Samos |
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![]() Samos City |
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Geography | |
Island Chain: | North Aegean |
Area:[1] | 477.395 km² (184 sq.mi.) |
Highest Mountain: | Mt. Kerkis (1,434 m (4,705 ft)) |
Government | |
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Periphery: | North Aegean |
Prefecture: | Samos |
Capital: | Vathy |
Statistics | |
Population: | 33,814 (as of 2001) |
Density: | 71 /km² (183 /sq.mi.) |
Postal Code: | 931 xx |
Area Code: | 227x0 |
License Code: | MO |
Website | |
www.samos.gr |
Samos (Greek: Σάμος) is a Greek island in the North Aegean sea, south of Chios, north of Patmos and the Dodecanese, and off the Ionian coast of Turkey.
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The area of the island is 478 km2 (184.6 sq mi), 43 km (27 mi) long and 13 km (8 mi) wide. It is one of the most important and fertile of the islands of the Aegean Sea. It is separated from Anatolia, by the approximately 1 mile (1.6 km)-wide Mycale Strait. While largely mountainous, Samos has several relatively large and fertile plains.
The island is fertile, and a great portion of it is covered with vineyards, the wine from the Vathy grapes enjoying an especially high reputation. The most important plains are that of Pythagorio, in the southeast, Karlovasi in the northwest, and Marathokampos in the southwest. The island's population is 33,814, which is the 9th largest of the Greek islands. The Samian climate is typically Mediterranean, with mild rainy winters, and warm rainless summers.
The largest mountain is the Ampelos massif, which occupies the center of the island and rises to 1,095 metres (3,590 ft). The island's highest point is the summit of the Kerkis range, at 1,434 metres (4,700 ft). The mountains are a continuation of the Mycale range on the Anatolian mainland.
The Samian economy depends mainly on agriculture and the tourist industry which has been growing steadily since the early 1980s. The main agricultural products include grapes, honey, olives, olive oil, citrus fruit, dried figs and almonds, and flowers. The Muscat grape is the main crop used for wine production. Samian wine is also exported under several other appellations. Samian wines have won several international and domestic awards.
With the neighbouring islands of Icaria and Fourni, the island of Samos is administered as part of the Samos Prefecture. Samos includes four of the eight municipalities of the prefecture, which constitute more than 77 percent of the prefecture's population (2001 census). The island's capital and main port is the city of Vathy, most commonly called Samos; other municipalities are Karlovasi and Pythagoreio. The smallest of the component municipalities is Marathokampos.
In classical antiquity the island was a centre of Ionian culture and luxury, renowned for its Samian wines and its red pottery (called Samian ware by the Romans). Its most famous building, was the Ionic order archaic Temple of goddess Hera - the Heraion.
Concerning the earliest history of Samos, literary tradition is singularly defective. At the time of the great migrations it received an Ionian population which traced its origin to Epidaurus in Argolis: Samos became one of the twelve members of the Ionian League. By the 7th century BC it had become one of the leading commercial centres of Greece. This early prosperity of the Samians seems largely due to the islands position near trade-routes which facilitated the importation of textiles from inner Asia Minor. But the Samians also developed an extensive oversea commerce. They helped to open up trade with the Black Sea and with Pharaonic Egypt, and were credited with having been the first Greeks to reach the Straits of Gibraltar.
Their commerce brought them into close relations with Cyrene, and probably also with Corinth and Chalcis, but made them bitter rivals of their neighbor Miletus. The feud between these two states broke out into open strife during the Lelantine War (7th century BC), with which we may connect a Samian innovation in Greek naval warfare, the use of the trireme. The result of this conflict was to confirm the supremacy of the Milesians in eastern, waters for the time being; but in the 6th century the insular position of Samos preserved it from those aggressions at the hands of Asiatic kings to which Miletus was henceforth exposed. About 535 BC, when the existing oligarchy was overturned by the tyrant Polycrates, Samos reached the height of its prosperity. Its navy not only protected it from invasion, but ruled supreme in Aegean waters. The city was beautified with public works, and its school, of sculptors, metal-workers and engineers achieved high repute.
In the 6th century BC Samos was ruled by the famous tyrant Polycrates. During his reign, two working groups under the lead of the engineer Eupalinos dug a tunnel through Mount Kastro to build an aqueduct to supply the ancient capital of Samos with fresh water, as this was of the utmost defensive importance (since being underground, it was not easily detected by an enemy who could otherwise cut off the supply). Eupalinos' tunnel is particularly notable for being the first tunnel in history to be methodically dug from both ends. With a length of over 1km, Eupalinos' subterranean aqueduct is today regarded as one of the masterpieces of ancient engineering. The aqueduct is now part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Pythagoreion.
After Polycrates death Samos suffered a severe blow when the Persian Achaemenid Empire conquered and partly depopulated the island. It had regained much of its power when in 499 BC it joined the general revolt of the Ionian city-states against Persia; but owing to its long-standing jealousy of Miletus it rendered indifferent service, and at the decisive battle of Lade (494 BC) part of its contingent of sixty ships was guilty of outright treachery. In 479 BC the Samians led the revolt against Persia.
During the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), Samos took the side of Athens against Sparta, providing their port to the Athenian fleet. In the Delian League they held a position of special privilege and remained actively loyal to Athens until 440 when a dispute with Miletus, which the Athenians had decided against them, induced them to secede. With a fleet of sixty ships they held their own for some time against a large Athenian fleet led by Pericles himself, but after a protracted siege were forced to capitulate. It was punished, but Thucydides tells us not as harshly as other states which rebelled against Athens. Most in the past had been forced to pay tribute but Samos was only told to repay the damages that the rebellion cost the Athenians: 1,300 talents, to pay back in installments of 50 talents per annum.
At the end of the Peloponnesian War, Samos appears as one of the most loyal dependencies of Athens, serving as a base for the naval war against the Peloponnesians and as a temporary home of the Athenian democracy during the revolution of the Four Hundred at Athens (411 BC), and in the last stage of the war was rewarded with the Athenian franchise. This friendly attitude towards Athens was the result of a series of political revolutions which ended in the establishment of a democracy. After the downfall of Athens, Samos was besieged by Lysander and again placed under an oligarchy.
In 394 the withdrawal of the Spartan navy induced the island to declare its independence and reestablish a democracy, but by the peace of Antalcidas (387) it fell again under Persian dominion. It was recovered by the Athenians in 366 after a siege of eleven months, and received a strong body of military settlers, the cleruchs which proved vital in the Social War (357-355 BC). After the Lamian War (322), when Athens was deprived of Samos, the vicissitudes of the island can no longer be followed.
Perhaps the most famous persons ever connected with classical Samos were the philosopher Pythagoras and Aesop. In 1955 the town of Tigani was renamed Pythagoreio in honor of the philosopher.
Other notable personalities include the philosopher Epicurus, who was of Samian birth and the astronomer Aristarchus of Samos, whom history credits with the first recorded heliocentric model of the solar system. The historian Herodotus, known by his Histories resided in Samos for a while.
Samos is also notable in the history of art, having produced a school of sculptors and achitects that included Rhoecus, the architect of the temple of Hera, and the great sculptor and inventor Theodorus, who is said to have invented with Rhoecus the art of casting statues in bronze.
The vases of Samos were among the most characteristic products of lonian pottery in the 6th century.
For some time (about 275-270 B.C.) Samos served as a base for the Egyptian fleet of the Ptolemies, at other periods it recognized the overlordship of Seleucid Syria. In 189 B.C. it was transferred by the Romans to their vassal, the Attalid dynasty's Hellenistic kingdom of Pergamum, in Asia Minor.
Enrolled from 133 in the Roman province of Asia Minor, Samos sided with Aristonicus (132) and Mithridates (88) against its overlord, and consequently forfeited its autonomy, which it only temporarily recovered between the reigns of Augustus and Vespasian. Nevertheless, Samos remained comparatively flourishing, and was able to contest with Smyrna and Ephesus the title first city of lonia; it was chiefly noted as a health resort and for the manufacture of pottery. Since Emperor Diocletian's Tetrarchy it became part of the Provincia Insularum, in the diocese of Asiana in the eastern empire's pretorian prefecture of Oriens.
As part of the Byzantine Empire, Samos became the head of the Aegean theme (military district). After the 13th century it passed through much the same changes of government as Chios, and, like the latter island, became the property of the Genoese firm of Giustiniani (1346-1566; 1475 interrupted by an Ottoman period).
During the early years of the Ottoman Empire most Samians abandoned the island. Those remaining lived inland in small settlements up in the mountains, hiding from pirates and other invaders. Around the 17th century Samos was granted the status of a semi-independent state. Many Greeks of Samian decent as well as others from Greek speaking territories settled on the island. The village of Mytilinioi for example, was inhabited by people from the island of Mytilini. Other settlers followed from various provinces in mainland Greece and as far away as Albania. A substantial population came from Ipiros and therefore the accent of the Samians even till the present day resembles that of mainland Greece. Samos, (Ottoman Turkish: سيسام Sisam) belonged to the Ottoman Empire since 1533, as part of Elayet of Djeza'ir-i Bahr-i Sefid until the year 1832.
During the Greek War of Independence, Samos bore a conspicuous part, setting up a revolutionary government under the following heads of local government:
Canaris blew up a Turkish frigate in the strait between the island and Mount Mycale. He did this in full view of the Turkish army that had been assembled for invasion. This success caused the Turks to withdraw. Nevertheless, the treaty concluding the war again put Samos under Turkish rule.
After repeatedly rebelling since 1835, the Samians had achieved self-government. It had become a semi-independent state tributary to Turkey, paying the annual sum of £2700.[2] It was governed by a Christian of Greek descent though nominated by the Porte, who bore the title of "Prince."[3] The prince was assisted in his function as chief executive by a 4-member senate. These werr chosen by him out of eight candidates nominated by the four districts of the island: Vathy, Chora, Marathokoumbo and Karlovasi. The actual legislative power belonged to a chamber of 36 deputies, presided over by the Greek Orthodox Metropolitan. The seat of the government was Vathy.
The consecutive 'princely' governors were:
The population in 1900 was about 54,830, not including the 15,000 Samians living nearby on the mainland. The predominant religion was the Orthodox Greek. The metropolitan district included Samos and Ikaria. In 1900 there were 634 foreigners on the island (523 Hellenes, 13 Germans, 29 French, 28 Austrians and 24 of other nationalities).
The modern capital of the island was, until the early 20th century, at Khora, about 2 miles (3.2 km) from the sea and from the site of the ancient city.
After reconsidering political conditions, the capital was moved to Vathy, at the head of a deep bay on the North coast. This became the residence of the prince and the seat of government.
Since then a new town has grown up, with a harbour.
The popular sentiment for merger with the Greek state of Hellas was not satisfied until 1913 when it was included in Greece as a result of the Balkan Wars. Samos has a sister town called Samo which is located in Calabria Italy
On August 3 1989, a Shorts 330 aircraft of the Olympic Airways (now Olympic Airlines) crashed near Samos Airport; thirty-one passengers died. In the summer of 2000 a fire burned about 30% of the island's forests.
The island is the location of the joint UNESCO World Heritage Sites of the Heraion of Samos and the Pythagoreion which were inscribed in UNESCO's World Heritage list in 1992.[1]
This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
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