Greek Archipelago Research Articles

Empires, Nations and the Question of Territorial Sovereignty in the Greek Archipelago during the Greek Revolution

Based mainly on the correspondence between the local religious and secular authorities, the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (Propaganda Fide) in Rome, representatives of the French and Austrian governments and the Greek insurgents, this article demonstrates how the story of the Catholic community of Syros describes the making of a new frontier but also the shaping of a new territorial conception of sovereignty where multiple agents and jurisdictions co-existed next to each other for centuries. The so-called “Pope’s Island” was the only one with a solid Roman Catholic majority among its inhabitants. After the outbreak of the Greek revolt, Syros declared its neutrality and became a safe haven for Orthodox refugees fleeing from Ottoman reprisals, especially after the Chios massacres in April 1822. By 1825, around 30,000 (mainly Orthodox) refugees had taken over the port, which in the meantime became a Christian “Eldorado” of legal trade and illegal traffic of all sorts, including piracy booties and slave labour.

Southern thought, islandness and real-existing degrowth in the Mediterranean

In thinking about alternatives to growth-based development, we draw attention to Mediterranean islands and the way they animate imaginaries and practices of a simple life. We follow Franco Cassano’s thesis of ‘Southern thought’ – a critique of Western developmentalism, prioritizing instead values of slowness, moderation and conviviality. These values are central to what Serge Latouche and others call ‘degrowth’. Drawing on fieldwork and ethnography from Ikaria and Gavdos, two remote islands in the Greek archipelago, we show how Southern thought, and forms of real-existing degrowth develop in relation to ‘islandness’ – a physical and cultural condition specific to small islands. Geography, historical contingency, and processes of myth-making combine to re-valorise what otherwise would be seen as ‘undeveloped’ places, thereby generating space for real-existing degrowth.

Mental health consequences of long-term stays in refugee camps: preliminary evidence from Moria

BackgroundEver since the implementation of the EU-Turkey deal, most refugees that enter Greece via sea are confined to the island on which they arrive until their asylum claims are adjudicated, where they generally reside in camps. Some of these camps have detention-like characteristics and dire living conditions, such as Moria camp on the island of Lesbos, Greece. Aid-organizations have stated that the situation in camp Moria deteriorates the mental health of its inhabitants and there is qualitative evidence to support this. This study explores the quantitative relationship between the incidence of acute mental health crises and the length of stay in the camp.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted using routinely collected data on 856 consultations of 634 different patients during 90 nights at an emergency clinic in Moria camp. Logistic regression analysis was used to explore whether the length of stay in the camp was predictive of the occurrence of an acute mental health crisis.ResultsOf the 634 patients, the majority were men (59·3%), the average age was 23·2 years [0–71], and 24·3% was < 18 years. 25·5% (n = 218) of consultations were related to mental health problems; 17·0% (n = 37) of these met the study’s case definition of an acute mental health crisis. Such crises were positively associated with the length of stay in the camp (p = 0·011); the odds ratio of a mental health crisis increases with 1·03 for every 10% increase in days of residence in the camp. This is notable when considering the average length of stay in the camp is 71 days.ConclusionThis study offers quantitative support for the notion that the adverse conditions in Moria camp deteriorate the mental health of its inhabitants as suggested in qualitative research. Although this study does not provide evidence of causality, it is likely that the poor and unsafe living conditions, challenging refugee determination procedures, and a lack of mental health services in the camp are significant contributing factors. We urgently call for Europe’s policymakers to honour the ‘51 Geneva refugee convention and terminate the neglectful situation on the Greek archipelago.

The Greek Archipelago: A Unique Representative Case-Study of Differential Legal Status and of Double Insularity

Greece’s insular space results into the birth of a unique case of double insularity in Europe where smaller islands act as satellites of bigger ones and depend upon them much more than on the mainland. Adoption of laws, public policies, the organization of public administration and the issue of administrative acts take into account this condition. The implementation of the principle of insularity is analyzed and clarified through two case-studies, law 4361/2016 on the “Regulation of issues concerning the transfers of soldiers, personnel care and other provisions” as well as law 4551/2018 on the “Implementation mechanism, state supervision, general conditions for the implementation of the transport equivalent. Insularity should not be considered as a reason for providing unjustifiable rights and privileges, but as a principle which should be taken into consideration and respected by the legislator and the administration in order to overcome the vulnerability of the islanders and counterbalance for the harsh conditions suffered due to geographic isolation.

Travelling to Grikkland and Mikligarðr: The Byzantine Empire and the Byzantines in Two Scandinavian Sagas

The article focuses on representations of the Byzantine Empire and the Greeks in two sagas from Snorri Sturluson’s Heimskringla: The Saga of Harald Sigurtharson (Hardruler) and The Saga of Sigurth the Crusader and His Brothers, which provide examples of contacts between the Scandinavian and Byzantine worlds in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The author employs a quantitative analysis, exploring names, such as Grikkland (Greece), Mikligarðr (Constantinople), Grikkjakonungr (Emperor), Grikk(j)ar (Greek), and Grikklandshaf (Greek archipelago, Greek sea). Separating objective from legendary information, he seeks to answer the question: to what extent are the representations of the Byzantine Empire, its Emperor, and its capital in the two sagas reliable from a historical point of view?

Determinants of alpha and beta vascular plant diversity in Mediterranean island systems: the Ionian islands, Greece

The Ionian archipelago is the second largest Greek archipelago after the Aegean, but the factors driving plant species diversity in the Ionian islands are still barely known. We used stepwise multiple regressions to investigate the factors affecting plant species diversity in 17 Ionian islands. Generalized dissimilarity modelling was applied to examine variation in the magnitude and rate of species turnover along environmental gradients, as well as to assess the relative importance of geographical and climatic factors in explaining species turnover. The values of the residuals from the ISAR log10‐transfomed models of native and endemic taxa were used as a measure of island floristic diversity. Area was confirmed to be the most powerful single explanatory predictor of all diversity metrics. Mean annual precipitation and temperature, as well as shortest distance to the nearest island are also significant predictors of vascular plant diversity. The island of Kalamos constitutes an important plant diversity hotspot in the Ionian archipelago. The recent formation of the islands, the close proximity to the mainland source and the relatively low dispersal filtering of the Ionian archipelago has resulted in islands with a flora principally comprising common species and a low proportion of endemics. Small islands keep a key role in conservation of plant priority sites.

What Fairy Tales Meant to Selma Ekrem

What Fairy Tales Meant to Selma Ekrem Nilüfer Hatemi (bio) In January 1924, Selma Ekrem, a recent graduate of the American College for Girls in Istanbul, came to the United States for the first time. She took this long journey by herself, and although she had traveled with her family extensively throughout her childhood, this was the first time she would be separated from them. She had left Istanbul due to the social restrictions Turkish women suffered, in particular, the veil, which she often described as "the shackles around my life." Not knowing that women in the new Republic of Turkey would soon be free, she felt compelled to leave. Ahead of me was Brooklyn Bridge lying on volumes of air. This, I said to myself, is the magic carpet of old that could transport one from country to country in the days of fairy lore. We in the East dream of such wonders, and you in the West create them… You have lived in this fairyland of unexpectedness and cannot realize that it is an American Thousand and One Nights Tales. (Ekrem, Unveiled 294) Click for larger view View full resolution A first-generation Turkish-American writer—author of three books, hundreds of articles, and numerous short stories—Selma Ekrem (1902–1986) was raised in a progressive, educated, and Western-oriented family. The famous poet Namık Kemal was her grandfather. Her father, Ali Kemal—whom the family followed to the cities of his appointments through political tensions, wars, internment, and occupations—was the governor of Jerusalem and the Greek Archipelago islands. They lived in places where they observed and experienced the fascinating aspects of different cultures, geographies, and religions. The household in which Selma grew up was like a microcosm of the multi-cultural, multi-religious empire, and her coming of age coincided with a series of upheavals that eventually led to the demise of the empire. Kalnick Doudou, the Source of All Knowledge Selma's nurse, an elderly Armenian lady named Kalnick Doudou, brought her up on fairy tales and had an undeniable impact on her formation. Kalnick, raised in the household of Namık Kemal's grandparents herself, had a rare gift of storytelling and a vast repertory of fairy tales. Before she could read or write, Selma was imbued with a "love of fairy [End Page 64] tales" from which she admits she never recovered. On winter nights, she would gather with her siblings by the porcelain stove, where a roaring fire kept them warm, and listen to the tales of love, bravery, and adventures. Along with Kalnick's enchanted tales, a quiet resignation, a traditional compliance with fate, was served: What is going to happen will happen. It is all written on our foreheads before we are born. Dadi [nurse], I asked, and who writes it there? Allah writes it. We are all born with our fate on our foreheads, and nothing can wipe it away. (Unveiled 39) At a time in which Turkish children's books hardly existed, Selma admits that the only samples of Turkish literature she tasted until her school days were these fairy tales. She owed the love of books and her desire to learn foreign languages to Kalnick: There were days when nurse was not in the mood to open the treasure house of her imagination, … [and] I was filled with the desire to be grown up and plunge my nose into the many books in my father's extensive library, … [or into the] volumes of Jules Verne in my elder brother's room. … When my parents decided to send me to the American School in Istanbul, my first reaction was, "Now I'll learn English and will read new stories." ("What Fairy Tales" 150–51) I Could Not Find Children in America In the States, Selma translated the fairy tales she had heard from Kalnick into English and took them to the editor of a prominent publishing house. The editor did not care to see them but suggested that Selma write about "a modern Turkish girl" ("What Fairy Tales" 150). The fairy tales of her childhood had guided Selma to the world of books, and she felt...

Seroprevalence of Sandfly-Borne Phleboviruses Belonging to Three Serocomplexes (Sandfly fever Naples, Sandfly fever Sicilian and Salehabad) in Dogs from Greece and Cyprus Using Neutralization Test.

Phleboviruses transmitted by sandflies are endemic in the Mediterranean area. The last decade has witnessed the description of an accumulating number of novel viruses. Although, the risk of exposure of vertebrates is globally assessed, detailed geographic knowledge is poor even in Greece and Cyprus where sandfly fever has been recognized for a long time and repeatedly. A total of 1,250 dogs from mainland Greece and Greek archipelago on one hand and 422 dogs from Cyprus on the other hand have been sampled and tested for neutralising antibodies against Toscana virus (TOSV), Sandfly fever Sicilian virus (SFSV), Arbia virus, and Adana virus i.e. four viruses belonging to the 3 sandfly-borne serocomplexes known to circulate actively in the Mediterranean area. Our results showed that (i) SFSV is highly prevalent with 71.9% (50.7–84.9% depending on the region) in Greece and 60.2% (40.0–72.6%) in Cyprus; (ii) TOSV ranked second with 4.4% (0–15.4%) in Greece and 8.4% (0–11.4%) in Cyprus; (iii) Salehabad viruses (Arbia and Adana) displayed also substantial prevalence rates in both countries with values ranging from 0–22.6% depending on the region and on the virus strain used in the test. These results demonstrate that circulation of viruses transmitted by sand flies can be estimated qualitatively using dog sera. As reported in other regions of the Mediterranean, these results indicate that it is time to shift these viruses from the "neglected" status to the "priority" status in order to stimulate studies aiming at defining and quantifying their medical and veterinary importance and possible public health impact. Specifically, viruses belonging to the Sandfly fever Sicilian complex should be given careful consideration. This calls for implementation of direct and indirect diagnosis in National reference centers and in hospital microbiology laboratories and systematic testing of unelucidated febrile illness and central and peripheral nervous system febrile manifestations.

The (Im)Palpable: Two Cycladic Landscapes in the Poetry of Derek Mahon and Michael Longley

ABSTRACTThis paper juxtaposes two poems depicting Cycladic landscapes: “Christmas in Kinsale” by Derek Mahon (1997) and “A Hundred Doors” by Michael Longley (2011). Mahon’s is a spiritual landscape based on the essential natural features of the Greek archipelago; in the poem, written from the perspective of his home in Kinsale, Ireland, the Greek landscape provides a counterbalance for global cultural and environmental crisis. Longley’s poem focuses on Cycladic cultural heritage which connects the present with the past via elements of nature personified in the poem. Both poets relate landscape to the spheres of imagination and memory as well as to notions of home, place and identity. Taking into account their Northern Irish origin, these concepts gain a political dimension, especially in Longley’s case. The paper situates both texts in the framework of ecocriticism, backed up with archaeological, historical and political facts, and argues that the poems represent the type of engagement with the world defined by Lawrence Buell as ‘registered and energized’ by ‘acts of environmental imagination’. Given the historical discontinuity in Ireland and Greece, writing landscape is not just an aesthetic venture, but also brings forth ecological, economic, cultural, political and spiritual concerns.

A Bayesian population model to estimate changes in the stock size in data poor cases using Mediterranean bogue (Boops boops) and picarel (Spicara smaris) as an example

The paper presents an effort to build a biologically realistic, age structured Bayesian model for the stock assessment of data poor fisheries where only aggregated catch data is available. The model is built using prior information from other areas and ecologically or taxonomically similar species. The modeling approach is tested with data poor fisheries on the Cyclades islands in Greek archipelago. The two most important species in the area are selected: bogue (Boops boops) and picarel (Spicara smaris). Both are hermaphroditic. The only data available is the total catch from 1950 to 2010. Information was gathered about natural mortality, recruitment, growth, body size, fecundity, and sex ratio. There were significant problems in finding reliable prior information and a uniform prior was used for fishing mortality. The models at their present stage are not used to give management advice. The biological characteristics of the species in that area should be further studied. However, the posteriors of biological parameters reflect the best available knowledge on these species and they could be used in future studies or in simpler biomass dynamics models as priors.

Viability analysis of an offshore wind farm in North Aegean Sea, Greece

The scope of the present work is the techno-economic study with concern for the environmental issues and the investigation of the viability of an offshore wind farm in the Greek sea area, northeast of the island of Limnos. In the context of this study, the wind data, the suitable location for the installation of the wind turbines beyond nature protected areas, the type of the wind turbines, the losses due to wind turbines interaction, and the visual impact at the respective study areas are analyzed. Moreover, reliable costing models are used and applied, internationally recognized for techno-economic studies of offshore wind farms. Thereafter, the viability of the project is studied through investment benchmarks. This means that specific economic indices are estimated indicating whether the realization of such an investment is viable or not. In conclusion, based on the analysis performed in this study, it is noted that in the Greek archipelago and especially at the island of Limnos, there is a sufficient offshore wind potential at low depths and at relatively short distances from the shore. These circumstances are necessary conditions for the development of offshore wind farms in these areas. Moreover, economic estimations based on current data of grants, taxation, interest rates, etc., showed that the investment is sustainable, having a cost of energy production equal to 87.92 €/MW h.

Nicholas Neocles Ambraseys 1929-2012

Online Material: Publications list. Nick Ambraseys died peacefully in his Putney home in London on 28 December 2012, a few weeks short of his 84th birthday. Born in Athens, Greece, 19 January 1929, he acquired his middle name from his father, Neocles Amvrasis, and, from his Alexandria‐born mother, Cleopatra Yambani, he learned Arabic. He was educated at the National Technical University of Athens, where he received a diploma in rural engineering in 1952. For his mandatory military service he chose the Hellenic Navy; and, in 1954 while still completing his navy duties, he was appointed to the staff of the Department of Fluid Mechanics at the National Technical University of Athens. During the time of his appointment in Athens (1954–1956), two events changed his life. The first was on 18 August 1955, when he married Xeni Stavrou, a happy event that Xeni recalls meant that Nick never learned to drive a car (she jests that in all the years she drove Nick around, he never provided her with an official chauffeur’s cap). Xeni and Nick left for London the next day. The second event occurred a year later. On 9 July 1956 a major earthquake near Amogas, roughly 80 km northwest of Santorini, generated the largest twentieth‐century tsunami in the eastern Aegean. Nicholas N. Ambraseys. He became interested in the study of the 1956 earthquake and its tsunami while investigating its impact on the stability of harbor works throughout the Greek archipelago. The study challenged his analytic skills but also triggered two interests that were to dominate his subsequent career: the study of earthquakes and the study of their historical records. His 1960 article discussing the 1956 tsunami lists 46 previous tsunamis from 1400 B.C. to that date and remarks that “in none of the references is the original source of …

Vicariance divergence and gene flow among islet populations of an endemic lizard

Allopatry and allopatric speciation can arise through two different mechanisms: vicariance or colonization through dispersal. Distinguishing between these different allopatric mechanisms is difficult and one of the major challenges in biogeographical research. Here, we address whether allopatric isolation in an endemic island lizard is the result of vicariance or dispersal. We estimated the amount and direction of gene flow during the divergence of isolated islet populations and subspecies of the endemic Skyros wall lizard Podarcis gaigeae, a phenotypically variable species that inhabits a major island and small islets in the Greek archipelago. We applied isolation-with-migration models to estimate population divergence times, population sizes and gene flow between islet-mainland population pairs. Divergence times were significantly correlated with independently estimated geological divergence times. This correlation strongly supports a vicariance scenario where islet populations have sequentially become isolated from the major island. We did not find evidence for significant gene flow within P. g. gaigeae. However, gene-flow estimates from the islet to the mainland populations were positively affected by islet area and negatively by distance between the islet and mainland. We also found evidence for gene flow from one subspecies (P. g. weigandi) into another (P. g. gaigeae), but not in the other direction. Ongoing gene flow between the subspecies suggests that even in this geographically allopatric scenario with the sea posing a strong barrier to dispersal, divergence with some gene flow is still feasible.

Influence of Dams on Downstream Beaches: Eressos, Lesbos, Eastern Mediterranean

Small water storage dams are nowadays regarded as the ideal solution for the water-thirsty islands of the Greek Archipelago. Several of these dams have been already constructed and more are planned for the near future. However, dams can also create problems to coastal areas, particularly to the beaches found at the lower reaches of the dammed rivers. The present contribution reports the results of a study undertaken on the effects of such a dam located at Eressos, Lesbos (E. Mediterranean), using both morphological and sedimentological information and a GIS-based sediment erosion model. The results showed that Eressos Beach is currently under erosion, which however is spatially variable. The spatial variability of the beach erosion can only partly be explained by the patterns of longshore sediment transport, suggesting also a negative sedimentary balance. The results of the sediment erosion model showed that the dam retains more than half of the sediment produced in the basin, irrespective of the scenario used. Thus, it is likely that the effects of the dam on the downstream beach are already apparent.

A wind-power fuel-cell hybrid system study on the non-interconnected Aegean islands grid

The current paper presents the study of coupling a wind-turbine with a fuel cell to improve the utilization of wind power in the non-interconnected Greek archipelago grid. A part of the energy produced by the wind-turbine is stored in the form of hydrogen and is then delivered to the consumption at constant power through a fuel cell. This decoupling between the wind potential and power delivery is necessary to increase the contribution of renewable energy sources to the small capacity grids of islands. The study presents the technology of the system and simulates its operation over a year using a specially developed software and actual wind speed input data. In this way, the energy availability can be estimated and is presented for hybrid installations of increasing size. The nominal size of the individual devices (electrolyser, fuel cell, hydrogen storage tanks) is then selected depending on the hybridisation level, that is the ratio of energy delivered directly from the wind-turbine over the energy delivered from the fuel cell. Results show that it is possible to replace conventional power stations with a hybrid system, delivering energy under constant power with fuel cell sizes that reach almost up to 1/3 of the nominal wind-turbine power and overall efficiencies that may exceed 60%.

International Conference on Emerging Technologies in Gene/Drug Therapy and Molecular Biology

Approximately 80 preclinical scientists and clinicians from Europe, North America, and Asia met at the beautiful island of Corfu for six days to discuss the latest developments in the field of molecular biology technologies related to gene therapy, application of gene delivery vectors in vivo in animal models, and clinical trials, mainly for cancer therapy. This was the fifth meeting organized by the International Society for Gene Therapy and Regulon Inc. in a relaxing atmosphere in the Greek archipelago.

Seismic electromagnetic signals (SEMS) explained by a simulation experiment using electromagnetic waves

The propagation characteristics of seismic electromagnetic signals (SEMS) both at an ultra low frequency (ULF) and at a very low frequency (VLF) are discussed based on a model experiment of propagation of electromagnetic (EM) waves in the earth's crust and atmospheric waveguide. A granite slab and two aluminium plates simulated the earth's crust, ionosphere and underground conductive layer, respectively. The Greek archipelago was modeled using a geographical map with the ocean covered by aluminium foil. The intensity of EM waves transmitted from a model hypocenter was mapped to investigate the influence of the ocean. The propagation of VLF waves over the long distance was obtained, while that of ULF indicated the exponential decay from the epicenter. This experiment considered waveguides might explain the ocean's effect on the selectivity and the long distance propagation of SEMS, presumably including seismic electric signals (SES) in the VAN method.

Les limites orientales de l'espace européen

Patrick Jager : The Eastern limits of Europe. Fixing the Eastern frontier of Europe is a complex problem that changed over the 18th Century ; it is connected with the value-laden distinction opposing enlightened to barbarian. For travellers, Russia was part of Europe while the Greek Archipelago tended to be outside it. But between these two worlds was a frontier zone which was not a line but an area, a sort of no man's land which finally seems to take on its own cultural identity, being neither European nor Oriental. This zone includes the Archipelago, the Phanariot principalities and part of Russia, but its extent varies.

The great Minoan eruption of Thera volcano and the ensuing tsunami in the Greek Archipelago

The eastern Mediterranean has been the cradle of many great civilizations. The history of the area consisted of glorious battles, heroic acts, and the rise and fall of great civilizations. But, sometimes, natural hazards became the cause for a new classification of the political, as well as of the military status quo of the region. The enormous eruption of the submarine volcano at the Greek island of Thera (Santorini) during the Bronze Age, around 1500 BC, is such a natural hazard. The tsunami generated by the eruption, literally wiped out the peace-loving Minoan civilization who inhabited the island of Crete. After the sea subsided, the configuration of the area was altered, and the decline of the Minoan principality on the Archipelago began. The present paper introduces evidence concerning the tsunami and states some of the after-effects which were partly responsible for the decline of the Minoan empire. All the information is gathered from historical sources and from recent research works. An effort has been made to include many of the theories introduced by various researchers through time concerning the event. Finally, information has been included from all known research, as well as from the author's own conclusions, in order to make the paper useful to future researchers.

The seismic sea wave of July 9, 1956, in the Greek archipelago

The earthquake of July 9, 1956 (magnitude 7½, epicentral intensity VIII-IX MM), with epicenter at 36°54′N, 26°12′E, was followed by a severe seismic sea wave which originated near 36°49′N, 26°09E. The wave was probably produced by a series of landslides on the steep banks of the submarine trench of Amorgos. The amplitude of the wave near its source was 100 feet, and the agitation of the sea within the central area lasted several days. A list of seismic sea waves in the Greek archipelago and adjacent seas is given in the Appendix.