The sources documenting the 1687 peasant war offer limited information about the people of Naxos, their names and their perspective on the horrific events. To fill this gap, we created the character of Irini, representing one of the cases that judge Konstantin Kokkos might have protested. His opposition against the Venetian noblemen Jakob Koronello and Francesco Barozzi ultimately led to his brutal murder in 1687 and sparked the chain of atrocities that culminated in the peasant wars.
Astrid Scharlau offers a good summary of the available information:
The history of the family Kókkos
By Astrid Scharlau
Several defence towers on the island belonged to the Greek family Kókkos. Konstantinos Kokkos, the most famous member of the family, was very politically active and was appointed as a representative of the villagers and a judge. He campaigned tirelessly for the rights of the poor Greek peasants. In 1670 and 1681, he led two uprisings against the feudal lords. This naturally made him extremely unpopular among the Venetians, which ended with him being brutally murdered in 1687. The murder was committed by Francis Barozzi, who, together with several other Catholic noblemen, lay in wait and attacked him as he returned to Chora from some errand. The representatives of the island’s villages and the Burgos neighbourhood sent a long letter to the admiral of the Venetian fleet, signed by many priests and citizens of the island, requesting that this murder of the highly esteemed Naxiot leader be punished, if only to prevent further hostilities, but to no avail. The Venetian fleet was still active in the Cyclades at this time, constantly striving for naval supremacy in the Aegean against the Ottoman fleet; some five years earlier, the Venetians had briefly recaptured the island of Naxos, hoping to restore the Duchy of the Aegean, but had soon lost it again to the Ottomans.
Two years later, the followers of Konstantinos Kokkos took revenge for the murder by murdering the father-in-law of Francis Barozzi, Chrousis Coronello, who was said to have instigated the crime, at Kaloxylos. This led to a bitter feud between the two families. The Kokkos family retreated to the fortified monastery of Ypsilotéras near Galíni (near Engarés), which had been built by Konstantinos Kokkos in 1660 and where his son Ambrosios was now abbot. A few days after the murder of Coronello, the enraged Catholics of Naxos instigated the pirate Reimond de Modene, whose frigate was anchoured in the harbour, to attack the fortified monastery of Ypsilotéras together with leaders of the Catholic feudal lords under Jakob Coronello, the son of the murdered man. After a siege lasting several days, which cost the lives of several inhabitants of the monastery, the defenders managed to escape secretly during the night. They left behind Konstantinos Kokkos’ then four-year-old daughter, fearing that the child would betray them by crying; they hoped that the attackers would not harm the child. They did indeed take the girl with them, and she seems to have lived in Chóra at least for a while and is said to have been brought up in the Catholic faith.
The renewed bloodshed brought the events to the attention of the Venetian admiralty, who arrested both the abbot Ambrosios Kokkos and two of his companions as well as the Naxiot leader of the attackers, Jakob Coronello. Only much later, after further bloodshed, did the Capuchins of the Chóra succeed in reconciling the Catholic and Orthodox churches of the island, which had become bitter enemies as a result of the events. To finally put an end to the bloody feud, the families of Kokkos and Barozzi agreed to marry their children, and little Annoúsa was promised to the son of Francis Barozzi. According to local tradition, this son, called Tsabatís, fell madly in love with the beautiful Annoúsa, whom he saw in the family’s tower near Potamiá, and she returned the love of the handsome young man, with the result that he kidnapped her and the two married against the wishes of their families, thus ending their enmity. They lived in the Barozzi’s fortified tower in Chalkí, which was long known as the ‘Tower of Annoúsa’, while Annoúsa’s mother, Konstantinos’ widow, lived in the tower near Potamiá until her death.
From: https://azalas.de/en/naxos-venetian-towers/
Astrid Scharlau’s account is based on these sources:
Η Ιερά Μονή Παναγίας της Υψιλοτέρας εις Εγκαρές Νάξου, Νίκος Κεφαλληνιάδης, Ναξιακή Πρόοδος, 1966
https://www.kastra.eu/castlegr.php?kastro=fragopoulo
https://orinosaxotis.blogspot.com/2018/11/1687.htm
https://ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr/index.php/esperia/article/viewFile/2000/1843.pdf