Crete can rightly be described as a vast Byzantine park, with hundreds of churches adorned with remarkable frescoes. Most of these paintings date from the period of Venetian rule, when Byzantine religious tradition continued to flourish on the island and gradually incorporated artistic influences from the West. Together, these monuments illustrate the development of ecclesiastical painting from the early Byzantine period to the renowned Cretan School of icon painting.

Entire regions of Crete, particularly the historical provinces of Kissamos, Selino and Pediada, preserve an exceptionally large number of frescoed churches. Many are small, single-nave rural chapels whose modest exterior gives little indication of the artistic treasures preserved inside. Their walls portray scenes from the life of Christ and the Virgin Mary, figures of saints and hierarchs, representations of the Last Judgement and, occasionally, rare episodes associated with the saint to whom each church is dedicated.

Fewer frescoed churches survive in areas such as the former province of Temenos, around Candia, where prolonged warfare, repeated destruction and the great Ottoman siege of the city caused extensive damage to religious monuments and settlements. Elsewhere, frescoes survived beneath layers of plaster or limewash, which sometimes protected them from deliberate destruction, smoke, humidity and the passage of time.

The scale of this artistic heritage is impressive. In the Topographical Catalogue of the Frescoed Churches of Crete, compiled by the Italian archaeologist and researcher Giuseppe Gerola in the early 20th century, more than 800 frescoed churches are recorded. Many remain scattered throughout the Cretan countryside, forming one of the richest collections of medieval ecclesiastical painting in the Mediterranean.