¹ Sidney Smith Saunders (Consul-General) to Erskine, 29/I / 1867, Dispatches from Her Majest's Consuls in Corfu, Zante and Cephalonia containing Information in the State of Those Islands since the Withdrawal of British Protection, and Their Annexation to the Kingdom of Greece (London: House of Parliament, 1867), enclosure 1 in Number 36. This document is hereafter cited as Dispatches.Google Scholar

The following additional abbreviations have been employed: CO: Colonial Office; PRO: Public Records Office, Kew Gardens, Great Britain; TIAK: Topikó lstorikó Arheió tis Kephallenías (Local Historical Archive of Kephallenia), Argostoloi, Greece; A and P: Acts and Proceedings of Parliament, London, Great Britain.

² Government Press, Esame di un progetto di legge per abolire in contratti di colonia parziaría perpetua hell' isola Corfu (Kerkyra: State Press, 1846);Google Scholar Ward Memorandum, 10/1830, “On the Colono System;” CO136/585 PRO; Kosmetatos, Nikolaos, “I kalliérgia tis stafídos en Kephallenía,” Parnasos, 19 (1972), 276–84Google Scholar; Hannell, David, “The lonian Islands under the British Protectorate: Social and Economic Problems,” Journal of Modern Greek Studies. 7:2 (1989), 105–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³ Typaldos, Ioannis, Statistica penale, ossia, rendi-conto generate dell' amministrazione della giustízia penal en Corfu (Kerkyra: State Press, 1986)Google Scholar. This particular year was even more tension-filled than most. Kerkyra, like the other lonian islands, had been ceded to the Kingdom of Greece by the British in 1864; and the terms of unification had only recently been agreed upon in the Assimilation Act of January 13, 1866. The peasants had voted overwhelmingly for Socialist deputies in the elections of 1864 and had given them the specific mandate to address the “land issue” and, in particular, the question of feudalism. Article Two of the Assimilation Act, however, forbade this much-hated practice for bodily seizure for default of rent payment. The discussion surrounding the act spurred on as well widespread rumors of sweeping land reform and redistribution—talk which was greatly worrying to the Ionian aristocracy. See, Hitiris, G., To kerkeraíkó agrotíkó próvlima tin epóméni tis enóseos kai i anaforés tou ánglou Proskénou (Kerkyra: Dimosievmata Etairia Kerkeraikon Spoudon, 1981).Google Scholar

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²³ Adam to Maitland, , 20/11/1819, A and P, June 1820, pp. 1–6; CO 136/12 PRO.Google Scholar

²⁴ The aristocratic petition and the full courtroom testimonies of the witnesses are included in dossier CO 136/12 PRO as supplemental enclosures, numbers 17 and 32.

²⁵ CO 136/12 PRO.

²⁶ This episode has recently been the focus of much attention. See, Gallant, , “Excommunication for Crime,” 500; Maria Paximadopoulos-Stavrinou, I Exeyérsís tis Kephallenías káta ta etí 1848 ke 1849 (Athens: Eteria Kephalliniakon Istorikon Erevnon, 1980)Google Scholar; Hannell, David, “A Case of Bad Publicity: Britain and the Islands,” European History Quarterly, 17:2 (1987), 131–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Tsoungatos, N. D., “I epanástasís tis Skálas (16.8.1849) kai o Pápa Lístis,” Kephalleniaká Hronika, 1 (1976), 64–96. Most of the literature has focused on the political implications of the rebellion. Insufficient attention has been paid to its social context.Google Scholar

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²⁹ A, and P, , Dispatches from Sir H. G. Ward to Earl Grey Regarding the Recent Disturbances on the Island of Cephalonia (London: House of Parliament, 1850), 7/9/89, enclosure 3, 8–16.Google Scholar

³⁰ The precise wording in Greek was:

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³⁷ This practice was repeatedly noted and decried by colonial officers. The following from Andrew Stewart, the Resident on Kephallenia, to Arthur Stanley, the Resident on Lefkas, is typical: “The fixation of prices was entirely in the hands of the landlords and the merchants, they being in fact the only capitalists, and that power I have reason to believe was not always exercised with great moderation” (Stewart to Stanley, 16/9/1833, CO 136/66 PRO).

³⁸ Ward to Grey, 7/9/1849. Dispatches. Ward bases his observations on patronage on the court testimony of Gerasimos Zapantis.

³⁹ Testimony by Anastasios Lambinato Bomboti at his trial on 11 October 1849; A, and P., Dispatches from Sir H. G. Ward to Earl Grey Regarding the Recent Disturbances on the Island of Cephalonia (London: House of Parliament, 1850), 19/10/1849, enclosure no. 7, 29–35.Google Scholar

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⁴⁴ Penal Code of the Ionian Islands, CO 136/1258–1269, section 12–18 PRO; emended in 1841, CO 136/76 PRO, CO 136/154 PRO. None of the changes to the debt laws altered the legal situation regarding seizure for default.

⁴⁵ Moustoksidis, Ioannis, “Memorial to Her Majesty,” 12/31/1839Google Scholar; printed in A, and P, , Blue Book of the Colonial Office: Ionian Islands and Malta (London: House of Parliament, 1839). memorial no. 3, sections 53–59.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Gilmore, , Aggression and Community; Honor and Shame and the Unity of the Mediterranean (Washington DC: American Anthropological Association, 1987)Google Scholar; Herzfeld, Michael, “Honour and Shame: Problems in the Comparative Analysis of Moral Systems,” Man, 15 (1980), 339–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “The Horns of a Mediterraneanist Dilemma,” American Ethnologist, 11:3 (1984), 439–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar; The Poetics of Manhood: Contest and Identity in a Cretan Mountain Village (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985)Google Scholar. Much of this book is devoted to a study of the performative aspect of cultural identity formation, including honor. Also see Wikan, Umni, “Shame and Honor: A Contestable Pair,” Man, 19 (1984); 635–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁷ The episode recounted here is derived from the correspondence of the chief of police preserved in a bound, unnumbered volume labelled “Petizioni, Suppliche, Demande, Requisizioni, 1853” (TIAK shelf 195, row 7). There are volumes for each year from 1821 to 1869 containing copies of all correspondence reviewed by or emanating from the office of the chief of police.

⁴⁸ Thompson, (“Rough Music,” 483)Google Scholar, for example, recounts the case of a butcher on the Isle of Wight, who in 1782 gunned down three men after they had appeared in his wedding procession adorned with rams' horns on the sides of their heads. Elijah Anderson (A Place on the Corner, 18–27), as well, recorded episodes in which verbal clashes quickly turned nasty as steel replaced words as the demanded riposte.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Gilmore found that members of the upper class left their community during Carnival, the period when shaming, insults and other verbal assaults were most common, because they did not want to risk being caught up in the wars of words and because of their fear that physical violence might also occur (Aggression and Community, 121).Google Scholar