ATHINA

Born in Crete, the "island of courage", Athina finds herself condemned, from an early age one, to live like a boy. Initiated to freedom by an Orthodox pope, she joins the resistance early on against the Turkish occupier. To escape enemy reprisals, she seeks shelter in Chios, unaware that a heinous slaughter is threatening this peaceful island. Full of hatred, she lands in Missolonghi where Lord Byron, who has abandoned everything to take up the Greek cause, is currently staying. A new disillusion: anarchy prevails in the besieged city and the disheartened poet succumbs to his disease.

Athina falls in love with a former Napoleon soldier: Lucien. Together, they witness the fall of Missolonghi, then join the troops of a French adventurer, Colonel Fabvier, who has his heart set on liberating Athens and the island of Chios. But a double disappointment awaits the young girl... Forlorn and forsaken, she lands in Rhodes where she survives by serving as a guide for foreign travelers. This is where she meets French writers Gustave Flaubert and Alphonse de Lamartine, who just lost his daughter Julie in Lebanon.

Back in Crete, she takes part, with her son Andreas, in one of the most episodes of the XIXth century: the desperate resistance of a handful of Christians entrenched in the Arkadi monastery…

From Crete to Rhodes, from Chios to Navarin and from Athens to Missolonghi, memorable figures move about in this vast historical fresco which takes place during the Greek War of Independence…