Legacy’s Cultural Inspirations
“The Cycles with their trails that rise and fall, Time’s Wheel that knows the height and depth of all…All these now haunt my mind and bid me tell the accidents and fortunes that befell / A princess and her lover in the link / Of a romance in which no guile could slink. And all who love, who hold another dear, Let them all read what I have written here…”
from Erotocritos
When you step into Legacy Gastro Suites in the heart of Heraklion, you’re not just checking into a boutique hotel. You’re immersing yourself in a cultural narrative that spans centuries—where art, poetry, literature, and food intertwine to tell the story of Crete’s rich heritage.
Our suites are inspired by three monumental figures whose influence has helped shape Cretan identity and modern Greek culture: Vincenzo Cornaro, Doménikos Theotokópoulos (El Greco), and Nikos Kazantzakis. Their stories, art, and legacy breathe life into every detail of our space—from the carefully curated bookshelves to the local art adorning the walls, and even the philosophy behind the gastronomy we serve at Epsilon Restaurant.
Erotokritos: The Soul of Cretan Poetry
Cornaro’s Erotokritos is more than a love story—it’s a cornerstone of Cretan literature and one of the great masterpieces of modern Greek letters. Written in the 17th century during the island’s Cretan Renaissance, this epic romantic poem in rhyming couplets captures the passion and resistance of the Cretan soul.
Cornaro’s work flourished during the final golden age of Venetian rule (1590–1669), when Heraklion—then known as Candia—became a cultural hub that rivaled Venice itself.
His poetic legacy continues to inspire lovers, artists, and travelers alike, and finds a permanent home in the V Suite of Legacy Gastro Suites.
El Greco: Where East Meets West on Canvas
Crete was also a center of post-Byzantine art and indeed El Greco, born in Heraklion, trained as a painter of icons. Born in Heraklion as Doménikos Theotokópoulos (which is how he signed his paintings, even long after he left Crete), his Greek Orthodox family had settled in Heraklion after following initial friction with the Venetians, who were Catholic, in Chania. In Candia and Heraklion, in particular, there was a healthy cross-pollination of the Mediterranean’s Eastern and Western cultures, with some 200 painters thriving in the 16th century. After joining a painter’s guild as a young man, Theotokópoulos would go on to Venice to hone his craft before eventually settling in Toledo, Spain where he would continue to turn light and shadow into magic on the canvas.
Nikos Kazantzakis: The Voice of Modern Greece
If you flew in into Heraklion, then you landed at the Nikos Kazantzakis International Airport, named for the man whose statue sits outside the entrance of Legacy Gastro Suites: Nikos Kazantzakis. It’s difficult to overstate the importance of Kazantzakis in the pantheon of great modern Greek writers or to neatly sum up his monumental list of literary accomplishments in a short space. But what you should probably know is that before they were movies, both Zorba the Greek and The Last Temptation of Christ were acclaimed novels and Kazantzakis wrote them both. He also wrote other novels—lots of them—travel books, essays and plays and perhaps most ambitiously, he wrote a sequel to Homer’s The Odyssey, with some 33,333 verses. There is a faithful recreation of the author’s library, along with numerous copies of all his published books, at the fabulous Historical Museum of Crete in Heraklion.
An icon today, Kazantzakis was something of an iconoclast in his time. He wrote in Demotic Greek, the modern vernacular version of the Greek language, at a time when the literary fashion favored the older, classic form of Greek. He asked questions about his religious faith at a time when doing so could be and often was, construed by the powers that be as blasphemous. Consider that The Last Temptation was published in 1955, a time when the deeply conservative Greek Orthodox Church held far more sway in terms of public opinion that it does today. Indeed, the church excommunicated Kazantzakis and after his death in 1957, refused to allow him to be buried in a cemetery. Something to contemplate, perhaps, on a visit to the author’s well-maintained grave: it sits on top of a section of the ancient Venetian ramparts, from which you can see all of Heraklion before you, stretching out to the edge of the Mediterranean.
A Cultural Stay in Heraklion
Legacy Gastro Suites is more than a hotel—it’s a curated cultural journey. Nestled in the vibrant heart of Heraklion, surrounded by historic sites, museums, and theatres, it’s the perfect base to explore Crete’s timeless stories. The Historical Museum of Crete just moments away houses rare manuscripts, paintings, and even a replica of Kazantzakis’ personal library.
Whether you’re indulging in gourmet Cretan cuisine at Epsilon Restaurant, reading from our handpicked selection of local literature, or gazing out to sea from your private balcony, you’re participating in the living heritage of Crete.
In a land where poetry is spoken like prayer, art is woven into daily life, and food is the sincerest form of expression—Legacy Gastro Suites invites you to live, taste, and feel the true culture of Crete.
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