Dragoman of the Porte

As few Ottoman Turks ever learned European languages, from early times the majority of these men were of Christian origin—in the main Austrians, Hungarians, Poles, and Greeks.

[2] In 1661, the Grand Vizier Köprülüzade Fazıl Ahmed Pasha appointed the Greek Panagiotis Nikousios as Chief Dragoman to the Imperial Council.

Their wealth, and the close contacts they had with the Ottoman sultan and his court as purveyors, advisors, and middlemen, they acquired enormous political influence, especially over the Patriarchate and the Eastern Orthodox communities of the empire more generally.

[6] During the 17th century, many Phanariotes gained political experience as representatives (kapı kehaya) of the princes (voivodes or hospodars) of the tributary Danubian Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia at the Sultan's court, where, in the words of C. G. Patrinelis, "their task was to sustain their masters’ always precarious position by bribing Ottoman officials in key positions and, above all, to pre-empt and disrupt, by hook or by crook, the machinations of the rivals who coveted the princes’ enviable posts".

[9] All dragomans had to be proficient in the elsine-i selase, the 'three languages'—Arabic, Persian, and Turkish—that were commonly used in the empire's administration, as well as a number of foreign languages (usually French and Italian).

[21][22] The knowledge of foreign languages also made the Phanariote dragomans crucial intermediaries for the transmission of European concepts and technologies to the Ottoman Empire during the latter's attempts at modernization.

[24] The Phanariotes maintained this privileged position until the outbreak of the Greek Revolution in 1821: the then Dragoman of the Porte, Constantine Mourouzis [el] was beheaded, and his successor, Stavraki Aristarchi [tr], was dismissed and exiled in 1822.