Land and Landowners in the Greek Territories 93
The final distribution of land to the feudatories of the third expedition in
1256 overturned the provisions made in 1252. According to this latest docu-
ment, the recipient feudatories of Canea were 38 and the fiefs were 56. They
were divided into two groups of 19 feudatories, who would then share 28 fiefs.
Twenty of these feudatories received a cavallaria each and 18 of them received
two cavallarie each. Despite the change in the overall number of feudatories,
their stratification remained the same. What shines through in this document,
as indeed in the 1252 one, is Venice’s obsession, especially in the mid-western
areas of Crete, to reinforce the middle and top tiers of feudatories, and to do so
whilst maintaining their ratio to each other.
The foundations of the feudal class of Crete, comprising of people bound
together by the ownership of land and the responsibilities that issued from it,
were set during the colonisations of the 13th century. In the long run, however,
this class evolved, influenced not only by the political and economic condi-
tions in Venice but also those of Crete and its different territories. Moreover,
one should not disregard the impact of personal factors, like the background
of each of the feudatories that arrived to Crete from Venice. Individuals with
a strong financial background were naturally able not only to retain the land
they acquired, but also to add to it. Furthermore, the geography and the politi-
cal circumstances in the various areas of Crete during the 13th century offered
feudatories unequal opportunities. The first feudatories, for example, who
moved into the more fertile and calmer areas of eastern Crete (e.g. the plain
of Messara) had much better prospects of economic advancement than those
last settlers who acquired the land of Canea.
The simple plan for the feudal class of Crete, as outlined in the document
of the first colonisation, had already changed by the mid-13th century. By this
time there had already emerged a group of Venetian feudatories, born in Crete,
whose interests were directly connected to the island. At the same time, dur-
ing these first 50 years, the first feudatories had been joined by new ones sent
from the metropolis, as well as others who arrived under their own initiative
and at their own expense.26 This was also the period of the resurgence of the
old Greek landowners who forcefully tried to retain their former position. The
second half of the 13th century is most noteworthy for the struggle of Greeks to
26 See Jacoby, “La colonisation militaire vénitienne de la Crète au xiiie siècle: une nou-
velle approche,” in Le partage du monde: Échanges et colonisation dans la Méditerranée
médiévale, ed. Michel Balard and Alain Ducellier (Paris, 1998), pp. 303, 306–07 and 313,
repr. in David Jacoby, Latins, Greeks and Muslims: Encounters in the Eastern Mediterranean,
10th–15th Centuries (Farnham, 2009), iv.