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| Adopted | 1815 |
|---|---|
| Design | A red bordered-Blue Ensign with a gold Lion of Saint Mark holding a Bible and seven bundled arrows |
The Flag of the United States of the Ionian Islands was used between 1815 and 1864. The flag consisted of a Blue Ensign with the coat of arms of the predecessor state, the Septinsular Republic on it with a red border.
The United States of the Ionian Islands were created as a result of the Treaty of Paris in 1815 at the Congress of Vienna as an amical protectorate under the United Kingdom. [1] In article 1 of section VI in the treaty, it stated that the new United States of the Ionian Islands' national flag would be the flag of the Septinsular Republic, a Lion of Saint Mark holding a Bible on a blue background, with a Union Jack in the canton to symbolise the British protectorate. [2]
During shipping in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean, the flag of the United States of the Ionian Islands would often be used as a flag of convenience by Greek ships to purport that they enjoyed the protection of the British Empire. The British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Percy Smythe, 6th Viscount Strangford, was annoyed by this and wrote to his opposite number stating that "The subjects of the Ionian States must be taught that their flag is too respectable to be converted into a mere matter of occasional convenience". [3]
During the Crimean War, ships flying the Ionian Islands flag were presumed to not be allowed to trade with Russia. However the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council from the Admiralty court in 1855 held that as Queen Victoria had negotiated treaties with other nations specifically including the United States of the Ionian Islands separately, instead of the implied inclusion with the Crown Colonies through mentioning just the United Kingdom alone, the Ionian Islands were not technically at war with the Russian Empire as the United Kingdom had not separately declared war on their behalf by mentioning them in the original declaration. However, the judgement also stated that ships flying the Ionian flag were not British and that the citizens were not British subjects as the United States of the Ionian Islands were a protectorate and not a colony. Therefore, Ionian flagged ships were entitled to trade with Russia during the Crimean War, while British ships were not, but they did not enjoy the rights and protection of the United Kingdom. [4]
In 1864, pursuant to the Treaty of London the United Kingdom ceded the United States of the Ionian Islands to the Kingdom of Greece as a gesture of goodwill following Prince Alfred declining to accept the Greek throne despite Greek popular request. Upon the annexation of the Ionian Islands, the flag of the United States ceased to have official status and was replaced by the flag of Greece. [5]
Ithaca, Ithaki or Ithaka is a Greek island located in the Ionian Sea, off the northeast coast of Kefalonia and to the west of continental Greece.
Pax Britannica was the period of relative peace between the Great Powers during which the British Empire became the global hegemonic power and adopted the role of a "global policeman".
A protectorate is a state that is controlled and protected by another sovereign state. It is a dependent territory that has been granted local autonomy over most internal affairs while still recognizing the suzerainty of a more powerful sovereign state without being its direct possession. In exchange, the protectorate usually accepts specified obligations depending on the terms of their arrangement. Usually protectorates are established de jure by a treaty. Under certain conditions as of Egypt under British rule (1882–1914) e.g., a state can also be labelled as a de facto protectorate or a "veiled protectorate".
The Ionian Islands are a group of islands in the Ionian Sea, west of mainland Greece. They are traditionally called the Heptanese, but the group includes many smaller islands as well as the seven principal ones.
Lord High Commissioner is the style of High Commissioners, i.e. direct representatives of the monarch, in three cases in the Kingdom of Scotland and the United Kingdom, two of which are no longer extant. Consequently, the remaining office is often known in short simply as the Lord High Commissioner.
The Septinsular Republic was an oligarchic republic that existed from 1800 to 1807 under nominal Russian and Ottoman sovereignty in the Ionian Islands.
The gazeta was a currency issued in the Ionian Islands in 1801 during the Russia and the Ottoman Empire protectorate. It replaced the Venetian lira at a rate of 1 gazeta = 2 soldi, and continued to be used through the existence of the Septinsular Republic. After the British took possession of the islands, coins were countermarked in Turkish kuruş for use on the islands before the obol was introduced in 1819 for the United States of the Ionian Islands.
The United States of the Ionian Islands was a Greek state and amical protectorate of the United Kingdom between 1815 and 1864. The successor state of the Septinsular Republic, it covered the territory of the Ionian Islands, in modern Greece, and was ceded to Greece as a gift of Britain to the newly enthroned King George I after the resolution for union with Greece had been proposed by the Party of Radicals.
The Treaty of London in 1864 resulted in Great Britain ceding the United States of the Ionian Islands to Greece. Britain had held an amical protectorate over the islands since the 1815 Treaty of Paris.
The Adriatic campaign was a minor theatre of war during the Napoleonic Wars in which a succession of small British Royal Navy and Austrian Navy squadrons and independent cruisers harried the combined naval forces of the First French Empire, the Kingdom of Italy, the Illyrian Provinces and the Kingdom of Naples between 1807 and 1814 in the Adriatic Sea. Italy, Naples and Illyria were all controlled either directly or via proxy by the French Emperor Napoleon I, who had seized them at the Treaty of Pressburg in the aftermath of the War of the Third Coalition.
The Greek Senate was the upper chamber of the parliament in Greece, extant several times in the country's history.
The Ionian Islands were an overseas possession of the Republic of Venice from the mid-14th century until the late 18th century. The conquest of the islands took place gradually. The first to be acquired was Cythera and the neighboring islet of Anticythera, indirectly in 1238 and directly after 1363. In 1386, Corfu voluntarily became part of Venice's colonies. A century later, Venice captured Zante in 1485, Cephalonia in 1500 and Ithaca in 1503. The conquest was completed in 1718 with the capture of Lefkada. Each of the islands remained part of the Venetian Stato da Màr until Napoleon Bonaparte dissolved the Republic of Venice in 1797, annexing Corfu. The Ionian Islands are situated in the Ionian Sea, off the west coast of Greece. Cythera, the southernmost, is just off the southern tip of the Peloponnese and Corfu, the northernmost, is located at the entrance of the Adriatic Sea. In modern Greek, the period of Venetian rule over Greek territory is known as Venetokratia or Enetokratia and literally means "rule of the Venetians". It is believed that the Venetian period on the Ionian Islands was agreeable, especially compared with the coinciding Tourkokratia — Turkish rule over the remainder of present-day Greece.
British protectorates were protectorates or client states under protection of the Imperial Britain's armed forces and represented by British diplomats in international arenas, such as the Great Game in which the Emir of Afghanistan and Tibetan Kingdom became protectorates for short periods of time. Many territories which became British protectorates already had local rulers with whom the Crown negotiated through treaty, acknowledging their status whilst simultaneously offering protection, e.g. British Paramountcy. British protectorates were therefore governed by indirect rule. In most cases, the local ruler, as well as the subjects of the indigenous ruler were not British subjects. British protected states represented a more loose form of British suzerainty, where the local rulers retained absolute control over the states' internal affairs and the British exercised control over defence and foreign affairs.
This article covers worldwide diplomacy and, more generally, the international relations of the great powers from 1814 to 1919. This era covers the period from the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna (1814–15), to the end of the First World War and the Paris Peace Conference (1919–20).
The Serene Grand Lodge of Greece is a Masonic Grand Lodge in Greece. The name was originally used by an organisation which existed from 1815—1843. After that time the Grand Lodge of Greece took its place. The present organisation under the name of the Serene Grand Lodge of Greece was refounded in 1986 by former members of the Grand Lodge. Today, they are firmly associated with Liberal Freemasonry, belonging to ISMAP and now CLIPSAS.
Zakynthos is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the third largest of the Ionian Islands. Today, Zakynthos is a separate regional unit of the Ionian Islands region, and its only municipality. It covers an area of 405.55 km2 (156.6 sq mi) and its coastline is roughly 123 km (76 mi) in length. The name, like all similar names ending in -nthos, is pre-Mycenaean or Pelasgian in origin. In Greek mythology the island was said to be named after Zakynthos, the son of a legendary Arcadian chief Dardanus.
The Treaty of Constantinople of 2 April [O.S. 21 March] 1800 was concluded between the Ottoman Empire and the Russian Empire, and heralded the creation of the Septinsular Republic, the first autonomous Greek state since the Fall of the Byzantine Empire.
The second period of French rule in the Ionian Islands began in August 1807, when the Septinsular Republic, a Russian protectorate comprising the seven Ionian Islands, was occupied by the First French Empire in accordance with the Treaty of Tilsit. The French annexed the Republic but maintained most of its institutions for local governance. In 1809–10, the British occupied the southernmost islands, leaving only Corfu, Paxoi, and the mainland exclave of Parga in French hands. The British also imposed a naval blockade on the French-ruled islands, which began to suffer from famine. Finally, the British occupied Paxoi in late 1813 and Parga in March 1814. Following the Abdication of Napoleon, the French governor-general in Corfu, François-Xavier Donzelot, capitulated and the French garrison was evacuated. In 1815, the islands became a British protectorate, the United States of the Ionian Islands.
The borders of Greece from the Protocol of London from March 22, 1829 until the accession of the Dodecanese were changed nine times and its territorial extensions were seven.
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