Koutouloufari – an old village above Hersonissos

A stone village above the sea

Koutouloufari (Κουτουλουφάρι) lies on the hillside above the coastal resort of Hersonissos, about a hundred metres above the sea and 29 kilometres east of Heraklion – near enough to walk up, and yet high enough to be removed from the noise of the seafront road. The houses are mostly built of rubble stone and roofed with tiles; narrow paved lanes, stepped paths, arched doorways and small courtyards full of flowers and shaded by vines preserve the character of traditional Cretan building. Many of the old houses have been carefully restored in recent decades, so that the village feels lived in rather than like a museum: after the war it had emptied until barely 160 people were left in 1981, and it is tourism on the coast that has brought the number back to around six hundred. In clear weather the terraces command the Sea of Crete, the Bay of Malia and the densely built coast at the foot of the mountain; in the evening, when the lights come on below, the view is at its finest. The origin of the curious place name has not been settled. Venetian records list the hamlet as “Catafari” in 1577 and “Cutrufari” in 1630, while village tradition tells of a priest, Father Koutifaris, who gave the refugees from the coast the land around his church to build on and was honoured in the name.

The church of St Basil

The main church of the village is dedicated to St Basil (Agios Vasilios). The present building was put up in 1840, after an earlier enlargement in 1811, on the site of a single-nave church of the 14th century – or, more precisely, it has absorbed it, for the little old church serves the larger one as its sanctuary, so that two ages stand together under one roof. The walls of the medieval chapel were once covered with frescoes, of which some survive, though many have faded. Inside, the carved wooden iconostasis, made around 1850, is preserved, carrying older and more recent icons in the Cretan tradition, some of them dated 1851 and 1912; among the images of the church the holy Mandylion – the likeness of Christ not made by human hands – and the Annunciation on the arch before the sanctuary, and the Ascension within it, with its attendant angels and apostles, stand out, and there are remains of the Crucifixion and of the women bringing myrrh to the tomb. The bell tower bears the date 1813. When the church was renovated in 2002, graves came to light beneath it, which suggests that the old chapel once served a cemetery. In this way the church joins the older history of the settlement to the life of the parish. Its patronal feast falls on 1 January, the day of St Basil, when the new year begins in Greece and the vasilopita, the New Year cake with a coin baked into it, is cut.

Three villages at the foot of Mount Charakas

Koutouloufari, Piskopiano and Ano Hersonissos form a close-knit group of old settlements above the present harbour; they lie so near one another that one hardly notices where one village ends and the next begins – a small cemetery chapel on the road is the only marker of the boundary with Piskopiano. Their lanes, courtyards and houses show another Hersonissos – not a tourist one but a farming one. These villages came into being in the centuries when the coast was thought unsafe because of pirates and the population of the ancient harbour town withdrew to the slopes; local memory has the people of the ruined port settling first at a place called Zambaniana, nearer the sea, before raids drove them higher still. Until the coming of tourism the inhabitants lived from tillage, olive trees and crafts; on the slopes stood olive groves, carob trees, almonds and vineyards, the oil and wine of the village had a good name in Ottoman times, and the harbour below was little more than a loading place. Later, from the 1960s and 1970s, some of the houses were converted into small hotels, guesthouses and tavernas.

House, courtyard and Cretan hospitality

Old Cretan houses are turned towards the inner courtyard, where a large part of daily life was played out: here the cooking and washing were done, here the harvest was dried, here people sat on summer evenings. Flowers, clay pots, vines and the coolness of the stone walls are therefore no chance decoration but the continuation of this inherited ordering of the house. Towards the lane the buildings often show nothing but a wall and a gate; only on entering does one see the well, the bread oven, the outside staircase to the upper floor. When it is told how the women sat knitting on their doorsteps and offered passers-by a sprig of basil and a glass of fresh water, it is this culture of hospitality that is meant.

Cretan cooking and summer festivals

In summer the inhabitants and the cultural associations put on Cretan evenings and small festivals at which the lyra and the lute are played and the old dances danced; the three villages take it in turns, and there is usually something on at least once a week. In the tavernas, whose tables stand on the terraces and in the lanes, the dishes of the island’s cooking are served: dakos, the barley rusk topped with tomato and fresh cheese, snails, wild greens, oven-braised lamb, little cheese pies with honey and, to finish, a glass of raki. A stroll through the village is best combined with the walk to Piskopiano, where a museum of rural life is housed in an old olive mill of the 19th century, and with the descent to Hersonissos.

How to walk round Koutouloufari

Koutouloufari is a place for an unhurried walk. There are steps, slopes and uneven paving; the car is left at the edge of the village, for the lanes are narrow and on summer evenings reserved for pedestrians. Those without a car take the bus to Hersonissos and walk or take a taxi for the last kilometre uphill. On foot, in return, one notices the details: the texture of the masonry, old doors with their ironwork, wells and the shade of the flowering courtyards. The village is at its quietest in the morning, when the tavernas are still shut and the church stands open; at its liveliest after sunset.