The popular culture of Chios was fortunate, during its vibrant era, to have K. Kanelakis, who believed in the value of documenting it. He had the abilities to research in the best way possible and the endurance to work tirelessly, collecting the wealth of the island until the end of his life. Prominent scholars (K. Krumbacher, H. Pernot, G. Psycharis, A. Paspatis, G. Zolotas, D. Loukatos) spoke admirably of "the first systematic collector of Chian folklore" and of the Chian Analects, a milestone book in Chian studies. From 1872, he participated in the "Living Monuments" contest of the Zografion School of Constantinople of the Hellenic Philological Society and won the first prize seven times. He gathered Chian words from his experiences, his searches in the villages of Chios, and from codes, as well as songs, riddles, proverbs, wordplay, wishes, curses, fairy tales, traditions, and various other materials. He planned to create a Chian dictionary and had compiled extensive lists, much of which he provided for A. Paspatis' Chian Glossary. The unpublished information found in his manuscripts enriches Chian language and folklore in all its forms, and a multi-page Byzantine dream interpreter is preserved, consisting of 190 alphabetically arranged entries in twelve-syllable verses, with their translation into the common language, which he copied "for the dual dialect".
