(b Melos; d Feb 16, 1936).
Greek archaeologist. Hazzidakis was a doctor by training, but his enthusiasm for the archaeological heritage of Crete led to his foundation in 1878 of the Herakleion Society for the Promotion of Learning. He became President of the Society (or ‘Syllogos’) in 1883 and thereafter devoted his time to one of its particular aims, the preservation and study of the ancient monuments of Crete. Under the aegis of the Syllogos, Hazzidakis began a small museum in Herakleion where chance finds and gifts from private collectors were housed. This formed the basis for the now world-famous Archaeological Museum of Herakleion. After the liberation of Crete from Turkish rule in 1900, Hazzidakis and his colleague Stephanos Xanthoudides were recognized as the two first Ephors of Cretan Antiquities. Hazzidakis collaborated with foreign scholars (especially the Italian Frederico Halbherr) who excavated for the Syllogos and negotiated on Arthur Evans’s behalf for the purchase of the site of Knossos. In ...