Corfu Blues and Global Views: June 2019

"As hard as marble, copper, iron,

The threshing floor

Where Charon waits"

(JP)

A concept for a bilingual performance on an aloni (threshing floor) in Epirus.

I started developing this idea more than thirty years ago. It's still a draft, which I revisit from time to time. Much of the source material is Ancient Greek, Hellenic or Pan-Hellenic rather than specifically Epirot. Most of the quotations relate to threshing floors, and to life in the mountains and distant border districts of Hellenism. I originally had one of the Kato Vitsa threshing floors in mind for the performance space.

Around the Threshing Floor - Γύρω από το αλώνι - An Evening in Epirus

Kostas Krystallis (Ta Marmora):

Ακούστε, χωριανοί! Ταχιά, που θα σημάνουν η καμπάνες, να σκωθήτε όλ' σας, για να πάμε για μάρμαρα! Όποιος δε σκωθή και δεν πάη, νάχη τ' Άι-Νικόλα την κατάρα

( “Akouste, horianoi! Tachia, pou tha simanoun i kambanes, na skothite ol’ sas, yia na pame yia marmara! Opoios dhe skothi kai dhen pai, vachi t’ Ai-Nikola tin katara!)

CHURCH BELLS RING.

Ήταν θεού χαρά. Μέρα η νύχτα. Τα καλτερίμια των ανηφορικών δρόμων του χωριού, η πέτρινες ρούγες, τα μαρμαρένια πεζούλια, η αφρόπλακες και τ' ασπρολίθια των σπιτιών γιάλιζαν, λαμπύριζαν στο σεληνόφωτο

(Itan Theou hara. Mera i nichta. Ta kalterimia ton aniforikon dromon tou horiou, i petrines rouges, ta marmorenia pezoulia, i afroplakes kai t’ asprolithia ton spition yializan, lambririzan sto selinofoto…)

Οι χωριανοί ροβόλαγαν τον κατήφορο φορτωμένοι με τα θεόρατα μάρμαρα.

(I horianoi rovolagan ton katiforo fortomenoi me ta theorata marmara…)

Μπροστά τα βιολιά πάντα κ' οι δημογέροντες κ' οι παπάδες, φορτωμένοι κι' αυτοί, και πίσω το πλήθος.

(Brosta ta violia panda k’ oi demoyerontes kai oi papades, fortomenoi kai aftoi, kai piso to plithos.”)

VIOLINS PLAY.

Yannis Ritsos (Romiosyni, III):

“All the footpaths lead to the High Threshing Floors.

The air is sharp up there.”

Ὅλα τὰ μονοπάτια βγάζουνε στὰ Ψηλαλώνια. O ἀγέρας εἶναι ἁψὺς κεῖ πάνου.

(“Ola ta monopatia vgazoune sta Psilalonia.

O ayeras einai apsis kei panou”)

Dionysios Solomos

"My eyes have never seen a more glorious spot than this small threshing-floor"

Dimitris Tsaloumas, from The Threshing-Floor

Down the slope of the declining year

In light of resined wine and crystal glass

I reached, not far above the setting sun,

A threshing-floor and a humble house

In shuttered loneliness. This is, I thought,

How bread begins, and I sat on a stone

To watch the blindfold horse that wound

About a cruel spool the unending thread

Of its darkness…

The threshing-floor below was full of moon.

Three girls I loved, hems stitched to slender

Waists, black kerchiefs chin-fast, hummed low,

Pitchforking moondust into the air. A wind

And a cypress moaned gently all night.

A Greek version (TO ALONI), translated (or a second writing, rather) by the poet from his original English version, can be found in the book DIFOROS KARPOS, 2006

Extract:

Eleni Oikonomidou-Douvli:

(“Stin eisodo kathe horiou stis akres dexia ki aristera, ekei pou o aeras to pianei perissotero, s’ola ta Zagorohoria tha vreis kalives ki alonia…Alonia plakostromena me meraki kai techni, m’ena hamilo pezouli oloyira, kai to ‘stouira’ sti mesi.” )

Detail

"To the left Demeter, goddess of the earth and fertility, is shown giving corn to the young Triptolemos, who will pass on the knowledge of agriculture to humankind. On the right stands Persephone with her torch, who having returned from the underworld symbolises the turning of the seasons that enables agriculture to flourish". Museum of Classic Archaeology, Cambridge.

The marbles obtained by Clarke and his pupil John Marten Cripps were presented to the Library in 1803. "They include the huge marble caryatid–then thought to be a statue of Ceres–taken despite local protest from the sanctuary of Demeter at Eleusis"*.

Narrator, standing in front of a large image of Demeter, in the centre of the threshing-floor:

“The circular orchestra of the ancient theatre began its life as a threshing floor where people danced for Dionysus and worshipped the bountiful Demeter…The Corn Goddess Demeter, the protecting deity, is standing on the threshing floor, dispensing corn to her worshippers, as in the days of Theocritus”. The abundant and rich harvests were the result of her bounty”. (cf J. G. Frazer, The Golden Bough, chapter 44, Demeter and Persephone).

“With time, as the seasons change, as the olives are shaken from the trees, gathered and pressed, as the soil is ploughed and sown, as much later the fruit begins to ripen and fall, as the grain is winnowed on the high circular threshing floor which must be the origin of the orchestra in which the tragic chorus danced, the scholar who has had the good fortune to spend a whole year in Greece can learn to feel the rhythm of the Greek seasons, of the Greek earth, a rhythm unlike that of his own country and one which has not changed since Hesiod wrote his rulebook and its praise”.

The Continuity of Greek Culture, Bernard M.W.Knox,

The Journal of Modern Hellenism.

p.145

journals.sfu.ca/jmh/Index.php/jmh/article/download/91/92

Turns to image: “Noble Demeter, mistress of fruits in their season, of bright gifts the bestower” (The Homeric Hymns, tr. Thelma Sargent, p. 3)…

“Awesome divinity, bright-haired Demeter” (p. 62)…to you we sing.”

Villager 1:

“When Orion appears, Demeter’s gift has to be brought to the well-smoothed threshing floor” (Hesiod, Work and Days)

Villager 2:

“Here to thee by the threshing floor, O toiling worker ant, I rear a memorial to thee of a thirsty clod, that even in death the ear-nurturing furrow of Demeter may lull thee as thou liest in the rustic cell” (The Ant, by Antipater of Sidon, from Selected Epigrams from the Greek Anthology, J.W. Mackail, Longmans Green, 1890)

Villager 3:

“Eudemus dedicates this shrine in the fields to Zephyrus, most bountiful of the winds, who came to aid him at his prayer, that he might quickly winnow the grain from the ripe ears”. (“To the West Wind”, Bacchylides, Selected Epigrams from the Greek Anthology, J.W. Mackail, Longmans Green, 1890)).

Villager 4:

“This journey is to a harvest festival, for friends of mine are celebrating a feast for beautifully robed Demeter, giving the first fruits of their wealth; for in fullest measure has the goddess piled their threshing floor with barley”. (Theokritos, Harvest Time in Cos, Idyll VII, tr. Constantine Trypanis, p. 296, Penguin Book of Greek Verse.)

Villager 5:

“Was it such nectar…such nectar as you, Nymphs, mixed for us to drink that day by the altar of Demeter of the Threshing-Floor? May I again plant the great winnowing-shovel on her heap of corn, while she smiles on us with sheaves and poppies in both hands” (Theokritos, PBGV, p. 302)

Villager 6:

“Even as from a broad shovel in a great threshing-floor, fly the black-skinned beans and pulse, before the whistling wind; even as when one yoketh wide-browed bulls to tread white barley in a stablished threshing-floor, and quickly is it trodden out beneath the feet of the loud-lowing bulls…” (Homer, Iliad, Book V, XIII and XX)

Villager 7:

“The Trojans turned about and faced the Achaeans. But these too held their ground. They closed their ranks and were by no means put to flight. Indeed, as the infantry came to grips again and the chariots wheeled to withdraw, the dust that the horses’ hooves kicked up among them into the copper sky settled down on the Achaeans and whitened them, like chaff-heaps whitened by the falling dust when men are winnowing and the chaff is blown across the sacred threshing-floor by the wind that auburn-haired Demeter sends to separate it from the grain.” (Homer, Iliad, Book V).

Re-enactment of ancient Greek village festival drama/dance. Autumn. High pitched voices of women singing polyphonic songs as they strip corn. The sound of the whistling wind. Soon the image of Dionysus (also a deity of grain and agriculture, as well as wine and ecstasy) replaces the image of Demeter, and bacchic revels begin. The music changes, becomes more Dionysian, frenzied and ecstatic. Maenads dance wildly, in an abandoned and promiscuous way, carrying torches and thyrsoi.

The sound of thunder.

Nikos Kazantzakis:

ΠΙΣΤΕΥΩ ΣΤΗΝ ΚΑΡΔΙΑ ΤΟΥ ΑΝΘΡΩΠΟΥ, ΤΟ ΧΩΜΑΤΕΝΙΟ ΑΛΩΝΙ, ΟΠΟΥ ΜΕΡΑ ΚΑΙ ΝΥΧΤΑ ΠΑΛΕΥΕΙ Ο ΑΚΡΙΤΑΣ ΜΕ ΤΟ ΘΑΝΑΤΟ.

Η ΣΙΓΗ from Ασκητική

“I believe in Man’s Heart, that earthen threshing-floor where night and day the defender of the borders fights with death.”

(from Kazantzakis’ The Saviour of God- Askitiki- Spiritual Exercises, The Silence).

SOLO SHEPHERD’S FLUTE, then KLARINO IMPROVISATION, slow, dirge-like, mournful miroloi, becoming a duel-duet with a violin.

Stylised balletic wrestling match on the aloni. Masked actors, Digenis (the Akritic border-guard, Mavroeidis, or the shepherd) versus Charon/Charos. Charos (Death, the black knight, transformed into the Drakos, or dragon) performs a bravado zeibekiko dance at end.

Κι επήγαν κι επαλέψανε στα μαρμαρένια αλώνια,

Κι όθε χτυπάει ο Διγενής, το αίμα αυλάκι κάνει,

κι όθε χτυπάει ο χάροντας, το αίμα τράφο κάνει.

Narrator introduces recitations after setting the context:

“The earthen circle, set with marble flagstones, where Digenis and Charos wrestled in mortal combat for each other’s souls. Digenis, the undying border-guard and frontiersman, defends our borders and our peaceful villages, even here in Epirus. Tonight he’s here to lead the dance, on stones as smooth as iron or copper, where resistance fighters once broke their bread”.

Pios na serni to horo (Who will lead the dance):

“Three birds sang high up in the sky:

Whoever wants and loves to lead the dance,

He must be a fine fellow, and good-looking,

He must have black eyes, and be tall,

And sinuous and supple like a sprig of basil.”

(Tr. Hilary Pym, Songs of Greece, p. 23)

Andartis, with beard, ammunition and rifle (from Yannis Ritsos, Romiosyni II):

Μπῆκαν στὰ σίδερα καὶ στὴ φωτιά, κουβέντιασαν μὲ τὰ λιθάρια,

κεράσανε ρακὶ τὸ θάνατο στὸ καύκαλο τοῦ παππουλῆ τους,

στ᾿ Ἁλώνια τὰ ἴδια ἀντάμωσαν τὸ Διγενῆ καὶ στρώθηκαν στὸ δεῖπνο

κόβοντας τὸν καημὸ στὰ δυὸ ἔτσι ποὺ κόβανε στὸ γόνατο τὸ κριθαρένιο τους καρβέλι.

“They have been through fire and steel,

they have conversed with stones

They have treated Death to wine served in the skull-bones of their grandpas,

And they have met with Dighenes on those same threshing-floors

And sat themselves to feast there,

Slicing their anguish in two just as they broke their barley-loaves across their knees.”

(“Bikan sta sidera kai sti fotia, koventiasan me ta litharia,

kerasane raki to thanato sto kafkalo tou pappouli tous,

st’ alonia ta idia antamosan to Diyeni kai strothikan sto deipno

kovontas ton kaimo sta dio etsi pou kovane sto gonato to kriarenio tous karveli.”)

Euripides Makris on the Sarakatsani Skaros (from Zoi kai Paradosi ton Sarakatsanaion, Ioannina, 1997):

P. 164 “Oi tsomnanarioi anavan foties, ta skilia efernan yiro ap’ ta kopadia alichtontas yia na prostatepsoun ap’ tous likous ki o tsombanos yia na xagripnisei epairne me ti flogera tou kanena argosirto poimeniko skopo. Oi palioi pou thimountai san oneiro aftes tis nichtiatikes ikones, nostalgoun n’akousoun afton ton gliko poimeniko skopo tis flogeras. Merikoi kaloi kai meraklides tragoudistes epairnan kai kana tragoudi kleftiko.”

Charos and Mavroeidis (the Dark-formed; epithet of Dighenis Akritas) - from Deep Into Mani, Peter Greenalgh and Edward Eliopoulos, pp 89-90:

“Come Charos, if you have the strength,

If you are really brave,

Come let us show our worth

Upon my threshing-floor,

This floor whose base is solid iron

Whose walls are steel all round.”

With seven blows Mavroeidis

Beat Charos as they fought,

And seven times great Charos reeled,

But then, in anger roused,

He summoned all his mighty strength

And smashed the young man’s sword,

And seizing then his flowing locks

He flung him helpless down…

Then Charos mocked him cruelly

And taunted him with scorn-

“Your sword of steel, your belt of iron,

Your chest of marble strong,

They lie, it seems, with all your boasts,

Upon the threshing-floor.”

Folk-song “Eteron” (P. Aravantinos, No. 448):

“Ekatevaina apo ton Ai Yiorgi,,

Kai foni akousa, foni apo Drakou stoma,

-E! more Yanni, more, kontokarterei,

-kai poios eis esi pou les more to Yanni?

-Eim’ o Drakontas ton evdominta vrison.

-‘go eim o Yannaros ton evdominta pente,

ki as palaipsoume sto marmarenio aloni.

K’epalaipsane treis merais kai treis nichtes,

Ki-out o Drakontas to Yannaro nikaei,

Out’ o Yannaros to Drako vanei katou.

Na ti k’erchetai ton Yannarou I yinaika,

-E, more Yanni, more yinaikokardhi,

pias’ ton an ombros kai rix’ ton apo piso”.

NB Roderick Beaton, Folk Poetry of Modern Greece, p. 80:

“This Diyenis, who is at once the borderer of the epic and the shepherd or brave young man (pallikari) who challenges Death to single combat in the folk songs.”

From Ellinikos Laikos Politismos, Athens, 1982

Kostis Palamas, Digenis Akritas:

Καβάλα πάει ο Χάροντας

το Διγενή στον Άδη,

— Ο Ακρίτας είμαι, Χάροντα,

δεν περνώ με τα χρόνια.

Μ' άγγιξες και δε μ' ένιωσες

στα μαρμαρένια αλώνια;

(Kavala paei o Charontas

To Digeni ston Adi…

Sta marmorenia alonia…)

The Death of Dhiyenis, tr. Martin Johnston:

“I crossed mountains and plains, mountains and gorges,

Nights without starblaze, nights without moonlight.

And all these years I’ve lived in the upper world

I’ve never feared a man among the brave.

But here I saw one barefoot and brightly clothed

Who had the peacock’s plumage and the lightning’s eyes

And he challenged me to wrestle him on the marble threshing-floor

And whichever should win would take the loser’s soul”.

And they went and wrestled on the marble threshing-floor

And where Dhiyenis struck the blood filled a trench

But where Death struck the blood filled a river.

From Death and the Shepherd, Freedom Plays the Flute, Carrie C. Dukakis, Smithtown, New York, 1982:

The full dialogue:

Odysseus Elytis:

"Below, on the Daisy’s Small Threshing Floor"

Κάτω στης μαργαρίτας τ' αλωνάκι, στήσαν χορό τρελό τα μελισσόπουλα.

"Below, on the daisy’s small threshing floor

The young honeybees have struck up a crazy dance"

Yannis Ritsos

We do not love our distant cousins that arrive from the capitol and wear double vests and who always have colds...

Upon the threshing floor the haystacks shine like naked breasts and the horses race at midday, trampling the ears of grain and getting lost in the woods.

from Midday Summer Dream (1938) [Collected Poems: Alpha ---pg 347-348].

Translation, Scott King

George Seferis

"He tells me of the sharp pain you feel...

Being alone, dark in the night, and helpless as chaff on the threshing-floor"

(Reflections on a Foreign Line of Verse, for Elli, Christmas 1931, tr. Keeley and Sherrard)

from LOGBOOK II,

Η μορφή της μοίρας (1η Οχτώβρη ‘41)

ποιος είναι εκείνος που προστάζει και σκοτώνει πίσω

από μας;

Άφησε μη ρωτάς∙ τρία κόκκινα άλογα στ’ αλώνι

γυρίζουν πάνω σ’ ανθρώπινα κόκαλα κι έχουν τα μάτια

δεμένα,

άφησε μη ρωτάς, περίμενε∙ το αίμα, το αίμα

ένα πρωί θα σηκωθεί σαν τον Αι-Γιώργη τον καβαλάρη

για να καρφώσει με το κοντάρι πάνω στο χώμα το

δράκοντα.

"Who is he who commands and murders behind our backs?

Don't ask; three red horses on the threshing floor
circle on human bones, their eyes blindfolded..." (tr. Keeley and Sherrard)

Όντως, τα κόκκινα άλογα του θανάτου μέσα στο αλώνι της φρίκης και της καταστροφής, που γυρίζουν πάνω στ' ανθρώπινα κόκκαλα, πού τα έχω δει αυτά;

Μοῦ λέει τὸ δύσκολο πόνο νὰ νιώθεις τὰ πανιὰ τοῦ καρα-

βιοῦ σου φουσκωμένα ἀπὸ τὴ θύμηση καὶ τὴν ψυχή

σου νὰ γίνεται τιμόνι.

Καὶ νἄ ῾σαι μόνος, σκοτεινὸς μέσα στὴ νύχτα καὶ ἀκυβέρ-

νητος σὰν τ᾿ ἄχερο στ᾿ ἁλώνι.

Γιῶργος Σεφέρης, «Πάνω σ᾿ ἕναν ξένο στίχο», Ποιήματα, Ἀθήνα, ἔκδ. Ἴκαρος, 1985, σσ. 87-89

Two photos by Kostas Balafas (Κώστας Μπαλάφας)

Nelly's, Threshing, Crete, 1927-1930, Benaki Museum (above)

Threshing the wheat, from Portrait of a Greek Mountain Village,
Juliet du Boulay, 1974

From Aristi kai Dhitiko Zagori, Fotios M. Petsas, Athens, 1982

From Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponnese, Patrick Leigh Fermor:

"Through another gap our host’s second daughter, wide-hatted and perched on the back of a wooden sledge and grasping three reins, was sliding round and round a threshing floor behind a horse, a mule and a cow – the first cow I had seen in the Mani – all of them linked in a triple yoke. On a bank above this busy stone disc, the rest of the family were flinging wooden shovelfuls of wheat in the air for the grain to fall on outstretched coloured blankets while the husks drifted away. Others shook large sieves. The sun which climbed behind them outlined this group with a rim of gold and each time a winnower sent up his great fan, for long seconds the floating chaff embowered him in a gold mist".

On the Sarakatsani shepherds; beyond Vitsa and Monodendri, where they grazed their flocks in summer

"All their eyes lit up like those of the children of Israel at the thought of Canaan...You didn't need wine there- the air made you drunk; and as for the shade, the grass, the trees and the water- why the water came gushing out of the living rock as cold as ice, you couldn't drink it, it was so cold, and you could drink it by the oka, and feel like a giant. Words failed them".

Patrick Leigh Fermor, Roumeli.

Demetrios Capetanakis, from "An Introduction to Modern Greek Poetry" (New Writing and Dayloght, Autumn 1944):

Songs to consider:

Leonard Cohen, The Gypsy's Wife

Mariza Koch, Elytis: Μαρίζα Κωχ - Ελύτης - Κάτω στης μαργαρίτας τ΄ αλωνάκι

Γιάννης Χαρούλης - Ο Διγενής Κι Ο Χάροντας

Μπήκαν στὰ σίδερα, Ρωμιοσύνη, Θεοδωράκης

Στου Διγενή τ' αλώνια, Hadzidakis

Some Biblical references

The Threshing Floor of Ornan (Araunah)

The threshing floor which King David bought,
and where Solomon built the temple in Jerusalem,
according to Chronicles.

See also: Threshing floors in Ancient Israel (pdf)

Two Old Testament Prophets:

Micah 4:12

"But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD, And they do not understand His purpose; For He has gathered them like sheaves to the threshing floor".

αὐτοὶ δὲ οὐκ ἔγνωσαν τὸν λογισμὸν Κυρίου καὶ οὐ συνῆκαν τὴν βουλὴν αὐτοῦ, ὅτι συνήγαγεν αὐτοὺς ὡς δράγματα ἅλωνος

https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/septuagint/chapter.asp?book=33&page=4

Hosea 13:3

"Therefore they will be like the morning cloud And like dew which soon disappears, Like chaff which is blown away from the threshing floor And like smoke from a chimney".

"Therefore shall they be as a morning cloud, and as the early dew that passes away, as chaff blown away from the threshing-floor, and as a vapor from tears".

διὰ τοῦτο ἔσονται ὡς νεφέλη πρωϊνὴ καὶ ὡς δρόσος ὀρθρινὴ πορευομένη, ὥσπερ χνοῦς ἀποφυσώμενος ἀφ᾿ ἅλωνος καὶ ὡς ἀτμὶς ἀπό δακρύων

https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/septuagint/chapter.asp?book=31&page=13

Two New Testament Apostles

Matthew 3:12

"His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

οὗ τὸ πτύον ἐν τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ καὶ διακαθαριεῖ τὴν ἅλωνα αὐτοῦ, καὶ συνάξει τὸν σῖτον αὐτοῦ εἰς τὴν ἀποθήκην, τὸ δὲ ἄχυρον κατακαύσει πυρὶ ἀσβέστῳ.

https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/new-testament/matthew/3.asp

Luke 3:17

"His winnowing fork is in His hand to thoroughly clear His threshing floor, and to gather the wheat into His barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

οὗ τὸ πτύον ἐν τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ καὶ διακαθαριεῖ τὴν ἅλωνα αὐτοῦ, καὶ συνάξει τὸν σῖτον εἰς τὴν ἀποθήκην αὐτοῦ, τὸ δὲ ἄχυρον κατακαύσει πυρὶ ἀσβέστῳ

https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/new-testament/luke/3.asp

General

MUSIC, POEMS AND DANCE

Possible selections for an expanded performance:

Death and the Shepherd, tr. Carrie C. Dulakis, Freedom Plays the Flute (O Haros ki o Tsopanos: “Upon the marble threshing-floor/They fight like beasts at bay”).

O Charos ki O Tsopanos: “Leventis erovolagen apo psili Rachoila…”
Reflections on a Foreign Line of Verse, George Seferis ("being alone, dark in the night, and helpless as chaff on the threshing-floor")

The Death of Dhiyenis (tr Martin Johnston)
Forrest Reid, Poems from the Greek Anthology

E. Legrand, Recueil de chansons populaires Grecques, 1904, Troisième Partie, (Cycle de Digenis Akritas), Akritas Mourant, LXXXIX, pp 195-196 (Ela, Char’, as palainomen sto chalkinon to alonen)

Kostas Palamas, Digenis Akritas (PBGV p 536-537)

Lord Byron, Child Harold Canto II, XII-LIV

Kostas Kristallis, O Skaros (poem); Ta Marmora (story); Easter in Pindus; O Horismos; First of May In Ioannina; Ithela namoun Tselingas.

Eteron, from Ipeirotika Tragoudia, P. Aravantinos, 1880 (no 448: “as palaipsoume sto marmarenio aloni”, the Drakos kai o Giannis)

Ioannis Nikolaides, Aslan Pasha and his mother from Vitsa (Zagori, pp 57-61)

Eleni Oikonomidou-Douvli (from Elafotopos), on Zagori threshing floors (Tin Erasmian kai mian kalivin”, 1998 (Paskalomansis, Ioannina 2005)

Ioannis Vilaras, Spring (Anoixis)

Dimitrius Sarras, Dream etc

Sikelianos, Akritika (1942), Akritan Songs

George Zalokostas: To Filima; To dentro mou

O. Elytis, On the Daisy’s Small Theshing-Floor (Sun the First; also Markopoulos, Kato stis margaritas to alonaki)

I. Kadare, Chronicle in Stone, introduction and chapter I

D. Hatzis, Sklithras, the Notary, from The Teacher’s Will, Section 3

K. Karyotakis: Preveza, plus prose piece, “Our Flag in Ioannina”

L. Mavilis, Lethe, and Harris

C. Milionis, Story, excerpt from ‘Phryne’

Euripides Makris, O Skaros pp 164-165 (Sarakatsanoi)

Ioannis Lambrides, women dancing on the threshing-floor and the men sitting round (D. Dallas for ref)

Frixos Tziovas, The Miroloi of the Gypsy and other stories

Evterpi Sarrou (from Trilogia), Dhoste ta Heria; O kainourios chronos; Epistrofi

M. Ganas, Yialina Iannena II

Terzis, Hymn and Lament

K. Palamas, The East (Anatoli)

P. Leigh Fermor, Zagori; Threshing floor in Mani
Juliet du Boulay: Portrait of a Greek Mountain Village

Kostas Pasagianis, In Epirus (Sherrard p 168-169)

Homer, Hesiod, Theokritos, Bacchylides, Antipater of Sidon.

Jim Potts, Zagori and Vitsa poems.

Folk Song; Sto Tsevari (Sto horio stin Kato Vitsa/Agapo mia kopelitsa)

Fauriel and Passow collections

Matthew, Chapter 3, 11-12, New Testament in Greek, John the Baptist “cleanse the threshing-floor”- “diakaqariei thn alwna”
Palies Fotografies, Ipeiros-Makedonia, Athens, 1977

Excerpts from "Portrait of a Greek Mountain Village", Juliet du Boulay (1994 edition, Denise Harvey):

The Threshing Floors in Ambeli, Evia

* From J.G.Frazer, The Golden Bough:

Photos from Zagorision Vios/Zagori: The Life of a Community,
Rizareios Foundation, Athens, 2003:

Final photo above, Konstantinos Manos

References to Vitsa threshing floors in Ioannis Nikolaidis,

"Istoriki Monografia peri tis en Ipeiro Horas Vezitsis", 1939:

"The plain of Kato Soudena used to be the granary of Zagoria. In “Anilia”, just opposite Anemi, we find concentrated in the same area the largest number of threshing areas and stone huts in the Balkans, about 46, built with the technique of “xerolithias” (from Anemi Guesthouse website, Kato Pedina).

Charmian Clift, from Honour’s Mimic, 1964

“There’s to be a dance at Paul’s on Sunday night. And I expect we shall go out to the threshing floor on Clean Monday…”

“Threshing floor?” she said.

“Oh yes. Didn’t you know? Everybody in the town simply packs up and goes out to the village threshing floor on Clean Monday – that’s the beginning of Lent, you see, and the last day for feasting – and they all dance on the old threshing floor…They sing a lot. And they all bring food – unleavened bread and olives and things, special sorts of food for Lent and masses of wine – and it’s sort of one great huge picnic out under the trees, and visits from family to family, and it goes on all day long and goodness knows how long through the night”.

Corfu Blues and Global Views

Sunday, 30 June 2019

Going Green (and Clean) at the Glastonbury Festival?

Antikythera: A Greek Island In Search of Residents?

C. M. Woodhouse, Two Books

Saturday, 29 June 2019

Τραγούδια στα Αγγλικά για μικρά παιδιά

The Zagori Villages, Epirus, Greece

Kostis Palamas: Ο Διγενής και ο Χάροντας

Around the Threshing Floor (An Evening in Epirus) - Performance Piece - Γύρω από το αλώνι. Ακούστε, χωριανοί!