45-51

Some new evidence and brief remarks regarding the first known Greek newspaper (1784)

• Κόκκωνας, Ιωάννης

In 1784 a Greek newspaper was published in Vienna for a few weeks, and was subsequently banned by the Austrian authorities on demand of the Turkish foreign minister. Although the existence of this newspaper has long been established, until recently, both the title of this weekly edition, and the number of issues printed were unknown. In a recent article by Ilia Chatzipanagioti-Sangmeister, relevant information from Journal von und für Deutschland (1785) is presented. According to the information taken from this German periodical, contemporary to the Greek newspaper in question, the title of the newspaper was Ταχυδρόμος της Βιέννης (Courier of Vienna) and the second issue was printed on 15.07.1784. In our paper some relevant, additional material is presented. More specifically: 1) We show that for the first time the German doctor and writer Gottfried Wilhelm Becker (1777-1854), getting information from the Journal von und für Deutschland, had revealed the title of this first Greek newspaper in a book printed in 1838. 2) We present two unknown extracts from the contemporary Italian newspaper Gazzetta Universale, which in August and September 1784 commented on the publication and the ban of the Greek newspaper; and 3) We demostrate that only two issues of the Greek newspaper were printed, the first on 9 July and the second and last, on 16 July 1784.

• Media and communications

• Newspapers