At the end of the 17th century the Ottoman Empire tried to be in harmony with the new political European climate, granting special privileges to the enslaved Greeks, who, finally managed to take under control trade and diplomatic affairs. The formation of the social group of traders, the improvement of the status of the Phanariotes and their ascent into power at the Danube Principalities, had as an outcome the introduction of new ideas and an improvement of intellectual consciousness among enslaved Greeks

       Several scholars studied in European institutions and after coming back they brought with them the newly acquired knowledge. During the first decades the Italian universities (Padova and Pisa) were preferred and later on the german-speaking ones (Vienne, Halle, Gottingen).

       That is to say that the traders and the Greek scholars who studied the “sciences” in Europe became the channel of the gradual introduction of scientific thought in general and mathematical thought in particular in the Greek intellectual world.