A Greek peasant on the Limassol works

Donisthorpe Donne was district officer in Limassol from 1880 to 1882. He was the person who decided and designed the costumes of the Pioneer Regiment. He was based in Limassol but travelled all over the island and enjoyed illustrating the country and its people. Variations in the costumes portrayed by Donne attest to ethnic diversity on the island. The watercolour depicts a Greek peasant wearing a pair of black boots, a dark pantaloon (vraka), a white shirt, a dark gillet and a red waistband. On his head, he is wearing the fez with a white band around it. The inscription does not match the actual colouring used in the picture. The peasant appears resting while carrying a water jug on his shoulder. Traditionally, Cypriot Greeks were dressed in dark colours and white shirts.The predominance of dark colours dates back to archbishop’s Kyprianos’ cautious admonition to the island’s Christian subjects in 1821 on the occasion of the mainland Greek insurgency against the Ottomans: ‘Let your clothing be humble and submissive, your headdress, your waistbands and your boots black, for this is the command of our master the Agha, and whoever is caught with foreign dress will be severely punished’ (Archbishopric Codex A). Dark colours were associated with the subject populations of the Ottoman empire but they also have a bearing on the Orthodox colour symbolism of repentance and mourning.