1. The story, music, and surviving fragments of the song were collected by the late Alexander Walton. I should like to thank Dr. Margaret Alexiou for much helpful advice on problems of methodology.

2. Page, D., Sappho and Alcaeus (Oxford, 1955), p. 288 Google Scholar.

3. 1,762 according to the 1971 census figure published by the National Statistical Service of Greece (information supplied by Mr. N. Baltas). It should be noted that the ancient site of Antissa is now called Ovriokastro, while the present-day village of Antissa lies now some two or three miles inland (see below). The census gives no separate figure for Ovriokastro. The name Ovriokastro may derive from , thus connecting the place with the well-known folk-song and the related legend of a princess in a castle. Against such a connection see N. G. Politis, , II (Athens, 1904), p. 720.

4. I refer to ‘the ballad’ for the sake of convenience. In all probability we are dealing with a long narrative work in verse of popular inspiration, surviving in a fragmentary form (see below, note 83, for a similar case), rather than a verse romance stemming from the pen of a more educated poet (cf. the romance of ‘Fiorentino and Dolcetta’ postulated by G. Morgan from surviving prose tales incorporating verse fragments: ‘Cretan Poetry, Sources and Inspiration’, XIV (1960), 42O-5) or a prose tale of folk origin.

5. This note was given as a minim by the school-master, which, however, upsets the basic quintuple rhythm of the tune.

6. It goes back at least to the seventeenth century, when it is found in a manuscript containing folk songs with musical notation; see Baud-Bovy, S., La chanson populaire grecque du Dodécanèse, I: Les textes (Paris, 1936), pp. 372, 376 Google Scholar; idem, ‘Sur le strophe de la chanson “cleftique”‘, L’Annuaire de l’Institut de Philologie et d’Histoire Orientales et Slaves, X (1950), 53-78, especially p. 58; G. Morgan, loc. cit., 49ff. (where the term ‘link-song’ is used).

7. In the Academy of Athens collection, III (Athens, 1968), the melodies which most resemble ours are those on pp. 216-17 and 329-30. It is perhaps not without significance that the first of these is sung to a song entitled I am grateful to Miss Lucy Duran for assisting me with these observations on the tune.

8. N. G. Politis, (Athens, 1914), p. 164, No. 189A. For other variants of the same motif see: A. Alexandris, VI (1917), 567, No. 18; I. Petsis, (1931), p. 84, No. 127; G. Ioannou, (Athens, 1970), pp. 119-20 /”, etc. In a song from Epirus the motif is used to introduce a curse on A. Yiangas, (Athens, 1959), p. 411, No. 638.

9. Petsis, op. cit., p. 36, No. 43 (cf. also P. 37, No. 44). Other variants may be found in: G. Martzoukos, (Athens 1959), pp. 61ff., No. 17; M. I. Sálvanos, IX (1926), 180, No. 51; Yiangas, op. cit., pp. 281f., No. 394; M. Michailidis Nouaros, (Athens, 1928), pp. 160-1, Nos. 18a, 18b; Liideke, I (1938), 505, No. I; A. Kriaris, 3rd ed. (Athens, 1969), pp. 307, 325-6. An Epirot song known as uses the same motif of washing a handkerchief in a rather different way: here the handkerchief seems to symbolize the exile’s links with his homeland; see Yiangas, cip. cit., p. 416, Nos. 648-9, and cf. abo No. 651.

10. See D. Petropoulos, I (Athens, 1958), p. 119.

11. See Petropoulos, op. cit., p. 133 and the relevant bibliography there given.

12. N. G. Politis, II, p. 48, No. 83. It may be possible to see a connection between this story and the case of King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem.

13. See N. G. Politis, II (1910), 146-8, R. M. Dawkins, Modem Greek Folktales (Oxford, 1953), pp. 332-3, G. Morgan, loc. cit., pp. 420-5.

14. See P. Argenti and H. Rose, The Folk-lore of Chios, I (Cambridge, 1949), p. 421.

15.

16. Miller, W., ‘The Gattilusj of Lesbos (1355-1462)’, BZ, XXII (1913), 430 Google Scholar. Miller’s sources for the information about Maria are: Exempla Baptistae Campofulgosi, Dictorum factorumque memorabilium, Liber III (Basle, 1551), pp. 826-7, ^and Ag. Giustiniani, Annali della Republica di Genova, II (1854), p. 384. These accounts perhaps deserve to be quoted in full. Campofulgosi : ‘Singulari etiam memoria dignus est amor, quern Dominicus Catalusius, qui Lesbi rerum potiebatur, erga uxorem ostendit. Quae cum in lepram incidisset, vir minime veritus a cotagione infici posse, aut aspectus horrore averti (etenim illuvies magis quam vivum corpus videri poterat) neque tetro odore quem ulcera mittebant, nunquam aut mensa aut lecto communi earn prohibuit. Coniugalis enim charitas apud eum contagionis timorem tetrumque conspectum odoremque in securitatem ac voluptatem verterat, quod earn iuxta Dei verbum eandem carnem secum esse arbitrabatur.’ Giustiniani (entered under the year 1454): ‘E accaddette per questi tempi un memorabil segno di benevolenza fra due consorti. Paris Giustiniano era dei primi Signori, ossia come si dice dei primi Maonesi di Scio dotato di grandezza d’animo e di molte richezze e maritò Maria una delle sue figliuole al Signore dell’Isola di Metelìno Dominico Gatilusio Genovese, e la mandò al marito con una galera che fece fabbricare e armare di nuovo. E la venusta matrona in processo di tempo contrasse il morbo lazzareno ossia il morbo leproso. E nondimeno il marito continuò sempre la mensa e il leto con la diletta moglie, la quale essendo reciproca nell’amore non l’abbandanò quando fu con le arme crudelmente assaltato dai suoi inimici, i quali con suprema violenza gliel levarono delle brazze, e menonlo via e gli detteno da morte. Essempio certo raro e degno di commemorazione.’

17. See Hopf, C., Chroniques gréco-romanes inédites ou peu connues (Berlin, 1873), p.519 Google Scholar.

18. See Miller, W., art. cit., pp. 435–6 Google Scholar, and the account of Giustiniani quoted in note 16 above.

19. I. Pavlidis, (Leipzig, 1883), pp. 6-21.

20. W. Miller, Trebizond (London, 1926), pp. 105-6.

21. Lamb, Winifred, ‘Antissa’, Annual of the British School at Athens, XXX (1930-1), 166 Google Scholar; see also the map ibid., XXXI (1931-2), pl. 17. Further: Koldewey, R., Die antiken Baureste der Insel Lesbos (Berlin, 1890), pp. 19–21 Google Scholar.

22. There is evidence for some attempt on-the part of the Gattilusi to integrate themselves with the native population: ‘Questa famiglia di astuti diplomatici, di principi splendidi e raffinati, governa il suo piccolo stato coi metodi caratteristici del nostro Rinascimento, che considera la politica un’opera d’arte; ma unisce questi metodi al ceremoniale greco. I Gattilusio sono vassalli di Bisanzio, imparentati anche con la casa imperiale di Trebisonda, e dope le prime generazioni adottano nomi greci (Palamede, Dorino) come i D’Oria in Sardegna e in Persia. Ma, come sempre, l’acclimatazione è soltanto parziale: in fondo all’animo si mantengono Genovesi…’ (R. S. Lopez, Storia delle colonie genovesi nel Mediterraneo [Bologna, 1938], p. 365)

23. A similar instance of an old ballad surviving in part with a prose summary of the narrative of the whole is mentioned by G. Morgan, op. cit., p. 53. In that case it was an Akritic song, from which only twenty lines could be remembered.

24. Hill, G., A History of Cyprus, I (Cambridge, 1940), pp. 271–2 Google Scholar.

25. N. Kliridis, (Nicosia, 1952), pp. 62-4.

26. Thompson, S., Motif-index of Folk-literature, 6 vols. (Bloomington, Ind., 1932-6)Google Scholar, B512, ‘Medicine shown by animal’. See also Hasluck, F. W., Christianity and Islam under the Sultans, II (Oxford, 1929), p. 686 Google Scholar, where among other examples is mentioned that of an anonymous Byzantine princess at Prousa.

27. The foundation-legend also seems to have become connected with the mythical Pijyaiva, who is associated with almost every ruin, and many natural features besides (woods, caves, springs), of Cyprus. According to S. Menardos, ‘ DIEE, VI (1901), 117-48, this may be a distant folk memory of the worship of Aphrodite in antiquity. He reports (p. 121) a tradition that the Monastery of St. Chrysostom was founded by the Pijyaiva, who also planted the cypresses which surround it, and that this queen was popularly identified with a certain Maria Molino depicted in an icon in the church. The lady in the foundation-legend is in Greek though the nearby castle of Buffavento is known still, as so many other ruins in Cyprus, as xd anixia rrçç Pijyaivaç (Kliridis, op. cit., p. 62; cf. Hill, op. cit., I, pp. 271-2. Hill also mentions another version of the same legend, according to which Buffavento Castle was built by a noble Cypriot lady, the same who founded die church of St. Chrysostom, who took refuge there from the Templars; op. cit., Il, p. 36). As to the true origin and date of die foundation of the monastery, nothing appears to be known beyond the fact that it already existed in 1152 when Neophytos began his monastic career there. For yet another account of the legend, and a similar one from a nearby village, see J. Hackett, A History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus (London, 1901—reprinted New York, 1972), pp. 356f. Hackett adds the detail that the healing fountain still existed in his day within the precincts of the monastery and retained its medicinal properties. The earliest mention of this fountain-legend seems to be dated 1683, when van Bruyn visited the monastery; his account is quoted by R. Gunnis, Historic Cyprus, 2nd ed. (London, 1947), pp. 294f.

28. S. Paraskevaidis, (Mytilene, 1956), p. 41, mentions a people known as who are supposed to have continued to practise ancient Greek religion on the island until 1462, when they were forcibly converted to Islam (I am indebted to Miss Eftychia Psarelli for referring me to this book and others about Lesbos). On the other hand another Mytilenean writer refers to (K. Makistos (Papacharalampous), [Athens, 1970], p. 202). Yürük is the Turkish word for ‘nomads’ and is used to designate a large number of different tribes. Most of them speak Turkish dialects and apparently practise some heretical form of Mohammedanism. (For an authoritative account see F. W. Hasluck, op. cit., I, pp. 126-37; further X. de Planhol, De la plaine pamphylienne aux lacs pisidiens. Nomadisme et vie paysanne [Paris, 1958], passim, and idem, Les fondements géographiques de l’histoire de l’Islam [Paris, 1968], p. 227 for the origin of the term yürük; I owe these references to Dr. A. A. M. Bryer.) There seems to be nothing to link the Yürük with the ancient Greeks, though it is a fairly frequent assertion of modern Greek writers.

29. The which has no connection with the ancient instrument of the same name, is commonly in use to accompany the folk songs; see S. Baud-Bovy, Chansons du Dodecanese, I (Athens, 1935), p. xxii, and S. Michaelidis, The Neohellenic Folk-Music (Limassol, 1948), p. 27.