Dedication

Dr. Alexis Alexandris

was born in Istanbul in 1950. He graduated from Phanar Greek High School, the

famous Red School. He pursued higher education in the United Kingdom, earning

his PhD from King’s College. His doctoral dissertation, The Greek Orthodox

Minority of Istanbul and Greek-Turkish Relations 1918–1974, published by the

Centre for Asia Minor Studies in 1992, remains his magnum opus.

Throughout his distinguished diplomatic career, Dr. Alexandris served in various

Greek missions abroad, including a posting at McGill University in Montreal and as

Consul General of Greece in Istanbul from 2003 to 2008. Alongside his diplomatic

service, he published extensively on Greek-Turkish relations, the Ecumenical

Patriarchate, minority issues, and the Rum Milleti—the Greek Orthodox nation

within the Ottoman Empire.

A perfect bi-cultural, Dr. Alexandris possessed a rare and profound understanding

of minority communities in both Greece and Turkey—their traumas and their

estrangement. His unwavering dedication to the survival of Istanbul Greekness

found a meaningful expression in his support for the revival of the

Hafız Ahmed Agha Foundation in Rhodes.

VOLUME II

is a tribute to Rhodes and

is dedicated to the memory of

Dr. Alexis Alexandris

and to

the eighteenth century Rhodian boy Ahmed, who became

Hafız Ahmed Agha