Cretan Nobility and the Legend of the 12 Young Rulers

One often hears, while travelling around Crete, claims from some of the villagers that they are from royal blood, descendants of nobility that once existed in Crete. The visitor would often dismiss such stories as the ramblings of old people, or as a misunderstanding due to the sometimes difficult Cretan dialect. But they would be quite wrong, as nobility did exist throughout Crete during the later part of the Byzantine era and later during the Venetian rule period. These were mainly the descendants of Byzantine nobility that came and settled in Crete in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The second settlement is also known as the legend of the twelve “Archondopoula”, part legend, part history, some of it well document but other parts based on forged documents prepared especially for the new Venetian rulers of Crete who took over the island in 1204.

When the Byzantine general Nikiforos Phokas, who was later to become an Emperor of Byzantium, freed Crete from the Arabs in 961, he became concerned about the low moral standing and religious beliefs of the population after 137 years of Arab rule. This, combined with unrest by the local population against the new Byzantine administration prompted the Emperor Alexios I Comninos, towards the end of the 11th century, to send a number of prominent Byzantine families from Constantinople to settle in Crete to improve the control over the local population and raise the moral and religious standards in the island. It appears that this was not effective as a century later, under the reign of the Emperor Alexios II Comninos, great-grandson of the Alexios I, an other large contingent of nobles from Byzantium arrived in Crete and they were also allocated significant property rights and administrative positions. Their arrival has been known for centuries as that of the story of the twelve Archondopoula (young rulers). This event has been the subject of some controversy amongst historians over recent years. The story, or the myth according to some, is detailed below.