Nicolaos M. Panayotakis: A Teacher and a Scholar

Nicolaos M. Panayotakis began his academic career in October 1971 as a full professor at the University of Ioannina. He taught the whole spectrum of Byzantine literature from Procopius to Bessarion, along with Greek paleography. He simultaneously helped a select group of students to undertake professional work in Byzantine and post-Byzantine literature after their graduation. He was a spiritual parent for his students, providing advice and encouragement in their graduate work. His greatest satisfaction was to see many of his former students in good academic positions. All these students will always remember his kindness and professional integrity, always coupled with a sense of humor and with paternal advice.

A large part of his activity in conjunction with his teaching duties was the founding and development of Byzantine and post-Byzantine studies at the University of Ioannina. He also founded the library of Medieval Philology and Byzantine History, which is now one of the richest Byzantinological libraries of Greece. He served as chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Ioannina and was the founder and director of Δωδ≈νη, the annual publication of that department. A large part of his activities related as well to the founding and development of the University of Crete, where he again gave priority to the library’s enrichment. On undertaking the directorship of the Istituto Ellenico in Venice in 1989, he found its morale low, owing to the absence of a director since 1982. In a relatively short time, he managed to rekindle the institute’s research, educational, and managerial functions. He immediately instituted weekly seminars for all resident scholars. The Θησαυρίσματα were once again published. He initiated the publication of Oriens Graecolatinus as part of the series Bιβλιθήϰη τoυ Eλληνιϰoυ̃ Iνστιύτoτoυ Bενετίας. He also organized international symposia on modern Greek literature, language, and ethnicity.

Panayotakis, one of the most distinguished Byzantinists of the medieval and Renaissance periods, concentrated principally on medieval Hellenism, the medieval and modern history of Europe (especially Renaissance and Reformation), Western medieval literature, theater history, and, more generally, the history of European civilization. His extended research in the archives and libraries of Venice, which he began in 1968 and afterwards extended to other cities of Western Europe, brought to the surface a whole new world of unknown scholars, texts, and items directly connected with the culture of Crete during the Renaissance and Baroque eras. Beyond Byzantine philology, the central theme of his research and publications was the study, from both a Greek and European perspective, of the two centuries that followed the fall of Constantinople, because he believed that the concept of neohellenism was established during those two centuries.

Panayotakis used to say that he did not belong to the category of scholars who throughout their life rework their doctoral thesis. He counted himself among those who have no compunction about switching from one subject to another since they believe that perfection is unreachable. It is generally accepted, however, that he approached perfection with a scientific precision that, as Stylianos Alexiou has remarked, “is especially useful today when mechanistic and soulless agnosticism or subjective impressionism … does not go beyond the obvious.” This “obvious” is what Panayotakis detested. Displaying un usual research abilities and achieving remarkable results in several fields, he (a) shed light on individuals as well as on the intellectual life of the Latin East (Λατινoϰρατoύμενη’Aνατoλή), especially concerning Greek literary productivity in sixteenth and seventeenth century Crete, (b) discovered the rich, previously unrecognized Italian literary produc tivity in Crete that accompanied Cretan literary productivity, (c) solved the question of the identity of the poet of Erotokritos, (d) was the first to talk about the infiltration of Reformation ideas in Crete, (e) discovered Φραγϰίσϰoς Λεoνταρίτης, the first modern Greek music composer, and (f), with new data, shed fresh light on the Cretan period of Dominicos Theotocopoulos. He left behind a large amount of unpublished material—an important legacy to his students, who will surely take advantage of this wealth of material, study it and publish it, following in the footsteps of their great teacher.