the Bay of Navarino in October 1827. Sultan Mahmud II defied the odds and proclaimed a holy war. Russia sent troops into the Balkans and engaged the Ottoman army in yet another Russian-Turkish war. Fighting continued until 1829 when, with Russian troops at the gates of Constantinople, the sultan accepted Greek independence by the Treaty of Andrianople. That time the Greeks who were alive and started rebuild their country were less than a million and the number of those who died for the freedom were more than 2 million. The Creek Struggle for Independence in 1821, whose beginning was heralded by the raising of the sacred Banner at the Monastery os Aghia Lavra, was a struggle "For Christ's Holy Faith   and for the Fatherland's Freedom" Greeks celebrate their independence day annually on March 25. We honor our ancestor's blood that offer us the freedom. We are here and we exist as a nation because of them. For all who are and for those who feel Greeks Happy Independence Day!