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The Great Island<br />
had agreed to the pasha’s terms instead of turning stubborn and losing<br />
his temper, lives might have been saved. Thus with his final and futile<br />
defiance, his actions conform exactly with the conventional heroic<br />
philosophy which he earlier transcended. Which seems psychologically<br />
quite probable.<br />
Probable, but no more. In some of the short folk versions of the story<br />
Daskaloyiannis is a much less heroic figure. But Pantzelios’s picture is<br />
the most detailed, and t<strong>here</strong> is no other more reliable. Daskaloyiannis<br />
has come down in the memory of the Cretans as the archetype of the<br />
Hero. He corresponds in real history to Digenes, Alexander the Great<br />
and Erotokritos in folk-tale, legend and romance. As time passed, however,<br />
even Daskaloyiannis took on legendary features. Glorified by<br />
later generations, and magnified by folk poets, he is to be found in one<br />
short poem struggling with the enemy single-handed for three whole<br />
days - like Digenes struggling for his soul with Charos on the marble<br />
threshing floor.