Koraes, Adamandios

Bora Apr. 27, 1748, in Smyrna; died Apr. 6, 1833, in Paris. Greek enlightener, figure in the national liberation movement. Son of a wealthy merchant.

Koraes lived in France from 1782. Between 1798 and 1801 he wrote a number of works in which he exposed the reactionary role of the Greek higher clergy and issued an appeal for an anti-Turkish uprising to be supported by France. In 1805 he began to republish Greek classics (The Greek Library), which contributed to the spread of nationalistic and patriotic ideas in Greece. He advocated a language “purified” of barbarisms that would be a compromise between the old and new, the katharevousa. Koraes actively supported the Greek national liberation revolution of 1821–29, although he considered it premature.