In the pre-Revolutionary period, Macedonia was at times a part of larger administrative regions (15th to 16th century), and at others itself divided up into more than one district (17th to 18th century); at no time, however, did its territory correspond to a single administrative unit.
For fiscal reasons, the administrative regions were separated into diverse provinces, an organization which reinforced the parochialism and cultural fragmentation of the rural class.
Furthermore, the institutions of self-government, the federated groups of villages (such as the Mademohoria and the Hasikohoria in Halkidiki) and the guilds intensified the introvertedness of the various social and linguistic groups, sometimes at the expense of the unifying power of the Church.
In the end, the informal aristocratic regime of the communities but, mainly, the deep gulf between Muslims and people of other faiths caused the type of taxes paid by each social group to become a basic unifying factor.
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