Basil Zaharoff, GCB, GBE (October 6, 1849, Muğla, Ottoman Empire – November 27, 1936, Monte Carlo, Monaco), born Basileios Zacharias, was a Greek-Turkish-born French arms trader and financier of Greek heritage, the director and chairman of the Vickers munitions firm during World War I.
Basileios Zacharias was from a Greek family in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul). The name Zaharoff was adopted when the family was in exile in Russia as a resu...
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Basil Zaharoff, GCB, GBE (October 6, 1849, Muğla, Ottoman Empire – November 27, 1936, Monte Carlo, Monaco), born Basileios Zacharias, was a Greek-Turkish-born French arms trader and financier of Greek heritage, the director and chairman of the Vickers munitions firm during World War I.
Basileios Zacharias was from a Greek family in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul). The name Zaharoff was adopted when the family was in exile in Russia as a result of the anti-Greek Easter pogroms of 1821. The family returned to Turkey, in the 1840s, and lived in the Anatolian town of Muğla where Basil was born October 6, 1849. By 1855, the family was back in Constantinople where they lived in the poor quarter of Tatavla.
Young Basileios' first job was as a guide for the tourists to the Galata. He was then to become a fireman. The 19th century firemen of Constantinople were not at all effective at extinguishing fires, but were quite effective at rescuing the treasures of the rich for a healthy...
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