Listed 13 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for destination: "CHIOS Island NORTH AEGEAN".
So called in ancient times because of its abundant pines, it is an
island in the Aegean separated from the W coast of Turkey by a strait 8 km wide.
Its earliest inhabitants included the Pelasgi, the Lydians, and the Carians; later
it was populated by people coming from the island of Euboia. The capital of the
island, also called Chios, is one of the centers that claim to be the birthplace
of Homer. The modern city has developed over the ancient one. It is situated in
a rich industrial zone which made it a commercial center, as is attested by the
first silver stater coins, issued in the late 7th and early 6th c. B.C. with a
sphinx as an emblem. It is known that at the end of the 7th c. B.C. the city had
a democratic regime. It sided with the Persians after their conquest of Asia Minor,
and then fell under their rule. After 477 Chios entered the Delian League, remaining
a member until 412, and then entered into the second constitution under the aegis
of Athens. The center of the ancient city probably corresponded to the site of
the ancient port. Inside the castle there are traces of Roman constructions. A
necropolis of the 6th c. has been excavated, as have archaic houses on isolated
terraces. The museum houses ceramics and sculpture, the finds from the excavations
carried out at Emporio, and architectural fragments and miscellaneous objects
dating between the 7th and 4th c. B.C. A ceramics factory, which had first been
placed at Naucrati, is now attributed to Chios. The ware is characterized by decoration
in black and polychrome on a white ground, and its manufacture flourished towards
the end of the 7th c. B.C., when the products were exported all over the Mediterranean.
From Pliny (HN 36.11) we know that a family of artists was active at Chios: Melas,
Mikkiades, and Archermos, the grandson of Melas and father of Boupalos and Athenis.
Delphinion, a small port situated 15 km N of Chios, served as an Athenian
naval base during the Peloponnesian War. The acropolis was destroyed by the Spartans
in 412 B.C. It was enclosed by a wall, parts of which have been found, along with
several towers. To the NE of the acropolis an artificial platform has been discovered,
dating from the end of the 4th c., on which there are the remains of houses datable
from the 4th to the 2d c. B.C.
Emporio is located 7 km SE of Phyrgi. The horseshoe-shaped port is
open to the SE, and immediately to its N is the hill of the Prophet Elias, 240
m high. The fortified city of the Early Bronze Age was on a small promontory to
the S of the port. Later the settlement moved, occupying the whole hill on which
the acropolis was located, and a large area around its foot. The city was destroyed
and abandoned at the end of the Mycenaean period, ca. 1100 B.C. The pottery shows
that the Mycenaean occupation of Emporio goes from Mycenaean III A to Mycenaean
III C. Beneath the Mycenaean land, there are six levels that seem to correspond
to those at Calcolitico in W Anatolia, and are contemporary with Minoan I in Crete.
The neolithic levels seem to belong to the earliest emergence of the neolithic
cultural age. In the Classical and Roman periods there was a small city near the
port, but in a different location. Between the port and the acropolis there are
four successive retaining walls, one above the other; and on the top of this terrace
there are rich votive deposits dating from the end of the 8th c. to 600 B.C. On
the hill of the Prophet Elias, N of the acropolis, a megaron and a Sanctuary to
Athena have been found. The city was probably abandoned in 600 B.C., while the
sanctuary was frequented intermittently from the 8th c. The temple was constructed
in the middle of the 6th c. and remained in use until the Hellenistic period.
It has a rectangular plan, with a portico and a square cella with a base for the
cult statue and an altar. It was destroyed and rebuilt in the 4th c. B.C. The
votive offerings were scattered on the floor of the cella and heaped behind the
altar. They come from three distinct periods: ca. 600, mid 6th to mid 4th c. B.C.,
and from the period of the reconstruction. The city is outside the acropolis wall
to the W. The houses are of the megaron type, oriented to the S, with two columns
in the portico, a central door, and three internal columns. Others are without
portico, oriented either N or S, and have a square plan. They were abandoned at
the end of the 7th c. B.C. Beside the port are the remains of an apsidal sanctuary
from mid 5th c. with four Ionic prostyle columns; and the remnants of an earlier
4th c. sanctuary. Hellenistic remains are rare. The construction was oriented
to the E, with the entrance before the entrance to the port. The basilica which
in part overlays the temple is perhaps Roman, but the other remains are from the
6th and 7th c. A.D., when the basilica became a church with a baptistery. The
settlement ended with the arrival of the Arabs in A.D. 665.
Pindakas or New Emporio, whose name perhaps derives from pidax, meaning
fountain or spring, is located to the W. It is a small hill about 1.5 km from
the port of Emporio, in the S part of the island of Chios, in a strategic position.
A large polygonal wall has been explored which forms two terraces with the remains
of houses from the Classic and Hellenistic periods. The finds show that the first
period of occupation was not earlier than mid 5th c. B.C., and continued until
the end of the 4th c., from which there are the incomplete remains of a building,
perhaps a temple. On the lower terrace there are late Roman constructions, abandoned
contemporaneously with the houses at the port of Emporio, in the 7th c. A.D.
G. Bermond Montanari, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
One of the Sporades in the Aegean
Sea, separated from the mainland of Asia
Minor by a strait five miles wide in its narrowest part; also the chief town
of this island.
Its origin is lost in the remotest antiquity. In historical times
it became a rich Ionian colony with a great navy, and took an important part in
the Medic wars. Allied with Athens
during the Peloponnesian War, it was conquered by Lacedaemon,
wavered in allegiance between Phillip of Macedon
and the Persians, entered into an alliance with the Romans, and at last became
a Roman possession (70 B.C.). Under the Byzantine Empire it was ravaged by the
Arabs in the eight century, and by the Turkish pirate, Tsachas, in 1089. The Venetians
occupied it from the beginning of the thirteenth century till 1261, and the Genoese
from 1346 to 1566, when it was conquered by Piali Pasha. Since then it has remained
a Turkish possession, except for a short occupation by the Tuscans in 1595 and
by the Venetians in 1694.
In 1822, on the occasion of the Greek insurrection, 30,000 Greeks
were killed or sold as slaves, and 20,000 fled from the island, most of them to
Syros, where they built Hermopolis.
On 22 March 1881, a great earthquake afflicted the island. With some neighbouring
islets Chios forms a sanjak of the archipelago vilayet.
The population is said to be 60,000: 1500 Mussulmans, 400 Catholics,
250 Jews, and the rest Greeks. The town itself (Scio) has 15,000 inhabitants.
Chios is a metropolitan see for the Greeks; they have several churches and schools,
and a library. There is also a Latin bishopric, a suffragan of Naxos.
The fertile valleys of Chios are like vast orchards, in which grow
oranges, lemons, and other fruits. The island also produces wine, mastic, resin
of a lentiscus, used chiefly in perfuming the raki, turpentine, silk and cotton,
wax, marble, and antimony. Chios is one of the sites that lay claim to the honour
of Homer's birthplace; the Dascalopetra,
or Homer's school, a rock where he is said to have taught, is still shown. Chios
is also the birthplace of the tragic poet Ion, the historian Theopompus, the philosopher
Metrodorus, and many artists.
S. Petrides, ed.
Transcribed by: Polychronios N. Moniodis
This extract is cited June 2003 from The Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent online edition URL below.
Chios lies 58 km south of Lesbos, and 8 km from Asia Minor. It had
an area of 842 sq km. A mountain range traverses the island from north to south.
The name Chios, according to some authorities, is of Phoenician origin and means
mastic. Chios is the main source of mastic, a resin of the lentisk tree used as
a varnish and a liqueur flavoring. The island has been occupied since the beginning
of the Bronze Age. After 1000 B.C. Ionian settlers established themselves on Chios,
and in historical times, this island became a member of the Ionic Confederacy.
The common sanctuary was the Panionion in Asia Minor. An important school of sculptors
sprung up in Chios in the sixth century B.C. From 512 to 479 B.C. Chios was under
Persian rule. Thereafter Chios became a member of the Attic Maritime League.
The modern Scio. One of the largest and most famous islands of the Aegean, lay opposite to the peninsula of Clazomenae, on the coast of Ionia. It was colonized by the Ionians at the time of their great migration, and remained an independent and powerful maritime state till the defeat of the Ionian Greeks by the Persians, B.C. 494, after which the Chians were subjected to the Persians. The battle of Mycale, 479, freed Chios from the Persian yoke, and it became a member of the Athenian League, in which it was for a long time the closest and most favoured ally of Athens; but an unsuccessful attempt to revolt, in 412, led to its conquest and devastation. Chios was celebrated for its wine and marble. Of all the States which aspired to the honour of being the birthplace of Homer, Chios was generally considered by the ancients to have the best claim; and it numbered among its natives the historian Theopompus, the poet Theocritus, and other eminent men. Its chief city, Chios (Khio), stood on the eastern side of the island.
This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
CHIOS: A Historic Island on the Verge of "Discovery"
Large island off the coast of Asia
Minor, south of Lesbos,
and main city on that island.
Chios was a member city of the Ionian Confederacy, the Paniones, grouping
cities founded in Asia Minor
by Ionians fleeing the southern shores of the gulf of Corinth
west of Sicyon in northern
Peloponnese when the area
was conquered by Achaeans.
Chios was the birthplace of the great mathematician Hippocrates of
Chios, who “flourished” toward the middle of the Vth century B. C.
Bernard Suzanne (page last updated 1998), ed.
This extract is cited July 2003 from the Plato and his dialogues URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
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