Why Doesn't Greece Have a King? | The Rise of the Hellenic Republic

Why doesn't Greece have a king? In 1832 Greece gained independence from the Turks with Otto I as its king, but over the course of 140 turbulent years, Greece saw monarchy come and go on more than occasion as no less than three republics ruled the country. All as Greece fought with its neighbors to bring the entire Greek-speaking world (or at least a large chunk of it!) under their control.

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[commodorezero]

"In 1920 King Alexander was attacked by a monkey and later died of sepsis". Continues video without skipping a beat.

[Hypnotized]

First king after the OTTOMAN rule was a MAN called OTTO 🤔 Got to appreciate the irony 😄

[Constantine]

I think the right question is why did Greece have a king in the first place? The Greek revolutionaries did not revolt against the Ottomans just to see a random Bavarian royalist become the ruler of their freed lands. Although the answer to the question becomes more obvious if you study the events as they unfolded after the breakout of the revolt, it is worth mentioning.
Great video btw!

[georgios_]

Great review! A few things that weren't mentioned were the Greek homelands that were never liberated, in Greek called αλύτρωτες πατρίδες (unsalvaged fatherlands). Northern Epirus was liberated 3 times by Greece and had a Greek majority, although because of the Great Powers (Italy and Austria-Hungary at first, then only Italy and finally the USSR) it was never incorporated into Greece, because they believed that would contest their rule of the entrance to the Adriatic. Then the Macedonian Greeks of Monastiri, Geugeli and Strumnica, living in what was then Serbia close to the border with Greece (Collectively known as the Pelagonian Macedonian Greeks) became subject of a voluntary population exchange, and so did the Greeks of Eastern Rumelia (in modern Plovdiv and Burgas, then called Philippoupolis and Pyrgos) in Bulgaria. Finally, the Greeks of Pontus, Cappadocia and Ionia either fled to Greece or were mass slaughtered and the remaining ones were subject of a forced population exchange. 150.000 Greeks were allowed to stay in Constantinople, while regions like Eastern Thrace and Ionia went from majority Greek to non Greek at all/forced converts. Also, Pontus Greeks, who were a plurality (less than 50% but the biggest group) in areas close to the Caucasus (like Trabzon/Trapezous and Sinop/Sinōpe) fled to the Soviet Union.

[teacherdude]

VenizElos - the accent is on third syllable.

[Hypnotized]

Surprisingly good video on a rather complicated issue. Greetings from Greece 👍

[psemapsema]

Greece didn't loose the east thrace. They volunteer give to Turkey as peace agreement so Turkey won't have any claims on Greek islands, (something that Turkey does keep the agreements by claiming the islands this days).

[Pan]

Quite accurate. Although the following has to be noted: despite all this political turmoil, Greece managed to have elections since 1843. That's quite a long ago. The reason why there have been so many governments throughout our modern history is because the elections actually worked. We always were kicking out whoever was deemed incompetent.

For Venizelos, he changed the country dramatically since the first day, quite literally. In his first 6 months in office he passed over 330 new laws, covering every facet. For the economy, well, it wasn't that poor and underdeveloped, it was actually quite developed to most of Europe, but Venizelos slingshoted it, and as a result, even during the political turmoil of 1922-1936, Greece was developing consistently, up until WWII broke out.

For the constitutions, yes, we still had a king, but the texts themselves were quite revolutionary in context. In 1844 we were the first country globally to permanently have universal male suffrage. And in 1864, the constitution that was drawn secured all liberal values, like parliamentarism, people's rule, absolute freedom of speech and the press and rule of law. Quite progressive for a country that was liberated from the Turks 34 years ago at that time.

[ΣωκράτηςΣ-σο]

Amazing video. Thanks for that. I think Greek genocide (in Pontos and Minor Asia) during this period is an important subject that would be mentioned.

[fidodido]

What ended the Greek Royals? Well... they weren't Greek first of all...

[ricardo]

The last referendum was less than fair. The exiled king, Constantine, was not allowed to come to Greece and campagn. It was a very unbalanced referendum.

[ntonisa]

Something important not mentioned is that Greece started out as a democratic Republic (as per its first Constitution of 1821) NOT a kingdom, As a republic it was also one of the first countries to legally emancipate the Jews and outlaw slavery (also since its founding) and later though a kingdom one of the first to establish universal male suffrage (1844, but women only a century later)

[yanni]

To make things really simple what ended the Greek royal family was their continuous involvement with internal politics.

[maximilianrhinestone]

as a greek, you did a very good job. spot on every sentence. you never "threw" random informations perimeterically.
excellent job. +1 sub

[anastasiosgkotzamanis]

A person who really deserves mention in this brief history is the last king's mother, queen Frederica of Hanover. She didn't just consult her husband, she was actively involved in the decision making. People used to say "you don't want to go against the palace", meaning the King/Queen complex and, in truth Frederica. And those politicians who did try to go against her were summarily dismissed. She even put her son "in his place" when he tried to express opinions of his own and slaped him at least once in front of non royal family witnesses when he refused to do as she said.

[tankadar]

Imagine a world where Ataturk didn't exist and greece got Constantinople back

[Alexander]

The main reason is that the Kings that Greece had was not really Greeks ... they was German and Danish...
The last Greek Emperor King died in the St Romanos Gate at 1453 defending Constantinople from the Ottoman hordes!
The second reason is that now days the Royal institution from many aspects is out of date...

[xgkotkot]

You deserve many more subs than what you have currently!

[Alkiviadis_]

Some corrections about Otto. He actually really loved Greece, and there are some paintings and photos showing him wearing traditional Greek clothes of the time. From what I know he actually had interest in rulling Greece. Although that probably didn't show because as you said, he kinda sacked at his job and the fact that neither he nor his wife Amalia were Orthodox didn't help.

Another reason though he was exiled, and this is a big one, was that he most likely couldn't have children. It isn't known if there was lack of effort or some short of medical issue, but even if he saw his reign till the end, we would probably have to elect a new king anyway.

[ΗλίαςΠαπαδάτος-χξ]

Now, in Greece, the former royal family are not popular any more. But, yes, there was a time, till 1915, that the Greek royal family was overwelmingly popular among Greeks in Greece and abroad.