Ottoman period
Greece was a part of Ottoman Empire from the 14th century until its declaration of independence in 1821. The Byzantine Empire, which had under control most of the Greek-speaking world, including the Greek peninsula and the Aegean, for 900 years, had been weakened and disorganised due to the raids of Crusaders in 1204. The ottomans after having defeated the Bulgarians and the Serbs went southern into Greek land, taking Athens in 1458. Up to 1500 most of the plains and islands of Greece were under ottomans control only the mountains of Greece were left untouched as a result to become refuge for most Greek people. Cyprus fell in 1571, and the Venetians retained Crete until 1670. Only the Ionian Islands, ruled by Venice, were never brought under Ottoman rule. When the Ottomans arrived in Greece, greek people; immigrated in two ways. The educated ones went to Western Europe and influenced the advent of the Renaissance while the Greeks who lived at plains of the Greek peninsula were compelled to go in the mountains and prevent the Ottomans of conquering the entire Greek peninsula.
The Ottomans divided Greece into six sanjaks, each ruled by a Sanjakbey under the supervision of the Sultan. He established his capital in Constantinople in 1453. Also they created a millet system which contributed to the ethnic cohesion of the Greek people living in the plains. Basically, the Ottoman Empire desired fighting wars when an area was conquered, the Ottomans lost interest in it. The conquered land was parcelled out to the Sultan's followers, who held it as feudal fiefs (timars and ziamets) directly from him. The land could not be sold or inherited, but reverted to the Sultan when the fiefholder died. So long as this system applied, the Greek peasants were in some ways better off than they had been under Byzantine rule. Once they paid their taxes properly and were cooperative they had no problems. Non-Muslims did not serve in the Sultan's army. Those that did not want to become Muslim were required to give one son in five to be raised as a Muslim and enrolled in the corps of Janissaries that was considered as the new force. Janissaries were an elite unit of the Ottoman army. Greeks also paid a land tax and a tax on trade, but these were collected irregularly by the inefficient Ottoman administration. Overall, the Greeks living in the plains during Ottoman occupation were either Christians who dealt with the burdens of foreign rule or Crypto-Christians (Greek Muslims who were secret practitioners of the Greek Orthodox faith). Many Greeks became Crypto-Christians in order to avoid heavy taxes and at the same time express their identity by maintaining their secret ties to the Greek Orthodox Church. However, Greeks who converted to Islam and were not Crypto-Christians were deemed Turks in the eyes of all Orthodox Greeks.
Regarding the religion matters, Greeks had better treatment by the ottomans than Venetians. The Greek Orthodox Church, an ethno-religious institution, helped the Greeks from all geographical areas of the peninsula to preserve their ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and racial heritage.
That is because the Sultan regarded the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church as the leader of the Greeks within Ottoman Empire. The Patriarch was responsible to behave the Greeks and in exchange he was given wide powers over the Greek community. For example, he controlled the courts and the schools, as well as the Church, throughout the Greek communities of the Empire. Also, some Greek towns, such as Athens and Rhodes, retained municipal self-government. Some areas, such as the Mani Peninsula in the Peloponnese, remained virtually independent along with the Sphakiots of Crete, and the Souliots (or Souli) of Epirus. In that way the ottomans did not consider as a threat for the Orthodox faith. Hence, that is the reason why Greeks sided with the Ottomans when they fought against the Venetians.
By the aspect of economy, things did not go that well. Economic activity and population declined. Albanians, Romanians (known as Vlachs) and Bulgarians settled in various parts of the country. Turks settled in Thrace. Later, Jewish refugees from Spain were settled in Thessaloniki. Greek culture declined, and outside the church few people could receive education. The Greek language absorbed large numbers of Turkish and Slavic words. Greek music and other elements of Greek folk-culture were also influenced by the Turks.
The Ottoman Empire entered a long decline in about 1600, both militarily against the Christian powers, and internally, leading to increased corruption and inefficiency. This provoked further disorders and occasionally rebellions. Some areas managed to get out of Ottoman control collectively. Many parts of Greece provoked further resistance, and also led to economic and accelerated population decline. Another sign of decline was that Ottoman landholdings became hereditary estates (chifliks), which could be sold or bequeathed to heirs. The new class of Ottoman landlords reduced the hitherto free Greek pesants to serfdom, leading to further poverty and depopulation in the plains.
On the other hand, the position of educated and privilged Greeks within the Ottoman Empire improved in the 17th and 18th centuries. As the Empire became more settled, and began to feel its increasing backwardness in relation to the European powers, recruited Greeks who had administrative, technical and financial skills which the Ottomans. From about 1700 Greeks began to possess highest offices of the Ottoman state. The Phanariots, a class of wealthy Greeks who lived in the Phanar a region of Constantinople, became increasingly powerful. They travelled to western Europe as merchants or diplomats and their activities brought them into contact with advanced ideas of liberalism and nationalism as a result to bring up later the modern Greek nationalist movement was born. This, combined with the new ideas let loose by the French Revolution of 1789, began to reconnect the Greeks with the outside world and led to the development of an active nationalist movement.
When the French under Napoleon seized Venice in 1797, they also acquired the Ionian Islands, which were elevated to the status of a French dependency called the Septinsular Republic, with local autonomy. This was the first time Greeks had governed themselves since the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The first independent head of Greek state was John Capodistria. By the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, Greece had re-emerged from its centuries of isolation. British and French writers and artists began to visit the country, and wealthy Europeans began to collect Greek antiquities. These "philhellenes" were to play an important role in mobilising support for Greek independence.
