List of people from Greece

This is a list of notable Greeks.

Actors/actresses

Ancient period

Adventurers

Athletes & sports figures

Ancient period

Phidippides, acclaimed runner and 'inspirator' of the Olympic Marathon race, who had run back and forth between Athens and Sparta in order to relay news of the Battle of Marathon, resulting in his death from ultimate exhaustion, when in his last breath he yelled out "We (the Greeks) won". Painting by Luc-Olivier Merson, 1869.

Modern period

Panagiotis Giannakis, former 1987 EuroBasket team captain and former Olympiacos head coach
Leonidas Pyrgos, first modern Olympic gold medalist in fencing
Sofoklis Schortsanitis
Theodoros Zagorakis, Greece national football team captain during Greece's UEFA Euro 2004 victory

Clerics

Medieval period

Modern period

  • Jacob Palaeologus (c. 1520–1585), Dominican friar, later antitrinitarian theologian; (Greek father)

See also:

Entrepreneurs

Explorers

Ancient period

Medieval period

Early Modern

Modern

Fashion designers

Fashion models

Aliki Diplarakou, Miss Europe 1930

Filmmakers

Military and political figures

Alexander the Great, king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon, tutored and personally mentored by Aristotle, leader of the Hellenic League, he conquered the Persian Empire, founded the city of Alexandria

Ancient period

  • Agis III (r.338–?331 BCE), Spartan king who rebelled against Macedon in 331 BCE
  • Alcibiades (450–404 BCE), Athenian general and statesman
  • Alexander the Great (356–323 BCE) King of Macedon, and conqueror of the Persian Empire
  • Antiochus III the Great, (c. 241–187 BCE) Seleucid Monarch
  • Antipater (c.390–319 BCE), Macedonian noble and Alexander the Great's regent in Macedon
  • Aristides (530–468 BCE), Athenian statesman
  • Cimon (510–450 BCE), Athenian leader and statesman
  • Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator, (c.68–30 BCE) Queen of Egypt, from the Hellenistic Ptolemaic Dynasty
    Michelangelo's rendering of Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator
  • Demosthenes (384–322 BCE), politician and orator
  • Dionysius I (c.432–367), ruler of the Syracusan empire
  • Epaminondas (c.420–362), Theban general and statesman
  • Eucratides, ruler of the Bactrian Greeks
  • Leonidas (d.480 BCE), Spartan king, killed defending Greece from the Persians
    Bust of Leonidas I, famed king of Sparta who led his troops at the Battle of Thermopylae against a Persian invasion of the Greek city states, perhaps most famous for having told the Persian King Xerxes his "Molon labe", or "Come and take them", when ordered to surrender and to give up his weapons once his unit's position had been betrayed and surrounded
  • Lycurgus (9th century BCE), semi-legendary Spartan lawgiver
  • Lysander (d.395), Spartan general and hero during the Peloponnesian War
  • Memnon of Rhodes (d.333), Greek mercenary general in Persian army under Darius III
  • Miltiades, Athenian statesman and general
  • Nearchus, Alexander's naval commander
  • Peisistratus, Athenian tyrant
  • Pericles (495–429 BCE), Athenian leader and statesman
    Pericles, strategos of the city state of Athens during the Peloponnesian War
  • Philip II of Macedon (382–336 BCE), Macedonian king and father of Alexander the Great
  • Polycrates, Samian ruler
  • Ptolemy I (c.356–285), Macedonian general under Alexander the Great, founded a dynasty in Egypt
  • Pyrrhus of Epirus (c.318–272), invaded Italy, became known for victories of dubious value (Pyrrhic)
  • Seleucus I, Macedonian general under Alexander the Great, founded dynasty in Persia
  • Solon (638–558 BCE), Athenian lawmaker and archon
  • Themistocles (c.514–449 BCE), Athenian statesman and admiral
  • Xenophon (430–c.354 BCE), mercenary general, led and recounted march from Persia
  • Saint George (AD c.275–303), soldier in the Roman army, venerated as a Christian martyr

Medieval period

Ottoman Empire period

Modern period

Greece

Northern Epirus

Canada

France

Romania

Spain

United Kingdom

Australia

United States

Musicians

Ancient period

Modern period

Franz Ferdinand vocalist and guitarist Alex Kapranos
Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee
Marinella in 2006, classical Greek singer and songwriter
Yanni, Kalamata native world-famous Greek composer, pianist and keyboardist

Painters

Ancient period

Renaissance

Modern period

Philosophers

Bust of Aristotle, the most influential and cited philosopher in history, student of Plato and teacher and tutor of Alexander the Great
Plato, as painted by Michelangelo, whose The Republic and other works on morality and politics are listed as some of the most influential works in philosophy

Ancient period

Medieval period

Modern period

Scientists, engineers, and academics

Ancient period

Archimedes, ancient influential inventor and scientist who spearheaded insights into mathematical calculus
Euclid, mathematician and inventor, famous still today for his Elements

Medieval period

Modern period

Constantin Carathéodory, acclaimed mathematician and scientist, mentor and teacher to Albert Einstein
Georgios Papanikolaou, scientist and inventor; developed the pap test, named after him, in order to treat and prevent ovarian cancer

Sculptors

Ancient period

Modern period

Tycoons

Aristotle Onassis in 1932, who later would create one of the largest shipping conglomerates of his day; married American first lady and widow Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Writers

Ancient period

Aesop, accredited with the Fables
Bust of Homer, composer and writer of the Iliad and Odyssey, the oldest poetry of Western civilization
Bust of Sophocles, writer of Oedipus Rex, one of the three most recomposed Greek playwrights of antiquity alongside Euripides and Aeschylus

Medieval period

Modern period

Odysseus Elytis in 1974, winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize in Literature
Greek-American author David Sedaris in June 2008, author best known for his When You Are Engulfed in Flames
George Seferis, winner of the 1963 Nobel Prize in Literature

General

List of Greeks who were born outside modern Greece

This is a list of ethnic Greeks who were born after the Declaration of the Greek War of Independence (1821), outside the borders of the Greek state. The list does not include Greeks born in the diasporan communities or Greeks of Cyprus (after its independence in 1960), but only Greeks born in the traditional Greek homelands (the Balkans, Anatolia and the Eastern Mediterranean shores).

Actors/actresses

Athletes

Clerics

Entrepreneurs

Fashion designers

Filmmakers

Military and political leaders

Musicians

Painters

Philosophers

Scientists and engineers

Sculptors

Singers

Tycoons

Writers

General

See also

Notes

  1. ^ His origin is disputed, but there are estimates that he was either Illyrian,[1][2][3][4] Greek,[5][6] or Thracian[7]

References

  1. ^ Treadgold, Warren T. (1997). A history of the Byzantine state and society. Stanford University Press. p. 246. ISBN 978-0-8047-2630-6. Retrieved 12 October 2010.
  2. ^ Barker, John W. (1966). Justinian and the later Roman Empire. University of Wisconsin Press. p. 75. ISBN 978-0-299-03944-8. Retrieved 28 November 2011.
  3. ^ History of the Later Roman Empire: From the Death of Theodosius I to the death of Justinian volume 2, by J. B. Bury p. 56
  4. ^ Count Marcellinus and His Chronicle by Brian Croke, p. 75
  5. ^ Carey, Brian Todd; Allfree, Joshua B.; Cairns, John (2012). Road to Manzikert: Byzantine and Islamic Warfare, 527–1071. Casemate Publishers. p. 210. ISBN 978-1-84884-916-7.
  6. ^ "The Rise of Byzantium". War. Vol. 1. London: Dorling Kindersley Limited. 2009. p. 62. ISBN 978-1-4053-4778-5.
  7. ^ Tucker, Spencer C. (2010). Battles that changed history : an encyclopedia of world conflict (1st ed.). Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. p. 88. ISBN 978-1-59884-429-0.
  8. ^ Από τη Βόρειο Ηπειρο στο Σύμπαν: (in Greek) «Οχι, δεν είμαι Πελοποννήσιος. Γεννήθηκα και μεγάλωσα στην Αθήνα, αλλά είμαι Βορειοηπειρώτης και μάλιστα Βλάχος. Νάκας ήταν το αυθεντικό επώνυμο του παππού μου προτού φύγουμε από την Αλβανία»
  9. ^ [1] "Greek conductor and composer"
  10. ^ "Μίκης Θεοδωράκης".
  11. ^ [2] "This website is dedicated to preserving the musical memory of the late, great, Tatiana Troyanos, Greek-American Mezzo-Soprano"
  12. ^  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Schmitz, Leonhard (1870). "Echephyllides". In Smith, William (ed.). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Vol. 2. p. 2.
  13. ^ "Eugenides is himself Greek-American, Detroit-born, suburb-raised – all sources of inspiration for his second novel." [3]
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