Home life in Hellas, Greece and the Greeks - eBooks4Greeks.gr

THE GREEK MAINLAND 41whole people. However, piracy is extinct. Emigrationhas replaced it, and education is graduallyeffacing distinctive peculiarities. Yet Maina isconservative, as it has always been. It remainedpagan until nearly the end of the ninth century,and to-day presents aspects of a primitivestate of society. Maina is the original home ofthe blood feud, which it is supposed to have introducedto Corsica as the vendetta. The Mainotecolony which settled in that island in 1673 stillexists at Cargese. The vendetta survives in spiteof the law, though to nothing like the same extentas when, sometimes for twenty years, familieswere atfeud, and reconciliation only came aboutafter many members on both sides had fallen.Some of the loopholed tower dwellings, whichwere a necessity in those days, still exist. Theentrance is reached only by a ladder, which incase of feud was always drawn up. The womenonly left the dwelling, for according to the law ofvendetta they are inviolable, as are the guests.A person whose life is sought goes scatheless ifhe accompanies a guest. The Mainote scrupulouslyobserves the rules of the game, andholds the common assassin in supreme contempt.Outside the bounds of Maina the feud ceases, andno self-respecting Mainote would attack a foebeyond its borders.For, whatever may be thoughtof the practice, it has its chivalrous side.Treachery is abhorred, and due notice must begiven of intention to attempt the life of a foe. It