The London Protocol of 22 March 1829 was an agreement between the three
Great Powers
A great power is a sovereign state that is recognized as having the ability and expertise to exert its influence on a global scale. Great powers characteristically possess military and economic strength, as well as diplomatic and soft power in ...
(
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands
* Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
and
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
), which amended the
first London Protocol on the creation of an internally autonomous, but
tributary
A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage ...
Greek state under
Ottoman suzerainty
Suzerainty () is the rights and obligations of a person, state or other polity who controls the foreign policy and relations of a tributary state, while allowing the tributary state to have internal autonomy. While the subordinate party is cal ...
.
[William Wrigley, "The Ionian Islands & the Restoration of Anglo-Ottoman Diplomacy, 1827-29" Südost-Forschunge (2010/2011), Vol. 69/70, p51-89.]
As a result of the
Greek War of Independence
The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution or the Greek Revolution of 1821, was a successful war of independence by Greek revolutionaries against the Ottoman Empire between 1821 and 1829. The Greeks were later assisted by ...
, which had begun in 1821, and the Great Powers' intervention in the conflict in the
Battle of Navarino
The Battle of Navarino was a naval battle fought on 20 October (O. S. 8 October) 1827, during the Greek War of Independence (1821–29), in Navarino Bay (modern Pylos), on the west coast of the Peloponnese peninsula, in the Ionian Sea. Allied fo ...
(1827), the creation of some form of Greek state in southern Greece had become certain. In 1827, the
Greek Third National Assembly entrusted the governance of the fledgling nation to
Ioannis Kapodistrias
Count Ioannis Antonios Kapodistrias (10 or 11 February 1776 – 9 October 1831), sometimes anglicized as John Capodistrias ( el, Κόμης Ιωάννης Αντώνιος Καποδίστριας, Komis Ioannis Antonios Kapodistrias; russian: ...
, who arrived in Greece in January 1828. Alongside his efforts to lay the foundations for a modern state, Kapodistrias undertook negotiations with the Great Powers as to the extent and constitutional status of the new Greek state, especially during the
Poros Conference of the Great Powers' ambassadors in September 1828. In November 1828, disregarding the ambassadors' recommendations, the Great Powers agreed on the
first London Protocol, which created an autonomous Greek state encompassing the
Peloponnese
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmu ...
(
Morea
The Morea ( el, Μορέας or ) was the name of the Peloponnese peninsula in southern Greece during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. The name was used for the Byzantine province known as the Despotate of the Morea, by the Ottoman ...
) and the
Cyclades
The Cyclades (; el, Κυκλάδες, ) are an island group in the Aegean Sea, southeast of mainland Greece and a former administrative prefecture of Greece. They are one of the island groups which constitute the Aegean archipelago. The nam ...
islands only.
On 22 March 1829, the British Foreign Minister,
George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen
George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen, (28 January 178414 December 1860), styled Lord Haddo from 1791 to 1801, was a British statesman, diplomat and landowner, successively a Tory, Conservative and Peelite politician and specialist in ...
, and the envoys of France and Russia,
Jules de Polignac
Jules Auguste Armand Marie de Polignac, Count of Polignac (; 14 May 178030 March 1847), then Prince of Polignac, and briefly 3rd Duke of Polignac in 1847, was a French statesman and ultra-royalist politician after the Revolution. He served as pr ...
and
Christoph von Lieven
Prince Christoph Heinrich von Lieven (russian: Христофор Андреевич Ливен, Khristofor Andreyevich Liven; 6 May 1774 – 10 January 1839) was a Baltic German nobleman, Russian general, ambassador to London in 1812–1834, and ...
, signed the second London Protocol, which largely accepted the recommendations of the Poros Conference. According to the protocol, Greece would become a separate state enjoying complete autonomy under the rule of a hereditary Christian prince to be selected by the Powers, but recognize the suzerainty of the Ottoman Sultan and pay an annual tribute of 1.5 million
Turkish piastres. The borders of the new state would run along the line of the
Gulf of Arta in the west to the
Pagasetic Gulf
The Pagasetic Gulf ( el, Παγασητικός κόλπος, Pagasitikós kólpos) is a rounded gulf (max. depth 102 metres) in the Magnesia regional unit (east central Greece) that is formed by the Mount Pelion peninsula. It is connected with ...
in the east, thereby including the Peloponnese and
Continental Greece
Continental Greece ( el, Στερεά Ελλάδα, Stereá Elláda; formerly , ''Chérsos Ellás''), colloquially known as Roúmeli (Ρούμελη), is a traditional geographic regions of Greece, geographic region of Greece. In English, the a ...
, as well as the Cyclades, but neither
Crete
Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, and ...
nor other Aegean islands like
Samos
Samos (, also ; el, Σάμος ) is a Greek island in the eastern Aegean Sea, south of Chios, north of Patmos and the Dodecanese, and off the coast of western Turkey, from which it is separated by the -wide Mycale Strait. It is also a separate ...
which had played a major part in the War of Independence and were still under Greek control.
The Ottoman Empire was forced to acknowledge the protocol in the
Treaty of Adrianople, which concluded the
Russo-Turkish War of 1828–29, but soon after this, the Powers began to turn towards complete independence for Greece, which was recognized in the
London Protocol of 3 February 1830.
References
Further reading
* Anderson, M.S. ''The Eastern Question, 1774-1923: A Study in International Relations'' (1966
online
{{Greek War of Independence
1829 in London
1829 treaties
1829 in the United Kingdom
Diplomacy during the Greek War of Independence
Greece–United Kingdom relations
Treaties of the United Kingdom (1801–1922)
Treaties of the Bourbon Restoration
Treaties of the Russian Empire
1829 in British law
Ioannis Kapodistrias