BioState

The project “BioState” aims at investigating the career of the first civil servants who staffed the Greek public administration (1822-1827), by means of a Digital Prosopography. The development of the digital tool will enable the research team to examine the ways the institutions of the Greek state were established and to investigate the role played by the first civil servants. “BioState” sheds light on the processes by which the state manifested itself through the persons who served it, and conversely identifies the effects of persons on the formation of state institutions.

The digital reconstruction of the careers of the first civil servants who – since they were minor – have largely remained less studied or unknown, will contribute to the renewal of the Greek historiography regarding the study of the state institutions making. “BioState” will be based on a thorough archival research, mainly, in primary and secondary sources.

All the pertinent information will be imported into a relational database, in order to create a “digital career file” for each civil servant. Such career files had never been produced by the Greek public administration in the 19th century.

Therefore, “BioState” provides an innovative research methodology to create archives in a digital environment that never existed in natural form. At the same time, “BioState” will provide solid documentation in order to conduct further historical analysis for the people who staffed the first institutions. A systematic recording of the first administrative staff will therefore offer an innovative perspective for a more complete understanding of the process of state institutions making and, more broadly, of the process of the transition of Greek society to modernity.