Opinion
Koskinas: British loans were crucial to Greek independence despite never funding combat
“Although there are historians that would disagree with that, but an important factor in the success of the War of Independence was those two loans. They were, yes, they were divisive. They were never used for the war itself, but politically, they played an imp…”
What-if
Koskinas: Alexander the Great would have conquered Rome with 15 more years
“I think if he had another 10, 15 years of life the map of the world and world history would have been very different. Probably we will never had the Roman Empire. Because he would have conquered Rome. If you have the tactical and strategic genius of Alexander,…”
What-if
Koskinas: Preserved pre-1960s Athens would be as beautiful as Prague
“If we were wise and we have kept Athens as it was in the sixties, we would have been a city as beautiful as Prague, even more beautiful.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: Ancient Greek history is distorted by an Athenocentric bias
“Because most of the history of Greece was written by Athenians, or by people who were living in Athens, or they were writing about. Athens. It's an Athenocentric perspective that we get about ancient Greek history.”
Opinion
Koskinas: Plato's dialogues are 70% Plato and only 30% real Socrates
“So, personally, I think that Plato use, use, Socrates has his own mouthpiece. And, ok, he has, say, 30% real Socrates and 70% Plato. But, ok, that's my view.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: 1.5 million Greeks and 500,000 Turks were relocated in 1923 exchange
“One and a half million Greeks left their villages and towns in, in Turkey, and they were settled in Greece, and about half a million Turks and Muslims left northern Greece, and they went to Turkey.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: Most Greek statues globally are Roman-era copies
“When the original, when they ran out of originals, they started producing copies, so there was an entire industry of producing copies or reworkings of early, earlier Greek statues. You go to several, you know, all around the world, and most of the statues that…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Koskinas: Athens protests in 2010 and 2011 were brief and geographically confined
“Yeah, we had situations like this, but they were just for a couple of days, confined in a very small area of the city.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: Athens Has Been Continuously Inhabited Since 3400 BCE
“Well, we have to go back to the fourth millennium, about 3400 BC, when the, we have the first inhabitants who settled on the Acropolis and in the surrounding plain, and from, since that time, the city has a continuous habitation, so you say that the city has a…”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: 16th-century Athens was the Ottoman Empire's fourth largest European city
“In the census of the 16th century, it was, it had a population of 17,000 people, which makes it the fourth largest city of the Ottoman Empire in in Europe.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: Athens grew from 4,000 to 100,000 residents between 1834 and 1896
“In 1834 the city had only 4000 people, because it was after the war people had left. Just in 60 years when the first Olympic Games were held in Athens, the population was more than a 100,000.”
Assertion Partly supported
Koskinas: Athens absorbed 250,000 people in one year after 1922
“By that time, the city had about 700,000 people. But within one year, a quarter of a million were added to the population.”
Assertion Supported
Koskinas: Greater Athens represents about 40% of Greece's total population
“About five million people, although those who are registered are about four million. It just happens that during the census people leave and go back to their villages or towns, because they believe that if they're registered there, the government will have a d…”
