# My American Lectures/French Influence in South-Eastern Europe

FRENCH INFLUENCE IN SOUTH-EASTERN
EUROPE
It is commonly accepted that French influence in Eastern Europe concerns Russia and Poland first and foremost. This is an erroneous conception.
Russia was subject in the 16th century to English influence, mainly evident in the commercial intercourse subsisting between the two countries and English trading with the Arctic Sea, Archangel and elsewhere. Peter the Great pursued western ideas which were partly Dutch and partly Swedish, and the Russia of his time was nothing more or less than a patchwork of Germanic design. Only under Catherine the Second, and without reference to the real needs of Russian society itself, the French of the 18th century became the teachers of the already Europeanised higher-classes of the Russian Empire. It was the imposition of an overwhelming — one might almost say overweening— imperial personality and not a necessary phase in the development of this society. The little Princess of Anhalt Zerbst, despite her German origin, introduced the Parisian philosophy.
In Poland, French customs, the French language and literature were first introduced through the casual marriage of a princess of French blood, de Nevers-Gonzague, with the two kingly brothers on the throne of Poland, Wladislaw and John Casimir (the latter of whom retired temporarily to Paris and had his first burial place in the ​church of St. Germain), then by the advent of Marysienka, a minor noble’s daughter, who espoused John Sobieski, the liberator of Vienna, which thereafter remained indebted and intimately attached to his smart wife. In the 18th century this fashion extended itself over the whole of Polish society, and Stanislas Poniatowski, unfortunate and unjustly ridiculed, the last ruler of the once-glorious realm, was at the same time almost president of a Court academy in the sense of the Parisian « cercles » of the time.
A much earlier origin than either of these is to be sought in regard to South-Eastern Europe.
French influence did not here commence with the development of the French monarchy. It is much older and represents the advance of the race itself. It must be connected with the great mediaeval phenomena of the crusades which afforded French chivalry and also the masses of frantically enthusiastic peasants led by the half-mad Peter the Hermit, not merely an opportunity of meeting a new world, but of making known to its peoples their own manner of life. They built castles and created baronies, counties, dukedoms and principalities; in fact a complete constellation of new States not only in Asia, but especially in the occupied provinces of the Eastern Empire from Phillipopolis to the farthest parts of Morea, from Asia Minor to the coasts of the Adriatic Sea.
It is impossible to say how important was the presence of the French nobility, especially in Morea. In the capital itself the number of knights was very small: the greater part of the warriors who had gone campaigning for the sake of Christ and their own gain returned to their countries, bringing with them only the record of an extraordinary, almost fabulous achievement. But in the peninsula of Greece the feudal knights remained: they built strong castles on the tops of mountains and ruled numerous vassals ​of Greek blood. The ruins of these fortresses are to be seen to this day. Athens itself had, up to the moment of its transformation into a copy of antiquity, a French tower in memory of the departed dukedom of the invaders.
But this influence extended itself over other fields of Greek life. The French in the middle ages were the creators of epic literature, the chansons de geste of France being the source of the inspiration for the Niebelungenlied of the Germans. Within the stone walls of the castles, the old songs of the distant homeland were frequently heard, and they were not exclusively confined to the members of this brilliant chivalry. The subject nation too was incited to give the same form, in verses of similar composition, to the same subjects or to such as were to be found in the local traditions and memories. So Blanchefleur was adopted as an image of the adored one, and the history of the Morea, with its fights and victories, its adventures and reverses, was clothed in a foreign garment, forming the well-known version in two of the western languages. Later, when a Greek « condottiere », a stratiote was lauded in long lines of a western type, the original note of this borrowed literature was recognisable.
In the 14th century this world, divided and exhausted by continual strife, had ceased practically to exist: Catalans and French, Navarrese and Teuton knights in their fierce struggles killed the « Frankish »influence in the Morea and in the adjacent provinces of the Greek peninsula.
An epoch began in which all the efforts of the French tended towards the creation of a ruling monarchy of Roman type, almost to be realised under Phillipe le Bel, and interrupted by the brilliant and disastrous return of the Middle Ages in the form of the Hundred Years War. France was separated from England, from the England which was prepared, by a long process of infiltration, to become ​a second home of French literature and spirit, Henry VI of England and France, being the son of Catherine, a French king’s daughter. Charles VII and Louis XI were enabled, thanks to their policy of caution, to attain this supreme goal. At the beginning of the 16th century the King was master of his subjects and could employ them for his adventures in foreign countries. In this way, the poor young prince Charles VIII was able to dream the crown of Constantinople, the inheritance of the old Latin emperors of new Rome.
With the accession of Francis I, the king of all illusions, began another era of French influence in SouthEastern Europe. The belief that he was the sincere associate of the great Turkish sultan Suleiman against the imperialistic intentions of the Spanish-Germanic Charles V is deep-rooted. In a chapter of mine Points de vue sur l'Histoire du Commerce de l'Orient a I’Epoque Moderne, I have endeavoured to show that no political treaty was ever concluded between the Turkish and French rulers, and that the French only obtained the right to trade which was identical with the older agreements with the mediaeval Catalans. In reality it was only a cooperation of the two fleets (the Turks having an opportunity of seeing Toulon), but not of two armies. Notwithstanding this, such support from a civilised state greatly impressed the Turks with the belief that the western world of the Christians, of the «Franks», had a single chief, and that chief not the invisible Pope, who possessed no troops capable of armed conflict, but the French « padishah », whose ambassadors were treated with respect and satisfied in any requests couched in the name of their master.
The era of the French representatives at the Ottoman Court had begun, and was much more important before the ​civil wars of France began,- the Turk later being less ignorant of foreign lands not to realise the decadent and perilous condition of the new «padishah» in this centre of Christianity. Besides, the French Government was not sufficiently generous in such presents as the Turk considered a just recognition of his importance, and the prestige of ambassadors like de Germigny, de Braves and others suffered accordingly. Despite their poverty, however, they succeeded in placing on the throne of Wallachia one of the numerous pretenders of the time who asked money and introductions from the Most Christian Monarch. Peter Cercel (Ear-ring) was one of these and ruled in Bucharest for two years by the will of the effeminate Henri III, whom he imitated in manners and dress. Others of these adventurers who found a loaf of bread, but no more, beyond the collar of a French order in Paris, were not so fortunate in their pursuit of a vain and transient crown of vassalage.
To the gallant Henry IV and to Louis XIII, whose great minister, Richelieu, had other preoccupations in the disputed West, the Turkish Orient and its neighbouring countries failed to afford much interest. The crusade for rescuing the oriental Christians existed only in the disciplined classical verses of Malherbe. The Rhine and not the Dardanelles or the Danube had first claim on the attention of French diplomacy. A new phase of influence was not due until such time as the resplendent majesty of Louis XIV burst upon a dazzled world, to become the type for all monarchies in the world, perhaps even for contemporary Sultans.
Now in the East, as in the West, each prince would have his court, his obedient nobles waiting on him and his pleasure, his official history, his literature and art, whichever most appealed to him. A characteristic example was ​that of the Wallachian ruler, Constantin Brâncoveanu, upon whom so dread a destiny waited (He was executed in Constantinople, after having been forced to look on while his sons were beheaded before him). He built and restored churches and monasteries, erected for himself and for his numerous family beautiful castles like that at Mogoșoaia near Bucharest; he kept a large retinue of boyards who had deserted their country houses in order to be ever under his eye; he commanded a chronicle of his reign to be written and ordered it to be changed accordingly as his own interest and sympathies waxed and waned.
Under the Regency, the revolutionary dissolutionist spirit of the so-called « philosophy »took hold on all minds. The salons of clever women took on the importance of the Court where Louis XV despised no means of avoiding great ceremonies and brilliant pageants. The thinkers and theorists on an abstract system of society were the teachers of the contemporary world which depended on their approval or condemnation. The reign of Voltaire had begun.
Nor was the East indifferent to this sweeping change of ideas and manners. Parallel to the Portugal of Pombal, the Spain of d’Aranda, and the Naples of Tannucci, Turkey too had her reformers. French adventurers were received in the houses of the mighty, who wished to give to the old world of the Ottoman Constantinople not only the prestige, but also the power which would result from drastic changes in all branches of the administration. At one moment there was talk of introducing in the capital of the Empire a parliament or assembly similar to that of the later French notables. Various technical and scientific French works were translated into the Turkish language. A printing press, an innovation contrived by a former ​Ottoman Ambassador to the French Court, too was tolerated. Selim the Third may be considered to have been a faithful simulacrum of the contemporary French King.
In the Roumanian Principalities, the French emigrants, Carra, de la Roche, Nagni and others, brought with them the ideas of the same triumphant philosophy. As secretaries of the princes, as teachers of language, they were able to exercise considerable influence over the ruling classes of this cultivated society, which was never entirely able to disassociate itself from all that French taste and fashions represented. The old libraries of the Roumanian boyards were full of books chosen from the best current literature of France. Many reforms, such as the liberation of the peasants, held up to that time in the chains of mediaeval bondage, were due, when not to these counsellors, to the spirit of French thought, which had penetrated deep into the Roumanian soul. The high school, where the Greek tradition of grammar and dry literary exercises had held dominion, was wholly transformed. At the same time as Poland became renascent by adopting without reserve the directions of the philosophers, so the establishments of Jassy and Bucharest, consecrated to the study of natural sciences and living languages, courageously took the new road. Roumanian students began to look for higher education in the foreign universities, and they were soon to be seen in the schools of Germany (for medicine), but above all in France, in Paris even, notwithstanding the fact that it was a forbidden city in those revolutionary times.
This important change was brought about not only by social intercourse, but by the native and foreign schools. French literature was procured and was to be found in the majority of the houses of the well-to-do. Long lists of such ​imported works are to be found in old papers. In Vienna, which in the second half of the 18th century was a great city, there were available most of the important works by French authors in published translations, nor were translators wanting in the Roumanian Principalities themselves, where the spirit of Voltaire and Rousseau was largely spread and one among the poets of the old regime, Conachi, gave a Roumanian rendering of Pope’s «Essay on Man », which had naturally first been translated into French.
The Revolution had not the great echo which might have been expected however. Some songs, a few pamphlets, and that is all.
Napoleon had no sense for the ever-increasing national spirit of the South-Eastern European States. For him all these countries were but means of satisfying his intricate and changing policy of alliances with Russia or Austria. He recognised the annexation of both Roumanian territories to the Empire of the Czar. French influence was not to be renewed and strengthened by this greatest of all epics. It was later when French classicism had supplanted the moribund philosophy that the noble cry for liberty of Rhigas and Salomos was to be heard.
Not only was the new French poetry translated by the best representatives of the new Greek generation and especially by the younger set in Roumania (Eliad, Alexandrescu, Alexandri, Negruzzi and Bolintineanu), but the romantic ideas, the new sentimentality, the ardent enthusiasm, the feverish imagination of the poetry invaded and permeated politics. The struggle for liberty against the Russian menace, the noble outburst for the reunion of all the Roumanian provinces were due, no less than the Greek aspirations to the reestablishment of the Byzantine Empire, to French romanticism. ​
The result of this influence in Turkey too brought about the astonishing revolution which crystallised into a complete transformation of public administration, the work of the young entlightened generation of Reshid, Ali and Fouad.
After this poetical state of mind, which dominated all nations and all states for several decades, Napoleon III, nationalist, democrat, socialist and mystic, but first and foremost the true successor of his famous uncle, the renovator of the old Roman forms, was the real and supreme ruler of all South-Eastern Europe.
From him the Turks imbibed the dangerous idea of a unitary empire, without historical privileges for national territories, such as the future united Roumania, which were considered as suzerain « provinces » and their hereditary rulers as mere chiefs of provinces; an idea which was transmitted by the victorious Sultan Abdul Medgid to the depressing period Abdul Hamid’s rule. In Constantinople not only the administrative routine, but the financial policy also was French. Roumania was liberated from Russian intrusion by the Crimean war, and it was the will of the French emperor against the resistance of his own diplomatist which was responsible for the union of Moldavia and Wallachia. The Roumanian prince for both Principalities, the great reformer John Alexander Cuza, was an admirer of Napoleon, who sustained his new throne with all his immense authority.
The fall of the Second Empire rendered France impotent to pursue her former policy in these countries.
What remained of a work of so many centuries was here, as in Russia, and especially in the Roumanian cities, the formation of a wholly denationalised upper class — and the success of the present Russian revolution can also be attributed to this moral condition. In Roumania public demonstrations ​of students in Bucharest in 1906 were all that was necessary to recall this class to a sense of its duties. The performance of an immoral French revue at the National Theatre brought matters to a head, and a riot broke out in which the national aspirations of the populace were clearly manifested. A collision with the police ensued and the situation was so serious as to necessitate the army being called upon to cooperate in the restoration of order and the suppression of hot-heads. As I was reminded of this in Paris at the delivery of my first lecture to the Sorbonne, I answered that the «beau monde» which had wanted to show «Madame Flirt» in those days had had German sympathies during the Great War, while the young rioters had given their blood for the common cause, helping to preserve the honour and existence of their great moral educator, France.
After the conclusion of peace French influence in all the States of South-Eastern Europe was renewed. The prestige of the victory was and is immense. Serbia, which was a sub-Germanic State in the matter of culture, has completely changed her direction. The young generation, educated in France, has determined this sudden transformation. Bulgaria is a suppliant for forgiveness for her attitude in time of war. In Roumania the new directives of this beneficial influence are linked up with the precise sense of the obligations each nation has and should have towards its own traditions and moral needs. Instead of forming a parasitical clan, it tends to inspire the life of an entire national community.