Photeine V. Perra
This chapter shall provide an overview of how modern Greeks have perceived the memory of the Hospitallers and in what ways this has manifested, focusing on several aspects that indicate the way in which this memory of the order has been preserved. The first is in the academic study of the Hospitallers’ history in Greece by Greek scholars studying the pertinent written sources. This exploration will also include the field of archaeology as well as the preservation of those monuments that are connected to the Hospitallers’ history in the country. It will also examine a particularly important period in modern Rhodian and Dodecanesian history, that of the Italian occupation (1912–43), which repeatedly attempted to revive the splendour of Hospitaller rule. Another important element is the literary depiction of the order’s presence by contemporary Greeks and in what ways this perception is expressed in various literary works. Finally, this chapter will examine whether the order is perceived positively or negatively in the collective consciousness of the Greek people and especially among Rhodians and other Dodecanesians.
Seven centuries have passed since the Order of the Hospitallers introduced a new chapter of late medieval history following its establishment in Greek lands and more specifically on the island of Rhodes and its Dodecanesian territory between 1306 and 1309/1310. The Knights Hospitaller of Saint John remained in the Aegean Sea until 1522/1523, that is, for over two centuries, with a continuous presence that left a deep historical footprint in all the territories under their rule.
There has been an extensive bibliography concerning the Hospitallers in Greece, enlightening many aspects of their history and presence in Helladic lands.1 What has seen less study is the impact of their occurrence and the perception of their rule in the collective subconscious of modern Greece. In this chapter we shall attempt to examine how the memory of the Hospitallers in modern Greece was preserved and how far it is viewed positively or negatively by Greeks today.
In modern Greece, Hospitaller History is seen through the prism of a broader chapter of Greek history that began following the first capture of Constantinople in 1204 by the Fourth Crusade: namely, the ‘Latinocracy’ (Λατινοκρατία), the era in which Latin (i.e. Catholic Western European) rulers occupied Greek lands formerly belonging to the Byzantine Empire. A special chapter of this period concerns the two centuries of the Knights Hospitallers’ rule on Rhodes and the other Dodecanesian islands, known as ‘the Rule of the Knights’, ‘Ιπποτοκρατία’, and the subject of a rich and important bibliography by both Greek and other scholars.2
The systematic study of the Hospitaller’s past in Greece commenced shortly before the mid-twentieth century. One of the first and most important Greek scholars to deal with the Knights was Ioannes Ch. Delendas (1890–1964?), an eminent scholar whose monograph on the Hospitallers was published in 1947 and was reissued in 1955. Delendas’ origins were in the island of Santorini and more specifically from the noble house of Delenda, a Catalan family that settled in Greece during the Latinocracy.3 His book The Knights of Rhodes was the first in Greek to deal with the Hospitaller’s past including their history not only in Rhodes but also in Jerusalem and Malta.4 His decision to write the book was dictated by the fact that he himself was a member of the Hospitaller Order. Delendas’ book is still used in Greek historiography, despite the fact that the field has since progressed significantly.
The next important scholar is Christodoulos Ι. Papachristodoulou (1899–1988 or 1989), who wrote a classic of the historiography of the regional history of Greece.5 This work consists of a detailed history of the Island of Rhodes, with important additions on that of its surrounding area, following the pattern established by several modern Greek authors who had often tackled the topic of regional history. Papachristodoulou succeeded in producing a well-researched and balanced account of the Rhodian past, paying particular attention to the period of the Hospitaller occupation, thus offering valuable material for furthering the study of this crucial period of the island’s history.6 His account of the Hospitallers was mainly based on the Hospitaller and historian Giacomo Bosio’s (1544–1627) works, also translating into Greek a few extracts from Bosio’s writings.7
Another important scholar who also successfully ‘introduced’ the Knights Hospitaller to a wider reading public was Elias Kollias (1936–2007), ephor (a senior official) of Byzantine Antiquities from 1966 to 1998, who did much to promote the Rhodian and Dodecanesian medieval past. His great contributions were not limited to his purely archaeological work, he also worked to disseminate the multi-faceted historical presence of the order through a variety of other aspects like its economic organization and its social life. Of particular importance was Kollias’ work on the order’s contacts and relations with their Greek subjects.8 Elias Kollias’ historiographical contribution will indubitably remain invaluable and fundamental for researchers of the history of the order in Greece and its islands.9
Yet another prominent Greek scholar who has contributed significantly to the study of the order’s history and civilization in Greek lands is Professor Zacharias N. Tsirpanles, who has taught medieval history to generations of students in the Universities of Ioannina and Thessalonica. His contributions are of major importance, since his researches in the Hospitaller archives make him the first and most important Greek scholar who has dealt with the order’s history through the publication of primary sources. His publications remain central for anyone attempting to undertake research on the order and its presence in the Dodecanese, since, in addition to his editions of primary source documents, he has investigated in depth several major issues relating to the Order’s rule, both in his erudite synthetic works and in specialized studies and articles.10
A general comment regarding the attitude of these historians towards the history of the order would be that they definitely did not treat it with prejudice or enmity. As a common rule, they primarily based their conclusions on archival and scholarly testimony, while avoiding providing either a negative or positive slant in their narratives. They invariably present the period of the Hospitaller occupation as an integral part of the history of Rhodes and the Dodecanese.
In addition to the activities on the part of researchers and the academic community, it is useful to consider a crucial parameter regarding the Order’s presence, which reflects on today through the Hospital’s monuments not only on Rhodes but also in the Dodecanesian area. These, in addition to the celebrated Palace of the Grand Master in Rhodes Town, include impressive fortifications, temples, churches and other installations which facilitated the various needs of the Hospitallers.
Following the Ottoman conquest by Suleiman II ‘the Law-giver’ (or ‘the Magnificent’) and the ensuing departure of the order from Rhodes, the island, together with the rest of the Twelve Islands (‘on iki ada’ in Turkish), remained under Ottoman domination from 1523 to 1912. In the course of the nineteenth century, still under Ottoman control, Rhodes was to become an object of interest on the part of various travellers, among which the case of the Swedish Johannes Hedenborg (1800–70) was the most interesting.11 This widely travelled and talented physician and historian decided to spend the final phase of his life on the island, residing there for over 20 years from 1840 to 1864. He harboured a special interest and affection for Rhodes, if we are to judge by the five-volume work which he composed on the island’s history. Hedenborg’s testimony is of critical value, since he has preserved in his writings a particularly clear picture of Rhodes and its medieval monuments which, it seems, were left in a lamentable condition in the mid-nineteenth century. Nothing whatsoever reminded one of the former fame of the Knights of Saint John. Whatever monuments remained were in ruins. No interest whatsoever in the relics of the Hospitaller was displayed by the Ottoman authorities, with the result being their total abandonment to the inevitable ravages of time. In addition, and especially during the latter part of the nineteenth century, natural phenomena like earthquakes, as well as an explosion in the Hospitaller Palace’s powder magazine, caused extensive devastation and damage to medieval Rhodes Town.12
This neglect was to change after 1912, with the arrival of the Italians, who seized control in the Dodecanese until 1943, when the area was eventually incorporated into the modern Greek state (the then-Kingdom of Greece).13 In building construction the Italians adopted a policy characterized by Tsirpanles as the ‘policy of the stone’. Among the various building projects the Italians restored many monuments associated with the Rhodian Hospitaller past, which they attempted to utilize as a means of propaganda in order to ‘legitimize’ their rights of possession over the Twelve Islands.14 In this framework we can put the visit to Rhodes of the Grand Master of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, Ludovico Chigi della Rovere Albani, which took place on September 1931. He was invited to participate in the ecclesiastical congress that had been organized for the 1,500-year anniversary of the Ephesus Synod of A.D. 431, which had condemned Nestorianism, and his presence was an attempt to underline the so-called ‘connection’ with the Hospitaller Order and the need of the Italian occupation to appear as the historical continuation of Hospitaller rule. This was indeed an event of crucial importance for local population’s future views of the Hospitaller past in the area and imposed a negative atmosphere which lingered on in future years, creating a dark association in the eyes of the Greeks for the historical memory of the Hospitaller presence in Rhodes and the Twelve Islands.
Thus, in the aforementioned ‘Italian’ period excavations were undertaken together with the commencement of restoration work with emphasis to the Hospital of the Knights. After its restoration it operated as a Museum (Regio Museo dello Spedale dei Cavalieri), which included a medieval section.15 It is an undeniable fact that, irrespective of the early twentieth-century Italian conquerors’ deeper motives, the monuments of the Hospitaller period were indeed looked after diligently and acquired to a great extent the condition in which we can encounter them today. It was not until the annexation of the Twelve Islands by the modern Greek state in 1948 that the Rhodian and other Dodecanesian monuments came under the jurisdiction and care of the local Ephorate of Byzantine Antiquities.
Α Greek journalist and writer well known for his monograph series on the history, topography and folklore of castles and fortresses in Greece, Yiannis Ghikas, offered the following interesting thoughts on his visit to the island of Cos and its castle:
The shadows of the Grand Masters lie buried under the forgetfulness of the ruins and sealed in subterranean chambers that the axe of the archaeologist may never reveal; they do not venture to come out in the open, in order to face the peaceful reality, to scent the odor of the fresh herb and flower; they are eternally lost, interred in the trunk of illiteracy and indifference. Who would indeed be interested in them save those who ‘scratch’ historical writings and read about their past and glorious feats?16
We could say that the above extract – impressively vivid and at the same time painfully accurate – provides in a few bare lines the reality with which the Hospitaller past in the Dodecanese is nowadays generally viewed and understood in Greece. Truly, it looks as if the memory of the Knights of Saint John is kept alive only through the studies of historians and other scholars, while ceasing to exist in the collective memory of the Greek past. It is interesting to note here, in the form of a general observation, that despite the progress of modern Greek scholarship regarding the study of ‘Latinocracy’ in Greek lands after A.D. 1204, it is painfully evident that, for a significant section of modern Greek society, everything to do with the various facets of Latin domination in Byzantium’s former lands is to be discarded and brushed aside.17 Indicative of this tendency is the fact that in official Greek school textbooks there is minimal treatment of the Latin presence in Greek lands during the medieval and modern eras, while until quite recently several Latin medieval monuments lay in ruins completely unattended; however, this neglectful tendency has been at least partly ended in the case of archaeological finds.18
Particularly regarding the Knights Hospitaller, it is sadly the case that their memory on Rhodes and the rest of the Dodecanese is only faintly preserved.19 The Rhodiots themselves seem to be painfully unaware about the Knights’ history and presence on the island, while the only undeniable witness of their presence are the monuments themselves, which are mainly utilized in order to attract the attention of foreign visitors. The sole initiative to promote the Hospitaller past and thus bring the general public in closer contact with the island’s medieval period belongs to the cultural association entitled ‘Medieval Rose’, which annually organizes the Medieval Festival of Rhodes. According to its organizers, however, this initiative has not been warmly embraced by the local population and it is treated, in the best of circumstances, with indifference – and often with suspicion, since it is associated with a historical period linked with Western conquerors and rulers, for whom the modern Greek subconscious does not maintain or harbour the best of reminiscences.20
This is a curious juxtaposition with the medieval past, if one takes into account the good relations which the Hospitallers maintained with the local Greek population in the course of their occupation of Rhodes and the Twelve Islands.21 It is a characteristic fact that, when the order was forced to abandon Rhodes in early January of 1523, many Greek families decided to follow the Hospitallers and settled with them on Malta when that island was ceded to them in 1530.22 Today, however, if we exclude the few readers of the relevant histories, it seems that this past is unknown and rather indifferent to the Rhodiots with the exception, of course, of those specialized researchers of history, archaeology and art history.
The attitude of modern Rhodiots poses a special interest compared to that on the part of the modern Maltese, who have indeed embraced their Hospitaller legacy. It is an interesting contradiction between two peoples who share a common page in their history. Maltese people view the Hospitallers as an important and crucial part of their history and this is totally understandable since, as we can firmly say, the presence of the order on the island of Malta formulated their identity. In Greece, however, the case is completely different, as the Greeks are coming from a distinctive past from which they had already shaped their identity, defined predominantly by their language and their Orthodox faith. Although in the course of Hospitaller rule they managed to live in peace and harmony, this fact was not enough to preserve the order’s place in the collective memory.
On the basis of what we have said so far we are in a position to draw some conclusions regarding the preservation of memory as well as the perception with which the Knights of Saint John are viewed today in Greece. If we attempted to make an overall evaluation, we could say that the topic presents a variety of facets. Regarding the academic milieu, Greek scholars who have dealt with the Order’s history are few in number although they have offered very notable contributions. A veritable desideratum would probably be the need for a dissemination of that particular historical knowledge to a wider public through a high-level popularization. On the other hand, concerning the care of the monuments and the development of archaeological research, it is evident that here we have significant results, especially if we take into account the limited financial resources that have perennially been afforded to the Humanities.
Yet, we cannot help but bewail the total alienation and lack of connection with this historical past among Greeks today, despite that past’s importance, although such an indifference is perhaps to be expected in our time as it is associated with the image of ‘the other’, the image of ‘the different’. Such a phenomenon, however, is provocative and deserves to be further investigated, since the intercultural interplay which was in force during the era of the rule of the Hospitallers on Rhodes and in the Dodecanese was of paramount importance; truly, that era’s living remains are its impressive surviving monuments which we encounter rising proud and unassailable across the centuries.