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Phanariots, Phanariotes, or Fanariots were members of prominent Greek families in Phanar, the chief Greek quarter of Constantinople where the Ecumenical Patriarchate is located, who traditionally occupied four important positions in the Ottoman Empire: Voivode of Moldavia, Voivode of Wallachia, Grand Dragoman of the Porte and Grand Dragoman of the Fleet. Despite their cosmopolitanism and often-Western education, the Phanariots were aware of their Greek ancestry and culture; according to Nicholas Mavrocordatos' Philotheou Parerga, "We are a race completely Hellenic".
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Nicholas Mavrocordatos was a Greek member of the Mavrocordatos family, Grand Dragoman to the Divan (1697), and consequently the first Phanariote Hospodar of the Danubian Principalities, Prince of Moldavia, and Prince of Wallachia. He was succeeded as Grand Dragoman (1709) by his brother John Mavrocordato (Ioan), who was for a short while hospodar in both Wallachia and Moldavia.
Alexander III, commonly known as Alexander III the Bad was the Prince of Wallachia between November 1592 and 1593. He was the son of Bogdan Lăpușneanu, former Prince of Moldavia. Although Alexandru had in his government both local Boyars and Greeks, complaints arose to the Ottoman Empire in June 1593 accusing the Prince of behaving like a tyrant just like his uncle, Prince of Moldavia, Aaron the Tyrant.
Constantin G. Cantacuzino, also known as Costache Cantacozino or Costandin Cantacuzino, was the Caimacam (Regent) of Wallachia in September 1848–June 1849, appointed directly by the Ottoman Empire. A member of the Cantacuzino family, he had emerged as a leader of the conservative boyardom during the Regulamentul Organic period. As a commander in the Wallachian militia, he organized in 1831 the first elections for Bucharest's Town Council, and subsequently served as one of the Bucharest Governors. He first played a major part in national government from 1837 to 1842, when he served Prince Alexandru II Ghica as Postelnic and Logothete. During that interval, he clashed with his own brother Grigore Cantacuzino, who sided with the liberal current.
Gheorghe Balș was a Romanian engineer, architect and art historian.
Elections for the princely throne of Wallachia were held on December 20–21, 1842, marking the start of Gheorghe Bibescu's rule. They were the first of two such elections ever held in Wallachia, and historic in that they restored and modernized the elective monarchy, after a 112-year hiatus. While earlier elections took place under the Vlach law, the 1842–43 race was held under a modernized suffrage: there were multiple candidates, an electoral college, approval voting, and exhaustive ballot. The selection of voters extended beyond the inner circle of the Wallachian boyars, with consultation of the provincial landowners and the guilds. Such practices reflected the modernizing trend instituted by the Regulamentul Organic regime in both Danubian Principalities, under the shared custody of the Russian and Ottoman empires. In Moldavia, however, the regime did not permit princely elections, making Bibescu's the only Regulamentul reign to have been consecrated by a vote.
Alecu Filipescu-Vulpea, also known as Aleco Filipescul, Alecsandru R. Filipescu or Alexandru Răducanu Filipescu, was a Wallachian administrator and high-ranking boyar, who played an important part in the politics of the late Phanariote era and of the Regulamentul Organic regime. Beginning in the 1810s, he took an anti-Phanariote stand, conspiring alongside the National Party and the Filiki Eteria to institute new constitutional norms. Clashing with the National Party over the distribution of spoils, and only obtaining relatively minor positions in the administration of Bucharest, Filipescu eventually joined a clique of boyars that cooperated closely with the Russian Empire. His conditional support for the Eterists played out during the Wallachian uprising of 1821, when Vulpea manipulated all sides against each other, ensuring safety for the boyars. He returned to prominence under Prince Grigore IV Ghica, but sabotaged the monarch's political reform effort and also seduced his wife Maria. She was probably the mother of his only son, Ioan Alecu Filipescu-Vulpache.
Ion Cuza or Cuzea, commonly known as Ioniță Cuza, was a Moldavian statesman and political conspirator, remembered as one of the first Romanian nationalists and Freemasons. His paternal family, the Cuzas (Cuzeas), were landowners of uncertain origin who, by the time of Ioniță's birth, had been established into the boyardom, being under the patronage of Doukas and Sturdza aristocrats. Ioniță's mother was a direct descendant of the statesman-chronicler Miron Costin; his father, Miron Cuza, had been involved in the pro-Habsburg conspiracy headed by François Ernaut, while his grandfather, Dumitrașco Cuzea, had been hanged during the clampdown. As boyars, both the Cuzas and the Costins opposed the Phanariote regime and devised other schemes to emancipate Moldavia from the Ottoman Empire.
References
- ↑ ἀλέξανδρος, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Digital Library
- ↑ ἀλέξω, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Digital Library
- ↑ ἀνήρ, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Digital Library
- ↑ a-re-ka-sa-da-ra (Alexandra) Palaeolexicon, Word study tool of ancient languages
- ↑ Mycenaean (Linear B) – English Glossary
- ↑ The Mycenaean World, John Chadwick, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1976, 1999
- ↑ Ἀλέξανδρος, Georg Autenrieth, A Homeric Dictionary, on Perseus Digital Library
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