 First edition (UK) | |
| Author | Patrick Leigh Fermor |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Travel |
| Publisher | John Murray |
Publication date | 1958 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 320 |
Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponnese is a travel book by English author Patrick Leigh Fermor, published in 1958. [1] It covers his journey with wife Joan and friend Xan Fielding around the Mani peninsula in southern Greece.
The book chronicles Leigh Fermor's travels around the Mani peninsula in southern mainland Greece. The region is typically viewed as inhospitable and isolated from much of the remainder of Greece due its harsh geography. The Taygetus mountains run down the middle of the peninsula, limiting most settlements to small villages on or near the coast. They begin near Kalamata, and then proceed south along the Mani coastline (mostly by boat or caique), ending the book in the town of Gytheon.
Leigh Fermor's book almost never mentions his travelling companions, and only rarely delves into first-person experiences. Much of the book concentrates on the history of the Maniots and of their larger place in Greek and European history; the middle portion of the book contains lengthy digressions on art history, icons, religion, and myth in Maniot society.
His future wife Joan accompanied him on the trip and took a number of photographs for the original version of the book. [2]
The cover of the book was designed by John Craxton. [3]
Mani is sometimes listed as a companion volume to Leigh Fermor's book Roumeli: Travels in Northern Greece. [4]
It was translated into Greek by future prime minister Tzannis Tzannetakis while in internal exile imposed by the Greek military junta. The translation was revised after his release with Leigh Fermor who added a further chapter on olives. [5]
Patrick and Joan Leigh Fermor later settled in the Mani peninsula, living in a house near Kardamyli that the two designed and built.
Mani may refer to:
Sir Patrick Michael Leigh Fermor was an English writer, scholar, soldier and polyglot. He played a prominent role in the Cretan resistance during the Second World War, and was widely seen as Britain's greatest living travel writer, on the basis of books such as A Time of Gifts (1977). A BBC journalist once termed him "a cross between Indiana Jones, James Bond and Graham Greene".
The Mani Peninsula, also long known by its medieval name Maina or Maïna, is a geographical and cultural region in the Peloponnese of Southern Greece and home to the Maniots, who claim descent from the ancient Spartans. The capital city of Mani is Areopoli. Mani is the central of three peninsulas which extend southwards from the Peloponnese. To the east is the Laconian Gulf, to the west the Messenian Gulf. The Mani peninsula forms a continuation of the Taygetos mountain range, the western spine of the Peloponnese.
Gytheio or Gythio, also the ancient Gythium or Gytheion, is a town on the eastern shore of the Mani Peninsula, and a former municipality in Laconia, Peloponnese, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality East Mani, of which it is a municipal unit. The municipal unit has an area of 197.313 km2.
The Battle of Vromopigada was fought between the Ottoman Turks and the Maniots of Mani in 1770. The location of the battle was in a plain between the two towns of Skoutari and Parasyros. The battle ended in a Greek victory.
Las, or Laas (Λάας), or La (Λᾶ), was one of the most ancient towns of Lakedaimonia, located on the western coast of the Laconian Gulf. It is the only town on the coast mentioned in the Periplus of Pseudo-Scylax between Taenarus and Gythium. The Periplus speaks of its port; but, according to Pausanias, the town itself was distant 10 stadia from the sea, and 40 stadia from Gythium. In the time of Pausanias the town lay in a hollow between the three mountains, Asia, Ilium, and Cnacadium; but the old town stood on the summit of Mt. Asia. The name of Las signified the rock on which it originally stood. It is mentioned by Homer in the Catalogue of Ships in the Iliad, and is said to have been destroyed by the Dioscuri, who hence derived the surname of Lapersae. There was also a mountain in Laconia called Lapersa.
The Ottoman–Egyptian invasion of Mani was a campaign during the Greek War of Independence that consisted of three battles. The Maniots fought against a combined Egyptian and Ottoman army under the command of Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt.
Oitylo, known as "Βίτσουλο", pronounced Vitsoulo, in the native Maniot dialect, is a village and a former municipality in Laconia, Peloponnese, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality East Mani, of which it is a municipal unit. It is one of the oldest towns in the Mani Peninsula. It was mentioned in the Iliad by Homer as Oetylus, as part of Menelaus' kingdom. In the Middle Ages, Oitylo grew to become the most important town in Messenian Mani. The only town in Mani that rivaled Oitylos in numbers of pirates was Skoutari. Now Areopoli has taken Oitylo's place as the most important town in Laconian Mani. Areopoli was also the seat of the municipality of Oitylo, which is located on the western half of the Mani Peninsula in the extreme southwestern part of Laconia. It has a land area of 218.582 km² and a population of 3,515 inhabitants. There are 91 villages in the municipality. The largest of these are Areópoli, Pyrgos Dirou (246) and Oítylo (224).
The Maniots or Maniates are an ethnic Greek subgroup that traditionally inhabit the Mani Peninsula; located in western Laconia and eastern Messenia, in the southern Peloponnese, Greece. They were also formerly known as Mainotes, and the peninsula as Maina.
John Leith Craxton RA, was an English painter. He was sometimes called a neo-Romantic artist but he preferred to be known as a "kind of Arcadian".
Mambrino was a fictional Moorish king, celebrated in the romances of chivalry. His first appearance is in the late fourteenth-century Cantari di Rinaldo, also known as Rinaldo da Monte Albano, Rinaldo Innamorato or Innamoramento di Rinaldo. The Cantari di Rinaldo is an adaptation of the Old French chanson de geste, Renaud de Montauban, also known as Les Quatre Fils Aymon. In the Old French, Renaud defeats the Saracen king Begon, who was invading King Yon's kingdom of Gascony. The Italian replaces Begon with Mambrino, and furnishes him with an elaborate backstory. In the Cantari, Mambrino is one of six brothers, all giants. Four of the brothers had been decapitated by Rinaldo on various occasions earlier in the poem, so that his invasion of Gascony was motivated by his desire for vengeance. Rinaldo, as the Italians called Renaud, wins the war by defeating Mambrino in single combat and decapitating him as well. Mambrino's helmet, in this poem, has for its crest an idol which is so constructed that whenever the wind blows through it, it says, "Long live the most noble lord Mambrino, and all his barons."
Aghios Nikolaos, Agios Nikolaos or Saint Nicholas, is a fishing village in the Mani Peninsula in southern Greece; it is popular with holidaymakers. The village, known to English-speaking tourists as "Ag Nik," lies about 30 kilometres (19 mi) south-east of Kalamata, on the eastern shore of the Messenian Gulf, and about 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) south of Stoupa, a larger tourist village. It is part of the municipal unit of West Mani in Messenia. The beautiful village of Agios Nikolaos is ideally located in the heart of the Mani peninsula and therefore other villages can be reached easily and quickly.
Kevin Andrews was an American philhellene, writer and archaeologist.
Anavryti or Anavriti (Αναβρυτή) is a small village in Laconia, Greece on Taygetus mountain, altitude 850m. Above the Evrotas Valley, Anavryti is traversed by European walking route E4. It is part of the municipal unit of Mystras.
Kardamili is a town by the sea thirty-five kilometers southeast of Kalamata, Greece. It is the seat of the municipality of Lefktro in the region of Messenia on the Mani Peninsula.
Ill Met by Moonlight: The Abduction of General Kreipe is a non-fiction partly-autobiographical book written by W. Stanley Moss, a British soldier, writer and traveller. It describes an operation in Crete during the Second World War to capture German general Heinrich Kreipe. Moss kept a diary during the war years and based his book on it. The 2014 edition includes an introduction by one of Moss's children and an afterword by Patrick Leigh Fermor.
Joan Elizabeth Eyres Monsell, Lady Leigh Fermor, formerly Rayner was an English photographer and wife of author Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor.
The Broken Road (2013) is a travel book by British author Patrick Leigh Fermor. Published posthumously by John Murray, the book, edited and introduced by his biographer Artemis Cooper and travel writer Colin Thubron, narrates almost all of the final section of the author's journey on foot across Europe from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople in 1933 and '34.
Tsikalia is a village of the Mani peninsula in Laconia in Southern Greece. It is very near to Cape Matapan, which is the southernmost point of mainland Greece and Europe. It consists of Pano Chora and Kato Chora. It belongs to the municipality of East Mani with its administrative capital at Gytheio and its historical capital at Areopoli. Its main church, in the centre of the village, is Agia Kyriaki. Its cemetery is Konstadounia with the church Agios Konstadinos inside it. The Local Community of Tsikalia consists of the villages Tsikalia, Moudanistika, Kotrafi, Sychalasmata and Xerolakkos.
The Patrick Leigh Fermor Archive is a collection of over 10,000 items of correspondence, literary manuscripts, articles and research papers, diaries, passports, sketches and photographs relating to Sir Patrick 'Paddy' Leigh Fermor, a British author, scholar, veteran, and adventurer. The bulk of the collection, the Papers of Patrick Leigh Fermor, was purchased by the National Library of Scotland (NLS) in 2012 from Fermor's estate, using funds donated by the John R. Murray Charitable Trust, and is housed at the Library's main building on George IV Bridge in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was made available to the general public in November 2014.
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