The strange case of the Turkish and Venetian judges in eighteenth-century Mani wall paintings.

Chapman, John

Investigating church wall paintings in Mani, Greece, the author identified a common theme of the Ainoi, the graphic interpretation of Psalms 148–150. Within this scheme there is often a specific depiction of the 'Judges of the Earth' as an Ottoman judge and a Venetian nobleman. This depiction is unique to Mani and is restricted to the mid-eighteenth century and those areas of Mani dominated by the rule of the kapetanoi. The paintings allude to the lack of established legal systems in that period of Mani's history and refer back to times of stable law under Ottoman and Venetian rule.

MURAL art; GREEK painting; 17TH century painting; CHURCH buildings; OTTOMAN Empire

Byzantine & Modern Greek Studies, 2006, Vol 30, Issue 2, p151

0307-0131

Academic Journal

10.1179/030701306X115814