free download here - Michael Llewellyn-Smith

Art under the Venetians
almost the whole interior is painted. Thus in the commoner’ scheme:
Apse: The Pantokrator, Christ in majesty, stares down from the
cupola. Sometimes there is the Virgin with Christ at her breast (Platytera).
In one rare case – the church of St George near Preveli monastery
– there is the Trinity, being the Father with the Son on His chest and
the Holy Ghost proceeding from His lips.
In the lower part of the apse, four hierarchs bearing scrolls with
sacred inscriptions.
Nave: Around the lower part of the wall, the martial figures of saints:
the women, Barbara, Eirene, Kyriaki, Paraskevi: and the warrior
saints, Demetrius, George, the two Theodores, often on horseback.
These fill the lower band.
In the larger churches, above this lower zone there is an intermediary
band of saints, head and shoulders only, framed in circular medallions.
The upper part of the nave is filled with scenes from the gospels;
scenes from the life of Christ and the Virgin. They cover the whole
vault; each panel separated from the next by a reddish band after the
style of the Paleologue period. At the south-east end of the nave is the
first picture of the series, the Nativity. From there in order, the Purification,
Baptism, the Raising of Lazarus, Palm Sunday, the Transfiguration,
the Last Supper, the Crucifixion, the Women at the Tomb, the
Descent into Hades. Interwoven with these are the scenes from the
Virgin’s life: the Visitation, the Nativity of the Virgin, the Presentation,
and the Dormition. The cycle ends at the north-east of the nave. At
the east end is the Ascension.
On the west wall is the Last Judgement - a grim warning to those
leaving the church by the main door. Brief inscriptions, often crudely
written and strangely spelt, indicate the sins of those who are being
conducted into the flames of Hell, The usual criminals are there: the
forger, the thief, the usurer, the false witness, the man who gives short
measure; and also those who were regarded as peculiarly Cretan, the
sheep rustler, the man who damages your land, the adulterer.
This bare schema cannot convey the richness and life of the Cretan
church. One must just try every approach, the factual, the enthusiastic,
the historical, in the hope that some of this richness will come over.
Consider for a moment the painter. He is a reticent figure. He remains
deliberately in obscurity. Usually he is anonymous, and when he signs
his name it is tucked away in a corner; the glory belongs to the Lord,
not to the painter.
In painting as in dogma Orthodoxy has prided itself on Tradition.
The emphasis on tradition is both the strength and the weakness of
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