“A mysterious bond forged by history” : the making of Greek-Serbian traditional friendship in 19th century Greece

Abstract

In 1913, when Greece and Serbia joined in an alliance against Bulgaria,
both nations were inspired by a sense of traditional friendship. Their military
co-operation was presented and indeed was thought to be the natural outcome
of a lengthy and intimate relationship. This paper seeks to prove that the
invocation and the rhetoric of this friendship were more traditional and certainly more effective as an argument than in deed. To do so it traces through
printed sources the timetable and the fluctuation of this friendship in terms of
theory and locates the actual grounds, arguments, counter-arguments, and
patterns on which this friendship was publicly recognized as “traditional” by
Greek public opinion. It was from the 1860s onwards that the “tradition” of
this friendship was defined, enriched and treasured as a symbolic capital. It
was widely known that there was no much substance in it -from time to time it
was admitted openly—nor direct contacts between the two peoples were particularly brisk. But still “tradition” counterbalanced effectively all the diplomatic shortcomings and even survived the Macedonian crisis.