Arabic Books Printed in Wallachia and Moldavia and their Phanariot Readers

Type:

Book Chapter

Author:

Mihai Ţipău

Published:

2024

Arabic Books Printed in Wallachia and Moldavia and their Phanariot ReadersFor anyone not familiar with Romanian historical writing, the word "Phanariot" needs at least some explanation.A few dictionaries of the English language do provide a short, often repetitive, definition and alternative spellings but usually that is not enough for a thorough understanding of its meaning.1First of all, we should state that "Phanariot" as a word and as a meaning is a modern construction, pretty much as "Byzantine" was used by later scholars to define the identity of the Christian Eastern Roman Empire.Therefore, some caution in its use and some explanations are always welcome.In this paper, "Phanariot" is used in a conventional way to define the Greek Orthodox elite of Constantinople, a group that also provided the rulers of the Romanian Principalities during most of the 18 th century and the first decades of the 19 th century.The limits of this definition must be stated as well.Members of this group were not all ethnically Greek and, more importantly, the ethnic component of their group identity must not be understood in modern terms during this timeframe.The neighborhood of Phanar (the "lighthouse" district), or Diplophanarion in older sources, was home to the most important institution of the Orthodox Christians, the Patriarchate of Constantinople.2However, during the 18 th century, the Greek 1 See for example https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Phanariot,accessed December 10, …

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