Abstract: In early 1770, a small expeditionary force from Russia landed in the southern Peloponnesus to aid local Greeks in a rebellion against Ottoman rule. The revolt of 1770 appears in history, when it appears at all, as a footnote to the Russo-Turkish Wars of 1768-1774 or the more important Greek rebellion of 1821. This chapter argues that 1770 marked a watershed in how Western Europeans perceived modern Greeks. The revolt was the emergence of philhellenism as a significant literary movement, and the year 1770 continued to echo in European writing for decades.

Keywords: Greece, rebellion of 1821, southern Peloponnesus, Russo-Turkish Wars, philhellenism, 1770,