Trebizond / Trapezounta – Τραπεζούντα / Trabzon Vilayet (Province)

Tychicos of Byzantium: Founder of the Trebizond Center of Higher Learning in the Seventh Century

Next to Alexandria, Edessa (Urfa) and other cities, Trebizond became an “important centre of higher learning during the early Seventh Century, largely because of the reputation of Tychicus of Byzantium as one of the foremost thinkers and teachers of his day. Widely travelled, Tychicus had studied in Jerusalem, Alexandria, Rome, Constantinople and Athens (where he had studied philosophy for several years) before settling in Trebizond. Invited back to Constantinople to a professorship, he refused and, with the advantage of a substantial library, made Trebizond a teaching magnet. One Armenian, Ananias of Shirak (or Shirakatsi) has left a telling account of his own quest for knowledge which gives us an insight into Seventh Century Armenian learning. As a young man, Ananias, despairing of finding respect for knowledge among the Armenians, set out to travel around Greek centres of learing, seeking out mentors. First, at Theodoupolis, he found Eliazar, but soon exhausted what he could be taught by him. He was directed next to Christodoulos, who lived in the Fourth District of Armenia, and spent six months with him being taught mathematics. Making his way to Constantinople, he met Pelagrius, a deacon of the patriarch, who was about to set out with numerous acolytes to study under Tychicus at Trebizond. Ananias joined this party and went on to spend several years studying under Tychicus, marvelling at the fluency with which he translated into Armenian and being introduced ‘to many writings that were not translated into our tongue’.”

Quoted from: Lowe, Roy; Yasuhara, Yoshihito: The Origins of Higher Learning: Knowledge networks and the early development of universities. London, New York: Routledge, 2017, p. 28

The term ‘Byzantine Empire’ coined by Hieronymus Wolf as late as the 16th century, was unknown to the citizens of the (Eastern) Roman Empire. The term ‘rum (Plural: rumlar)’, still common in Turkey, refers to the descendants of the Eastern Roman Empire. It can be derived from their self-designation: ancient Greek Ῥωμαῖοι (modern Greek Ρωμαίοι) – Rōmaioi (‘Romans’). Speakers of Pontic Greek thus refer to their language as Romey(i)ka (‘Roman’) or Pontiaká (‘Pontic’). It was and is written with Greek (with the diacritics σ̌ ζ̌ ξ̌ ψ̌ for /ʃ ʒ kʃ pʃ/, α̈ ο̈ for [æ ø]), Latin or Cyrillic letters.

Language or Greek dialect?

The linguistic, lexical and grammatical features of Pontic Greek are so pronounced that Pontiaka or Romey(i)ka almost seems to be a language in its own right. It is hardly understood not only by Greeks in Greece today. Greeks from other regions of Asia Minor also had difficulties with it (cf. the quotation from Elias Venezis’ memoirs recorded close to events). The reasons for these difficulties of understanding lie in the geographical isolation of Pontos, where the Attic-Koiné Greek of the Greek colonists developed separately from the rest of the Greek language for almost two millennia; it thus preserved elements of Ancient Greek that are no longer found in today’s standard Greek.

At the same time, Pontic Greek was exposed to numerous influences from neighbouring cultures and changing systems of rule: Iranian (Persian, Parthian), South Caucasian (Laz) languages, Armenian, as well as Byzantine Greek and Ottoman Turkish.

Sub-dialects and historic distribution

Similar to most modern Greek dialects, Pontic Greek is mainly derived from Koiné Greek, which was spoken in the Hellenistic and Roman times between the 4th century B.C. and the 4th century AD. Following the Seljuk invasion of Asia Minor during the 11th century AD, Pontos became isolated from many of the regions of the Byzantine Empire.

The Greek linguist Manolis Triantafyllidis (1883-1959) distinguishes between a western group of Pontos Greek (Oinuntian or Niotic, around Oinoe (Turkish: Ünye), an eastern coastal group ( Trapezuntian, around Trabzon), and Chaldian, which was spoken in the eastern hinterland (around Gümüşhane); most speakers lived in Chaldia.

Ophitic/Romeyka

The inhabitants of the Of valley who had converted to Islam in the 17th century remained in Turkey after the forcible population ‘exchange’ of 1923 and have partly retained the Pontic language until today. Their dialect, which forms part of the Trapezountiac subgroup, is called ‘Ophitic’ by linguists, but speakers generally call it Romeyka. As few as 5,000 people are reported to speak it. There are however estimates that show the real number of the speakers as considerably higher. Speakers of Ophitic/Romeyka are concentrated in the eastern districts of Trabzon province: Çaykara (Katohor), Dernekpazarı (Kondu), Sürmene (Sourmena) and Köprübaşı (Göneşera). Although less widespread, it is still spoken in some remote villages of the Of district itself. It is also spoken in the western İkizdere (Dipotamos) district of Rize province. Historically the dialect was spoken in a wider area, stretching further east to the port town of Athina (Pazar).

Ophitic has retained the infinitive, which is present in Ancient Greek but has been lost in other variants of Modern Greek; it has therefore been characterized as ‘archaic’ or conservative (even in comparison with other Pontic dialects) and as the living language that is closest to Ancient Greek.

A very similar dialect is spoken by descendants of Christians from the Of valley (especially from Kondu) now living in Greece in the village of Nea Trapezounta, Pieria, Central Macedonia, with about 400 speakers.

Ioanna Sitaridou, a linguist of Pontic Greek descent, calls the Pontic Greek dialect, which is still spoken by about 5,000 people in the Trabzon area, Romeyka. In its sentence structures as well as in many vocabulary, this language, which is spoken by Islamicized Greeks, has been able to preserve its archaic elements most strongly, since its speakers separated themselves from the Christian Pontic Greeks and were no longer exposed to the influences of the liturgical language due to their change of faith.

Due to the forced resettlement of the Christian Pontic Greeks in accordance with the Lausanne Treaty (1923), speakers of Pontic Greek were brought to the Republic of Greece, where their children were not taught Pontic Greek in schools, but Standard Greek. Many second and third generation Pontians who grew up in Greece also remember with pain and anger how they were discriminated against and ridiculed for their dialect by Greek school teachers and non-Pontic classmates.

Though Pontic was originally spoken on the southern shores of the Black Sea, from the 18th and 19th century and on substantial numbers migrated into the northern and eastern shores, into the Russian Empire. Pontic is still spoken by large numbers of people in Ukraine, mainly in Mariupol, but also in other parts of Ukraine such as the Odessa and Donetsk region, in Russia (around Stavropol) and Georgia. The language enjoyed some use as a literary medium in the 1930s. Among other things, a school grammar was written down (Konstantinos Topkharas, 1998 [1932]), which explains Pontic grammar in Pontic language. In these areas, Pontic Greek is considered the most vital today, although large parts of the speaker populations migrate to Greece.

Outside Turkey and Greece one can distinguish the following sub-dialects:

• the Northern group (Mariupol Greek or Rumeíka), originally spoken in Crimea, but now principally in Mariupol, where the majority of Crimean Pontic Greeks of the Rumaiic subgroup now live. Other Pontic Greeks speak Crimean Tatar as their mother tongue, and are classified as “Urums“. There are approximately half a dozen dialects of Crimean (Mariupolitan) Pontic Greek spoken.
  • Soviet Rumaiic, a Soviet variant of the Pontic Greek language spoken by the Pontic Greek population of the Soviet Union.

Today’s distribution

The number of speakers of Pontic Greek has been estimated at 300,000-778,000 for the period around 2015, of which about 400,000 are located in Greece (where Pontiaka and Rumeyika have no official status).

In 1989, 40,000 speakers lived in Russia, including 15,000 each in the Krasnodar region and near Stavropol. In Georgia, 60,000 speakers were reported at that time, and 2,500 speakers lived in Armenia. The Pontic Greek dialects in the Georgian Tsalka and the Armenian Alaverdi regions were partly derived from Greek dialects of Cappadocia, which were presumably assimilated from Pontic Greek.

Endangered language

In its latest edition of the Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger (2010; updated 2017), UNESCO estimates the number of speakers of Pontic Greek at 300,000, with Armenia, Georgia, Greece, the Russian Federation, Turkey and Ukraine as the distribution areas. It classifies Pontic Greek as a language definitely threatened with extinction because the speakers (according to this classification by UNESCO), with the exception of a few half speakers and linguists, are only older speakers and there is no transmission of the language to the younger generation.

In Greece, the youth of Pontic origin often speak standard Greek as their first language. The use of Pontic has been maintained more by speakers in North America than it has in Greece.

Literature and music

Pontic Greek has a rich oral tradition. The Pontic Greek songs, also referred to as ‘Pontiaká’, are particularly popular in Greece and among the local Pontic community. There is also some limited production of modern literature in Pontiaka, including poetry collections (among the most renowned writers is Kostas Diamantidis), novels, and translated Asterix comic albums.

Wikipedia in Pontic Greek – Η Βικιπαίδεια σα Ποντιακά τα Ρωμαίικα τη Πόντονος

https://pnt.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CE%91%CF%81%CF%87%CE%B9%CE%BA%CF%8C%CE%BD_%CF%83%CE%B5%CE%BB%CE%AF%CE%B4%CE%B1

Elias Venezis: “Very funny was their Greek”

At the age of just 18, the later Greek novelist Elias Venezis (Gr.: Ηλίας Βενέζης; i. e. Elias Mellos; March 4, 1904 – August 3, 1973) was deported by the Kemalist rulers to a concentration camp for Greek forced laborers (of Ottoman nationality). He published his memoirs of this time event-close under the title Number 31328 (Το Νούμερο 31328; 1924; 1931). In the 15th chapter of this autobiographical work, Venezis (who himself came from the Ionian city Ayvalık (Gr.: Kydonies)) describes the arrival of Pontic Greek forced laborers in this camp.  At the same time, his description hints at the pronounced regionalism and the pecularities of the Pontic Greeks:

“While this affliction united us ever more closely, a group of companions stood apart, the Ambrosians and Pegasians, about fifty men. They were brought from the Ankara work battalion.They were Greeks from the Sivas area, down near Trapezunt.  They’d been working 3 or 4 years longer than us in the work battalions. The Hellenic army had not penetrated into their area. But the Turks had drafted them and used them for stone cutting. They differed from us in that they wore costumes that had not been taken from them. It was a kind of harsher dress; the pants first bulge out a little and then close tightly around the calves. In the good times, these people roamed all over Anatolia. ‘Cotton pads we fix, quilts we mend’. And when they weren’t pounding stones, they’d turn the spindle from dawn till dusk. Even on the road, when we went to forced labor, they wouldn’t let the spindle rest.  Most of them had names like Ambrosios or Pegasios.

Very funny was their Greek. They could not suppress the voiced n, always put the verb at the end as in the Turkish syntax and mixed Greek with Turkish words.

They all slept in the same accommodation, did not separate from each other, did not mix between us. If one of them stepped out of line and was late to join them, they would all step outside the door together and call out. Then they went around the other shelters and asked:

Have you seen the Pegasios? Have you seen the Ambrosios?

Some jokers from Smyrna, from among our own, held them up. Then, for a brief while, there was a merriment.”

The string instrument lyre is a Greek invention. From ancient Greek mythology we learn that the god Hermes made the first lyre: from animal armor and three branches which he stretched into “sweet sounding strings”.

The lyre went through several stages of development during its 5,000-year history. Its first name was Phyrminx. Probably the 4-string Phyrminx was called Lyra of Hermes.  The following changes to the lyre involved increasing the number of strings and modifications to the shape of the sounding body. From the 10th to the 15th century A.D. this instrument was called fiddle in Europe. In the 15th century AD the name ‘lyre’ reappeared. A family of lyras of different size, shape and number of strings was created. One of these lyras was the lyra da braccio. After its perfection by Italian artists it was called violin.

The Lyra in the Pontos

However, the Black Sea Greeks simplified the instrument again, and this variant was called the Pontic lyra. An even earlier emergence of the simple Pontic lyra, for example at the time of the development of the ‘fiddle’, cannot be completely ruled out. The Greek Pontians called the 3-string lyra Kementsés and the 8-string Kemanés. The kemanés has five strings at the top and three below these five. The bow plays only the five upper strings and thus makes the lower ones vibrate. The reasons for the equation of lyra and kementsés are probably the same number of strings and the same way of playing them and holding the bow. But also the mixture of languages caused by the contacts between Greek Pontians and the Ottoman people may have played a role. The fact that in Pontic tradition one and the same person plays the lyre, sings and dances clearly shows the influences of musical customs in ancient Greece.

The Kementsés with its elongated shape, on the other hand, is adapted to the Anatolian way of playing, in which the player sits and crosses his legs. The shape of this instrument excludes playing in an upright position, as is typical for the Pontic lyre. It is without doubt the musical instrument that defines Pontic culture, and has a very distinct melody unlike any other instrument, used in Pontos. It has significant symbolic value for Pontic Greeks and serves as a symbol of their cultural identity.

The Pontic lyra comprises a narrow box shaped body which includes a neck and a pegbox, and a soundboard which covers the body. The body is either made by hollowing out a single piece of wood, or by gluing pieces together. The best lyra are said to be made of extremely dense wood such as cherry, plum, mulberry, walnut or juniper wood. Cedar is sometimes used. The soundboard is made of pine or spruce.

The sides of the body are generally 2-3mm in thickness, as is the soundboard. The pegs are made of hardwood (usually the same wood as the body) and are inserted from the front. Until around 1920, some, or all of the three strings were made of silk. However, silk strings produce a beautiful but weak sound. Silk made way for gut strings and subsequently replaced by metal strings.

Traditionally, the bow (doksar) was made from an olive branch however nowadays it’s made from any light piece of wood. Hair from a male horse’s tail was used historically. Nowadays bows with synthetic hair are more commonly used.  While playing, the tension of the bow hair is controlled by the second and third finger while it is held palm upwards.

The instrument can be played while standing up or sitting down and is held vertically. When seated, the bottom of the lyra is rested between the thighs of the player. The chords are touched with the flesh of the fingers, not the nails. There is no vibrato. A particular characteristic of the Pontic lyra is its polyphony in which drone effects and parallel fourths dominate. Wrist movement is also used especially in faster paced tunes.

Two classes of kementsés (kemenche) differing in size have been distinguished, but local Black Sea Turks did not differentiate them. The smaller ones, around 54 cm in length, often have a fingerboard and the larger instruments are around 68 cm in length. Also, the kemane of Cappadocia, is a type of ‘large kemenche’, which, as seen in Turkish Museums, have six strings with a further six sympathetic strings under the fingerboards.

In contrast to the kementsé, or kemenche, according to the Greek kemane player, George Poulantzaklis, the kemane is between 55 cm and 70 cm in length and only larger in volume and shape than the kemenche. The instruments Poulantzaklis uses have four strings with four other strings (sympathetica) which create a vibration (clamour) to the first four.

The kemenche is one of the four basic types of lyra. The other three, the Cretan lyra, the lyra of the Dodekanisa and the Thrakian lyra, are pear-shaped with three or four metal or gut strings which are stopped from the side by the fingernails (which differs from the kemenche where strings are stopped by the finger tips).  Small pellet-bells attached on the bow (which provide rhythmic accompaniment), on the pear-shaped lyra, were once common (until around World War II), but are now rare.

History

The origin and history of the kemenche are obscure. The earliest known representation of a kemenche appears to be in an album of watercolors of Constantinople painted by Amedeo Preziosi. The Maltese Preziosi was active in Constantinople from about 1840 onwards and was the chief figure in the Ottoman art world in the 1870s.

Matthaios Tsahourides, researcher and respected kemenche player, believes the instrument (which he prefers to call the Pontic lyra) and its music has similar roots in Medieval Europe and Byzantium. If the construction of the instrument with other European instruments is examined, the kemenche looks more like a Byzantine or Medieval European instrument, than an instrument of Asian origin.

The kemenche was taken to the South Caucasus in the last half of the 19th century and the first quarter of the 20th century by Pontic immigrants and refugees.

The word kemenche is believed to be derived from the Persian words keman (bow) and che (little). The kamancheh or kamāncha is a Persian bowed string instrument related to the bowed rebab

(the historical ancestor of the kamancheh), and also to the bowed Byzantine lira which is an ancestor of the European violin family. Other variations of the kemenche are the Kemona and the Kemane.

Geographically the Pontic lyra was played only in the areas which once bordered the Byzantine Empire of Trebizond (from Samsun to just east of Trabzon, and also inland). Today, in this region situated in north-eastern Turkey, the kemenche is still made by local luthiers and played extensively and is referred to as Karadeniz kemençesi. However, the Karadeniz kemençesi is a slightly lighter instrument due to its lower depth. It also has fewer sound holes and therefore sounds slightly different. The instrument is generally not played in other parts of Turkey.

The Rum (Orthodox Greeks) who lived in this region for nearly 3000 years, and who were expelled in 1923 as part of the forcible exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey, sometimes simply call the instrument a ‘lyra’.

Source: Sam Topalidis (2010): The Kemenche – https://pontosworld.com/index.php/music/iistruments/326-the-kemenche-2

The Pontic Lyra (Kemenche) – https://pontosworld.com/index.php/music/iistruments/331-the-pontic-lyra

Playing the Pontic Lyra:

(Tik Santas)

Folklore in mountain regions is always diversified. Traditional costumes, dances, songs, but also dialects differ from valley to valley. This also applies to the Pontos.

Today 50 to 80 Pontic dances are known. Some of them are widespread and were and are danced everywhere, but there are also some that are hardly known. Each region of the Pontos had its own specific regional dances.

The Pontic dances have their origin in the dances of ancient Greece, many of which were dedicated to specific deities. They are social dances, which – depending on the occasion – have different dance emphases; they are divided into warlike, religious-ritual and peaceful dances. Their social character is shown by the fact that they are circle and group dances. They are of great importance to the Pontic Greeks because they helped to maintain their tradition and identity, both in the Pontos under Ottoman rule and in exile after the ‘uprooting’ in 1923.

In the Pontic dances, together with the dancing people, the lyricist also takes part. In the dances, which are accompanied by his song, he himself dances with his lyre. He runs from one end to the other, from one dancer to the other, he jumps in rhythm with the dancers and shows an uncontrolled, enthusiastic, Dionysian side.

Most Pontic dances were pure male or female dances. There were only a few mixed dances, which were danced only on special occasions. For example Kotsagél, which is danced at a wedding as the last dance by all relatives of the bridal couple, or the so-called Kodespiniaká dances, which were called that because they were danced by adult men and women and sometimes even led by a woman (Kodéspina = mistress; lady of the house). The Omál, the Dipát and the Tik belong to the Kodespiniaká. Today all dances are danced mixed, except the Pyrrhíchios, which was and is only danced by men (or women in men’s costume).

The majority of Pontic society was rural. So we know many peaceful peasant dances, for example Trygóna, Kótsari, Saríkus. The religious-ritual dances revealed the loyalty of the Pontians to their customs and traditions and the respect for the values of the society they lived in. The religious-ritual dances include the wedding dances such as Thímisma and Kotsagél. The only martial dance is the Pyrrhíchios.

The Pontic dance is a group dance, and there are no distinction of location or class, no best or worst. The circle of dancers unites all together and the ‘I’ merges into the ‘we’. The first becomes the last and the last the first in the dance circle.

The Horon (Serra; Lazikon)

Probably the most archaic and well-known dance is Horon (also: Khoron; Horonu; from Greek choros (χορός) – ‘choir’, ‘dance’) or Ser(r)a (probably after the river of the same name west of the city of Platana [Tr.: Akçaabat]).

This dance is also referred to as the Pyrrichio or Lazikon. The ancient origins of the dance can be proven as the dance moves resemble those of the ancient Pyrrhic dance.

According to Plato, Pyrrhíchios means ‘Armed Dance’, a dance symbolizing war, in the course of which attack and defense are represented. Plato considered it essential that women and girls, as well as men and boys, should practice the dance of arms and warfare. He points out “that there are countless masses of women on the Pontos, called Sauromantes, who are prescribed the same exercises and performances as men, not only in riding, but also in archery and the other arts of arms”. (Plato, Laws, Book 7)

Then as now, Pyrrhíchios is danced in two ways: one is when two men armed with knives circle each other with dancing movements, they wrestle and try to defeat each other. This version is still danced today under the name ‘Mazér’ (from Greek “machéri” = knife). In the second version the warrior-dancers hold each other’s hands in a round dance. They are armed and ready for a joint fight. This kind of Pyrrhíchios is danced today under the name Sérra.

In the periodical Pontiaki Estia (1956, 4th edition, #76) Mouzenidis states that the Serra is a dramatic dance and analyses it as follows:

Firstly the dance comprises 3 parts. In the first part the dancers who are characterizing the people (laos) as a whole, hold each other by the hand and with arms raised begin to dance slowly with a mood of joy expressed on their faces. Gradually the dance moves into the 2nd part. Joy turns to unease and the dancers’ bodies increase intensity their hands moving rhythmically forward and then backward attempting to keep their bodies upright so as not to fall. At this point the dancer is trying to mimic an injured fighter trying to cling to life and to win. And although the body is leaning over, small energetic and sudden movements show the wounded fighter is trying to survive. In the 3rd phase redemption arrives. The dancer’s body which was bent over and almost touching the ground gains strength and the dancer begins to jump with his legs spread wide apart and his body becomes erect like a column and his head is held up with pride and looking upwards.

K. Papamihalopoulos in his work titled A tour of Pontus (1904) wrote the following about the Serra after touring the region and seeing the dance in person:

It is a war dance characterized by directional body movements by dancers that are joined tightly together. The dance consists of violent movements of the body, strong foot taps on the floor, contractions of body muscles, an enthusiasm and cheerfulness that grips the dancer, and a spark which transmits emotion. A dance identified by its originality and splendor of a group which quite rightly classifies it as one of the most famous dances in the entire world. ^[9]

The Pyrrhic Dance
The Pyrrhic dance, which the Serra is based on, was an armed dance of ancient Greek origin. The exact steps are not known but the movement was definitely quick and combat-like. According to Strabo (Gr.: Strávonas), an ancient geographer and historian from the Pontic city auf Amásia, the origins of the dance and also its name comes from the contorted movements in the death of Achilles’ son Pyrrhus as described by Euripides in Andromache.

A more likely argument is that the Pyrrhic’s birthplace was in Crete due to its association to the myth of the Curetes guarding infant Zeus with warlike movements and noises of clashing swords and shields. By 1250 B.C. the dance was widespread in Crete, mainland Greece and Asia Minor. It is mentioned in the Iliad (8th century B.C.) where it’s suggested the name derives from pyra (pyre) or pyr meaning fire.^[10]

The Kótsari (Ko(t)chari)

Although the Kochari (or Kotchari; in Greek pronunciation Kotsari; Grk.: Κότσαρι) is a popular dance amongst Pontic Greeks second only in popularity to the Serra, it seems to be an import from the South Caucasus, namely from neighboring Armenia. It was danced in the eastern regions of Pontos such as Argyroupolis (Gümüşhane), Bayburt (Arm.: Baberd) and primarily by the Pontic people of Kars, the ancient capital city of the Armenian Bagratid Kingdom. It was also danced in the Upper Matsouka region. The dance was introduced to the Upper Matsoukans as late as in the last decades prior to the forcible population Exchange (1923) and it’s sometimes said that the Matsoukans learnt the dance at the festivals of Panagia Soumela from worshippers who originated from the home of the dance, i.e. those from the easternmost regions of Pontos and the Caucasus.^[11]

There is an Armenian and a Greek ethymology for the origin and the name of this group dance: Ko(t)chari (from Armenian ‘քոչէլ’ (ko(t)chel – to move around; to nomadize) is a shepherd dance, which has been registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 2017.^[12]

Jannis Korosidis characterizes the Pontic Greek variant of the Ko(t)chari as follows:

„This dance is danced by the rural population in the south of the Pontos, especially by the Pontic Greeks of the Caucasus.  Its name refers to the Pontic word for ram, the billy goat, the sacred animal in the worship of Dionysos. The fast, springy, double-footed movements of the dancers remind us of the jumps of the billy goat during the rut, at the beginning of spring, the time of the religious veneration of Dionysos. The worship of the god who was originally the patron saint of the farmers is also recalled by the first steps of the dance, which were performed by the dancers to get onto the stage as early as in ancient times.

‘Stamátima’, a typical figure in Kótsari, a short ‘behaviour’ during the dance, is considered an element of ancient religious worship and has been preserved in the Pontic dance tradition until today. During their magical services, the dancers suddenly stopped and then started again with the aim of attracting the attention of the audience or the worshipped deity.”^[13]

Diverging explanations are quoted in the dance’s description by Pontosworld:

“Its name is derived from the manner in which it’s danced and in particular the 2 limp movements (the first 4 steps of the dance), which are executed with synchronous stepping of the heel (the kotsi) on the ground. In Greek, the word koutso means limp, and the heel of the foot is called the kotsi (pl. kotsia).

Another explanation of the name is that it describes the manner in which the legs-knees are shaken and locked by metatarsal movement. The dance relies on powerful foot movement/limps and hence it’s the dancer’s feet which keep the dancer upright. Whilst the above descriptions are considered arbitrary another explanation is that it was named after an anonymous dancer by the name of Kotsari (or Konstantinos) although this explanation does seem unlikely.

The Kotsari belongs to the family of straight step heel dances which rely on heel steps. Such dances also exist in Greece, the Aegean islands, Crete and generally amongst the races of Asia minor since Ancient times.

It’s a double rhythm fast dance similar to the Susta dance of Rhodes and the Maleviziotic-Castrino dance of Crete. The dancers hold each other at the shoulder in a circle but more commonly in a semi-circle. There are 8 steps in the dance which are broken down into 2 parts. The first 4 movements are the 2 on the spot jumps, in other words the limp steps of the left heel – this is the first part of the dance. The next 4 steps are basic ones and move the dancer towards the right.

The dance started off as a male only dance. Some researchers have classified it as a mountain war dance. Later it became acceptable for women to dance it also.”^[14]

“A multiethnic seaside town inhabited by 20,000 Turks, 15,000 Greeks, and 7,000 Armenians, Trabzon in the 1890s was ripe for tensions. Turks in the area claimed they feared large-scale Armenian violence, though as one missionary put it, ‘it seems incredible that they could have been sincere in this.’
‘Rumors of massacres at Constantinople tended to aggravate matters,’ Longworth reported. There was considerable homegrown instability, too. On October 2, 1895, Lieutenant General Bahri Pasha, the outgoing vali of Van, was nearly assassinated in Trabzon, on his way to Constantinople. Bahri had been walking with the Trabzon town commandant, Ahmed Hamdi Pasha, when both were lightly wounded by a gunman. The shooter was not caught, but the Turks charged two ‘accomplices.’

The situation escalated further on the night of October 4, when ‘large bands of armed Muslims from the neighboring villages,’  intent on plunder, attacked Christian houses, firing guns and breaking in doors and windows. A rumor then spread that Christians were massacring Turks—or, alternatively, that Armenians had assassinated the vali. A mob of ‘at least 3,000’ mustered, ‘with knives, pistols and revolvers,’ and rushed through the streets. Christians fled to consulates and public buildings. But the vali, Kadri Bey, intervened along with his troops and some Muslim notables. They arrested the ring-leaders and ‘unmercifully beat’ many of the ‘rowdies.’ The crowd dispersed before any lives were lost. The next day, the local consuls—British, Russian, French, Belgian, Austrian, Greek, Persian, and Italian- ostentatiously rode in procession down the main street to government house. Their aim, Longworth explained, was to ‘calm the fears of the Christians and strike fear in the hearts of the Turks!’

The Turks were not impressed. On October 8, at about eleven o’clock in the morning, the mayhem in Trabzon began ‘like a clap of thunder in a clear sky.’ Turkish authorities later claimed that ‘it was impossible to determine on which side the brawl began’ and that Armenians ‘from their shops and bazaars . . . indeed from anywhere and everywhere . . . fired at random on soldiers, police, zapties, and citizens alike’ such that the ‘crowd which found itself in the square and the adjoining streets was obliged to respond.’ But Western observers—not to mention Armenian witnesses—knew just what they saw: the Turks had initiated the massacre without provocation. According to an unsigned report, probably by an American missionary, Armenians were shot down in the street ‘or sitting quietly at their shop doors. . . . Some were slashed with swords. The Turks ‘passed through the quarters . . . killing the men and large boys, generally permitting the women and younger children to live. For five hours this horrid work of human butchery went on’. (…)”

Excerpted from: Morris, Benny; Ze’evi, Dror: The Thirty-Year Genocide: Turkey’s Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894-1924. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press, 2019, p. 73f.

In Trebizond, on 8 October 1895, “Armenian shops were looted, merchants killed on the spot. Homes, ransacked. In one day nearly a thousand Armenians lay dead in the ruin. But this was just the beginning. That same month massacres took place at Erzinjan [Erzincan], Erzurum, Gumushkhane [Gümüşhane], Baiburt, Urfa, and Bitlis.”^[15]

Trebizond, January 29, 1914.

The decision of the Turkish Greeks and Armenians not to participate in the parliamentary elections has caused an increased animosity against the Christian subjects of Turkey also in the Muslim circles of Trebizond and the neighbouring ports, which finds its expression in a boycott movement against them. The shops of the Christians are shunned by the Mohammedans and the steamships belonging to the Armenian Gümüchian are poorly served by the port staff than the other vessels.

The campaign undoubtedly originates from the “Union et Progrès” committee. The authorities are sympathetic to it. Even though they deny the existence of the boycott movement at all.

In general, there is no evidence of animosity against foreigners. Their interests are therefore suffering there, where they coincide with the sufferings of the Rayahs. For example, the Italian shipping company’s steamships, whose agent here is an Armenian, meet with passive resistance from the port staff during unloading because not enough lighters are made available to them.

On this occasion, the contrast between the lower class of the population and the better-off is once again evident in Trebizond. The port staff, the porters, coachmen, etc., who are mainly the members of the committee, are pleased that the government circles are again calling for their help. They know that occasionally, when their tariffs etc. are revised, their counter-calculations will be accepted. The better circles which are averse to the Committee feel that their interests have been violated, especially since the better shops, restaurants, etc. they prefer are in the hands of Armenians and Greeks. They point out that in the new appeal to the alleged patriotism of the lower classes of the population, their already intolerable arbitrary rule will only find new support and that the boycott movement will exacerbate the contrast between Mohammedans and Christians in an undesirable way. The consequences are already making themselves felt. They will remain, even if, as I would like to assume, the movement should soon subside.

The indigenous Christians are very worried, and rumours of imminent massacres are spreading through the city. In my obedient opinion, such fears are unfounded. The population of the local area seems to have a strong tendency to insubordination. But they will bend when faced with a strong will. The government will not lack it in the extreme. Because a degeneration of the movement could perhaps lead to Russian intervention. The ruling circles cannot close their eyes to this danger.

I have sent a copy of this report to the Imperial Embassy in Constantinople.

Bergfeld

Source: http://www.armenocide.net/armenocide/armgende.nsf/$$AllDocs/1914-01-29-DE-003

The Ottoman war capitulation of 30 October 1918 did not bring any easing of the situation, let alone security for the Christian population of the Pontos, which continued to be exposed to attacks by armed irregular gangs. Pontian Greek refugees, who had fled to Russian-controlled territory during the World War, had their return home hampered and even banned by the Ottoman ministry. On 9 July 1919, the Ottoman-Turkish newspaper Akşam (‘Evening’) thanked Ottoman Minister of Infrastructure Ahmet Ferit Bey for ordering that refugees were no longer allowed to stay in Pontos. Greeks of non-Ottoman nationality were denied the right to settle.

“By late January 1919, between 10,000 and 40,000 Greeks had returned to Samsun and Bafra, many living in makeshift ‘mud huts’ and in the street, as usurping Turks, ‘gypsies,’ and Albanians, ‘with the connivance of the authorities,’ refused to vacate their homes. The kaymakam of Bafra reportedly told returnees ‘to go and live with the Albanians and become their servants.’ A number of Bafra Greeks were killed trying to regain homes, even as some empty Armenian homes were being torn down and ‘sold for wood.’

Kapancızade Hamid Bey, the governor of Samsun, was set against any Greek revival in the city. He did not see Greeks as refugees trying to go home, but as enemies of the state: ‘It seemed as though the Samsun area was already in the hands of the Pontus rebels,’ he wrote in light of the ongoing repatriation. The situation in Kastamonu vilayet was little better. Returning Greeks were ‘in a very pitiful condition,’ though the Turkish authorities provided them with transport and ‘repatriation expenses.’ Greek children were ‘nearly naked, their scraps of clothing consisting of pieces of sacking, curtains, cushion covers and strips of mattress cloth’ In Merzifon and its environs, Greek refugees were returning ‘to wrecked homes and ruined villages.’ The returning refugees formed ‘bands’ to defend themselves and reclaim their property, giving the Turks a ‘pretext’ for violence.”^[37]

The days of the Ottoman government in Constantinople were numbered. In numerous regions, so-called committees for the defence of national rights (Müdafaa-yi Hukuk Milliye Cemiyetler) called on the Muslim population to resist the victorious allied powers. Since the Muslim population in many places feared to suffer the same fate of expulsion and expropriation as the Ottoman Christians before them or through them, groups of irregulars soon formed, which were also joined by deserters from the Ottoman armed forces. In order to comply with the provisions of the Mudros Armistice Agreement, the Sultan therefore ordered the liquidation of the gangs and sent General Mustafa Kemal to Samsun with such an order on 19 May 1919. But he had made the goat a gardener. Kemal had been commander in the Special Organization and had belonged to those officers who had led the partisan fight against the Italian army under a false identity. He was therefore an expert in sabotage and partisan fighting. Instead of carrying out the orders of the Ottoman head of state, Kemal was at the head of the armed anti-allied movement. Not only did he give refuge to high-ranking colleagues of the notorious Special Organization in the territories under his control, but he also gave them important posts.

The consequences of the Kemalist-nationalist movement in Pontos, which was rapidly gaining in popularity and strength, are described in a report by British Lieutenant S. J. Perring from the Erbaa area dated 25 July 1919:

“This area is replete with robbers. This situation is encouraged by the local Turks, civilians and soldiers alike. There is an agreement whereby the local military authorities supply the Turkish bands with guns and provisions. Captain Izzet Bey, second in rank, visits the robbers’ villages continuously….

They continue to hold orphans and women and children who have become Muslim, despite the fact that there are orders to do otherwise. Since it is impossible to execute such orders while war rages, the Christian population is awaiting the right moment to leave en mass following the failure of the Allied landings. However, at the moment, it is not possible to do such a thing given the state of the roads.

I received urgent appeals to send military aid here. I request the compiling of a catalogue of culpable Turks, against whom the entire Christian population is prepared to give evidence. There is no doubt that such arrests and removals would be to the considerable benefit of the remaining populace, and might perhaps stop further blood being shed in the future.

The leader of a Greek resistance corps, who recently surrendered, was murdered in the local market, and there is no doubt it was carried out on the orders of the military authorities. The local administrator, who is a hard-working and intelligent man, is of no use whatsoever in this situation as he is an Armenian.

The Greek population today: 7,743. Pre-war: 18,000.

Many hundreds have been hanged. Those remaining died of hunger and disease. They informed us that their situation worsens by the day, that they are unable to cultivate their fields, that they dare not travel even a short distance after dark, and that they are threatened by the Turks all the time.” ^[38]

The situation in Thermi (sancak Samsun) was even worse. According, once again, to S.J. Perring, of the 835 Greeks and 75 Armenians who lived there until 1919, none remained. “I was informed by the only Greek I found that apart from very few in the villages, he was the only survivor he knew of. Of the 140 Armenians who were ejected, none returned. All the Greek property has been destroyed; I handed the few houses left standing over to the only remaining Greek, instructing him to rent them out and send the rent to Samsun. I ordered the administrator to gather the orphans and send them to Samsun, but I couldn’t get any figures and I fear that the result will not be satisfactory”.^[39]

The British Admiral of the Fleet Sir John Michael de Robeck, who served as Allied High Commissioner in Constantinople in 1919-1920, reported on 24 November 1919: “The situation in the vilayet of Trebizond is one of progressive deterioration. The area of Kerasus, for instance, is openly controlled by the leader of the looters, who dictates to the local authorities. The Vali of Trebizond is powerless or too weak to impose himself on the bandits.”^[40]

In the following years 1920 and 1921 the number of massacres increased even more.

„Terrible massacres are reported from the seaports of Samsun and Trebizond the capital of Armenia. The streets are strewn with bodies of Greeks. Many shops have been ransacked. An American destroyer has arrived at Samsun to protect American subjects there.”^[41]

In June 1922, the Royal Hellenic Legation to Washington reported, among other incidents in the adjacent Sivas province, a massacre at Platana [today Akçaabat], where “all the best Greek houses were set on fire and the inhabitants massacred.”^[42]

The Kemalists adopted the genocidal methods of the Young Turks, including deportations and eliticide, i.e. the targeted arrest, condemnation and execution of political, intellectual and spiritual Christian elites.

In all areas under control of the Nationalist government hundreds of Greeks were executed by hanging – or massacred, in particular during the initial phase – among them many publishers, entrepreneurs, the mayors of towns and villages and previous members of the Ottoman parliament. Thus, the intellectual and political elite of the Asian Minor Greeks was destroyed in the course of a few months. In June 1921 seven Orthodox priests from Alaçam, Bafra “and outlying districts were arrested and after being publicly tortured, were crucified in the market-place of Guioz-Keuy [Göz-Köy].”^[43] In the Pontos region alone the daily rate of hanging was 60 during September 1921. In one day, on 22 January 1921, Kemalist military courts (‘Independence Courts’) sentenced 72 prominent Greeks – including scientists, educators, officials and business figures – from the cities of Samsun, Alaçam, Bafra (Grk: Pafra) and other towns to death by hanging for alleged rebellion. ^[44]

In his telegram to the League of Nations the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople quoted the Turkish newspapers of Samsun, the Ehale and the Helal of 18, 19 and 25 September 1921, giving a list of three Armenians and 168 Greeks, including two naturalised Americans, one missionary and the other Professor at the American College at Merzivan [Armenian: Marzovan; Turkish: Merzifon; also Merzifun], who were condemned to death and executed.^[45] In the vicinity of Kavak (Pontos), 1,300 Greeks were shot on 15 or 16 August 1921 in about two and a half hours.^[46] During the meeting of the Armenian-Greek-Section (A.G.S.) of 31 August 1921, Dr. Théotokas read the Ecumenical’s Patriarchate’s report of 24 August 1921, which also covered the “question of Ottoman Greeks who were being tried by the Turkish Courts for supposed acts of brigandage; and said that the prisoners were being ill-treated and subjected to severe humiliation, and that, through fear of worse treatment, they made no complaint to Captain Wilson, when he interrogated them on the round of inspection.”^[47] In the A.G.S. meeting of  12 October 1921
“(…) Dr. Théotokas said, that a Greek lady who had escaped from Samsoun [Samsun] had furnished the Patriarchate with a reliable and vivid account of the recent executions in that town. The victims were given three days notice of their fate; they were hanged naked and in batches, all the condemned having to undergo the terrible ordeal of standing by and witnessing the executions until their turn arrived. In one case a father and son were given the option of choosing which should be hanged first.”^[48)

A fortnight later, the representative of the Ecumenical Patriarchate added information on massive executions by hanging in Amasya. The A.G.S. minutes of 26 October 1921 concluded:

“These additional details show with what deliberation and studied cruelty, these sentences have been carried out; the victims were alleged to have been hanged in batches, the first victim being the aged Abbé Platon, Metropolitan Vicar of Samsoun [Samsun]. After these executions, the bodies of the victims were stripped of their clothes and valuables, and the gold teeth of the executed extracted by the Turks.”^[49]

The Pontian Greeks were particularly endangered in the interior of the country, where the absence of foreign representations made it easier for the Kemalist gangs (‘liberation units’) to carry out their work of annihilation undisturbed and with impunity.

The reduction of foreign presence was also served by the decree of the Kemalist government in Ankara of 5 January 1921, according to which Christian educational institutions – with the exception of American ones – had to close. ^[50]

Konstantinos Emm. Fotiadis: Discrimination and Destruction of Greek Physicians

In early 1920, the Allied High Commissioner of Greece, Efthymios Kanellopoulos, reported: “In pursuit of their goal to exterminate Christian ethnic groups, the Turks did not fail to discern that a blow against Christian scientists was important for their full success. Therefore, they also deviously persecuted Greek doctors, at a time when they were treating the sick—and Turkish soldiers, in particular—regardless of race or religion, in accordance with the principles of their humanistic profession.”^[51] The process began with a secret and strict order by which Turkish families were forbidden to consult Christian doctors. Compliance was so universal that even those responsible for its implementation were impressed by the results.

The drafting of physicians in times of war is indisputably a common practice everywhere in the world. In this case, however, it was the first time since the establishment of the Ottoman Empire that Christian doctors were obliged to join the Ottoman army. What is clear, however, is that the inclusion of Christian doctors as well as the remaining Greeks in the mobilization was not intended as a defence measure; its underlying rationale was the annihilation of Christian ethnic groups, as the Association of Greek doctors concluded in its memorandum: “All of us felt this to be the case from the very beginning. It was the sad fate of many of us to die far from our family to no purpose and serving no ideal, lacking moral support and facing indifference, deprivation, misery and abandonment”.^[52]

The departure of Greek doctors decreased the professional competition in favor of the Muslims. This was a significant advantage not only for the private but for the public interests of the Turkish state. Exposed to all kinds of sufferings with their health often too frail for them to cope, condemned to undergo hardship too harsh for their age, the potential victims of the epidemics they had to fight, Greek doctors were obliged to face all sorts of difficulties that their executioners intended to result in their deaths.^[53]

After the armistice of Mudros in October 1918, some surviving Greek doctors wrote about their personal strife, the madness they had lived through, and mainly about the crimes of genocide they had witnessed. Some exemplary excerpts from this extensive body of writing follow:

After I had been drafted, I caught typhus and left myself to my fate, without treatment or attention, thinking that I was doomed to die. Nevertheless, fate decided differently and I managed to escape death, while every day a hundred people died around me. A fortnight after my fever ceased, I was ordered to assume my duties again; when I complained that I was still too weak to stand, they retorted: ‘You have to work till you’re dead. Your weakness is of no concern to us!’ You have to try and imagine the effort I had to make to walk and accomplish some of what was expected of me. For my support, I had to endure daily abuse and endless threats that it was us, the Greek subjects of the Ottoman Empire, who had created Greece’s navy, and that the Turks were waiting for Greece to enter the war so that they would get rid of us as they had done with the Armenians. However, they hastened to add: “With you, we are not going to make the same mistakes we did with the Armenians. You have to be slaughtered to the last man!”^[54]

(…)

In Kurdistan I saw heaps of braids and women’s hair, pulled off the heads of unfortunate victims by those who dragged them to rape and slaughter; during their struggle, their braids were left in the hands of their executioners…

On the way from Erzincan to Erzurum in early May 1915, close to the road to Kara Su (Euphrates) and near Sansa  I came across the bodies of five Greek soldiers who had been savagely murdered and slaughtered on the mountains because they dared offer some bread to the unfortunate Armenians who were being taken from one area to the other. I choose to mention only the bodies of the murdered soldiers and not the hundreds of bodies scattered on the ground along the path that I had been following for days. Those were soldiers from the labor battalions who had died of typhus and were left exposed, to be eaten by wild animals and vultures.

I have to stress that Sansa is the tomb of Greek soldiers [of Ottoman nationality] who had served in the labor battalions of Samsun, Kerasus, Trebizond, and Erzurum, and died or were slaughtered by the Turks during the retreat.”^[55]

Excerpted from: Konstantinos Emm. Fotiadis: The Genocide of the Pontian Greeks; 2019; Chapter Four, paragraph 16: The Work Battalions

On 21 July /2 August (new style), 1914, the Ottoman government declared a general mobilization, calling all men from 18 to 45 to arms (including Non-Muslim men who were drafted already in the age of 16 up to 55 years of age). Those who failed to present themselves within 11 days were to be considered deserters and sentenced to death.^[56] The order was posted in all mosques, churches, coffee houses, and public buildings. All those on the black lists of deserters were executed.

On 23 July 1914 the Russian consul at Trebizond informed his embassy in Constantinople: “General mobilization continues in the district under my consular supervision. Orders that conflict with previous orders arrive daily. Every man had to bring enough bread to feed him for five days. The city is full of people without lodgings; several of them had to spend the night in the streets. According to the information at my disposal, apart from the Trebizond draftees, thousands of untrained recruits from other ports of Asia Minor have been sent inland. Several city doctors have been ordered to join the army as military medical staff and to travel to the camps by their own means”.^[57]

As the C.U.P. (‘Young Turkish’) government distrusted the loyalty of non-Muslims, most of them were put into units that were used for road construction and load-bearing. These notorious forced laborer units (Trk.: amele taburları), popularly called ‘donkey units’ (eşek taburları), developed into a special method of extermination with particularly high death rates. These labor brigades “were nothing more than places of execution for the Christians taking place under the cruelest conditions imaginable. There was neither food nor clothing. There was no heating and there was the burning sun of the day and the extreme cold of the nights. In the depths of winter they lived in holes and caves.”^[58]

A written order which was sent from the chief of public works, Ömer, to the supervisor of the Argana Maden labor battalions, Lütfi Bey, also reveals genocidal intent:

“To Lütfi Effendi, chief foreman in Argana,

We have been informed that our nation’s traitors, the Greeks, are not being taken to work if it is raining. This entails a daily burden of 860 grams of wheat at the expense of the state; furthermore, it hinders the attainment of our goal. Therefore, from now on and following your communication with the commander of the work battalions, we instruct you to send them to work in both rain and snow. No exceptions are permitted.

(Signed by) Ömer, chief of public works

Addressed to chief foreman Lüfti of the labor battalions.”^[59]

Many Greek draftees did not survive the hardships of compulsory labour, malnutrition and poor accommodation or the lack of it altogether. In a German cable of 12 May 1918 to the Foreign Office in Berlin, the statements of Ottoman prisoners of war were repeated, who spoke of a ‘methodical annihilation of the Greeks’, due to the general mobilisation, the confiscation of property and the deportations. These captives mentioned a number of more than 200,000 Greek draftees until the end of 1917, of which many had been slaughtered or committed suicide in order to escape the hardships, ill-treatment, diseases, starvation and cold weather.

The issue of the Ottoman Christian labour conscripts was raised during a parliamentary debate by Emmanouil Emmanoulidis (Εμμανουήλ Εμμανουηλίδης, 1867-1943), member of the Ottoman Parliament from Pontos, who on 4 November 1918 set before his colleagues in that body eight issues, of which the seventh had to do with the labour battalions:

“On the occasion of the conscription there were created the labour battalions. They [state authorities] destroyed through starvation and through general deprivations 250,000 from the men thus… We ask: ‘What does the new government know of the perpetrators? What does it think on this matter? And, when will it initiate the measures that it is able to undertake?”^[60]

Conscriptions of non-Muslims, especially Greek Orthodox Christians, occurred before and after the First World War. Already on 2 March 1921, the National Assembly at Ankara ordered the reintroduction of labour battalions for Ottoman non-Muslims. According to Leyla Neyzi of the Sabancı University, “one of the main reasons for the formation of these units was to ensure that local non-Muslims (…particularly local Greeks) would leave their regions of origin and not join the forces fighting the Turks”.^[61] Interestingly, the subscription into the labour battalions was also imposed on oppositional or otherwise ‘unreliable’ Muslims, according to the Armenian survivor Varteres Mikael Garougian. Being meanwhile sentenced to compulsory labour himself, he joined a labour unit that “was composed of mostly young Greek men, gathered after the massacres from the area of Samsun and now driven to this location [of Zara].“^[62]

The sancak and the city of Samsun (Grk.: Amisos) in the west of the province Trebizond remained particularly affected; they had already borne the main burden of massacres and deportations during the First World War, because they were outside the Russian occupied territory. The altogether nine deportations from Samsun – towards Malatya – began in June 1921; the last trek left Samsun on 13 September 1921. The New York Times already reported on 9 July 1921: “The notorious murderous chief, Osman Agha, arrived at Samsun the second day of Bairam, a Turkish holiday similar to Easter, inaugurating his entry by the murder of ten Greeks. Then, surrounding the stores of the American Tobacco Company, he arrested all the Greek clerks, numbering about 800, and had them transported to an unknown destination. The Greek quarter was then surrounded and 1,500 other Greeks arrested and deported to the interior.”^[63]

“On June 21, 1921, the Kemalists decided to deport the Greek population of Kotyora [Trk.: Ordu]. Approximately eight hundred men and children, with a heavy escort of gendarmes, were taken to Meşudiye (Ordu district) without casualties, via the mule path from Kapatiz to Han Yeri and Chambashin. Ioakeim Saltsis wrote: ‘In Meşudiye we remained in strict isolation for two days. This measure was taken by the kind commander of Şebinkarahisar to protect us from falling into the hands of Topal Osman and to gain time, until that brute and his ferocious band had moved away from the Commander’s territory.’”^[64]

Kemalist destruction of the majority of Greek villages in the kazas Samsun and Bafra was reported on 18 October 1921: “According to reliable foreign testimony, 420 out of 720 prosperous Greek villages in the Black Sea district of Samsun and Bafra, have been completely destroyed in the past few months. The male inhabitants were either massacred or deported, and the women were removed to the interior. The remaining 300 villages, it is stated, were partially destroyed, and are inhabited by only a few women. The principal organizer of this persecution was a boatman named Osman Agha, of Constantinople, now a Kemalist (Turkish Nationalist) colonel.”^[65]

In early 1922, the deportations extended to the city and kaza of Trebizond.^[66] “Most Trabzon Christians were deported inland. But some—from the village of Ardache [Grk: Ardasa, kaza Torul, sancak Gümüşhane], for example—were pushed toward newly occupied Russian areas. (…) Deportations from Trabzon to the Anatolian interior often resulted in rape and death. (…) The Turks maintained the pretext of military justification even when they were winning. When the tide of battle changed, and they reconquered Trabzon vilayet, they continued expelling Greeks systematically.”^[67]

On 1 November 1922, the Turkish National Assembly at Ankara issued its decision to expel all the remaining Christian population from Asia Minor, estimated by the Near East Relief to be still about half a million of people.^[68] The systematic mass expulsions, combined with boycotts, massacres and deportations in the Pontic area increased towards the end of 1922. „Ankara was eager to rid Anatolia of its Christians before the Lausanne Conference ended. By December 1922, a month into the conference, the evacuation was in full swing. [The head of the Near East Relief in Turkey, Harold] Jaquith described what he saw: ‘Death is overtaking thousands of the children and the aged infirm on the frozen roads of Anatolia. . . . Moving over the worst mud roads in the world, I saw a crowd of broken civilians more depressing than an army in hard-pressed retreat. Women about to become mothers tramped in snow up to their knees. Tired children dropped weary by the wayside, and girls of tender years bore men’s burdens.’ At the ports the waiting refugees suffered intimidation, robbery, and violence.”^[69]

“The French high commissioner, General Maurice Pellé, said he had heard that ‘in all parts of Anatolia from Mersina to Trebizond’ Christian men aged eighteen to fortyfive were to be ‘made prisoners,’ and the rest were to be ‘expelled from the country’. (…) Along the Black Sea coast, the Christians were bluntly told that they had thirty days to leave, otherwise they would be marched to the interior. All knew what that meant. The order encompassed the Christians working in missionary institutions and the many thousands of orphans in their care. [The British High  Commissioner at Constantinople, Horace] Rumbold, probably exaggerating the number of Christians left to expel, thought the order would affect ‘over one million Christians in Eastern Anatolia.’ Throughout Anatolia, the orders received the approval and reinforcement of the Muslim public. Newspapers lambasted the Christians, and neighbors threatened them with massacre. In November 1922 [the American consul at Aleppo until May 1923, Jesse B.] Jackson cataloged a litany of persecutions, big and small. Christians, he said, were excessively taxed, ‘beaten, robbed and [left] with no redress. A persistent boycott exists against them, preventing them from selling anything . . . at any price; also, whatever they are obliged to purchase from a Moslem they are forced to pay from ten to twenty times the value thereof.’ In short, ‘there is a clear understanding among the Turkish authorities and the Mohammedan population that everything possible is to be done to oblige the Christians to leave.’”^[70]

In December 1922, Greeks from the Black Sea area including Trabzon, began to arrive in Constantinople/Istanbul and were placed into refugee camps on route to Greece. In January (winter) 1923 most of the Orthodox Christian families who still lived in Trebizond were told they must leave their homes permanently and gather near the harbour bringing only what they could carry. Within a few days, the uprooted Greeks were taken to disease-ridden refugee camps in Istanbul (where many died), on to Greece, their notional homeland. Many also died who had to walk long distances from their villages to the ports.

In the end, the only real choice for Christian Pontic Greeks was to leave their homeland or convert to Islam and remain in Anatolia.⁽⁷¹⁾

Greeks, whose ancestors came from the Pontos region, summed up their experiences of persecution and suffering under the terms spaghi (σφαγή – massacre) and xerisomos (uprooting; eradication).