PATMOS TRAVEL GUIDE

PATMOS > HISTORY

HISTORY

We know little about the first inhabitants of the island. Patmos was inhabited by the Dorians and later by the Ions.

From the 4th to the 6th BC the island prospered as evidenced by the remains of the acropolis on Kastelo hill. The island was named Patnos back then. At the times of the Roman dominance the island was a land of banishment.

Emperor Domitianos banished Saint John there in 95A.D. The most brilliant page in the island’s history was written then. During the period of his banishment he wrote the Apocalypses. Since then Patmos became a land of worship, as Christians from all over the world visited it in order to see the land where Saint John wrote the most ambiguous book in Orthodoxy.

In 1088 the priest and afterwards Osios Christodoulos, asks for and gets the holy island from the emperor Alexios Komninos A’ and builds the holy monastery of Saint John Theologos.

In 1207 Patmos was dominated by the Venetians and became part of Naxos’ Duchy.

In 1537 Turkish occupation came to Patmos.

In 1713 Patmiada School was built, where many important personalities went.

In 1821 the island participated in the Revolution but, as with all the Dodecanese, it remained under Turkish rule.

In 1912 the Italians took over possession of the Dodecanese.

In 1948 Patmos officially became a part of Greece.

In 1981 with a special law passed by the Greek Parliament, Patmos was characterized as a Holy island.