Victor Trombettas

Durin the Ottoman period, the Muslim Turks, impaled and roasted alive the Greek Christian Athanasios Diakos. But, they gave him a chance: "Will you become a Turk, Diakos? Will you change your faith? Will you pray in the mosque and abandon the church?" He replied to them: "Go away, you and your faith, may you perish, you heathens! I was born a Greek, and as a Greek I shall die." According to eyewitness accounts of the time, two Turks kindled a fire beside the stable and set an iron grate over it, with a large copper cauldron of oil above the flames. They then lifted Diakos, still bound, and seated him on an old wooden stool. His legs were raised. The Turks began to mock him and put questions to him. At every negative nod they drove nails into his feet. Afterward they took the boiling oil and poured it first over his bare feet. Seeing that he gave no reaction, they tore his clothing and began pouring the oil over his back and chest. He groaned quietly under the pain. The soldiers, ordered not to kill him, used needles to burst the blisters that the boiling oil raised on his skin. This went on for hours, until the following morning. Exhausted, he was dragged through the town to be put to death. The execution was carried out in public view, by leave of Halil Bey, so that the Greeks would be warned of the fate awaiting anyone who dared to rise in revolt. Diakos’s mother was present at his torture. After he had been tied backward onto a saddle with his legs forced apart, the executioner began pressing the sharpened point of a wooden stake into his groin and then drove it slowly deeper, through the length of his body, until it emerged near his right ear. The executioner worked with care, under orders not to kill him quickly; with every thrust of the stake, Diakos’s cries showed that he was still alive. When the executioner had finished, the Turks bound the body tightly to the stake so the skin would not tear, and propped him nearly upright against a tree. As he was dying, he is said to have spoken these sorrowful lines: "Look at the hour Death has chosen to take me, now, when the branches are in blossom and the earth brings forth grass." (Sources: Spyridon Trikoupis "History of the Greek Revolution", Aristotelis Valaoritis "Athanasios Diakos" 1867, Georg Gottfried Gervinus "History of the Revolution and Rebirth of Greece", Songs of the Greek People 1821) Halil Bey ordered a fire to be lit beneath him and the body turned slowly, so that he would be roasted alive like an animal. After many hours of torment, the Greek captain died on April 24, 1821. When the Greeks learned of his story and his martyrdom, they were filled with even greater rage and strength to liberate themselves from the barbarous Muslims and Islam. Athanasios Diakos is one of the most important heroes in the Greek history. If you want to support me in the effort I’m making, please consider becoming a subscriber to my X account for only $2. I write about the ancient, medieval, and modern history of Greece and what Christians went through in Asia Minor, Greece, and Cyprus because of Islam. Thank you very much to those of you who support me and read me. - Homer Pavlos

On April 13, 1822, the Muslim Turk Abu Lubut captured Naousa at the head of 20,000 Greek Christian men and turned the city into hell. There, 13 young women preferred to throw themselves into the waterfall of the Arapitsa bridge rather than be dishonored by the Turks. All the male captives were slaughtered or hanged, and their women and children were enslaved. A year ago, an imperial firman (dated May 3, 1821), stipulated that "the commandments of the Holy Sharia require that the infidels be put to the sword, their children and women be enslaved, their possessions distributed among the faithful victors of Islam, and their homes delivered to fire and ashes so that not even the crow of a rooster shall be heard in them again." So, on the Greek island of Chios on March 30, 1822, the Ottoman fleet under the command of Kara Ali arrived on the island. With excessive zeal in executing the sultan's order "for the exemplification of the rebellious cities and islands," Kara Ali and Vahit ordered the indiscriminate and merciless extermination of all the Greek Orthodox population. Literally the whole island. Irregular Muslims arriving from the coasts of Asia Minor in every kind of vessel participated in this for plunder and revenge. Infants up to 3 years old were killed, along with youths and men from 12 years and older, and women over 40. Pouqueville described the scene in dark colors: "The flames illuminate scenes of debauchery and barbarity unheard of in history. While women are dragged by their hair and violated amid the dead and the dying, drunken dervishes dance around piles of corpses [...] erecting pyramids of heads, atop which they plant their flags, forming heaps of ears destined to adorn the sterns of Ottoman ships." Young girls were raped publicly in the streets, and newlyweds in front of their husbands, who were then slaughtered. Others were raped in front of their parents, after which the men's genitals were cut off. Women over 40 were set on fire and left to burn alive. Pregnant women had their bellies ripped open and their fetuses pulled out, while small children were thrown forcefully against rocks. The frenzy of the Muslims was unprecedented. Many Turkish soldiers cut off the heads of Greek Christians and then licked their swords. With this act, they believed they would earn a place in paradise. Others were hanged from the island's trees for deterrence. Severed human limbs and corpses were scattered on the streets, while the sea had turned red from the blood. The smoke from the burning houses had covered all of Chios, while the flames made the night look like day. Several women from Chios preferred death over dishonor and slavery. Immediately after the "assaults," the harsh fate of captivity followed. Girls from 3 years old, women up to 40 years old, and boys from 3 to 12 were captured and sold as slaves. Age, skin color, body type, features, as well as social status determined the price. According to the statistics of the Turkish customs, up to May 25, 1822, transportation duties had been paid for 42.000 people. Approximately 8–9.000 Greek captives were transferred to Cairo, which, along with Constantinople, constituted the largest centers for receiving Greek slaves. The descriptions by R. Walsh, the chaplain of the English embassy church in Constantinople, of the public sale of the women and girls from Chios in the slave markets are shocking. "The sales usually took place at the Avret Bazaar, the Women's Market. It was a square building with an open courtyard in the middle. Around it were platforms for exhibiting African female slaves. The white ones and women of greater value were in chambers with latticed windows. There the bargaining was done with some decency. But the Chiotisses (Greek women from Chios Island) were so many that they were sold in the squares and streets." The sales stopped on June 19, 1822, following the intervention of the sultan's sister, to whom Chios belonged. It is now known as "Chios Massacre" where 42.000 Christian Greeks were slaughtered, while 52.000 women and children were sold as slaves. Post picture: This is a Greek slave captured by the Muslim Turks during the Ottoman period. The sign writes: "ΡΟΔΟΝ ΕΤΩΝ ΙΗ ΠΩΛΕΙΤΑΙ ΜΝΑΣ Ω" which means: "Rose, eighteen years old, for sale, for 800 mnas". A painting by José Jiménez Aranda. José Jiménez Aranda, Delacroix and Hiram Powers all these artists created sculptures and paintings for these events. The barbaric enslavement of the Greek Christians from the Muslim Turks is one of the worst and most brutal things in entire history. Yet nobody knows or writes about those events. Approximately 16.000–18.000 slaves were imported into the Ottoman empire each year during the first 70 years of the 19th century, while it is estimated that by the end of the century, 5% of the total population of the Ottoman Empire descended from slaves. If you want to support me in the effort I’m making, please consider becoming a subscriber to my X account for only $2. I write about the ancient, medieval, and modern history of Greece and what Christians went through in Asia Minor, Greece, and Cyprus because of Islam. Thank you very much to those of you who support me and read me. - Homer Pavlos