Koraes Professor of Modern Greek and Byzantine History, Language and Literature

Athens in the thrall of the Great Idea

The year 1896, following the first modern Olympic Games, was defined by a widespread sense of optimism in Athens, a rather insignificant city of just 130,000. It was a time when "little Greece" began cultivating aspirations of victory, reaching out to realize the Great Idea by reclaiming the territories of the Byzantine Empire - including Constantinople, the center of Hellenism.