The Sudanese Greeks, or Greeks in Sudan, are ethnic Greeks from modern-day Sudan; they are small in number (estimated at around 150 in 2015), but still a very prominent community in the country. Historically, this diverse group has played a significant role in the political, economic, cultural, and sporting life of Sudan, as they have been one of the few European immigrant communities of considerable size and economic power.
Following cultural exchanges in ancient and medieval times, a few hundred Greeks – mostly military officers and traders – settled in the six decades after the 1820 Egyptian-Turkish conquest of what became modern Sudan. About one hundred of them stayed, either forcedly or deliberately, when the Ottoman occupiers were defeated by the local Mahdist forces in 1885. With the establishment of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan in 1898, Greek merchants, administrators and artisans de facto became the stalwarts of the British-dominated colonial regime. By the time Sudan gained independence in 1956, their numbers had increased to around 6,000-7,000, but soon afterwards decreased, especially after the nationalisation of many businesses in 1969 and the introduction of Sharia law in 1983.
The Greek anthropologist Gerasimos Makris, who is related to the Greeks of Sudan through marriage, stresses that "neutrality and a 'clean hands' ideology has always been central to the Greek settlers' self-image, though it is difficult to be reconciled with political developments". While the members of this community have been "proud for being Greeks 'more than the Greeks of Greece'", he concedes at the same time a hybrid identity, because they, "in the long run, have proven to be culturally and sentimentally surprisingly close to the Sudanese".
History
Ancient times
Intercultural exchange between the Hellenic and Nubian civilizations started at least two and a half millennia ago. The Greek presence in the Nile Valley and its considerable impact on ancient Nubia have long been recognized by scholars. The first recorded contact took place in 593 BC: graffiti at Abu Simbel reveal that large numbers of Greek mercenaries served under Psamtik II in his invasion of what is now Sudan.
Vice versa, ancient Nubia also had an influence on Greek culture from those early times onwards, as it was well known by scholars throughout the Hellenic world, where several of the classical writers mentioned it. It evidently inspired curiosity about the exotic lands South of Egypt and particularly about the sources of the Nile river. Hence, the pioneering historian Herodotus (circa 484 – circa 425 BC) made references to Nubia as a land of "burned faces" (Aethiopians) and the source of the Nile. Though he is assumed to have been personally familiar with the river only as far as Aswan, he did identify a "city of Ethiopians" at Meroë, apparently from reports by Psamtik II and Cambyses II.
A new era of Greek-Nubian relations began in 332 BC, when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt and soon dispatched reconnaissance expeditions into Nubia, possibly to find the sources of the Nile. Scholars assume that the potential Ptolemaic threat contributed to the decision by the Kushitic king Nastasen to move the capital from Napata to Meroë. Greek language and culture were introduced to the Kushitic ruling classes, which may have triggered the creation of an alphabetic Meroitic writing. Hellenic influences are also evident from changes in art styles.
Nubian contact with the Greek world remained sporadic until Ptolemy II's Nubian campaign for Meroë in the 270s BC. Ptolemy's interest in Nubia was to secure a source of war elephants from Meroë, and to gain access to Meroitic gold mines. At the same time, Ergamenes (Arkamani II), King of kush at the time, studied Greek language and customs at the Alexandrian court in the Ptolemaic Empire.
Eratosthenes (circa 276–194 BC), the Greek geographer and librarian at Alexandria, sketched "with fair accuracy" the course of the Nile as far south as what is now Khartoum, based on the accounts of various travellers. Pliny listed a number of Greeks who had travelled to Meroë and sometimes beyond: Dalion, Aristocreon, Bion, Basilis, and Simonides the Younger, who apparently lived at Meroe for five years.
Relations between Kush and Ptolemaic Egypt thereafter remained tense, but stable. By the time of Ptolemy VIII (170-163 BC), Greek ships regularly sailed on the Red Sea and to Meroitic ports. The Nubian upper class traded with Greek merchants and adopted certain Hellenic styles of life. However, following the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC and an unsuccessful attempt by the Romans to conquer the kingdom, Greek influences withered in Nubia. The account of Strabo, the geographer and historian of Greek descent, in his Geographia is one of the last references to Nubia from that time.
Axumite conquest of Meroe
The Axumite Empire engaged in a series of invasions that culminated in the capture of the Nubian capital of Meroë in the middle of the 4th century AD, signaling the end of independent Nubian Pagan kingdom of kush. It was the Byzantine missionaries that helped established the authority of Christianity In the area, and as a result converted the new Nubian Christian kingdoms, Nobatia, Alodia, and Makuria.
Tribal nomads like the Beja, Afar, and Saho managed to remain autonomous due to their uncentralized nomadic nature. These tribal peoples would sporadically inflict attacks and raids on Axumite communities. The Beja nomads eventually Hellenized and integrated into the Nubian Greek society that had already been present in Lower Nubia.
Nubian Greeks
Nubian Greek culture followed the pattern of Egyptian Greek and Byzantine Greek civilization, expressed in Nubian Greek art and Nubian Greek literature. The earliest attestations of Nubian Greek literature come from the 5th century; the Nubian Greek language resembles Egyptian and Byzantine Greek; it served as a lingua franca throughout the Nubian Kingdoms, and had a creolized form for trade among the different peoples in Nubia.
Nubian Greek was unique in that it adopted many words from both Coptic Egyptian and Nubian; Nubian Greek's syntax also evolved to establish a fixed word order.
The following is an example of Nubian Greek language:
A plethora of frescoes created between 800–1200AD in Nubian cities such as Faras depicted religious life in the courts of the Nubian Kingdoms; they were made in Byzantine art style.
Nubian Greek titles and government styles in Nubian Kingdoms were based on Byzantine models; even with Islamic encroachments and influence into Nubian territory, the Nubian Greeks saw Constantinople as their spiritual home. Nubian Greek culture disappeared after the Muslim conquest of Nubia around 1450AD.
Medieval times
Half a millennium later, Hellenic influence became all the stronger, when Byzantium reached out to Nubia, which consisted of the three kingdoms of Nobadia, Makuria and Alodia . Around 540 AD, the Empress Theodora sent Greek-speaking missionaries to these lands, which had already been in the process of evangelisation earlier and went on to adopt Christianity as their official religion. The two northern states of Nobatia and Makuria later merged, with the former ruled by an Eparch of the latter. Its king was based at Old Dongola and its culture showed especially strong elements of Byzantine Greek influence. These cultural changes are not believed to have been forced upon the indigenous population, but rather adopted as a conscious cultural choice to use elements from the cultures in the North.The Greek alphabet was adopted from neighbouring Coptic Egypt and the local language was rendered by using Greek letters. By 700 AD, a combination of Greek, Arabic, and Coptic prevailed over the Meroitic language and writing. Thus, Greek became the main language of the Church in Christian Nubia at least for the first five centuries and was used for expressing both official and private piety. Greek texts have been mostly found in epitaphs and liturgical manuscripts, as well as in wall paintings of Nubian churches and other places of religious importance, such as the monastery in Ghazali. The language was apparently widely used in those contexts until the fifteenth century, but it is assumed that around the 10th / 11th century, it was increasingly replaced by Nubian. Analysis of Greek inscriptions on terracotta and stone shows regional differences though: in the kingdom of Makuria, the Greek language was the main linguistic vehicle for the "Byzantine-like royal court at Old Dongola", whereas in the Kingdom of Nobatia the Coptic language played a similarly important role. Hence, for example, the foundation stele of the Faras Cathedral was carved in both languages.
There is also evidence of interaction during the times of the Mamluk rule over Egypt: a Greek Eunuch from their court was exiled to the nubian port of Suakin at the Red Sea coast in the late 15th century. The end of Christianity in Nubia around that time did not necessarily mean, however, the end of contacts with Greeks in the lands that are now Sudan, since at least in the late 17th century, some Greek merchants settled in the Funj Sultanate of Sennar.
One century later, the Scottish explorer James Bruce was accompanied by two Greeks during his travels, when he traced the source of the Blue Nile. Another Greek is reported to have travelled to Darfur in 1796, but to have been executed there for attempting to assassinate the Sultan, who had refused him permission to return to Egypt.
Modern times
Turkiya (1821–1885)
When the Turkish-Egyptian forces of the Ottoman Khedive Mohamed Ali conquered the Funj kingdom in 1821, the invading army reportedly included Greek mercenaries of Arvanite origin. The chief military doctor was a Greek named Dimitrios Botsaris. In 1822, he was killed along with the Khedive's son Ismail in an ambush by Mek Nimr. Ali himself is reported to have taken some of his Greek business partners to Sudan, for instance in 1838 a certain Michalis Tossitsas on a mission in search of gold mines, as well as his personal physician Spiros Laskaris Bey.
More Greeks followed in subsequent years from Egypt, not only as military officers and soldiers, but also as interpreters, some of whom guided expeditions further southward, as well as medical doctors and pharmacists, who opened several drug stores. However, there were especially Greek merchants who came through Egypt with its established Greek trading-houses to trade in ivory, leather, ostrich feathers, and gum arabic.
Their commercial activity and the number of merchants greatly increased after the monopoly of trade was abolished in 1849 and the White Nile was opened for navigation. Some also became involved in the trade of slaves from what was later to become South Sudan. The Greek historian Antonios Chaldeos, who wrote his PhD thesis about the history of the Greek communities in Sudan, suggested from the local histories of Omdurman residents that one of those slave-traders was actually George Averoff, who is still widely considered a "philanthropist" and "one of the great national benefactors of Greece". The Omdurman quarter of Abu Ruf is still today named after Averoff. Moreover, Greek entrepreneurs in Kassala and Gedaref used slaves on their cotton plantations in the 1870s.