Kottas

Kote Hristov (Bulgarian and Macedonian: Коте Христов, Greek: Κότε Χρήστου, romanized: Kote Christou), known simply as Kote (Bulgarian/Macedonian: Коте, Greek: Κώτε(ς), Κότε(ς) or Κώτης) or Kottas (Greek: Κώτ(τ)ας),[1][2] was a Slavophone insurgent leader in Western Macedonia.

Kote Hristov
The photograph's inscription reads in Greek: "Macedonian warlord Kotes with his sons and a supporter."
Nickname(s)Kote, Kottas
Born1863
Prespes, Ottoman Empire (now Greece)
Died1905 (aged 42)
Manastir, Ottoman Empire (now R. North Macedonia)
Allegiance
  • Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (1899–1900)
  • Hellenic Macedonian Committee (1900–1905)
Years of service1898–1905
Unit
  • Korestia band (1898–99)
  • Kostur band (1900)
  • Karavangelis' band (1900–05)
Battles/warsMacedonian Struggle

Kottas was born in the village of Rulja (Greek Ρούλια/Roulia, Bulgarian/Macedonian Руља), in 1863, and was elder of Roulia from 1893 to 1896. He began anti-Ottoman rebel activity in 1898, killing four local Ottoman officers. He was first associated with the pro-Bulgarian Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO). Afterwards he became associated with the pro-Greek irregular fighters[3]. He was captured by the Ottomans, convicted of robbery and hanged in Monastir in 1905.

The village he was born, now in the Florina regional unit, has been renamed Kottas in his honour.

Background
His seal, in Greek, while member of the IMRO (1900). The slogan "Eleutheria i Thanatos (Liberty or Death), was the central slogan of Greek War of Independence (1821).

Though a Slavopohone, who only spoke Bulgarian, Kote had a Greek identity.[4][5][6] He was initially a member of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) movement, but he felt deceived after he realized the real purposes of the Bulgarian-directed IMRO.[3] The day that Marko Lerinski[7] ordered Kottas to kill a Patriarchate priest, he decided to join the Greeks (Hellenic Macedonian Committee).

Conflicts

Kottas was sentenced to death by IMRO twice for murders of their members. The IMRO also accused him under the pretense of theft. Kottas developed ties with the Greek bishop of Kastoria, Germanos Karavangelis, in order to organize his struggle against the IMRO. His mission was to kill IMRO leader (voivode) Lazar Poptraykov and other leaders in order to protect Greek civilians. Karavangelis funded his troops.[8] Gotse Delchev had repeatedly pardoned and vainly tried to reform Kottas before he was finally outlawed by the IMRO, after entering the service of the Greek bishop. At the time of the Ilinden Uprising (1903), when all old wrongs were forgiven in the name of the common struggle, Kottas was received back by the IMRO at the insistence of Lazar Poptraykov, the same voivode he set out to kill. During the uprising, Poptraykov had been wounded and taken refuge with Kottas, who used the opportunity to kill him and present his head to the Greeks.[9] The Greek bishop was wary of him because of his native Slavic tongue and hatred of Turks. His behavior toward the Ottomans was an obstruction to the Greek tactic, as it was often necessary to cooperate with the Ottoman officers against the Bulgarian enemy (IMRO).[10]

Kottas, a veteran klepht (brigand), kidnapped Petko Yanev, a Bulgarian seasonal worker recently returned from America, and tortured him and his family until he had extracted all the savings Yanev had brought. However, Yanev complained vigorously to the vali Hilmi Pasha himself, and to foreign consuls. The British consul pressed Hilmi Pasha to act, and eventually, Kottas was arrested by the Ottomans.[11] He was executed by hanging in 1905 in Bitola. His last words before hanging, in his native Lower Prespa dialect, were "Long live the nation!".[12] The loss of Kottas was detrimental to the Greek movement.[13] After his death, many volunteers from free Greece came to Macedonia to participate in the struggle, besides the locals.[14]

Legacy
Kottas Museum

Today Kottas has surviving descendants in Greece and he is memorialized in the Captain Kottas Museum, which was built at the site of his birth. Kottas is known for saying, "The difficult part is to kill the bear first, and then, it is easy to share the skin."

He is revered as a national hero by Greeks, while Bulgarians and ethnic Macedonians consider him a predatory warlord. Kottas's objectives are not easily identifiable by contemporary historians. It seems that his chief goal was the rejection of Ottoman rule.[15]

References
  1. For a list of the various forms of his name in Slavic and in Greek, see Κωστόπουλος, Τάσος (2008). Η απαγορευμένη γλώσσα: Κρατική καταστολή των σλαβικών διαλέκτων στην ελληνική Μακεδονία. Athens: Βιβλιόραμα. p. 148.
  2. Kostopoulos, Tasos (2009). "Naming the Other: From "Greek Bulgarians" to "Local Macedonians"". In Ioannidou, Alexandra; Voss, Christian (eds.). Spotlights on Russian and Balkan Slavic Cultural History. Studies on Language and Culture in Central and Eastern Europe. 4. Muenchen/Berlin: Otto Sagner. p. 102., Βούρη, Σοφία. Οικοτροφεία και υποτροφίες στη Μακεδονία (1903-1913): τεκμήρια ιστορίας. Athens: Gutenberg. p. 192, 196.
  3. "Douglas Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia 1897-1913 (Thessaloniki, 1966)
  4. Stelios Nestor (1962). "Greek Macedonia and the Convention of Neuilly (1919)". Balkan Studies. 3 (1): 178. many leaders who fought and fell in the field defending the Greek cause, though they did not speak but Bulgarian. Such leaders were: Capetan Kottas from Roulia [...]
  5. David Ricks; Michael Trapp (8 April 2014). Dialogos: Hellenic Studies Review. Routledge. p. 49. ISBN 978-1-317-79178-2. Archived from the original on 16 December 2017.
  6. Paulos Tzermias (1994). Die Identitätssuche des neuen Griechentums: eine Studie zur Nationalfrage mit besonderer Berücksichtigung des Makedonienproblems. Universitätsverlag. p. 81. ISBN 978-3-7278-0925-5. Archived from the original on 2017-12-16.
  7. in Greek: Memoirs of Germanos Karavangelis, diligence by V. Laourdas, Institute of Studies of Peninsula of Aemos (ISPA) p.26 (1959)
  8. Massacre and Barbarism at Zagorichane from http://www.geocities.com/macedonian_world/ Archived 2009-07-24 at the Wayback Machine
  9. For freedom and perfection. The Life of Yané Sandansky, Mercia MacDermott,(Journeyman, London, 1988), p 159
  10. "Newer history of Macedonia 1830-1912" K. Vakalopoulos, Thessaloniki"
  11. For freedom and perfection. The Life of Yané Sandansky, Mercia MacDermott, (Journeyman, London, 1988), p 159- 160 Archived 2008-10-06 at the Wayback Machine.
  12. Dakin, Douglas (1966). The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 1897-1913. Thessaloniki: Ίδρυμα Μελετών Χερσονήσου του Αίμου/Institute for Balkan Studies. p. 183.
  13. Vakalopoulos & Vakalopoulos 1988, p. 215.
  14. Memoirs of Georgios Christou Modis
  15. Koliopoulos, John S.; Veremis, Thanos (2002). Greece: The Modern Sequel: From 1831 to the Present. London: Hurst & Co. p. 240.

Sources
  • Koemtzopoulos, N (1968). Kapetan Kottas o Protos Makedonomachos [Captain Kottas the First Macedonian Freedom Fighter]. Athens.
  • Kōnstantinos Apostolou Vakalopoulos; Apostolos Euangelou Vakalopoulos (1988). Modern history of Macedonia, (1830-1912). Barbounakis.
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