[3] He obtained secondary education on the island of Syros, then enrolled with the law faculty of the university of Athens where he studied only for a year, as his father's illness forced him to return to Heraklion.

[4] The Turkish authorities who controlled the island forced him to stop excavation three weeks later,[5] but he managed to discover storage rooms and a corner part of the throne hall of the west wing of the palace.

Stillman, Heinrich Schlieman and finally Sir Arthur John Evans, who was able to excavate the whole palace after the island gained independence from Turkey.

[7] During the violent events of August 25, 1898, when the Turks tried to suppress the Cretan revolt, his home was pillaged and burnt, and his collection was much damaged; only the rarest objects, which were kept separately, survived.

They were mostly amphoras found in the western wing of the palace, which he donated later to museums of Greece, Paris and London to promote public interest in Cnossos.