| From the second half of the 16th century until the Ottoman conquest, Crete charted a course in the field of intellectual achievements and general historical circumstances similar to that charted by the countries of Western Europe. New trends of the Renaissance and late Renaissance were fused with survivals from Byzantine times. Thus the means of expression were altered, new literary genres introduced and the style of Cretan literary output renewed. The exponents came from the middle and upper classes of a flourishing, distinctly Greek urban society. The erroneous impression that Cretan literature was a folk creation arose through confusion with folk song, and the transformation of the urban culture on Crete in 1600 into a folk culture under Ottoman rule. |