This paper (Demoticists between Crete and Constantinople) deals with expressions of demoticism emanating from Autonomous Crete which do not fit comfortably into well polished polar interpretive schemes; demoticism does not always align with parliamentarianism and/or nationalism. I argue that as examined here, the instance of the ‘Society for the National Language’ in Chania (1909) needs to be handled by considering the stakes involved both in the transition from the Ottoman Empire to nation-statehood and the expansionist modernization of the Greek State. At any given historical moment, the dynamics of the relationship between national identities and statehood may prove to be more nuanced and complex, more open to the eventualities of the future, than ex post factum projections seem to allow.