I had heard a lot about Sfakia from my grandfather, who was a Cretan emigrant in Australia. When I was young, I kept listening about the hard Cretan men who get too angry once they are offended, who abduct their woman and who do anything to protect their honour.
At first, I didn't believe him. I thought that all these stories were told with a lot of enthusiasm from him and maybe with a bit of excess. When we visited Sfakia this summer with my wife, we saw nothing more than a small, seaside village with smiling people and many hotels. Indeed, some men looked furious with their big moustaches but that is how most of Cretan men look.
People in Sfakia were very easy to talk to and we even started a conversation on my ancestors and how life used to be there in the "old good times". In my surprise, I heard similar rough stories about men defending their honour in any way.
From my whole trip on Crete, I understood that these stories were true, since Sfakia has the fame of a brutal and rough place many centuries now. It appears that the area was somehow isolated from the rest of Crete because transportation was not easy throught the high, rough mountains that exist in the middle of the island. So, when a crime happened, it would either take the judge a lot of days (even months) to come and punish the guilt, or he wouldn't come at all.
Those were difficult and dangerous times, as there was a war between the Cretans and the Turks and also many thiefs were threatening travellers along their way. So, the people of Sfakia decided not to lay to the formal justice but solve their problems with their "own laws". That is how they developed such a brutal and hard attitude. Now the connection of Sfakia with the rest of Crete is easy but this brutal attitude is still existing at some point. Pretty interesting story, isn't it?
Back:
More:
Related:
