Greeks in Sudan

The Greeks in Sudan are small in number (estimated at around 150 in 2015), but still a very prominent community in the country. Historically, this diverse group has played a significant role in the political, economic, cultural, and sporting life of Sudan, as they have been the only European immigrant community of considerable size and economic power.

Following cultural exchanges in ancient and medieval times, a few hundred Greeks – mostly military officers and traders – settled in the six decades after the 1820 Egyptian-Turkish conquest of what became modern Sudan. About one hundred of them stayed, either forcedly or deliberately, when the Ottoman occupiers were defeated by the local Mahdist forces in 1885. With the establishment of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan in 1898, Greek merchants, administrators and artisans ''de facto'' became the stalwarts of the British-dominated colonial regime. By the time Sudan gained independence in 1956, their numbers had increased to around 6,000-7,000, but soon afterwards decreased, especially after the nationalisation of many businesses in 1969 and the introduction of Sharia law in 1983.

The Greek anthropologist Gerasimos Makris, who is related to the Greeks of Sudan through marriage, stresses that "neutrality and a ' clean hands' ideology has always been central to the Greek settlers' self-image, though it is difficult to be reconciled with political developments". While the members of this community have been "proud for being Greeks 'more than the Greeks of Greece'", he concedes at the same time a hybrid identity, because they, "in the long run, have proven to be culturally and sentimentally surprisingly close to the Sudanese".

History

Ancient times

Inter-human and cultural exchange between the Hellenic and Nubian civilizations started at least two and a half millennia ago. The Greek presence in the Nile Valley and its considerable impact on ancient Nubia have long been recognized by scholars. The first recorded contact took place in 593 BCE: graffiti at Abu Simbel reveal that large numbers of Greek mercenaries served under Psamtik II in his invasion of what is now Sudan.

Vice versa, ancient Nubia also had an influence on Greek culture from those early times onwards, as it was well known by scholars throughout the Hellenic world, where several of the classical writers mentioned it. It evidently inspired curiosity about the exotic lands South of Egypt and particularly about the sources of the Nile river. Hence, the pioneering historian Herodotus (circa 484 – circa 425 BCE) made bizarre references to Nubia as a savage land of the "burnt faces" ( Aithiopia) and the source of the Nile. Though he is assumed to have been personally familiar with the river only as far as Aswan, he did identify a "city of Ethiopians" at Meroë, apparently from reports by Psamtik II and Cambyses II.

A new era of Greek-Nubian relations began in 332 BCE, when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt and soon dispatched reconnaissance expeditions into Nubia, possibly to find the sources of the Nile. Scholars assume that the potential Ptolemaic Greek threat contributed to the decision by the Kushitic pharaoh Nastasen to move the capital from Napata to Meroë. Greek language and culture were introduced to the Kushitic ruling classes, which may have triggered the creation of an alphabetic Meroitic writing. Hellenic influences are also evident from changes in art styles.

Kushite contact with the Greek world remained sporadic until the invasion of Ptolemy II in the 270s BCE. His interest in Kush – apart from raiding for slaves, gold and livestock – was to find a secure source of war elephants. At the same time, the Kushite king Ergamenes (Arkamani II) reportedly studied the Greek language, while Greek descriptions of "Ethiopia" increased.

Eratosthenes (circa 276–194 BCE), the Greek geographer and librarian at Alexandria, sketched "with fair accuracy" the course of the Nile as far south as what is now Khartoum, based on the accounts of various travellers. Pliny listed a number of Greeks who had travelled to Meroë and sometimes beyond: Dalion, Aristocreon, Bion, Basilis, and Simonides the Younger, who apparently lived at Meroe for five years.

Relations between Kush and Ptolemaic Egypt thereafter remained tense, but stable. By the time of Ptolemy VIII (170-163 BCE), Greek ships regularly sailed on the Red Sea and to Meroitic ports. The Nubian upper class traded with Greek merchants and adopted certain Hellenic styles of life. However, following the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BCE and an unsuccessful attempt by the Romans to conquer the kingdom, Greek influences withered in Nubia. The account of Strabo, the geographer and historian of Greek descent, in his ''Geographia'' is one of the last references to Nubia from that time.

Medieval times

Half a millennium later, Hellenic influence became all the stronger, when Byzantium reached out to Nubia, which consisted of the three kingdoms of Nobadia ("Migit" in Nubian language), Makuria (Dotawo) and Alwa. Around 540 CE, the Empress Theodora sent Greek-speaking missionaries to these lands, which had already been in the process of evangelisation earlier and went on to adopt Christianity as their official religion. The two northern states of Nobadia and Makuria later merged, with the former ruled by an Eparch of the latter. Its king was based at Old Dongola and its culture showed especially strong elements of Byzantine Greek influence. These cultural changes are not believed to have been forced upon the indigenous population, but rather adopted as a conscious cultural choice to use elements from the cultures in the North.The Greek alphabet was adopted from neighbouring Coptic Egypt and the local language was rendered by using Greek letters. By 700 CE, a combination of Greek, Arabic, and Coptic prevailed over the Meroitic language and writing. Thus, Greek became the main language of the Church in Christian Nubia at least for the first five centuries and was used for expressing both official and private piety. Greek texts have been mostly found in epitaphs and liturgical manuscripts, as well as in wall paintings of Nubian churches and other places of religious importance, such as the monastery in Ghazali. The language was apparently widely used in those contexts until the fifteenth century, but it is assumed that around the 10th / 11th century, it was increasingly replaced by Nubian.
Analysis of Greek inscriptions on terracotta and stone shows regional differences though: in the kingdom of Makuria, the Greek language was the main linguistic vehicle for the "Byzantine-like royal court at Old Dongola", whereas in the Kingdom of Nobatia the Coptic language played a similarly important role. Hence, for example, the foundation stele of the Faras Cathedral was carved in both languages.

There is also evidence of interaction during the times of the Mamluk rule over Egypt: a Greek Eunuch from their court was exiled to Suakin at the Red Sea coast in the late 15th century. The end of Christianity in Nubia around that time did not necessarily mean, however, the end of contacts with Greeks in the lands that are now Sudan, since at least in the late 17th century, some Greek merchants settled in the Funj Sultanate of Sennar.

One century later, the Scottish explorer James Bruce was accompanied by two Greeks during his travels, when he traced the source of the Blue Nile. Another Greek is reported to have travelled to Darfur in 1796, but to have been executed there for attempting to assassinate the Sultan, who had refused him permission to return to Egypt.

Modern Times

Turkiya (1821–1885)

When the Turkish-Egyptian forces of the Ottoman Khedive Mohamed Ali conquered the Funj kingdom in 1821, the invading army reportedly included Greek mercenaries of Arvanite origin. The chief military doctor was a Greek named Dimitrios Botsaris. In 1822, he was killed along with the Khedive's son Ismail in an ambush by Mek Nimr. Ali himself is reported to have taken some of his Greek business partners to Sudan, for instance in 1838 a certain Michalis Tossitsas on a mission in search of gold mines, as well as his personal physician Spiros Laskaris Bey.

More Greeks followed in subsequent years from Egypt, not only as military officers and soldiers, but also as interpreters, some of whom guided expeditions further southward, as well as medical doctors and pharmacists, who opened several drug stores. However, there were especially Greek merchants who came through Egypt with its established Greek trading-houses to trade in ivory, leather, ostrich feathers, and Gum Arabic.

Their commercial activity and the number of merchants greatly increased after the monopoly of trade was abolished in 1849 and the White Nile was opened for navigation. Some also became involved in the trade of slaves from what was later to become South Sudan. The Greek historian Antonios Chaldeos, who wrote his PhD thesis about the history of the Greek communities in Sudan, suggested from the local histories of Omdurman residents that one of those slave-traders was actually George Averoff, who is still widely considered a "''philanthropist''" and "''one of the great national benefactors of Greece''". The Omdurman quarter of Abu Ruf is still today named after Averoff. Moreover, Greek entrepreneurs in Kassala and Gedaref used slaves on their cotton plantations in the 1870s.

While for the first five decades of the Turkiya most of the Greeks settled in Omdurman, the port town of Suakin on the Red Sea coast became another favourite destination after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. El-Obeid and Bara in Kordofan also had large and stable Greek communities. In 1871, the Kingdom of Greece apparently established a consulate in Suakin (see illustration) and a vice-consulate in Khartoum, mainly to cater to the needs of Greek merchants. These were among the very first diplomatic representations in Sudan. According to the written account by one of the Greek settlers, there were 193 Greeks in Sudan in 1881, of whom 132 were based in Khartoum and Omdurman.

Other Greeks did not come to Sudan for commercial reasons though. For instance, Panayotis Potagos, a Greek traveller and physician, explored southern Darfur and Bahr El Ghazal in 1876–77.

The indigenous Mahdist insurrection against the colonial rule of the Turkiya was apparently partly sparked by Marcopoli Bey, the Greek private secretary to the Governor General Muhammad Raouf Pasha: according to Reginald Wingate, Marcopoli – also known as Marcopoulis – advocated for bringing Muhammad Ahmad, the self-proclaimed redeemer (Mahdi) of the Islamic world, to Khartoum for an investigation into his intentions. As a result of the failed expedition, Ahmad went into open rebellion, and Marcopoli went on to become sub-governor of Massawa.

His fellow countrymen and -women were soon affected by the Mahdist uprising as well. In early 1883, five Greeks took part in the defense of El Obeid. After the fall of the city, ten Greeks were taken captive by the insurgents and forced to convert to Islam, but got altogether treated in a rather "''friendly''" manner. Three Greeks agreed to marry Catholic nuns ''pro forma'' in order to protect them. The newly appointed Governor-General Charles Gordon later ironically wrote in his diary:

«The union of the Greek and Latin Church came true through these marriages».

At least five Greeks, who fought on the side of the Ottoman forces, were killed in various battles against the Mahdists. One of them was the Ottoman surgeon-general of Sudan Georgios Douloghlu, a Greek born in Egypt. He died when a Turco-Egyptian force was annihilated by the rebels in November 1883. A Greek trader reportedly played a key role in this crucial event as a guide of this ill-fated expedition, led by William Hicks Pasha, and was later suspected of misleading it on purpose. Allegedly, some Greek merchants also joined the camp of the Mahdi deliberately as renegades and served in important positions of his army.

More Greeks were taken captive in the course of the rebellion, for instance a grocer at El Fasher after the capitulation of Darfur at the end of 1883. Five Greeks served in the army units commanded by Rudolf Slatin in Darfur, who surrendered after Hicks' defeat. Three of them were killed during previous battles, while two were captured and taken to Omdurman.

In the wake of these events, more than half of the 132 Greeks who used to live in Khartoum evacuated from the city, before the Mahdist forces started their siege in March 1884. A few months later, the Mahdi reportedly sent a Greek merchant, who had converted to Islam after his capture, to negotiate with Gordon, but the British Pasha refused to meet him.

In September 1884, a group of Europeans – including 16 Greeks – made an attempt to evacuate from Khartoum on the riverboat ''Abbas'', but the vessel ran aground and its passengers were massacred.

By January 1885, 54 Greeks still remained in Khartoum. Gordon appointed the Greek Consul Nicos Leontides as Deputy Governor and the medical doctor Xenophon Xenoudakis as consultant to his office. Several other Greeks volunteered as soldiers, particularly as the personal guard of Gordon, who likened them to the 300 Spartan fighters at the battle of Thermopylae.

Mahdiya (1885–1898)

When the Mahdists finally conquered Khartoum in January 1885, several Greeks were amongst those killed by the victorious dervishes. Most of them died during combat near the ammunition depot, and one of these victims was the doctor Xenoudakis. Consul Leontides was brutally executed. Of the 54 Greeks, who had remained in the city until the end of the siege, only seven survived. One of them managed to hide Gordon's diary.

Eight months later, shortly after the death of the Mahdi, Mahdist commander Osman Digna had two Greeks executed in Kassala. The other Greeks who had lived there had earlier been evacuated to Abyssinia by forces of the Ethiopian Emperor Yohannes IV upon the request of the Greek Consul in Suez.

Those Greeks, who had been captured and kept alive, were forced to convert to Islam. Altogether though, it seems that the Mahdi's successor, the Khalifa, had them treated relatively mildly, especially in the beginning. By the account of the Austrian missionary Josef Ohrwalder, who managed to escape after ten years, many Greeks continued to do "fairly well in business". They were even allowed to travel, but were restricted to Omdurman after a number of Europeans escaped, including three Greeks, two of whom fled along with two nuns. Over the years, ten Greeks died in prison.

There were about twenty Greek captives in Omdurman: those who had survived the siege of Khartoum and others who had been captured in other towns. The representative of the group became Dimitris Kokorembas who had been living in El Obeid. He married the Catholic Sister Teresa Grigolini, who had been the Lady Superior of the monastery in Kordofan. Altogether five Greeks married nuns in order to protect them. Kokorembas and Grigolini had two sons, reportedly after Father Ohrwalder had decided that she should make the sacrifice in order to pretend to the Mahdists that the marriages between the Greeks and the nuns were not just fake. Panayotis Trampas was later decorated by the Austrian Emperor Franz Josef for protecting a nun, whom he took ''pro forma'' as his wife. Other Greeks married Sudanese women.

One of the Greek captives succeeded in producing gunpowder for the Mahdi and started construction of a luxurious home, but was killed along with another Greek, when the powder keg exploded in 1891.

Another one, Nicolas Papadam, wrote his memoir after the end of the Mahdist State, painting an extraordinarily humanising portrait of the Mahdi, the Khalifa and the Mahdist movement, especially in contrast to "the arrogant, tyrannical and hated Turkish rule." Makris concludes:

«The Mahdi's label of the Greeks as 'men of trade' with no responsibility for political and social developments summarizes the way the Sudanese have always seen the Greek settlers. Naturally, this conception has been warmly embraced by the Greeks themselves although, strictly speaking, it has never corresponded to reality.»

Thus, the Greek captives held out in Omdurman for more than 13 years, though it may be argued that some of them might have had no particular desire to leave, especially those who had been born and brought up in Sudan. The German Charles Neufeld, who was held as a prisoner in Omdurman for twelve years before being freed after the Battle of Omdurman, praised in his memoirs especially "the old Greek lady, Catarina—who was a ministering angel alike to prisoners and captives". Still today, Katarina Street near the International airport of Khartoum is named after Katarina Kakou.

Meanwhile, more Greek merchants moved to Suakin, which stayed under Egyptian and, respectively, British control. Its harbour became a strategic hub for plans to re-take the Sudan. The traders mainly engaged in catering to the needs of the military. There were fourteen canteens run by Greeks like Angelo Capato, who went on to become one of the most eminent businessmen in Sudan. He also started the first ice factory and was contracted to supply meat to the troops.

Likewise, when an Anglo-Egyptian army under Herbert Kitchener's command began moving up the Nile in 1896 to defeat the Mahdists, Greek traders followed the expedition to provide those forces with supplies, especially food and drinking water for the workers involved in the construction of the railway network, thus literally paving the way for the British-led re-conquest. Amongst them were Capato, John Cutsuridis, Theocharis Kotsikas and Nicola Loiso, who all became famous business tycoons in Sudan. The Sudanese historian Hassan Dafalla writes that

«there was a saying, during those imperialistic days, that whenever a British officer was sent for military conquest, a Greek grocer always accompanied him with his whisky ration.»

Anglo-Egyptian Condominium (1899–1955)

= Colonial stalwarts (1899-1938)

=
When Kitchener's forces defeated the Mahdist army in 1898, they counted a community of 87 Greeks in Omdurman, including non-Greek family members. Many of them, like their dean Dimitri Kokorembas and the later chronicler Nicolas Papadam, chose to remain in the British-dominated Anglo-Egyptian Sudan.

This nucleus of the Greek community was immediately enlarged by interpreters and merchants, who entered the Sudan with the invading army, either from the Red Sea or along the Nile. The latter specialized as contractors in supplying logistics to the military and the newly established government. Some Greeks also officially served in the Anglo-Egyptian administration, particularly in the Railways and Steamers Department, as clerks and technical staff. Altogether, the symbiotic association between the colonial regime and the Greek settlers essentially defined the Hellenic presence in Sudan during the first half of the 20th century.
Makris and the Norwegian historian Endre Stiansen conclude that from the point of view of the British-dominated government the Greeks were the ideal expatriates: "Capato – and probably many other Greeks – saw themselves as stalwarts of the 'colonial' order." Makris has also found that "Greeks from Sudan remembered and emphasized the good relations they had with the Sudanese because, unlike the British, they were not 'colonialists', but rather people of a humble background. This, however, did not prevent them from having racist attitudes towards non-Greek Sudanese, or even people of mixed origin, similar to those other Europeans had." However, Makris does concede "a healthy scepticism towards the British, the French and the other 'Big Powers' and their political schemes".
While the Sudanese middle classes struggled to recover from the crushing defeat of 1898, the Greek traders effectively dominated the market for more than two decades. Already during the first months, Greek speculators purchased land "for trifling sums" in the Khartoum area, so that "much of the most valuable land in the new city passed thus at once into the hands of a few wealthy capitalists". The same happened in the fertile Gezira until the introduction of regulation in 1905. One of those who acquired large estates was Capato. This buying spree, until it was curbed by the government, led to a substantial increase in prices, which in turn induced many urban residents to sell their land.
However, not all of the Greeks who came to Sudan were stereotypically merchants and shopkeepers, but there were many other professions as well, including teachers, physicians, pharmacists, scientists, and engineers. During the 1900s and 1910s, many Greeks, particularly from the island of Karpathos, came to work as builders, carpenters, masons, and other craftsmen. Greek contractors and subcontractors constructed governmental buildings in Khartoum – including the reconstruction of the Governor-General's palace – the new port and town of Port Sudan. They also constructed churches such as the All Saints' Anglican Cathedral on Gordon Avenue in Khartoum, designed by Polychronis Zavolas, as well as the mosque in Ed Dueim. Moreover, they were involved in setting up irrigation canals for cotton plantations and in the expansion of the railway network. Some of them worked even in remote places like Darfur. Most prominently, Dimitrios Fabricius, a Greek of German ancestry, who was the chief architect of the Khedive, designed landmark buildings like the Gordon Memorial College, the historic main building of today's University of Khartoum.

It is still possible to identify a broad pattern of Greek immigration into Sudan that applies also to the Greek diaspora in other parts of Africa: as soon as a Greek, like Capato, had established his business, he would bring in younger compatriot