This text is an eyewitness account of the crucial first five years of the War of Candia (1645–1669), also known as the Cretan War and Fifth Ottoman-Venetian War: the war between the Republic of Venice and her allies against the Ottoman Empire and the Barbary States. It is a primary source for the longest Mediterranean conflict of the early modern age.
Composed by Emmanuel Mormori, a hitherto obscure Greek Cretan nobleman, the text is accompanied by an extensive introduction focusing on the author, who appears to have been a Venetian intelligence agent in Ottoman-conquered Chania (in Crete), and, for a period of five years, became key to the Venetian war effort. The volume includes a dossier of documents illuminating this figure, culled from the collections of the State Archive of Venice.