Historical outline 1204–1669

The following summary account of the political, social and economic history of Crete during the period of Venetian domination is intended to serve as a background for a fuller understanding of Cretan literature and of the development of Cretan intellectual life in general. After a brief historical outline we shall examine the administration of the island, the social and economic structures, relations between the Orthodox and Catholic communities, the organisation of towns and villages and, finally, the private life of the inhabitants of Venetian Crete.

Crete had already ceased to belong to the Byzantine Empire on the eve of the Fourth Crusade. Alexios Angelos, son of Isaak II, had sought the help of the crusaders in restoring his father to the Byzantine throne; to this end he had ceded the island of Crete to the leader of the Fourth Crusade, Boniface, Marquis of Montferrat. However, on 12 August 1204, a few months after the capture of Constantinople by the crusaders, Boniface made a treaty with the Doge's representatives in Adrianople, in order to win Venetian support in his quarrel with the Latin Emperor of Constantinople, Baldwin of Flanders, and thus Boniface in his turn ceded Crete to the Most Serene Republic of Venice (Tafel-Thomas 1856–7: 1, 512–15).