Tinos

This is an excerpt from the book Travels through History : 9 Greek Islands , newly available on Amazon.

The first inhabitants of Tinos were probably the Phoenicians, followed by the Ionians in the 11th century BCE. Two tombs from the Mycenaean period have been discovered in the area of Kyra Xeni, and about fifty archaeological sites in the area of Xombourgo.

The island came under the authority of the Persians in 490 BCE, but the inhabitants rapidly regained their freedom after the battle of Marathon ten years later. Tinos became a member of the Delian Alliance, which was dominated by Athens, and instituted democracy. In 386 BC, the island became independent.

Tinos soon came under the authority of Philip of Macedonia. After the death of his son Alexander the Great, the island was ruled by the Egyptian Ptolemies, the successors of Alexander the Great. In the 2nd century BC, Tinos, with all the other islands and the mainland of Greece, became a part of the Roman Empire.

During Byzantine times, the inhabitants moved from the seaside to the interior of the island in order to protect themselves from the many devastating pirate raids. One of the few things known about Tinos during the Byzantine times is that it was a time of epidemics, fear, and insecurity for the island.

Tinos is recommended for those people who want to visit an island in The Cyclades that has more visitors from the rest of Greece than non-Greek visitors. Tinos is the most important Orthodox centre of worship in Greece but is also an important Catholic centre too, due to the Venetians holding out against the Turks until 1715, a lot longer than the rest of Greece. This mixture of religions is so rare in Greece and gives the island a particular character.

The main reason for the influx of Greek visitors is the church at the top of the hill in Tinos Town. The Panayia Evangelistra was built on the spot where an amazing icon was found in 1822 by a local nun, Ayia Pelayia. The nun is now the ‘patron saint’ of Tinos. The timing couldn’t have been better as the Greek War of Independence had only started the previous year and the ‘chance’ discovery served to reinforce the relationship between the Greek Orthodox Church and the cause of Greek independence from Turkey.

In the church today, visitors can still pay homage to the icon, even though it’s well hidden beneath a layer of jewels and other gifts. Some pilgrims ascend the plush, red-carpeted stairs to the church on their knees, symbolising the veneration the icon can generate in some believers. In the crypt there’s a mausoleum to the sailors who were killed when the Greek cruiser, Elli, was torpedoed by an Italian submarine when she was at anchor of Tinos in 1940. There’s another memorial to this ship on the waterfront about three hundred yards to the east of the ferry terminal. The tragedy was that the Elli was taking part in the celebrations of the Feast of the Assumption when she was torpedoed and no one was on lookout as Greece was still at peace with the Fascist states of Northern Europe.

Tinos is renowned throughout Greece for the excellence of their craftsmen in producing marble ornamentation and this is particularly evident in the town of Pyrgos with its School of Fine Arts and Museum of Marble Crafts. Tinos is also famous for its dovecotes – there’s even a dovecote trail to follow if you hire a car.  I’d heard a village called Tarambados had a great selection of dovecotes, so I caught the bus to the interior and got off at the village. There was no one around, but I saw at least five dovecotes in the mid-distance and sure enough there were soon some signs, which took me by streams, through fields, and along walls. The fields were full of vegetables and the hedges and low trees were full of the sounds of insects, especially bees who were attracted by the copious wild flowers. The dovecotes were bigger than the houses in the village and were attractively decorated with intricate triangles, circles, and honeycomb patterns.

When the Fourth Crusade lurched violently out of control and sacked and captured Constantinople in 1204, instead of heading to the Holy Land, the ramifications for Tinos were enormous. The island was no longer part of the Byzantine Empire and instead was ruled by a private Venetian citizen named Andrea Ghisi, who captured the island in 1207, along with his brother Jeremiah. One of their first moves was to erect fortifications on the Exobourgo Mountain, making it a stronghold. The “Castle of Saint Helen” as it was called, took its name from a chapel on the peak.

If you’d like to read more, the book Travels through History : 9 Greek Islands  is newly available on Amazon.