The Mantinades are the most common form of folk song and are a poetic genre widespread throughout Crete. The Cretan mantinada is a couplet with fifteen syllables and rhyming verses in the Cretan dialect. Each mantinada has an independent meaning despite its limited length. However, there are mantinades that are said in response to another mantinada. In this case one complements the other and the rule of independent meaning does not apply.
The mantinada is the special way in which the young, the old and the children of Crete can express at any time the abundance and diversity of their feelings, pain, joy, anticipation, longing, love, anger, revenge, nostalgia. Thousands of mantinades have been said and continue to be said about every event of human life. Most of them are about love and romance, but there are also satirical, didactic, teasing, of engagement and marriage, of everyday issues and of course the death and loss of loved ones.
The mantinades are sung at feasts accompanied by the lyra, or without music in friendly company, in the kafeneia, in daily conversations. Most are rarely written in a notebook, and even fewer are printed in a book. Many are said and forgotten, but the best are memorized and passed on by word of mouth.
The mantinades appeared in Crete, according to historians, during the 15th century, during the Venetian occupation period. The Cretans were influenced by Venetian poets and European poetry and began to use the rhyme, something that had not happened until then. The influence of Erotokritos on the conception and evolution of the mantinada seems to have been decisive. The influence that the epic love poem by Vitsenzos Kornaros had on the people of Crete was immense, with its 10,000 verses constantly recited and quoted from the moment of its creation (1590 AD) to today.
As for the poetic art in general, there is historical information that it was used in Crete since ancient times. For example, the Cretan seer and prophet Epimenides (6th century BC) wrote oracles in poetic form. Also mentioned is Iofon from Knossos, who delivered oracles with verses at the Oracle of Amphiaraus in Oropos.
Contrary to popular belief, mantinades are not the exclusive prerogative of Crete. Mantinades are also the popular couplets in Kasos and Karpathos, the islands that border Crete to the east. Similar couplets have been developed on other islands in the Aegean and Ionian Seas, even in Cyprus, where they are known as tsatista.
What differentiates Crete is that the creation of mantinades continues unabated, especially in the villages of Crete. On the contrary, in the rest of Greece it has stopped or decreased dramatically. Crete manages to combine tradition with adaptation to modern life, with no end in sight.
Translated with minor editing from article published on May 16th, 2019, on www.cretans.gr