Following Greek independence, he had a tumultuous public career, playing a prominent part in the granting of the first Constitution of the Kingdom of Greece and later being sentenced to death and pardoned.

Indeed, its literary quality led Nobel laureate Giorgos Seferis to call Makriyiannis one of the greatest masters of Modern Greek prose.

At age seven, he was given as a foster son to a wealthy man from Levadeia, but the menial labour and beatings he endured were, in his own words, "his death".

[10] After the Acropolis of Athens was surrendered by the Ottomans in June 1822, Makriyiannis was appointed Supervisor of Public Order in the city by the executive authority of Roumeli on 1 January 1823.

In October 1823, he led a force of Roumeliots in the Peloponnese, and fought alongside the government of Georgios Kountouriotis against the rebels in the civil war.

[10] In March 1825, after the Peloponnese had been invaded by Egyptian forces, he was appointed politarch (head of public order) of Kyparissia and took part in the defence of Neokastro.

More chieftains soon arrived in Myloi and Ibrahim Pasha, the commander of the Egyptian forces, was unable to take the position, despite numerical superiority and the launching of fierce attacks on 12 and 14 June.

He managed to repel a fierce assault against the Odeon of Herodes Atticus on 7 October, and during the defence of the Acropolis, he sustained heavy injures three times, to the head and to the neck.

After Governor Ioannis Kapodistrias arrived in Greece, he appointed Makriyiannis "General Leader of the Executive Authority of the Peloponnese", based in Argos, in 1828.

Makriyiannis also believed that the Prime Minister, the Bavarian von Armansperg, was personally responsible for the serious problems faced by the newly formed state.

[10] He often voiced his demand for constitutional rule, even though the royal administration had initially held him in high esteem and given him the rank of colonel.

[1] During the King's absence from Greece on the occasion of his marriage to Queen Amalia (late 1836 – early 1837), public discontent with von Armansperg was at its peak.

Makriyiannis, in his capacity as President of the Athens city council, proposed, in January 1837, the adoption of a resolution to be handed to the King upon his return requesting the granting of a Constitution.

Not long before that, at a banquet attended by former fighters of the War of Independence, such as Kountouriotis, Kolokotronis and others, Makriyiannis had toasted the health of the royal couple, adding "may God enlighten them to rule us through constitutional laws, in accordance with the fatherland's sacrifices".

Von Armansperg immediately dissolved the city council, fired Mayor Petrakis and had Makriyiannis placed under house arrest.

He opposed what he perceived as a continued degradation of the veterans of the War of Independence, and had repeatedly been considered suspect of plotting against King Otho.

The blockade of Peiraeus by the French and British fleets also led to the imposition of Kallergis as Minister of War, despite his previous attempts at overthrowing the King.

[1] Makriyiannis was restored to the ranks he had been stripped of as a result of his trial, and was re-elected as a representative of Athens to the new National (Constitutional) Assembly of 1864.

[11] Makriyiannis concluded work on his Memoirs in the years before his imprisonment; the last entries seem to be from September or October 1850, as evinced by his references to the events of that period.

[10] In the text of the Memoirs, one can see not only the personal adventures and disappointments of his long public career, but, more significantly, his views on people, situations and events, phrased clearly and quite often passionately.

[10] Kostis Palamas, in 1911, called his work "incomparable in its kind, a masterpiece of his illiterate, but strong and autonomous mind" (ibid).

[10] Makriyiannis, having been ignored by history, and hardly mentioned by chroniclers of the War of Independence, had renewed interest in the revolution by offering a significant personal testimony to historical research.

Since then hundreds of essays have been written on the subject of his Memoirs, and it would be fair to say that the chronicler has overshadowed the fighter, and with good reason, according to Sphyroeras.

[10] Spyros Asdrachas has noted that: The fact that an illiterate man managed to use the Demotic speech ... to achieve an expressive density and dynamism entirely unusual of Greek prose made a terrific impression on people.The general's objectivity, however, has often been questioned.

[10] A few months after completing his Memoirs, on New Year's Eve in 1851, Makriyiannis started to write another "history", as he called it, which he interrupted rather abruptly in late March 1852, when he was under house arrest.

It also shows Makriyiannis's deep religious feeling; he turns away from guns, instead seeking the nation's salvation through divine intervention.

Furthermore, as Sphyroeras points out, the work is unique in Modern Greek literature in its subject matter, and is, as the Memoirs, a significant source of linguistic and cultural information.