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Kea (island)

 

 
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Kea (island)
 
 
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Kea, (also known as Gia (Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
: ??a/???a), Tzia, Zea, Keos (Ancient: ????), or in Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
 as Ceos), is an island of the Cyclades
Cyclades

The Cyclades are a Greece island group in the Aegean Sea, south-east of the mainland of Greece; and an administrative prefectures of Greece of Greece....
 archipelago, in the Aegean Sea
Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkans and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey respectively....
, in Greece
Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkans. It has borders with Albania, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the north, and Turkey to the east....
. Its capital, Ioulis, is inland at a high altitude (like most ancient Cycladic settlements, for the fear of pirates) and is considered quite picturesque. Other major villages of Kea are Korissia (the port) and Vourkari (a fishing village).






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Kea, (also known as Gia (Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
: ??a/???a), Tzia, Zea, Keos (Ancient: ????), or in Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
 as Ceos), is an island of the Cyclades
Cyclades

The Cyclades are a Greece island group in the Aegean Sea, south-east of the mainland of Greece; and an administrative prefectures of Greece of Greece....
 archipelago, in the Aegean Sea
Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkans and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey respectively....
, in Greece
Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkans. It has borders with Albania, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the north, and Turkey to the east....
. Its capital, Ioulis, is inland at a high altitude (like most ancient Cycladic settlements, for the fear of pirates) and is considered quite picturesque. Other major villages of Kea are Korissia (the port) and Vourkari (a fishing village). After suffering depopulation for many decades, Kea has been recently rediscovered by Athens
Athens

Athens , the Capital and largest city of Greece, dominates the Attica periphery; as one of the List of cities by time of continuous habitation, its recorded history spans around 3,400 years....
 as a convenient destination for weekends and yachting
Yachting

Yachting or recreational sailing is the specific act of sailing as a sport....
 trips. The population in 2001 was 2,417.

Geography

It is the island
List of islands of Greece

The Greek Islands are a collection of over 6,000 islands and islets that belong to Greece. Only 227 of the islands are inhabited, and only 78 of those have more than 100 inhabitants....
 of the Cyclades complex that is closest to Attica
Attica

Attica is a Peripheries of Greece in Greece, containing Athens, the capital of Greece. Attica is subdivided into the prefectures of Greece of Athens Prefecture, Piraeus Prefecture, East Attica and West Attica....
 (about 1 hour by ferry from Lavrio) and is also 20 km from Cape Sounio
Sounion

Headlands and bays Sounion is a promontory located 69 km SSE of Athens, at the southernmost tip of the Attica peninsula in Greece.Cape Sounion is noted as the site of ruins of the ancient Greek temple of Poseidon, the god of the sea in classical mythology....
 as well as 60 km SE of Athens
Athens

Athens , the Capital and largest city of Greece, dominates the Attica periphery; as one of the List of cities by time of continuous habitation, its recorded history spans around 3,400 years....
. Its climate is arid
Arid

A region is said to be arid when it is characterized by a severe lack of available water, to the extent of hindering or even preventing the Individual growth and Morphogenesis of plant and animal life....
 and its terrain is hilly. Kea is 19 km long from north to south and 9 km wide from west to east. The area is 129 kmē with the highest point being 560m.

The municipality includes the island of Makronisos
Makronisos

Makronisos is an island in the Aegean sea, in Greece and is located close to the coast of Attica, facing the port of Lavrio. It has an elongated shape and its terrain is arid and rocky....
 to the northwest as well as a couple of ferry and shipping lines.

History

Kea is the location of a Bronze Age
Bronze Age

The Bronze Age is, with respect to a given prehistory, the period in that society when the most advanced metalworking included smelting copper and tin from naturally-occurring outcroppings of copper and tin ores, creating a bronze alloy by melting those metals together, and casting them into bronze artifact s....
 settlement at the site now called Ayia Irini, which reached its height in the Late Minoan
Minoan civilization

The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization which arose on the island of Crete. The Minoan culture flourished from approximately 27th century BC to 1450 BC; afterwards, Mycenaean Greece culture became dominant at Minoan sites in Crete....
 and Early Mycenaean
Mycenaean Greece

Mycenaean Greece is a cultural period of ancient Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece....
 eras (1600-1400 BCE).

In the classical period Kea (Ceos) was the home of Simonides
Simonides of Ceos

Simonides of Ceos , Greek Lyric poetry poet, was born at Ioulis on Kea . He was included, along with Sappho and Pindar, in the canonical list of nine lyric poets by the scholars of Hellenistic Alexandria....
 and of his nephew Bacchylides
Bacchylides

Bacchylides was an Ancient Greek Lyric poetry poet. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list of nine lyric poets which included his uncle Simonides....
, both ancient Greek lyric
Lyric poetry

Lyric poetry refers to a usually short poem that expresses personal feelings, which may or may not be set to music. Aristotle, in Poetics , contrasted lyric poetry with drama and epic poetry....
 poet
Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry....
s, and the Sophist Prodicus
Prodicus

Prodicus of Ceos He came to Athens as ambassador from Ceos, and became known as a speaker and a teacher. Like Protagoras, he professed to train his pupils for domestic and civic service; but it would appear that, while Protagoras's chief instruments of education were rhetoric and style, Prodicus made linguistics prominent in his curriculum....
, and the physician Erasistratus
Erasistratus

Erasistratus was a Greek anatomist and royal physician under Seleucus I Nicator of Syria. Along with fellow physician Herophilus, he founded a school of anatomy in Alexandria, where they carried out anatomical research....
. The inhabitants were known for offering sacrifices to the Dog Star Sirius
Sirius

Sirius is the list of brightest stars in the night sky with a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star....
 and Zeus
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
 to bring cooling breezes while awaiting for the reappearance of Sirius in summer; if the star rose clear, it would portend good fortune; if it was misty or faint then it foretold (or emanated) pestilence. Coins retrieved from the island from the 3rd century BC feature dogs or stars with emanating rays, highlighting Sirius' importance.

During the Byzantine
Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire and Eastern Roman Empire are conventional names used to describe the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered on its capital of Constantinople....
 period many churches were built and the prosperity of the island rose. Kea was Byzantine until, in 1204, it was captured by the Venetians
Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy, the capital city of the Italian regions Veneto, a population of 271,251 . Together with Padua, Italy, the city is included in the Padua-Venice Metropolitan Area ....
 in the wake of the fourth crusade
Fourth Crusade

The Fourth Crusade was originally designed to conquer Islam Jerusalem by means of an invasion through Egypt. Instead, in April 1204, the Crusaders of Western Europe invaded and conquered the Christianity city of Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire....
. It was recaptured by the Byzantines in 1278. In 1296 it fell to the Venetians again, who soon built a castle on the ancient acropolis of Ioulis. The port became a haven for pirates and by 1470 there were only around 200 inhabitants on the island.

Kea was occupied by the Turks
Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire , also known by its contemporaries as the Turkish Empire or Turkey , was an empire that lasted from 1299?1923. It was Treaty of Lausanne by the Republic of Turkey, which was officially proclaimed on October 29, 1923....
 in 1527. The Turks never settled on the island but they did repopulate it with Arvanites
Arvanites

Arvanites are a population group in Greece of, ultimately, Albanians origin who traditionally speak Arvanitika, a form of Tosk Albanian. They settled in Greece during the late Middle Ages and were the dominant population element of some regions in the south of Greece until the 19th century....
 at the end of the 16th century. During this period the island attracted many of the religious and intellectual personalities who wanted to lie low.

Historical population


Communities

  • Chavouna
  • Ellinika Kea
  • Kato Meria
  • Ioulis
  • Kea
  • Korissia
  • Koundouros, Greece
  • Otzias
  • Pisses
  • Vourkari


See also

  • Communities of the Cyclades


External links

  • , an excerpt from James Theodore Bent
    James Theodore Bent

    James Theodore Bent was an England explorer, archaeologist and author....
    's The Cyclades, or Life among the Insular Greeks
  • Map and Aerial photos:
    • Coordinates:
    • , street map not yet available