Background
Psycharis was born on 15 May 1854 to a Greek family from Chios island, in Odessa (in modern-day Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire), on the coast of the Black Sea.
Psycharis was born on 15 May 1854 to a Greek family from Chios island, in Odessa (in modern-day Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire), on the coast of the Black Sea.
He studied at the École des langues orientales, where he later became a professor
Nicholas I of Russia still reigned at the time of his birth and his government exercised censorship and other controls over education, publishing, and all manifestations of public life. He made a short stay in Constantinople during his youth, and settled definitely in Paris at the age of fourteen. He was director of studies at the École pratique des hautes études after 1885, and then professor at the École des langues orientales from 1903 to 1928, succeeding Émile Legrand.
In 1886, he made a trip to Greece out of which he wrote My Journey, advocacy of the Demotic Greek language.
He then became the mentor of the Demotic side in the Greek language question. Psycharis died in Paris on 29 September 1929.
He is buried in Chios.
Human Rights League; Hellenic Philological Society of Constantinople.