Reviewed by: A History of Crete by Chris Moorey A. M. Genova (bio) Chris Moorey, A History of Crete. London: Haus Publishing Ltd., 2019. Pp. xi + 344. 16 unnumbered pages of plates: illustrations (some color), 3 maps. Cloth $27.95. Since Theocharis Detorakis’ History of Crete (1994), a new macro-history has not been written about Crete from antiquity to the present in English—until now. Chris Moorey positions A History of Crete as a long-overdue heir to Detorakis’ comprehensive account (published originally in Greek in 1986), but Moorey separates himself from that more academically focused work by offering an “outline of Cretan history” that is both “simple and straightforward” (ix–x). His contribution to the field seeks to provide the general reader with a readable narrative about Cretan history from prehistory to today that goes beyond the content of Detorakis’ book in terms of both chronology and sources. Moorey, who has lived in Crete for over two decades, is a historian, writer, and retired educator. He attended St. Catherine’s College, Oxford and the University of Surrey and has authored several books, including Traveling Companions: Walking with the Saints of the Church (2013), A Glimpse of Heaven (2014), and God Among the Bunkers: The Orthodox Church in Albania Under Enver Hoxha (2015). While Moorey’s A History of Crete does not advance the field through any particular intervention or theoretical model, it serves as an accessible resource for general audiences, helping them to understand how Crete, as “a tiny continent,” has been shaped by three primary characteristics: its inhabitants, natural landscape, and strategic position as an island situated at the intersection of three continents (1–3). Moorey’s book offers a framework for navigating the ways in which these factors influenced economic, political, and social change over the centuries. Guided primarily by two principles, Moorey streamlines his content both by trying to remain “true to the subject” and by keeping “names and dates to the minimum” so as not to overwhelm the reader (ix–x). For example, Moorey categorizes the transitory period between the Mycenaeans and Dorians simply as “Dorian” in Chapter 5, entitled “Dorian Crete: 1100 BC to 69 BC.” While [End Page 226] Moorey acknowledges the complexity of this long period, he limits his terminology for “the sake of simplicity” (44). This is an approach he also employs in his use of the term “Arab” in Chapter 8, “The Arab Emirate of Crete: 824 to 961.” The main divisions in this book are chronological, with subdivisions for thematic topics, but Moorey is also influenced by the “idiosyncratic” presentation used by the English historian Edward Gibbon (x), and he inserts personal commentary throughout the text. A History of Crete contains 18 chapters which, apart from the introduction, extend from “Mythological Crete” (Chapter 2) to “Post-War Crete: 1949 to the Present” (Chapter 18). The divisions between Moorey’s chapters correspond mainly to significant periods of invasion or foreign disruption, and the chapters themselves are centered on the Cretans’ response to the Mycenaeans (Chapter 4), Dorians (Chapter 5), Romans (Chapter 6), Byzantines (Chapters 7 and 9), Arabs (Chapter 8), Venetians (Chapter 10), Ottomans (Chapters 12 and 13), and Third Reich (Chapter 16). Additionally, Moorey’s broad outline of Cretan history includes chapters about Cretan autonomy from 1898 to 1913 (Chapter 14), efforts to achieve unification with Greece (Chapter 15), and subsequent periods including the Battle of Crete from 1941 to 1945 (Chapter 16) and the Greek Civil War from 1945 to 1949 (Chapter 17). Moorey mainly employs English-language texts as his primary and secondary sources, which is a limitation for scholarly readers. Moreover, instead of providing a complete bibliography, Moorey cites his sources in notes on each chapter at the end of the book. Not all direct quotations or numerical data—such as statistics and census counts—have source attributions, so the reader sometimes needs either to accept the author’s information at face value or to substantiate it independently. (A good example of this can be found on pp. 248–249, where Moorey gives no citations for figures relating to the exchange of Greek and Turkish populations and the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne.) As part of...