page_title: Greeks in Sudan
section_title: Medieval times
hierarchical_section_title: Greeks in Sudan / History / Medieval times
context_page_description: The Greek diaspora in Sudan is small in the number of its members, but still a very prominent community in the country. Historically, the diverse group has played a significant role in the political, economic, cultural, and sporting life of Sudan as the only European settler community of considerable size and economic power.
  The Greek anthropologist Gerasimos Makris, who is related to the Greeks of Sudan through marriage, stresses that "neutrality and a 'clean hands' ideology has always been central to the Greek settlers' self-image, though it is difficult to be reconciled with political developments". While "Greeks in Sudan have been proud for being themselves Greeks ‘more than the Greeks of Greece'", he concedes at the same time a hybrid identity, because they, "in the long run, have proved to be culturally and sentimentally surprisingly close to the Sudanese".
context_section_description: Half a millennium later, Hellenic influence became all the stronger, when Byzantium reached out to Nubia, which consisted of the three kingdoms Nobadia ("Migit" in Nubian language), Makuria (Dotawo) and Alwa. Around 540 AD, the Empress Theodora sent Greek-speaking missionaries to these lands, which had already been in the process of evangelisation earlier and went on to adopt Christianity as their official religion. The two Northern ones of Nobadia and Makuria later merged, with the former ruled by an Eparch of the latter. Its king was based at Old Dongola and its culture showed especially strong elements of Byzantine Greek influence, yet not forced upon the locals but rather as a conscious cultural choice of themselves to use elements from the Northern cultures.
  The Greek alphabet was adopted from neighbouring Coptic Egypt and the local language was rendered into Greek letters. By 700 AD, a combination of Greek, Arabic, and Coptic prevailed over the Meroitic language and writing. Thus, Greek became in Christian Nubia at least for the first five centuries the main language of the Church and generally of expressing both official and private piety. Greek texts have been mostly found in epitaphs and liturgical manuscripts, as well as in paintings of Nubian churches and other places of religious importance, such as the monastery in Ghazali. The language was apparently widely used in those contexts until the fifteenth century, but it is assumed that around the 10th / 11th century it was increasingly replaced by Nubian.
  Analysis of Greek inscriptions on terracotta and stone shows regional differences though: in the kingdom of Makuria the Greek language was the main linguistic vehicle for the "Byzantine-like royal court at Old Dongola", whereas in the Kingdom of Nobatia the Coptic language played a similarly important role. Hence, for example, the foundation stela of the Faras Cathedral was carved in both languages.
  There is also evidence of inter-action during the times of the Mameluk rule over Egypt: a Greek Eunuch from their court was exiled to Suakin at the Red Sea in the late 15th century. The end of Christianity in Nubia around that time did not necessarily mean, however, the end of contacts with Greeks in the lands that are now Sudan, since at least in the late 17th century some Greek merchants settled in the Funj Sultanate of Sennar.
  One century later, the Scottish explorer James Bruce was accompanied by two Greeks during his travels, when he traced the source of the Blue Nile. Another Greek is reported to have travelled to Darfur in 1796, but to have been executed there for attempting to assassinate the Sultan who had refused him permission to return to Egypt.
caption: Wall painting of Saint Anne,  8th – first half of 9th AD, found in Faras, National Museum in Warsaw
exif: {}