Abstract
Throughout the first 50 years of their reign in Greece, the Danish dynasty of Glücksborg struggled to win over their notoriously indifferent subjects. This chapter investigates how between 1896 and 1906 Crown Prince Constantine of Greece, the eldest son of King George I, temporarily managed to become a popular national figure by choosing the fields of archaeology and athleticism as his special areas of engagement. By presiding over the first Olympic Games in Athens in 1896, the Interim Olympic Games in 1906, and the first International Archaeological Congress in 1905, Constantine tapped into the formative myths of Modern Greek national identity. He advertised Greece’s ‘cultural capital’ to the world and thus also represented the country’s aspirations to regional power as well as international recognition.
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Schneider, M. (2016). A ‘Sporting Hermes’: Crown Prince Constantine and the Ancient Heritage of Modern Greece. In: Müller, F., Mehrkens, H. (eds) Royal Heirs and the Uses of Soft Power in Nineteenth-Century Europe. Palgrave Studies in Modern Monarchy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59206-4_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59206-4_13
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Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-59208-8
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-59206-4
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