Greek Modernity and its Reception in the Great Exhibition of 1851

Abstract

The article explores the participation of Greece in the 1851 Exhibition as an event that offers a glimpse into Greek modernity and its reception in the Victorian press. Greece, a nascent state, partook in the ‘Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations’ with a display that attested to modern economic interests and a knowledge of the commercial value of its past: the thirty one exhibits included products for exports like tobacco, raisins, and figs, some fabrics and garments, and several types of marble which were shown side by side with national Greek costumes, woodcarvings, marble bas-reliefs, and reproductions of ancient monuments. The marginal position of the Greek display on the floor plan of the Exhibition designated the country as belonging more to the Orient, rather than the European nations. Located in an imaginary ‘grey area,’ between the European West and the Levantine East, the Greek pavilion reinforces the Victorian impulse to negotiate the old with the new and thus contributes to the cultural hybridity that characterised modern Greece. I suggest that the display and the ways it was received in the press be viewed as a register of the relation between Victorian culture and modern Greece, a country which resisted taxonomy and assimilation within the given modern categorisations.