Authors

Discussion

I. Eliade-Rădulescu received his education at the Hellenophone Academy of Bucharest. After the Greek War of Independence, he became a publicist and played a key role in articulating a Romanian national identity. Here, I trace out his relationship to the Grecophone culture that defined his formative years as well as the tension in his written work when he depicted “Greeks” in the 1830-1840s. On the one hand, he venerated Hellenophone culture and admired the Greek state as a model of modernization. On the other, he frequently complained about the "exploitation" of the Principalities by certain “Greeks” and "abandonment" of Romanian-speakers by their Hellenophone brethren. Situating these portrayals of “Greeks” in a shifting political context, I argue that they underwrote the development of concepts like “Phanariot” and “Phanariotism” in the Danubian lands. I draw comparisons with Greek-language debates about autochtones and hetrochtones  during the same era.