Editing Greeks (section)

==Identity==
[[File:Hermes the scholar.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.8|The cover of ''[[Hermes o Logios]]'', a Greek literary publication of the late 18th and early 19th centuries in [[Vienna]] with major contribution to the [[Modern Greek Enlightenment]]]]

The terms used to define Greekness have varied throughout history but were never limited or completely identified with membership to a Greek state.<ref name=Broome>{{harvnb|Broome|1996|loc="Greek Identity", pp. 22–27}}</ref> [[Herodotus]] gave a famous account of what defined Greek (Hellenic) ethnic identity in his day, enumerating 
#shared [[kinship and descent|descent]] ({{langx|grc|ὅμαιμον|hómaimon|of the same blood|label=none}})<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do%28%2Fmaimos ὅμαιμος] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225070512/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do(%2Fmaimos |date=25 February 2021 }}, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, ''A Greek-English Lexicon'', on Perseus</ref>
#shared [[language]] ({{langx|grc|ὁμόγλωσσον|homóglōsson|speaking the same tongue|label=none}})<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do%28mo%2Fglwssos ὁμόγλωσσος] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225073414/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do(mo%2Fglwssos |date=25 February 2021 }}, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, ''A Greek-English Lexicon'', on Perseus</ref>
#shared [[sanctuaries]] and [[sacrifices]] ({{langx|grc|θεῶν ἱδρύματά τε κοινὰ καὶ θυσίαι|theôn hidrúmatá te koinà kaì thusíai|common foundations, common sacrifices to gods|label=none}})<ref>I. Polinskaya, "Shared sanctuaries and the gods of others: On the meaning Of 'common' in Herodotus 8.144", in: R. Rosen & I. Sluiter (eds.), ''Valuing others in Classical Antiquity'' (LEiden: Brill, 2010), 43–70.</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0038%3Abook%3D8%3Achapter%3D144|title=Herodotus, The Seventh, Eighth, & Ninth Books with Introduction and Commentary|last=Macan|first=Reginald Walter|author-link=Reginald Walter Macan|date=1908|via=Perseus|publisher=Macmillan & Co. Ltd.|access-date=7 October 2023|chapter=8. 144|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230913094839/https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0038%3Abook%3D8%3Achapter%3D144|archive-date=13 September 2023}}</ref>
#shared [[Mores|customs]] ({{langx|grc|ἤθεα ὁμότροπα|ḗthea homótropa|customs of like fashion|label=none}}).<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do%28mo%2Ftropos ὁμότροπος] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225222702/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Do(mo%2Ftropos |date=25 February 2021 }}, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, ''A Greek-English Lexicon'', on Perseus)</ref><ref>Herodotus, 8.144.2: ''"The kinship of all Greeks in blood and speech, and the shrines of gods and the sacrifices that we have in common, and the likeness of our way of life."''</ref><ref>Athena S. Leoussi, Steven Grosby, ''Nationalism and Ethnosymbolism: History, Culture and Ethnicity in the Formation of Nations'', Edinburgh University Press, 2006, p. 115</ref>

By Western standards, the term ''Greeks'' has traditionally referred to any native speakers of the [[Greek language]], whether [[Mycenaean Greek language|Mycenaean]], [[Medieval Greek|Byzantine]] or [[modern Greek]].<ref name=Mazower>{{harvnb|Mazower|2000|pp=105–107}}.</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Adrados|2005|p=xii}}.</ref> [[Byzantine Greeks]] self-identified as ''Romaioi'' ("Romans"), ''Graikoi'' ("Greeks") and ''Christianoi'' ("Christians") since they were the political heirs of [[Roman Empire|imperial Rome]], the descendants of their [[Ancient Greeks|classical Greek forebears]] and followers of the [[Apostles in the New Testament|Apostles]];<ref>{{harvnb|Finkelberg|2012|p=20}}; {{harvnb|Harrison|2002|p=268}}; {{harvnb|Kazhdan|Constable|1982|p=12}}; {{harvnb|Runciman|1970|p=14}}.</ref> during the mid-to-late Byzantine period (11th–13th century), a growing number of Byzantine Greek intellectuals deemed themselves ''Hellenes'' although for most Greek-speakers, "Hellene" still meant pagan.<ref name=Cameron/><ref>{{harvnb|Ševčenko|2002|p=284}}.</ref> On the eve of the [[Fall of Constantinople]] the [[Constantine XI|Last Emperor]] urged his soldiers to remember that they were the descendants of Greeks and Romans.<ref>{{cite book|last=Sphrantzes |first=George|author-link=George Sphrantzes|title=The Chronicle of the Fall|year=1477}}</ref>

Before the establishment of the modern Greek nation-state, the link between ancient and modern Greeks was emphasized by the scholars of Greek Enlightenment especially by Rigas Feraios. In his "Political Constitution", he addresses to the nation as "the people descendant of the Greeks".<ref>Feraios, Rigas. ''New Political Constitution of the Inhabitants of Rumeli, Asia Minor, the Islands of the Aegean, and the Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia''.</ref> The [[History of Modern Greece|modern Greek state]] was created in 1829, when the Greeks liberated a part of their historic homelands, [[Peloponnese]], from the [[Ottoman Empire]].<ref>{{harvnb|Koliopoulos|Veremis|2002|p=277}}.</ref> The large [[Greek diaspora]] and merchant class were instrumental in transmitting the ideas of western [[romantic nationalism]] and [[philhellenism]],<ref name=BritMerchant>{{cite encyclopedia |year=2008 |title =History of Greece, Ottoman Empire, The merchant middle class |encyclopedia= Encyclopædia Britannica |publisher= Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. |location=United States |id=Online Edition }}</ref> which together with the conception of Hellenism, formulated during the last centuries of the [[Byzantine Empire]], formed the basis of the [[Diafotismos]] and the current conception of Hellenism.<ref name=BritIdent/><ref name=Mazower/><ref>{{harvnb|Smith|2003|p=98: "After the Ottoman conquest in 1453, recognition by the Turks of the Greek ''millet'' under its Patriarch and Church helped to ensure the persistence of a separate ethnic identity, which, even if it did not ''produce'' a "precocious nationalism" among the Greeks, provided the later Greek enlighteners and nationalists with a cultural constituency fed by political dreams and apocalyptic prophecies of the recapture of Constantinople and the restoration of Greek Byzantium and its Orthodox emperor in all his glory."}}</ref>

The Greeks today are a nation in the meaning of an ''[[ethnic group|ethnos]]'', defined by possessing [[Culture of Greece|Greek culture]] and having a Greek [[First language|mother tongue]], not by citizenship, race, and religion or by being subjects of any particular state.<ref>{{harvnb|Tonkin|Chapman|McDonald|1989}}.</ref> In ancient and medieval times and to some extent today the Greek term was ''[[genos]]'', which also indicates a common ancestry.<ref>{{harvnb|Patterson|1998|pp=18–19}}.</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Psellos|first=Michael|title=Michaelis Pselli Orationes Panegyricae|year=1994|location=Stuttgart/Leipzig|publisher=Walter de Gruyter|page=33|isbn=978-0-297-82057-4}}</ref>

===Names===
{{main|Achaeans (Homer)|Names of the Greeks}}
[[File:Ancient Regions Mainland Greece.png|thumb|right|Map showing the major regions of mainland ancient Greece, and adjacent "barbarian" lands]]

Greeks and Greek-speakers have used different names to refer to themselves collectively. The term {{em|Achaeans}} (Ἀχαιοί) is one of the [[Names of the Greeks|collective names]] for the Greeks in [[Homer]]'s ''[[Iliad]]'' and ''[[Odyssey]]'' (the Homeric "long-haired Achaeans" would have been a part of the [[Mycenaean civilization]] that dominated Greece from {{circa}} 1600 BC until 1100 BC). The other common names are {{em|Danaans}} (Δαναοί) and {{em|Argives}} (Ἀργεῖοι) while {{em|Panhellenes}} (Πανέλληνες) and {{em|Hellenes}} (Ἕλληνες) both [[hapax legomenon|appear only once]] in the ''Iliad'';<ref>See ''Iliad'', II.2.530 for "Panhellenes" and ''Iliad'' II.2.653 for "Hellenes".</ref> all of these terms were used, synonymously, to denote a common Greek identity.<ref>{{harvnb|Cartledge|2011|loc=Chapter 4: Argos, p. 23: "The Late Bronze Age in Greece is also called conventionally 'Mycenaean', as we saw in the last chapter. But it might in principle have been called 'Argive', 'Achaean', or 'Danaan', since the three names that Homer does apply to Greeks collectively were 'Argives', 'Achaeans', and 'Danaans'."}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Nagy|2014|loc=Texts and Commentaries – Introduction #2: "Panhellenism is the least common denominator of ancient Greek civilization&nbsp;... The impulse of Panhellenism is already at work in Homeric and Hesiodic poetry. In the Iliad, the names "Achaeans" and "Danaans" and "Argives" are used synonymously in the sense of Panhellenes = "all Hellenes" = "all Greeks.""}}</ref> In the historical period, Herodotus identified the [[Achaea (ancient region)|Achaeans]] of the northern [[Peloponnese]] as descendants of the earlier, Homeric Achaeans.<ref>[[Herodotus]]. ''Histories'', 7.94 and 8.73.</ref>

[[Homer]] refers to the "Hellenes" as a relatively small tribe settled in Thessalic [[Phthia]], with its warriors under the command of [[Achilleus]].<ref>Homer. ''[[Iliad]]'', 2.681–685</ref> The [[Parian Chronicle]] says that Phthia was the homeland of the Hellenes and that this name was given to those previously called Greeks ({{lang|grc|Γραικοί}}).<ref name="Parian-Chronicle">[http://www.ashmolean.org/ash/faqs/q004/q004008.html The Parian Marble, Entry #6] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170823171940/http://www.ashmolean.org/ash/faqs/q004/q004008.html |date=23 August 2017 }}: "From when Hellen [son of] Deuc[alion] became king of [Phthi]otis and those previously called Graekoi were named Hellenes."</ref> In [[Greek mythology]], [[Hellen]], the patriarch of the Hellenes who ruled around Phthia, was the son of [[Pyrrha]] and [[Deucalion]], the only survivors after the [[flood myth|Great Deluge]].<ref>Pseudo-Apollodorus. ''[[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Bibliotheca]]''.</ref> The Greek philosopher [[Aristotle]] names ancient [[Ancient Greece|Hellas]] as an area in [[Epirus]] between [[Dodona]] and the [[Achelous]] river, the location of the Great Deluge of [[Deucalion]], a land occupied by the [[Selloi]] and the "Greeks" who later came to be known as "Hellenes".<ref name=Aristotle>Aristotle. ''Meteorologica'', [http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/meteorology.1.i.html 1.14] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629061102/http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/meteorology.1.i.html |date=29 June 2011 }}: "The deluge in the time of Deucalion, for instance took place chiefly in the Greek world and in it especially about ancient Hellas, the country about Dodona and the Achelous."</ref> In the Homeric tradition, the Selloi were the priests of Dodonian Zeus.<ref>[[Homer]]. ''Iliad'', 16.233–16.235: "King Zeus, lord of Dodona&nbsp;... you who hold wintry Dodona in your sway, where your prophets the Selloi dwell around you."</ref>

In the [[Hesiod]]ic ''[[Catalogue of Women]]'', [[Graecus]] is presented as the son of Zeus and [[Pandora II]], sister of [[Hellen]] the patriarch of the Hellenes.<ref>Hesiod. ''Catalogue of Women'', Fragment 5.</ref> According to the [[Parian Chronicle]], when [[Deucalion]] became king of Phthia, the {{em|Graikoi}} (Γραικοί) were named Hellenes.<ref name="Parian-Chronicle"/> [[Aristotle]] notes in his ''Meteorologica'' that the Hellenes were related to the Graikoi.<ref name=Aristotle/>

====Etymology====
The English names ''Greece'' and ''Greek'' are derived, via the Latin ''{{lang|la|Graecia}}'' and ''{{lang|la|Graecus}}'', from the name of the [[Graecians|Graeci]] ({{lang|grc|Γραικοί}}, {{Lang|grc-Latn|Graikoí}}; <small>singular</small> {{lang|grc|Γραικός}}, {{Lang|grc-Latn|Graikós}}), who were among the first [[List of ancient Greek tribes|ancient Greek tribes]] to settle [[southern Italy]] (the so-called "[[Magna Graecia]]"). The term is possibly derived from the [[Proto-Indo-European language|Proto-Indo-European]] root ''[[wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/ǵerh₂-|*ǵerh₂-]]'', "to grow old",<ref>{{cite book |last=Starostin |first=Sergei |year=1998 |url=http://starling.rinet.ru/main.html |title=The Tower of Babel: An Etymological Database Project}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Watkins |first=Calvert |year=2000 |title=The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots |publisher=Houghton Mifflin Company |location=Boston, New York |isbn=0618082506}}</ref> more specifically from [[Graea]] (ancient city), said by [[Aristotle]] to be the oldest in Greece, and the source of colonists for the [[Naples]] area.<ref>Aristotle, ''[[Meteorologica]]'' I.xiv</ref>

===Continuity===
[[File:Byzantine Greek Alexander Manuscript Bracca (cropped).JPG|thumb|Alexander the Great in [[Byzantine Emperor]]'s clothes, by a manuscript depicting scenes from his life (between 1204 and 1453)]]

The most obvious link between modern and ancient Greeks is their language, which has a documented tradition from at least the 14th century BC to the present day, albeit with a break during the [[Greek Dark Ages]] from which written records are absent (11th–8th cent. BC, though the [[Cypriot syllabary]] was in use during this period).<ref name=Adrados>{{harvnb|Adrados|2005|pp=xii, 3–5}}.</ref> Scholars compare its continuity of tradition to [[Chinese language|Chinese]] alone.<ref name=Adrados/><ref name="Browning">{{harvnb|Browning|1983|p=vii: "The Homeric poems were first written down in more or less their present form in the seventh century B.C. Since then Greek has enjoyed a continuous tradition down to the present day. Change there has certainly been. But there has been no break like that between Latin and Romance languages. Ancient Greek is not a foreign language to the Greek of today as Anglo-Saxon is to the modern Englishman. The only other language which enjoys comparable continuity of tradition is Chinese."}}</ref> Since its inception, Hellenism was primarily a matter of common culture and the national continuity of the Greek world is a lot more certain than its demographic.<ref name=Roberts1/><ref name=ADS>{{harvnb|Smith|1991|pp=29–32}}.</ref> Yet, Hellenism also embodied an ancestral dimension through aspects of Athenian literature that developed and influenced ideas of descent based on autochthony.<ref>{{harvnb|Isaac|2004|p=504: "Autochthony, being an Athenian idea and represented in many Athenian texts, is likely to have influenced a broad public of readers, wherever Greek literature was read."}}</ref> During the later years of the Eastern Roman Empire, areas such as [[Ionia]] and [[Constantinople]] experienced a Hellenic revival in language, philosophy, and literature and on classical models of thought and scholarship.<ref name=ADS/> This revival provided a powerful impetus to the sense of cultural affinity with ancient Greece and its classical heritage.<ref name=ADS/> Throughout their history, the Greeks have retained their language and [[Greek alphabet|alphabet]], certain values and cultural traditions, customs, a sense of religious and cultural difference and exclusion (the word ''[[barbarian]]'' was used by 12th-century historian [[Anna Komnene]] to describe non-Greek speakers),<ref>Anna Comnena. ''[[Alexiad]]'', Books 1–15.</ref> a sense of Greek identity and common sense of ethnicity despite the undeniable socio-political changes of the past two millennia.<ref name=ADS/> In recent anthropological studies, both ancient and modern Greek osteological samples were analyzed demonstrating a bio-genetic affinity and continuity shared between both groups.<ref>{{harvnb|Papagrigorakis|Kousoulis|Synodinos|2014|p=237: "Interpreted with caution, the craniofacial morphology in modern and ancient Greeks indicates elements of ethnic group continuation within the unavoidable multicultural mixtures."}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Argyropoulos|Sassouni|Xeniotou|1989|p=200: "An overall view of the finding obtained from these cephalometric analyses indicates that the Greek ethnic group has remained genetically stable in its cephalic and facial morphology for the last 4,000 years."}}</ref> There is also a direct genetic link between ancient Greeks and modern Greeks.<ref name="Gibbons2017">{{cite journal |last1=Gibbons |first1=Ann |title=The Greeks really do have near-mythical origins, ancient DNA reveals |journal=Science |date=2 August 2017 |doi=10.1126/science.aan7200 }}</ref><ref name="Lazaridis2017">{{harvnb|Lazaridis|Mittnik|Patterson|Mallick|2017}}</ref>

===Demographics===
{{Main|Demographics of Greece|Demographics of Cyprus}}

Today, Greeks are the majority ethnic group in the [[Hellenic Republic]],<ref name=Greece>{{cite web |script-title=el:Πίνακας 9. Πληθυσμός κατά υπηκοότητα και φύλο|language=el|publisher=Hellenic Statistical Authority|year=2001|url-status=dead|url=http://www.statistics.gr/gr_tables/S1101_SAP_09_TB_DC_01_10_Y.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090206090424/http://www.statistics.gr/gr_tables/S1101_SAP_09_TB_DC_01_10_Y.pdf |archive-date=6 February 2009|access-date=7 January 2009}}</ref> where they constitute 93% of the country's population,<ref>{{cite web|title=CIA Factbook|access-date=19 December 2008|work=Central Intelligence Agency|publisher=United States Government|year=2007|url=https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/greece/|archive-date=9 January 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210109063832/https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/greece/|url-status=live}}</ref> and the [[Republic of Cyprus]] where they make up 78% of the island's population (excluding Turkish settlers in the occupied part of the country).<ref name=autogenerated2>{{cite web|title=Census of Population 2001|access-date=11 June 2016|publisher=Γραφείο Τύπου και Πληροφοριών, Υπουργείο Εσωτερικών, Κυπριακή Δημοκρατία|url=http://www.pio.gov.cy/mof/cystat/statistics.nsf/All/805CB6E0CF012914C2257122003F3A84/$file/MAIN%20RESULTS-EN.xls?OpenElement|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170203065940/http://www.pio.gov.cy/mof/cystat/statistics.nsf/All/805CB6E0CF012914C2257122003F3A84/$file/MAIN%20RESULTS-EN.xls?OpenElement|archive-date=3 February 2017}}</ref> Greek populations have not traditionally exhibited high rates of growth; a large percentage of Greek population growth since Greece's foundation in 1832 was attributed to annexation of new territories, as well as the influx of 1.5 million Greek refugees after the [[Population exchange between Greece and Turkey|1923 population exchange]] between Greece and Turkey.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|title=Greece: Demographic trends|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|publisher=Encyclopædia Britannica Inc.|year=2016|id=Online Edition|url=https://www.britannica.com/place/Greece/Climate|access-date=21 June 2022|archive-date=17 July 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190717045510/https://www.britannica.com/place/Greece/Climate|url-status=live}}</ref> About 80% of the population of Greece is urban, with 28% concentrated in the city of Athens.<ref name=EconWorld>{{cite book|title=Pocket World in Figures (Economist)|publisher=Economist Books|location=London|year=2006|page=150|chapter=Merchant Marine, Tertiary enrollment by age group|isbn=978-1-86197-825-7}}</ref>

Greeks from Cyprus have a similar history of emigration, usually to the English-speaking world because of the island's colonization by the [[British Empire]]. Waves of [[emigration]] followed the [[Turkish invasion of Cyprus]] in 1974, while the population decreased between mid-1974 and 1977 as a result of emigration, war losses, and a temporary decline in fertility.<ref name="Britannica-Cyprus">{{cite encyclopedia|title=Cyprus: Demographic trends|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|publisher=Encyclopædia Britannica Inc.|id=Online Edition|year=2016|url=https://www.britannica.com/place/Cyprus|access-date=21 June 2022|archive-date=22 June 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080622013659/http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-33828/Cyprus|url-status=live}}</ref> After the [[ethnic cleansing]] of a third of the Greek population of the island in 1974,<ref>{{harvnb|Papadakis|Peristianis|Welz|2006|pp=2–3}}; {{harvnb|Borowiec|2000|p=2}}; {{harvnb|Rezun|2001|p=6}}; {{harvnb|Brown|2004|p=48}}.</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Yotopoulos-Marangopoulos|2001|p=24: "In occupied Cyprus on the other hand, where heavy ethnic cleansing took place, only 300 Greek Cypriots remain from the original 200,000!"}}</ref> there was also an increase in the number of Greek Cypriots leaving, especially for the Middle East, which contributed to a decrease in population that tapered off in the 1990s.<ref name="Britannica-Cyprus"/> Today more than two-thirds of the Greek population in Cyprus is urban.<ref name="Britannica-Cyprus"/>

Around 1990, most Western estimates of the number of ethnic Greeks in Albania were around 200,000 but in the 1990s, a majority of them migrated to Greece.<ref name=BJp49>{{Cite book |last1=Bideleux |first1=Robert |last2=Jeffries |first2=Ian |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/85373407 |title=The Balkans : a post-communist history |date=2007 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-203-96911-3 |location=London |oclc=85373407 |page=49 |quote=It is difficult to know how many ethnic Greeks there were in Albania before the exodus of refugees during the early to mid-1990s. The Albanian government claimed there were only 60,000, based on the biased 1989 census, whereas the Greek government claimed there were upwards of 300,000. Most Western estimates were around the 200,000 mark |access-date=17 December 2022 |archive-date=29 May 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200529222056/https://www.worldcat.org/title/balkans-a-post-communist-history/oclc/85373407 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Georgiou |first=Myria |url=https://www.lse.ac.uk/media@lse/research/EMTEL/Minorities/papers/greekreport.pdf |title=Mapping Minorities and their Media: The National Context – Greece |publisher=London School of Economics |year=2004 |quote="The long and adventurous 20th century history of migration in Greece can be drawn by period: .... 1990’s: The vast majority of the 200,000 ethnic Greeks from Albania". |access-date=17 December 2022 |archive-date=14 December 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221214211946/https://www.lse.ac.uk/media@lse/research/EMTEL/Minorities/papers/greekreport.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> The Greek minority of [[Greeks in Turkey|Turkey]], which numbered upwards of 200,000 people after the 1923 exchange, has now dwindled to a few thousand, after the 1955 [[Istanbul Pogrom|Constantinople Pogrom]] and other state sponsored violence and discrimination.<ref>{{cite news|last=Gilson|first=George|title=Destroying a minority: Turkey's attack on the Greeks|work=Athens News|date=24 June 2005|access-date=19 December 2008|url=http://www.athensnews.gr/athweb/nathens.print_unique?e=C&f=13136&m=A10&aa=1&eidos=S|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080617131719/http://www.athensnews.gr/athweb/nathens.print_unique?e=C&f=13136&m=A10&aa=1&eidos=S |archive-date=17 June 2008}}</ref> This effectively ended, though not entirely, the three-thousand-year-old presence of Hellenism in Asia Minor.<ref>{{harvnb|Vryonis|2005|pp=1–10}}.</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Birand|first=Mehm |display-authors=etal |title=The shame of Sept. 6–7 is always with us|work=Hürriyet Daily News|date=7 September 2005|access-date=19 December 2008|url=http://arama.hurriyet.com.tr/arsivnews.aspx?id=-559132|archive-url=https://archive.today/20121209034629/http://arama.hurriyet.com.tr/arsivnews.aspx?id=-559132|url-status=dead|archive-date=9 December 2012}}</ref> There are smaller Greek minorities in the rest of the Balkan countries, the [[Greeks in Lebanon|Levant]] and the [[Greeks in Georgia|Black Sea]] states, remnants of the Old [[Greek Diaspora]] (pre-19th century).<ref name=Prevelakis>{{cite web|last=Prevelakis|first=George|year=2003|location=Oxford|publisher=Transnational Communities Programme (Working Paper Series)|access-date=16 May 2016|title=''Finis Greciae'' or the Return of the Greeks? State and Diaspora in the Context of Globalisation|url=http://www.transcomm.ox.ac.uk/working%20papers/prevelakis.PDF |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/http://www.transcomm.ox.ac.uk/working%20papers/prevelakis.PDF |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live}}</ref>

===Diaspora===
{{Main|Greek diaspora}}
[[File:50 largest Greek diaspora.png|thumb|upright=1.25|Greek diaspora (20th century)]]

The total number of Greeks living outside Greece and Cyprus today is a contentious issue. Where census figures are available, they show around three million Greeks outside Greece and Cyprus. Estimates provided by the [[SAE – World Council of Hellenes Abroad]] put the figure at around seven million worldwide.<ref>{{cite web|title=Speech by Vasilis Magdalinos|access-date=19 December 2008|publisher=SAE|date=29 December 2006|url=http://www.sae.gr/?id=12566&tag=%CE%95%CE%B9%CF%83%CE%AE%CE%B3%CE%B7%CF%83%CE%B7%20%CE%92%CE%B1%CF%83%CE%AF%CE%BB%CE%B7%20%CE%9C%CE%B1%CE%B3%CE%B4%CE%B1%CE%BB%CE%B7%CE%BD%CE%BF%CF%8D|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721090732/http://www.sae.gr/?id=12566&tag=%CE%95%CE%B9%CF%83%CE%AE%CE%B3%CE%B7%CF%83%CE%B7%20%CE%92%CE%B1%CF%83%CE%AF%CE%BB%CE%B7%20%CE%9C%CE%B1%CE%B3%CE%B4%CE%B1%CE%BB%CE%B7%CE%BD%CE%BF%CF%8D|archive-date=21 July 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> According to George Prevelakis of [[Sorbonne University]], the number is closer to just below five million.<ref name=Prevelakis/> Integration, intermarriage, and loss of the Greek language influence the self-identification of the Greek diaspora (''omogenia''). Important centres include [[Greek Americans|New York City]], [[Chicago]], [[Boston]], [[Los Angeles]], [[Greek Australian|Sydney]], [[Greek community of Melbourne|Melbourne]], [[Greeks in the United Kingdom|London]], [[Greek community of Toronto|Toronto]], [[Greek Canadian|Montreal]], [[Vancouver]], [[Greek New Zealander|Auckland]], and [[Greek Brazilian|Sao Paulo]].<ref name=Prevelakis/> In 2010, the Hellenic Parliament introduced a law that allowed members of the diaspora to vote in Greek elections;<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/Articles/en-US/15072008_SB1306.htm|title=Meeting on the exercise of voting rights by foreigners of Greek origin|work=Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs|date=15 July 2008|access-date=19 December 2008|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120216034948/http://www.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/Articles/en-US/15072008_SB1306.htm|archive-date=16 February 2012}}</ref> this law was repealed in early 2014.<ref>{{cite web|title=Non-Greeks and diaspora lose out on voting rights|publisher=Ekathimerini.com|date=8 February 2014|access-date=13 January 2015|url=http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_1_08/02/2014_537214|archive-date=13 January 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150113222826/http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_1_08/02/2014_537214|url-status=live}}</ref>

====Ancient====
{{See also|Colonies in antiquity}}
[[File:Griechischen und phönizischen Kolonien.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|right|Greek colonization in antiquity]]

In ancient times, the trading and colonizing activities of the Greek tribes and city states spread the Greek culture, religion and language around the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins, especially in [[Southern Italy]] (the so-called "[[Magna Graecia]]"), Spain, the [[History of Marseille|south of France]] and the [[Pontian Greeks|Black sea coasts]].<ref name=Apoikiai>{{harvnb|Boardman|1984|pp=199–289}}.</ref> Under Alexander the Great's empire and successor states, Greek and Hellenizing ruling classes were established in the [[Seleucid Kingdom|Middle East]], [[Indo-Greek Kingdom|India]] and in [[Ptolemaic dynasty|Egypt]].<ref name=Apoikiai/> The [[Hellenistic period]] is characterized by a new wave of Greek colonization that established Greek cities and kingdoms in [[Dayuan|Asia]] and [[Cyrene, Libya|Africa]].<ref>{{harvnb|Horden|Purcell|2000|pp=111, 128}}.</ref> Under the Roman Empire, easier movement of people spread Greeks across the Empire and in the eastern territories, Greek became the [[lingua franca]] rather than [[Latin]].<ref name=Haldon50/> The modern-day [[Griko people|Griko community]] of southern Italy, numbering about 60,000,<ref name="Grecia-Salentina"/><ref name=Bellinello/> may represent a living remnant of the ancient Greek populations of Italy.

====Modern====
[[File:Distribution Of Races 1918 National Geographic.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Distribution of ethnic groups in 1918, National Geographic]]
[[File:Constantine Cavafy with cane and hat in hand Photograph dated 1896 Alexandria Egypt.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Poet [[Constantine P. Cavafy]], a native of [[Alexandria]], [[Egypt]]]]

During and after the [[Greek War of Independence]], Greeks of the diaspora were important in establishing the fledgling state, raising funds and awareness abroad.<ref>{{harvnb|Calotychos|2003|p=16}}.</ref> Greek merchant families already had contacts in other countries and during the disturbances many set up home around the Mediterranean (notably Marseilles in [[Greeks in France|France]], Livorno in [[Greeks in Italy|Italy]], Alexandria in [[Greeks in Egypt|Egypt]]), [[Greeks in Russia|Russia]] ([[Odesa]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]), and [[British Greeks|Britain]] (London and Liverpool) from where they traded, typically in textiles and grain.<ref name=Diaspora>{{harvnb|McCabe|Harlaftis|2005|pp=147–149}}.</ref> Businesses frequently comprised the extended family, and with them they brought schools teaching Greek and the [[Greek Orthodox Church]].<ref name=Diaspora/>

As markets changed and they became more established, some families grew their operations to become [[Greek shipping|shippers]], financed through the local Greek community, notably with the aid of the [[Ralli Brothers|Ralli]] or [[Panayis Athanase Vagliano|Vagliano Brothers]].<ref name=Kardasis>{{harvnb|Kardasis|2001|pp=xvii–xxi}}.</ref> With economic success, the Diaspora expanded further across the [[Greeks in Syria|Levant]], North Africa, India and the USA.<ref name=Kardasis/><ref name=Clogg>{{harvnb|Clogg|2000|loc="The Greeks in America"}}</ref>

In the 20th century, many Greeks left their traditional homelands for economic reasons resulting in large migrations from Greece and Cyprus to the [[Greek American|United States]], [[Greeks in the United Kingdom|Great Britain]], [[Greek Australian|Australia]], [[Greek Canadian|Canada]], [[Greeks in Germany|Germany]], and [[Greeks in South Africa|South Africa]], especially after the [[Second World War]] (1939–1945), the [[Greek Civil War]] (1946–1949), and the [[Turkish Invasion of Cyprus]] in 1974.<ref>{{harvnb|Laliotou|2004|pp=85–92}}.</ref>

While official figures remain scarce, polls and anecdotal evidence point to renewed Greek emigration as a result of the [[Greek financial crisis]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Seiradaki|first=Emmanouela|title=As Crisis Deepens, Astoria Finds Its Greek Essence Again|work=Greek Reporter|publisher=GreekReporter.com|date=11 April 2012|access-date=21 May 2016|url=http://usa.greekreporter.com/2012/04/11/as-crisis-deepens-astoria-finds-its-greek-essence-again/|archive-date=25 February 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190225103121/https://usa.greekreporter.com/2012/04/11/as-crisis-deepens-astoria-finds-its-greek-essence-again/|url-status=live}}</ref> According to data published by the [[Federal Statistical Office of Germany]] in 2011, 23,800 Greeks emigrated to Germany, a significant increase over the previous year. By comparison, about 9,000 Greeks emigrated to Germany in 2009 and 12,000 in 2010.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Papachristou|first1=Harry|last2=Elgood|first2=Giles|title=Greece Already Close to Breaking Point|agency=Reuters|work=The Fiscal Times|date=20 May 2012|access-date=22 May 2012|url=http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/05/20/Greece-Already-Close-to-Breaking-Point.aspx#page1|archive-date=30 July 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130730210903/http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/05/20/Greece-Already-Close-to-Breaking-Point.aspx#page1|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Hannon|first=Paul|title=OECD Says Euro-Zone Crisis Has Led to Some Emigration|work=The Wall Street Journal|date=27 June 2012|access-date=21 May 2016|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303649504577492411116780178|archive-date=24 February 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190224231522/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303649504577492411116780178|url-status=live}}</ref>