Giovanni Battista Serpieri

Giovanni Battista Serpieri                  ΙΩΑΝΝΗΣ ΒΑΠΤΙΣΤΗΣ ΣΕΡΠΙΕΡΗΣ

Born in 1832 in Rimini                                    Died in 1897 in Athens

Section One, Number 271

Giovanni Battista Serpieri was the first foreign ‘mega-entrepreneur’ to invest in Greece. He was demonized almost immediately after he had invested fifteen million drachmas to gain the concession to re-open the Lavrion Mines, the same mines that had made ancient Athens an economic powerhouse. (1)   Led by Epaminondas Deligiorgis (Επαμεινώνδας Δεληγεώργης), the opposition in the Greek parliament raised questions about the legality of his concession.  Journalists filled the newspapers of the day with endless articles and analyses and, as the debate gained critical mass,  inflated and fantastical financial expectations about the mine’s potential began to circulate. Many began to believe that the Lavrion mines could make every single citizen wealthy forever – if only they were in Greek hands!

  In the end, the Lavrion ‘question’ would create hard feelings internationally and cause internal political instability.

His Life:

Giovanni Serpieri was the oldest child of Enrico Serpieri. Like his father, he was a metallurgical engineer. The family had extensive mining interests in Italy. Giovanni married Clemence Leboyl and, through this marriage, gained a connection with the Banking House of Roux Frassinet and Company.  

Giovanni began his career in Marseilles but came to Athens because the possibilities of mining in Lavrion had been brought to his attention(2).  In 1864 he founded the company  Roux - Serpieri - Fressynet in order to mine the silver-lead of Lavrion.  

Lavrion became one of the most important industrial installations in Greece at that time,  with multiple facilities including blast furnaces, metal works, chemistry laboratories, and various storerooms.  In 1867, there were 1,200 employees.

This concession included the right to mine the tailings from the ancient mines, or so Serpieri believed.

The Lavrion ‘Question’ and the Rumors

The issue arose when the Koumoundouros government, pressed by opposition members of parliament (especially Epaminondas Deligiorgis), questioned the legality of the extraction of ore from the ancient slag heaps which lay on the surface. In 1870 parliament passed a law forbidding Serpieri from exploiting this ore until a final decision could be made.

Serpieri refused to stop mining the slag and requested the arbitration of the Italian and the French governments. They took the company’s side and asked for damages. All the while, the relationship between Greece and France and Greece and the rest of Europe deteriorated.

The French Government took measures:

a)     They left the chair of the French Ambassador to Greece empty.

b)    They passed a new law affecting shipping. New taxes were levied on goods carried by foreign flagged ships coming from a third port and then on to France. These new taxes detrimentally affected Greek ships picking up grain in Russia, Romania and Egypt, and then transporting it on to France .

At the same time, the affair contributed to a political crisis in Greece with many resignations and changes of government (from Koumoundouros to Zaimis to Boulgaris and then to Deligiorgis).

The Solution

At the kings’ request, Andreas Syngros, as representative of the Bank of Constantinople, reached an agreement with Serpieri in February of 1873. Negotiations ended in an agreement in which the company came into Greek hands and was renamed The Lavrion Metallurgical Company.  (Serpieri was not left empty handed; he formed another joint French-Hellenic company named “Mines of Kamariza”.) 

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Almost immediately, the Lavrion Metallurgical Company issued stocks with a face value of 200 Francs.

A stock certificate from 1873 of the Lavrion Metallurgical Company

The rumors about the mines and the fact that the bank was supporting the new company led thousands of Greeks to buy shares and the rush to buy caused the price to skyrocket.  As time passed and expectations proved unfounded, the price of the stock plummeted. In February 1874, Deligiannis was forced to resign as Prime Minister because he was blamed for the fiasco(3).

The Hellenic company did well, even building a railway from the center of Athens to Lavrion after 1885. (4) 

Serpieri  remained in Greece, remained wealthy, and built an impressive mansion that still exists on Panepistimiou Street in the center of Athens.

It was built between 1880 and 84 by Anastasios Theofilas. It was later bought by the Agricultural Bank of Greece. It is typical of the houses of wealthy merchants in this era. Business was conducted downstairs and the family living quarters were above. Notice the carriage entrance at the right.

He retained his interest in Greek mining. A statue of Serpieri by Giorgios Vroutos, still stands today in a square in Lavrion:

Wikipedia Commons

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A rare blue hydrated sulphate mineral was named especially for him:

Sepierite

The Family Grave

 His Grave is one of the most elegant and well cared for in the First Cemetery.

 

 

 Georges Lemaire

Only recently was the signature of the sculptor revealed (up and to the right on the bas relief) on the family tomb. His name was Georges Lemaire.

Map

Section One, Number 271 

Footnotes

(1) Serpieri was able to use modern methods to extract metals from the ore left over from the many ancient mines in the area. 

(2)  Apparently he had seen ballast from a ship that had been loaded it in the Lavrion port and realized it was pure Smithsonite (zinc carbonate). He was also apparently aware of a report written by a Greek metallurgist named Kordelas stating that the old silver mines had potential.

(3)  According to the book Entrepreneurship and Growth: an International Historical Perspective (p.54).  The court case against Serpieri and the subsequent  Lavrion ‘bubble’ significantly retarded the development of joint stock companies in Greece at a critical time in Greece’s nascent efforts to industrialize.

Sources

 1. Παπαδοπούλου Ελίζα Κριτική μιας αναστήλωσης: Μέγαρο Σερπιέρη και Πανεπιστημίου Εδουάρδου Λω http://library.tee.gr/digital/techr/2004/techr_2004_ii_1_2_49.pdf

2."Ο Χαρταετός" της Αθηνά Κακούρη, Εστία

   3. Entrepreneurship and Growth: an International Historical Perspective    by Gabriel Tortella, Gloria Quiroga, ( on Kindle and Amazon)
4. If you walk two and one half blocks down September 3rd Street from Omonia Square, you will still find a small square named Lavrion Square. the was the terminal of the long gone railway that was once the pride of Athens.