The Descendants of
Pantaleone d'Andria
Chios
Pantaleone's World
The merchants and nobles of Genoa, tended to be interested more by trading opportuinities than the quest for religious glory but the skill of their seamen had led to the city's involvement in the First Crusade. For the next five hundred years the Genoese were major participants in trade throughout the Levantine world: particularly by virtue of the ring of colonies it established around the Black Sea, and their lease of a merchants’ quarter in Constantinople. In 1204 the Fourth Crusade led to the exile of the Byzantine Emperors from Constantinople and ther establishent of a Latin Empire of the Orient dominated by the interests of France and Venice. Genoese merchants were exiled to Pera, across the Golden Horn from Constantinople. In 1261 the Byzantine emperor regained Constanytinople with Genoese support and the Genoese were permitted to fortify their colony at Pera with walls and a mighty gothic tower. This became in effect a city in its own eright which they called Galata.The republic found itself unable to reimburse the ship-owners their expenses in the recapture of Chios. A novel alternative was found with the ship-owners being permitted to form a company called the Maona di Scio to govern the island for the succeeding twenty years, with rights to levy taxes and to farm the valuable mastic gum. In 1362 this company (predominantly comprising nobles) sub-let the island to an albergho, a consortium of trading families, that collectively took the name Giustiniani and who governed the island until 1566.
From 1305-1335 the island of Chios had been the personal possession of two Genoese merchants Benedetto and Manuele Zaccaria. In 1346 a Genoese fleet sent to assist a joint Papal-Byzantine Holy League confronting the rising threat from the Ottoman Empire retook the island.
From Leonardo to Pantaleone
The Giustiniani crest The Kastro
(later adopted by the d'Andrias) The upper part of the tower dates from
Pallazzo Giustiniani, Genoa. the time of Leonardo d'Andria. The base was
re-enforced by the Venetians in 1694.
The Giustiniani governed Chios from a citadel called the Kastro. In 1427 the Kastro was restored (1427) after an earthquake by a famous Genoese fortress-builder Leonardo d'Andria da Ragusa from whom the Chios d'Andrias are said to be descended. There are seven known references to d'Andrias on Chios between Leonardo and Pantaleone suggesting a d'Andria family presence there from the mid-fifteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries. One of these is Nicolo d'Andria who was imprisoned in nearby Izmir, until released in exchange for a Muslim captive on Chios (1451).
Pantaleone d’Andria, is said to have arrived on Chios in its last year as a Genoese colony (1565). and to have lived their with himmediately after it’s seizure by the
Chios was seized by the Ottoman Empire on Easter Sunday 1566 after two years of famine. The Ottoman fleet had been sent from Istanbul by Sultan Suleyman to seize Malta from the Knights Hospitaller the previous year but that invasion (sometimes called the last battle of the Crusades) had failed after an epic seige in which Chios sailors had participated.
Pantaleone d'Andria is referred to in several sources. In 1789 four of his descendants petitioned the Genoese city authorities for a certificate which was granted, certifying their descent from Pantaleone, and that Pantaleone had been recognised as of Genoese citizenship in 1584. In 1822 several declarations were made for other members of the family by or on behalf of the island's bishop certifying that they too were descended from Pantaleone. These included some furter details including the claim that Pantalone had arrived in Chios from Genoa in 1565. Three Pantaleone d'Andrias appear in Chios baptism records for around that time as well as one who donated towards the rededication of a Church.
Early Ottoman Rule
Above: St Maria Dell' Assunzione as it is today
Despite some imprisonments and torture of members of the Giustiniani albergho, and the expulsion of all Catholics from the Kastro, the Latin community on Chios were permitted to continue living on Chios which even becomes fairly autonomous within the Ottoman Empire. Catholics were permitted to rebuild their churches.
One such church is the Kampos church of St Maria Dell' Assunzione. Pantaleone's son Gasparo d'Andria was a trustee for the Order of Preachers responsible for the church. A dispute over money led to Gasparo and another trustee being excommunicated (1615).
At this time there were very many d'Andrias living on Chios, as seen from the surviving baptism and marriage records. One of these Giovanni d'Andria (1635-1675) was buried in Galata where his tombstone records that he was kidnapped and held prisoner before being ransomed in Istanbul where he lived the remainder of his life.
From the Venetian Occupation (1694) to the Rebuilding of e Cathedral (1722)
From 1667 the Chios Catholics suffered persecutions at the hands of the island's Orthodox majority. In 1694 a Venetian fleet briefly occupied the island to relieve them, but it is forced to withdraw in the face of a Turkish counter-attack. Initially those Catholics who remained were condemned to death or slavery, but this sentence was commuted to loss of property rights and renouncing their Catholicism and submitting to the Orthodox Rite. All Catholic churches on the island were destroyed or converted to mosques.
Two d'Andria priests nevertheless were continuing to administer sacraments on the island in 1709. One Rev. Stanislao d'Andria S.J. had been enslaved upon an Ottoman galley for his faith but released after the local Catholics obtained the intervention of French King Louis XIV with the Sultan in Istanbul (1707).
In 1720 the Ottomans permitted the rebuilding of the Catholic Cathedral. A row over funding for this between the first Bishop (whose Vicar General was Rev. Michel d'Andria) and one of the island's wealthiest Catholics (Michel's brother Giuseppe) led eventually to the Bishop fleeing Chios in disgrace.
A Century of Stability 1722-1822
Zanantoniko, one of half a dozen estates held by the d'Andria family in one area of the Kampos. It was outside this house that John d'Andria was killed by Turkish soldiers in 1822.
After the restoration of rights to thew Latin comminuty on Chios the d'Andrias appear to have prospered and come to own half a dozen estates centred around a crossroads in the Kampos. Maps and photographs describe the extent of their landholdings.
During this period there were thirteen priests from the d'Andria family on Chios, one of whom Nicolo Timoni became Bishop of Chios (c.1789-1812).
In 1789 the Certificate of Pedigree was obtained from Genoa.
The Massacres of Chios 1822
Scenes des massacres de Scio... An ossuary on Chios displays the remains of
Eugene Delacroix (the Louvre) some of the victims of the 1822 massacres.
In 1821 Greek nationalists in the Peloponnese rebelled against Ottoman rule in a revolt that became the Greek War of Independence. On 23 March 1822 the nationalists seized Chios but only held it for three weeks before fleeing a Turkish counterarrack. In events that followed the Ottoman authorities lost control of affairs on the island as an influx of Turkish irregulars from Izmir led to terrible massacres in which the island's population was reduced by death, slavery, and flight from 160,000 to less than 1000.
The events are described in detail in diplomatic dispatches by Giovanni Antonio Pasqua, Dutch vice-consul on Chios and a descendant of the d'Andria family. This document includes several refernces to the adventures during this period of several d'Andria family members.
A separate tradition recounts how Giovanni d'Andria, was treacherously killed by the Turks after surrendering his Kampos house. His sons Nicolo d'Andria (the author's great-great-grandfather) and Giuseppe cheated death on four occasions through the following months: This included their being imprisoned on the Kapidan Pasha's flagship, as it was preparing to carry slaves to the slave market at Izmir, and being ransomed by their mother shortly before this ship was sunk by the Greek nationalist Kanaris. Their cousin, a different Giuseppe d'Andria was visiting the island and fled with his pregnant wife on a ship to Malta: she gave birth whilst their ship was still moored in Valetta harbour.
Chios After 1822
Some d'Andrias returned to the island after 1822. The last reference to the family in the episcopal archives is from a Rev. Nicolo d'Andria stating that the Catholic population was too small to justify his presence and seeking a mission to China. Two d'Andrias, Luigi and Nicola, formerly settled in Izmir returned to Chios much later but left after the island was devastated by an earthquake in 1881.
Previous | Pages 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | Next | Back to index page
