Venice, Symposium entitled "The influence of Byzantium in Venice" Keynote speaker Mr. George Ploumidis, Emeritus Professor and former Vice Rector of the University of Ioannina - Director of the Greek Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies in Venice and Dr. Elizabeth Grapsa, Historian - Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies
In Greek and Medieval Greek and Medieval Studies: George Plumidis, Professor Emeritus and Former Vice-Rector of the University of Ioannina; Director of the Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies in Venice.
The Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies in Venice was founded in 1951. It is a public law entity, which is funded and supervised by the Ministries of National Education and Foreign Affairs. The institution is the only Greek Research Centre abroad, and its main objective is the study of Byzantine and post-Byzantine history. The Institute’s activities are publications (researchers’ books as well as the scientific journal “Thesaurisms” on an annual basis) and scholarships (it offers six postgraduate scholarships (1-3 years), which include for scholarship holders’ accommodation and a monthly allowance).
The institute owns real and movable property, which comes from the donation of the Greek community of Venice (35 properties including the Church of St. George, the Flanginius School and the Museum).
The Center of Mediterranean and Island Culture “MESONISOS”, in the framework of the visit to Venice, discovered that Gerasimos Messinis, unpaid consul and president of the Hellenic Community of Venice in 1950, was a Lefkadite. We quote a text about the life and work of Gerasimos Messinis, as described in his blog (http://elgeorgakis.blogspot.gr) by the well-known Lefkadian journalist of the Athenian newspaper “TA NEA”, Elias Georgakis.
“His name was Gerasimos Messinis (1897-1957). He came from the town of Lefkada. In the early 1950s he was unpaid consul and president of the Greek community in Venice. He linked his name with the transfer of the community’s movable and immovable property to the Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies in Venice. He was a scholar and merchant. He researched the Venetian occupation in the State Archives of Venice together with the Venetian historian Koninos Merzio (1886-1971) and sent this information to their friend, the historian Koninos Machairas, who recorded it in his most important book: ‘Lefkas during the Venetian rule’.
On 8 February 1949, according to a document preserved in the Institute: ‘The newly elected president of the Greek Community, Gerasimos Messinis, announces to Metropolitan Germanos of Thyatira that after ‘forty years of foreign control’ the historic Community of Venice ‘breathes from two days the air of freedom’. The extraordinary general assembly elected the new board of directors and then passed by acclamation the resolution drawn up ‘jointly between the Greek and Italian Governments on the transfer of the property to the Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies’.
Gerasimos Messinis died in 1957 and his grave is in Venice. He had two children, Sotiris and Mario, who live in Venice and visit Lefkada in the summer. A street in the town of Lefkada Island bears his name.
