Stefanos Streit (; 6 April 1837, in

Patras Patras (; ; Katharevousa and ; ) is Greece's List of cities in Greece, third-largest city and the regional capital and largest city of Western Greece, in the northern Peloponnese, west of Athens. The city is built at the foot of Mount Panachaiko ...

– 13 April 1920, in

Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

) was a

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

jurist, banker and politician. He served as chairman of the

National Bank of Greece The National Bank of Greece (NBG; ) is a banking and financial services company with its headquarters in Athens, Greece. Founded in 1841 as the newly independent country's first financial institution, it has long been the largest Greek bank, a ...

and Minister of Finance. Stefanos Streit signature

Biography

He was born on 6 April 1837 in PatrasΣκόκου Κωνστ. Φ.,Εθνικόν Ημερολόγιον του έτους 1899, p. 33 - 35.
/ref> as the son of the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

philhellene Philhellenism ("the love of Greek culture") was an intellectual movement prominent mostly at the turn of the 19th century. It contributed to the sentiments that led Europeans such as Lord Byron, Charles Nicolas Fabvier and Richard Church to a ...

and military officer Johannes Alexander Streit, who, after his resignation from the army, settled in Patras.Εθνική Τράπεζα της Ελλάδος: Διοικητές.
Athens Streit-Street

After completing his general education in his home town he studied law in

and

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

and when he returned to Greece in 1861 he was appointed a magistrate. In 1865 he was promoted to the rank of appellate, however the same year he resigned and practised law in Patras until 1872, when he was appointed director of the branch of the

Lamia Lamia (; ), in ancient Greek mythology, was a child-eating monster and, in later tradition, was regarded as a type of night-haunting spirit or "daimon". In the earliest myths, Lamia was a beautiful queen of ancient Libya who had an affair with ...

. Later, he was appointed as inspector of the provincial branch of the bank and then he was transferred to the legal department. In 1875, he was nominated lecturer of the

University of Athens The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA; , ''Ethnikó kai Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón''), usually referred to simply as the University of Athens (UoA), is a public university in Athens, Greece, with various campuses alo ...

and the next year he became professor of constitutional and international law. In 1880 he was appointed by the Greek government as its representative in the mission to Munich to settle the debt of the Greek state to

Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...

. In 1889 he was elected assistant manager of the National Bank, while he was also chairman of the board of the National Insurance and the

Corinth Canal The Corinth Canal () is a canal in Greece that connects the Gulf of Corinth in the Ionian Sea with the Saronic Gulf in the Aegean Sea. Completed in 1893, it cuts through the narrow Isthmus of Corinth and "separates" the Peloponnese peninsula fro ...

Company. In 1896 he became Chairman of the National Bank, a position that he held until 7 December 1910, when he resigned for health reasons. During his presidency, the activity of the National Bank was extended beyond the borders of Greece with the establishment of the Bank of Crete and the Bank of the East. At the same time the

Macedonian Struggle The Macedonian Struggle was a series of social, political, cultural and military conflicts that were mainly fought between Greek and Bulgarian subjects who lived in Ottoman Macedonia between 1893 and 1912. From 1904 to 1908 the conflict was p ...

was strengthened and National Defense Treasury loans were issued for the rehabilitation of the Greek refugees coming from Bulgaria and Romania. In 1897 he served as Finance Minister in the government of

Alexandros Zaimis Alexandros Zaimis (, Romanization, romanized: ''Aléxandros Zaímis''; 28 October 1855 – 15 September 1936) was a Greeks, Greek politician who served as Greece's Prime Minister of Greece, Prime Minister, Minister of the Interior (Greece), Minist ...

. While he was a minister he managed to achieve the settlement of Greece's debts, but also to acquire a new foreign loan. He also served as an advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He died in Athens on 13 April 1920 and his funeral was held at the next day.Newspaper “Empros”, April 14, p. 2.
/ref> He was married since 1865 to Victoria Londou, daughter of former mayor of Patras,

Andreas Londos Andreas S. Londos (, c. 1786–1846) was a Greek military leader and politician. Born in Vostitsa in c. 1786 to Sotirakis Londos, he was initiated into the Filiki Eteria in 1818, and was one of the first military leaders to raise the banner ...

. Together they had a son, the politician

Georgios Streit Georgios Streit (; 1868–1948) was a Greek lawyer and professor. A legal advisor to King Constantine I, Streit was Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1913–14, on the eve of World War I. Later, he served as a Judge at the Permanent Court of Arbi ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Streit, Stefanos 1837 births 1920 deaths Greek people of German descent MPs of Patras 19th-century Greek judges Greek bankers National and Kapodistrian University of Athens alumni Academic staff of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens Leipzig University alumni Finance ministers of Greece Politicians from Patras