Why did ancient kings and modern poets obsess over a culture they never knew?

Cultures · Published 3 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Philhellenism, the love of Greek culture, has shaped history for millennia. From Parthian kings using the title to court Greek subjects to 19th-century romantics funding revolutions, this intellectual movement turned ancient Greece into an enduring, often idealized, standard for Western civilization—sometimes to the detriment of the Greeks themselves.

The term philhellene, meaning a lover of Greeks, originated in antiquity to describe both patriotic Greeks and foreign rulers who admired the culture. Parthian kings, beginning with Mithridates I in 171 BC, adopted the title to build political rapport with their Greek subjects. Similarly, Roman elites became increasingly Hellenized by the 3rd century BC. Figures like Titus Quinctius Flamininus, who proclaimed the freedom of Greek states in 196 BC, were celebrated as liberators, while poets like Horace famously noted that conquered Greece had captured its Roman victors through the power of its arts.

By the 19th century, philhellenism evolved into a powerful European movement. Disillusioned by the restoration of absolute monarchies, the educated middle and upper classes looked to ancient Greece as a romanticized ideal. This obsession, fueled by literature like Jean-Jacques Barthélemy’s 1788 novel Travels of Anacharsis the Younger, inspired widespread support for the Greek War of Independence. Figures such as Lord Byron even took up arms, while others financed the cause, viewing the struggle as a reclamation of a sanctified, classical past.

However, this movement often created a burden for modern Greeks. Scholars like Paul Cartledge and Nikos Dimou have noted that Western philhellenes frequently constructed an unchanging, essentialized version of 'Greekness.' This perspective often ignored the realities of the Byzantine Empire and the Orthodox Church, which were central to Greek identity. By focusing exclusively on a classical past, the movement imposed an ideological expectation that modern Greeks were forced to navigate, often feeling that their contemporary heritage was being sidelined by a romanticized, ancient ghost.

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