This article investigates the ideological instrumentalisation of astronomy within twentieth-century Greece, centring on the work of Dimitrios Kotsakis (1909-1986) and, secondarily, Stavros Plakidis (1893-1991). The study demonstrates how Greek astronomers functioned as active agents, reframing scientific practice to serve specific apologetic and political agendas. By recontextualising pre-existing antimaterialist discourses, these figures perpetuated an ideological struggle against materialism and socialism that long predated the geopolitical Cold War, but which contributed to it. Ultimately, the article argues that Kotsakis and his milieu successfully synthesised disparate intellectual fields - scientific, religious and political-to wage what was essentially a Cold War anticommunist crusade, yet one deeply rooted in a distinctively Greek context.
The interweaving of anticommunist/totalitarian patterns of thought in Greece with those formulated in other Western countries invites a crossnational pursuit without a comparative evaluation. Anticommunism was linked to nationalism during the Greek Civil War, while antitotalitarianism created an ethical and political space for those opposed to totalitarianism and the communist regimes. It also formulated a semasiological field around notions such as freedom of speech, the captive mind, intellectual enslavement, anticommunist martyrs and the antithesis between truth and ideology/fanaticism.
This article reviews the perception of atheism by Orthodox Christian circles in Greece from the early 1930s to 1974, as reflected mainly in texts published in various Orthodox periodicals. It focuses on their conceptualisation of "atheism" and how it was influenced by factors such as Christian education and apologetics, political motives, ethics and cultural beliefs. It shows that their perspective on atheism, which focused primarily on it as materialism and its facets, moved beyond its theological interpretation as a form of "apostasy" from God, shaping the portrayal of the relationship between science and religion within the Greek context.
This article investigates the fiscal mechanisms of the Greek state during the Greek Revolution, with a particular focus on taxation and the institutional formation of the public finances between 1822 and 1829. Drawing on underexplored fiscal documents - such as tax registers and auction records - it examines how the Provisional Administration sought to establish a centralised revenue system through the abolition of Ottoman personal taxes, the introduction of tithe-based taxation and the leasing of public revenues. The analysis highlights both continuities with Ottoman fiscal practices and significant innovations aimed at legitimising and consolidating state authority under revolutionary conditions.
