venice’s maritime empire in the early modern period 179
The last decades of Venetian rule in Crete have been depicted as a
period of reconciliation and harmony between Catholics and Orthodox,
and even these religious identities are often presented as secondary to a
growing consciousness of a common Cretan identity at the backdrop of a
tolerant Republican regime that defended the islanders from the militant
Catholic Church.197 This representation may apply to certain groups of the
urban upper classes, where mixed marriages can often be encountered,
and more particularly to certain literary circles that were strongly influ-
enced by Italian Renaissance culture.198 Not surprisingly, historians who
emphasize these social and cultural trends tend to disregard the continuous
religious frictions that have been described above. Apparently, these two
contrasting phenomena co-existed in late Venetian Crete.
For the Greek Orthodox subjects, The Republic often fulfilled the role
of an honest arbitrator, whose judgment was accepted by all parties con-
cerned. Understandably, this image was nurtured by Venice and was argu-
ably one of the strongest elements in keeping its overseas empire together.
This role can be observed, for example, in the conflicts that developed
between the elites of Zante and those of Cephalonia over the election of
their Orthodox bishops (from the 17th century, archbishops) of Cephalonia
and Zante. Since the electing body consisted of the clergy of Cephalonia,
the elected prelate was in most cases also a Cephalonian. Finally it was
the Venetian Senate that decided upon a procedure that would allow the
election of a candidate from Zante every third time when a new bishop
had to be elected.199 The delicate question of mixed marriages between
Catholics and Orthodox was also regulated by the state.200 In his study of
the Ionian Islands in the 18th century, Alfredo Viggiano has observed the
common interests of Venice and her Greek Orthodox subjects to consider
the latter as directly subject to the civil authority, a dependence that they
preferred over the coercive authority of the Latin prelates.201
The Appearance of the Russians
In 1687, during the war of Morea, Orthodox bishops in the Balkans
appealed to Russia for help against the allied Catholic powers of Venice
197 Panagiotakes, El Greco, pp. 7, 71–74.
198 David Holton, ed., Literature and Society in Renaissance Crete (Cambridge, 1991).
199 Lunzi, Della condizione, pp. 407–08.
200 Augliera, Libri, Politica, religione, p. 105; Viggiano, “Venezia e la chiesa greca,” p. 27.
201 Viggiano, Lo specchio, p. 200.