Astypalaia tours are small-group trips on Astypalaia, an island of the south-eastern Aegean Sea. Its main town, Chora, stands below a Venetian castle. This page covers the Byzantine, Ottoman and modern past, the Querini castle and the Kylindra graves. It ends with Onesicritus, early Christian mosaics, church history and the Italian years. Related pages cover the Dodecanese islands and the best Greek islands. More trips appear on the Greece tours page.
Bookings made through the GetYourGuide widgets on this page earn Classical Greece Tours a commission, at no extra cost to the traveller.
What are Astypalaia tours?
Astypalaia tours centre on an island that formed part of the Byzantine Empire through the Middle Ages. Latin crusaders are thought to have seized it early in the 13th century. No written record confirms that conquest, so it stays a presumption.
In Ottoman Turkish the island went by the name Istanbulya. Astypalaia tours belong to an island whose main town, Chora, is a listed traditional settlement. Such places keep an unchanged image of the past and their local character. Greece has designated around 830 of them. Designated means officially named.
The Ottoman Empire took Astypalaia in 1522 and kept it until 1912. Two breaks interrupted that rule. In 1947 the Treaty of Paris made Astypalaia part of Greece. The other Dodecanese islands joined Greece under the same treaty. Treaties are written pacts signed by states. Dodecanese means twelve islands in Greek.
Astypalaia tours run on an island linked with Argiris Kambouris, a former basketball player. He scored the two winning free throws in the final of EuroBasket 1987. EuroBasket is the European basketball championship. Frank Skartados, an American politician and businessman, is also listed among the notable people of Astypalaia. He lived from 1956 to 2018.
- Islets: Every offshore islet of the municipality, from Avgo to Khondronisi, is uninhabited.
- Villages: In 2021 Livadia had 159 residents and Analipsi, or Maltezana, had 111.
- Plan: In 2023 the Greek government announced a plan for climate-neutral transport on Astypalaia, as a model island.
Astypalaia tours share an island where grants will help replace cars and vans with electric vehicles. Ride-sharing and on-demand transport are part of the same plan. A solar power station of 3.5 megawatts with battery storage is also planned. A megawatt is a million watts.
What history does the Querini castle add to Astypalaia tours?
Astypalaia tours belong to the island where Giovanni Querini, a Venetian noble, raised a castle and palace. The Querini family kept Astypalaia until 1522. Nobles were families with inherited titles and rank. A palace is the large home of a ruler.
Kylindra occupies the western slope of the hill under the castle. The Greek archaeological service dug a graveyard there. Archaeologists learn about past lives by digging up objects and remains. Newborns and small children were buried at Kylindra from about 750 BC until Roman times. Astypalaia tours share an island with this burial ground.
A regional office, the 22nd Ephorate, first excavated Kylindra in 1996. An ephorate is a state office that protects ancient sites. Its experts placed the graves between the Late Archaic and Early Classical periods. Archaic means the early era of Greek city-states. Katsalos, a nearby cemetery for adults, runs from the Geometric age to Roman times.
Remains of infants turn up rarely in cemetery excavations. The Kylindra collection is now kept at University College London. Researchers there study how the children grew, through their tissues, bones and teeth. Astypalaia tours belong to an island whose old name, Stampalia, lives on in the Querini Stampalia family name.
- Venice: The last heir of the Querini Stampalia family founded a cultural foundation in Venice in 1869.
- Collection: The foundation holds an archive, a library and a museum of paintings and furnishings.
- Patelos: Across from the monastery of Agios Ioannis, Mount Patelos holds ruins of a pre-Venetian fort.
Astypalaia tours belong to an island tied by name to the Palazzo Querini Stampalia in Venice. The foundation is housed there. A palazzo is an Italian palace. Architect Carlo Scarpa designed spaces on its ground floor and in its garden.
What do travellers ask about Astypalaia tours, and what are the answers?
Astypalaia tours happen on an island linked with Evdokia Anagnostou, a professor. She holds a Canada Research Chair in autism treatment research. The former footballer Anthimos Kapsis is also named among notable people of Astypalaia. A footballer plays football for a team.
Before Astypalaia tours, who was Onesicritus?
Onesicritus, a native of Astypalaia, was a Greek writer of history and a Cynic philosopher. The Cynics praised a simple life free of social custom. Alexander the Great made him pilot of the royal ship when building a fleet on the Hydaspes. Onesicritus was also the first author to mention Taprobane, now Sri Lanka.
On Astypalaia tours, what remains of the early Christian mosaics?
Under the chapel of Agia Varvara lies an early Christian basilica. Its columns and marble bases were reused from a Hellenistic or Roman religious site. The Tallaras bath mosaics have been reburied, yet photographs are on show at the museum. Mosaic fragments stay in place at Karekli and at Agios Vasilios, south of Livadi.
Near Astypalaia tours, what is the church history of the island?
Astypalaia became a Christian bishopric, the seat of a bishop. A 10th-century church list, the Notitia Episcopatuum, records it. The see answered to the Archdiocese of Rhodes, then capital of the Insulae province. In 1933 the Catholic Church restored it in name as a titular bishopric. A titular see exists in name only.
Before Astypalaia tours, how did Italian rule begin?
Italian naval troops landed on Astypalaia on 12 April 1912, in the Italo-Turkish War. That war set Italy against the Ottoman Empire. From Astypalaia the Italians then landed on Rhodes. They did so on the night between the third and fourth days of the fifth month. Italian rule lasted until the Second World War.
Featured photo: Zde, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (File:Chora of Astypalaia, Asty03.jpg).