Thasos
Encyclopedia
Thasos or Thassos is a Greek
island in the northern Aegean Sea
, close to the coast of Thrace
and the plain of the river Nestos
but geographically part of Macedonia
. It is the northernmost Greek island, and 12th largest by area. Thasos
is also the name of the largest town of the island (also known as Limenas Thasou, "Harbour of Thasos"), situated at the northern side, opposite the mainland and about 10 kilometres (6 mi) from Keramoti
.
There is then a gap in the archaeological record until the end of the Bronze Age c 1100 BC, when the first burials took place at the large cemetery of Kastri in the interior of the island. Here built tombs covered with small mound of earth were typical until the end of the Iron Age. In the earliest tombs were a small number of locally imitated Mycenaean
pottery vessels, but the majority of the hand-made pottery with incised decoration reflects connections eastwards with Thrace and beyond.
ns, attracted probably by its gold mines; they founded a temple to the god Melqart
, whom the Greeks
identified as "Tyrian Heracles"
, and whose cult was merged with Heracles in the course of the island's Hellenization. The temple still existed in the time of Herodotus
. An eponym
ous Thasos, son of Phoenix (or of Agenor, as Pausanias reported) was said to have been the leader of the Phoenicians, and to have given his name to the island.
In either 720 or 708 BC, Thasos received a Greek
colony from Paros
. It was in a war the Paria
n colonists waged with the Saians, a Thracian tribe, that the poet Archilochus threw away his shield. The Greeks extended their power to the mainland, where they owned gold mines even more valuable than those on the island. From these sources the Thasians drew great wealth, their annual revenues amounting to 200 or even 300 talents
. Herodotus, who visited Thasos, says that the best mines on the island were those opened by the Phoenicians on the east side of the island facing Samothrace
.
Thasos was important during the Ionian Revolt
against Persia. After the capture of Miletus
(494 BC) Histiaeus, the Ionia
n leader, laid siege. The attack failed, but, warned by the danger, the Thasians employed their revenues to build war ships and strengthen their fortifications. This excited the suspicions of the Persians, and Darius
compelled them to surrender their ships and pull down their walls. After the defeat of Xerxes the Thasians joined the Delian confederacy; but afterwards, on account of a difference about the mines and marts on the mainland, they revolted.
The Athenians defeated them by sea, and, after a siege that lasted more than two years, took the capital, Thasos, probably in 463 BC, and compelled the Thasians to destroy their walls, surrender their ships, pay an indemnity and an annual contribution (in 449 BC this was 21 talents, from 445 BC about 30 talents), and resign their possessions on the mainland. In 411 BC, at the time of the oligarchical revolution at Athens, Thasos again revolted from Athens and received a Lacedaemonian governor; but in 407 BC the partisans of Lacedaemon were expelled, and the Athenians under Thrasybulus
were admitted.
(405 BC), Thasos again fell into the hands of the Lacedaemonians under Lysander
who formed a decarchy there; but the Athenians must have recovered it, for it formed one of the subjects of dispute between them and Philip II of Macedon
ia. In the embroilment between Philip V of Macedon
ia and the Romans, Thasos submitted to Philip, but received its freedom at the hands of the Romans after the battle of Cynoscephalae
(197 BC), and it was still a "free" state in the time of Pliny
.
It is related, that Byzantine Greek Saint Joannicius the Great
(752 - 846) in one of his miracles freed the island of Thasos from a multitude of snakes.
. It was captured by the Turks
in 1462. Under the Turks the island was known as Ottoman Turkish
: طاشوز Taşöz. A brief revolt against Ottoman rule in 1821, led by Hajiyorgis Metaxas, failed. The island was given by the Sultan Mahmud II
to Muhammad Ali of Egypt
of as a personal fiefdom in the late 1820s, as a reward for Egyptian intervention in the War of Greek Independence
(which failed to prevent the creation of the modern Greek state). Egyptian rule was relatively benign (by some accounts Muhammad Ali had either been born or spent his infancy on Thasos) and the island became prosperous, until 1908, when the New Turk regime asserted Turkish
control. It had the status of a sanjak
in the vilayet of Salonici until the Balkan Wars
. On October 20, 1912 during the First Balkan War
, a Greek naval detachment claimed Thasos as part of Greece
, which it has remained since.
. Under Bulgarian rule the island was called Тасос. Mountainous terrain facilitated small-scale resistance activity. The Greek Civil War
affected the island in the form of skirmishes and Communist
guerilla attacks until 1950, almost a year after the main hostilities were over on the mainland
.
Thasos is served by ferry routes to and from Kavala
and Keramoti. The latter is a port close to Kavala International Airport
, and has the shortest possible crossing to the island.
region, and the only municipality
of the regional unit. As a part of the 2011 Kallikratis government reform, the regional unit Thasos was created out of part of the former Kavala Prefecture
. The municipality, unchanged at the Kallikratis reform, includes a few uninhabited islets besides the main island Thasos.
Thasos has generally round shape, without deep bays and significant peninsulas. The highest peak, Ypsario or Ipsario, is 1,205 m (3428 ft) high and lies in the eastern half of the island, which is steeper and mostly covered in pine forest. The western half has gentler slopes. While generally mountainous, the terrain is not particularly rugged, as it rises gradually from the coast towards the island center.
Most villages were placed inland, as the population was chiefly engaged in agriculture and stockbreeding. Those villages had their harbors at nearest points on the shore, often connected with stairways ("Skalas") and the population gradually migrated there, as tourism began to emerge as an important source of income. Thus, there are several pairs of villages such as Marion–Skala Maries, where the former is inland and the latter on the coast.
Thasos island is located in the northern Aegean sea approximately 7 km from the mainland and 20 km south-east of Kavala
. The Island is formed mainly by gneiss
es, schist
s and marble
s of the Rhodope
Massif. Marble sequences, corresponding to the Falacron Marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses, are up to 500m thick and are separated from the underlying gneisses by a transition zone about 300 m thick termed the T-zone consisting of alternances of dolomitic and calcitic marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses.
The rocks have undergone several periods of regional metamorphism, to at least upper amphibolite
facies, and there was a subsequent phase of retrograde metamorphism. At least three periods of regional deformation have been identified, the most important being large scale isoclinal folding with axes aligned north-west. The T-zone is deformed and is interpreted by some authors as a regional thrust of pre-major folding age. There are two major high angle fault systems aligned north-west and north-east respectively. A large low-angle thrust cuts the gneiss, schist and marble sequence at the south-west corner of the island, probably indicating an overthrusting of the Serbomacedonian Massif onto the Rodope Massif.
The Late Miocene oil-producing Nestos-Prinos basin is located between Thassos island and the mainland. The floor of the basin is around 1,500 m deep off the Thassos coast(South Kavala ridge; Proedrou, 1988) and up to 4.000-5.000 m in the axial sector between Thassos and the mainland. The basin is filled with Late Miocene-Pliocene sediments, including ubiquitously repeated evaporite layers of rock salt and anhydrite-dolomite that alternate with sandstones, conglomerates, black shales, and uraniferous
coal measures (Proedrou, 1979, 1988; Taupitz, 1985). Stratigraphically equivalent rocks on the mainland are clastic sediments with coal beds, marine to brackish fluvial units and travertines.
hosted calamine deposits for lead and silver although there was also minor exploitation of gold and copper. Worth mentioning is the discovery of a paleolithic addit located at Tzines iron mine, whose age has being estimated at approximately 15.000 years old, (Kovkouli et al. 1988) for the exploitation of limonitic
ochre.
More recently, mining companies such as Speidel
(1905–1912) and Vielle Montagne (1925–1930) exploited the Zn
-Pb
(calamine
) ores, which had reported grades over 12% Zn+Pb. In 1905 a metallurgical plant was erected at Limenaria for the calcination of the calamines in vertical and Oxland
furnaces to produce ZnO. Later (1926) the calcination plant was rebuilt by Vieille Montagne with Waelz system rotary furnaces. Iron ore mining became important during the years 1954-1964. Several mining companies (Krupp and Apostolopoulos A.E., Chondrodimos S.A.) exploited the iron ore deposits of the island. It is estimated that total mineral production during the period 1905-1964 was about 2 million tonnes of calamine (12% Zn+Pb) and 3 million tonnes of iron ore (44% Fe). Since 1964 there has been no mining activity on the island.
A new exploration effort was initiated in 1976 by IGME aimed at locating hidden primary base metal mineralization. Core drilling resulted in the discovery at the Marlou prospect, in 1979, of a stratabound primary Zn
-Pb
deposit at a depth of 200 m. The marble quarrying had a parallel history with the mining activity of the Byzantine
period. In the present era, starting about forty years ago, marble quarrying has been the only activity extracing the mineral wealth of Thasos.
and olive oil
as well as wine
, sheep, goat
herding and fishing. Other industries includes lumber and tourism. Mining industry includes lead, zinc and marble, especially in the Panagia area where one of the mountains near the Thracian Sea has a large marble quarry. Now abandoned marble quarry in the south (in the area of Aliki) has been mined during the ancient times. By far the most important economic activity is tourism.
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
island in the northern Aegean Sea
Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea[p] is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkan and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey. In the north, it is connected to the Marmara Sea and Black Sea by the Dardanelles and Bosporus...
, close to the coast of Thrace
Western Thrace
Western Thrace or simply Thrace is a geographic and historical region of Greece, located between the Nestos and Evros rivers in the northeast of the country. Together with the regions of Macedonia and Epirus, it is often referred to informally as northern Greece...
and the plain of the river Nestos
Mesta River
The Nestos or Mesta , formerly the Mesta Karasu , is a river in Bulgaria and Greece. It rises in the Rila Mountains and flows into the Aegean Sea near the island of Thasos. It plunges down towering canyons toward the Aegean Sea through mostly metamorphic formations...
but geographically part of Macedonia
Macedonia (Greece)
Macedonia is a geographical and historical region of Greece in Southern Europe. Macedonia is the largest and second most populous Greek region...
. It is the northernmost Greek island, and 12th largest by area. Thasos
Thasos town
Thasos is a municipality on the island of Thasos in northern Greece. It is the capital and main town of the island. The town is also called Limenas Thasou or for short just Limenas to distinguish the town from the island on which it is situated...
is also the name of the largest town of the island (also known as Limenas Thasou, "Harbour of Thasos"), situated at the northern side, opposite the mainland and about 10 kilometres (6 mi) from Keramoti
Keramoti
Keramoti is a town and a former municipality in the Kavala peripheral unit, East Macedonia and Thrace, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Nestos, of which it is a municipal unit. As of the 2001 census, the municipal unit had a population of 6,039, and the...
.
Prehistory
Lying close to the coast of Eastern Macedonia, Thasos was inhabited from the Palaeolithic period onwards, but the earliest settlement to have been explored in detail is that at Limenaria where Middle and Late Neolithic remains have been found that relate closely to those of the Drama Plain. In contrast, the remains of the Early Bronze Age on the island align it with the culture that developed in the Cyclades and Sporades to the south in the Aegean. At Skala Sotiros for example, a small settlement was encircled by a strongly built defensive wall. Even earlier activity is demonstrated by the presence of large pieces of 'megalithic' anthropomorphic stelai built into these walls, which, so far, have no parallels in the Aegean area.There is then a gap in the archaeological record until the end of the Bronze Age c 1100 BC, when the first burials took place at the large cemetery of Kastri in the interior of the island. Here built tombs covered with small mound of earth were typical until the end of the Iron Age. In the earliest tombs were a small number of locally imitated Mycenaean
Mycenaean Greece
Mycenaean Greece was a cultural period of Bronze Age Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites...
pottery vessels, but the majority of the hand-made pottery with incised decoration reflects connections eastwards with Thrace and beyond.
Antiquity
The island was colonized at an early date by PhoeniciaPhoenicia
Phoenicia , was an ancient civilization in Canaan which covered most of the western, coastal part of the Fertile Crescent. Several major Phoenician cities were built on the coastline of the Mediterranean. It was an enterprising maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 1550...
ns, attracted probably by its gold mines; they founded a temple to the god Melqart
Melqart
Melqart, properly Phoenician Milk-Qart "King of the City", less accurately Melkart, Melkarth or Melgart , Akkadian Milqartu, was tutelary god of the Phoenician city of Tyre as Eshmun protected Sidon. Melqart was often titled Ba‘l Ṣūr "Lord of Tyre", the ancestral king of the royal line...
, whom the Greeks
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
identified as "Tyrian Heracles"
Heracles
Heracles ,born Alcaeus or Alcides , was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus...
, and whose cult was merged with Heracles in the course of the island's Hellenization. The temple still existed in the time of Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
. An eponym
Eponym
An eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...
ous Thasos, son of Phoenix (or of Agenor, as Pausanias reported) was said to have been the leader of the Phoenicians, and to have given his name to the island.
In either 720 or 708 BC, Thasos received a Greek
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
colony from Paros
Paros
Paros is an island of Greece in the central Aegean Sea. One of the Cyclades island group, it lies to the west of Naxos, from which it is separated by a channel about wide. It lies approximately south-east of Piraeus. The Municipality of Paros includes numerous uninhabited offshore islets...
. It was in a war the Paria
Paria
Paria is a village situated near Vapi in Valsad District, Gujarat. India. The town of Udwada, away from Paria, has a railway station which connects Paria to Mumbai and western Gujarat...
n colonists waged with the Saians, a Thracian tribe, that the poet Archilochus threw away his shield. The Greeks extended their power to the mainland, where they owned gold mines even more valuable than those on the island. From these sources the Thasians drew great wealth, their annual revenues amounting to 200 or even 300 talents
Attic talent
The Attic talent , also known as the Athenian talent or Greek talent, is an ancient unit of mass equal to 26 kg, as well as a unit of value equal to this amount of pure silver. A talent was originally intended to be the mass of water required to fill an amphora . At the 2009 price of $414/kg, a...
. Herodotus, who visited Thasos, says that the best mines on the island were those opened by the Phoenicians on the east side of the island facing Samothrace
Samothrace
Samothrace is a Greek island in the northern Aegean Sea. It is a self-governing municipality within the Evros peripheral unit of Thrace. The island is long and is in size and has a population of 2,723 . Its main industries are fishing and tourism. Resources on the island includes granite and...
.
Thasos was important during the Ionian Revolt
Ionian Revolt
The Ionian Revolt, and associated revolts in Aeolis, Doris, Cyprus and Caria, were military rebellions by several regions of Asia Minor against Persian rule, lasting from 499 BC to 493 BC...
against Persia. After the capture of Miletus
Miletus
Miletus was an ancient Greek city on the western coast of Anatolia , near the mouth of the Maeander River in ancient Caria...
(494 BC) Histiaeus, the Ionia
Ionia
Ionia is an ancient region of central coastal Anatolia in present-day Turkey, the region nearest İzmir, which was historically Smyrna. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements...
n leader, laid siege. The attack failed, but, warned by the danger, the Thasians employed their revenues to build war ships and strengthen their fortifications. This excited the suspicions of the Persians, and Darius
Darius I of Persia
Darius I , also known as Darius the Great, was the third king of kings of the Achaemenid Empire...
compelled them to surrender their ships and pull down their walls. After the defeat of Xerxes the Thasians joined the Delian confederacy; but afterwards, on account of a difference about the mines and marts on the mainland, they revolted.
The Athenians defeated them by sea, and, after a siege that lasted more than two years, took the capital, Thasos, probably in 463 BC, and compelled the Thasians to destroy their walls, surrender their ships, pay an indemnity and an annual contribution (in 449 BC this was 21 talents, from 445 BC about 30 talents), and resign their possessions on the mainland. In 411 BC, at the time of the oligarchical revolution at Athens, Thasos again revolted from Athens and received a Lacedaemonian governor; but in 407 BC the partisans of Lacedaemon were expelled, and the Athenians under Thrasybulus
Thrasybulus
Thrasybulus was an Athenian general and democratic leader. In 411 BC, in the wake of an oligarchic coup at Athens, the pro-democracy sailors at Samos elected him as a general, making him a primary leader of the successful democratic resistance to that coup...
were admitted.
Roman Era
After the Battle of AegospotamiBattle of Aegospotami
The naval Battle of Aegospotami took place in 405 BC and was the last major battle of the Peloponnesian War. In the battle, a Spartan fleet under Lysander completely destroyed the Athenian navy...
(405 BC), Thasos again fell into the hands of the Lacedaemonians under Lysander
Lysander
Lysander was a Spartan general who commanded the Spartan fleet in the Hellespont which defeated the Athenians at Aegospotami in 405 BC...
who formed a decarchy there; but the Athenians must have recovered it, for it formed one of the subjects of dispute between them and Philip II of Macedon
Philip II of Macedon
Philip II of Macedon "friend" + ἵππος "horse" — transliterated ; 382 – 336 BC), was a king of Macedon from 359 BC until his assassination in 336 BC. He was the father of Alexander the Great and Philip III.-Biography:...
ia. In the embroilment between Philip V of Macedon
Philip V of Macedon
Philip V was King of Macedon from 221 BC to 179 BC. Philip's reign was principally marked by an unsuccessful struggle with the emerging power of Rome. Philip was attractive and charismatic as a young man...
ia and the Romans, Thasos submitted to Philip, but received its freedom at the hands of the Romans after the battle of Cynoscephalae
Battle of Cynoscephalae
The Battle of Cynoscephalae was an encounter battle fought in Thessaly in 197 BC between the Roman army, led by Titus Quinctius Flamininus, and the Antigonid dynasty of Macedon, led by Philip V.- Prelude :...
(197 BC), and it was still a "free" state in the time of Pliny
Pliny the Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman author, naturalist, and natural philosopher, as well as naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and personal friend of the emperor Vespasian...
.
It is related, that Byzantine Greek Saint Joannicius the Great
Joannicius the Great
Venerable Saint Joannicius the Great, in original Greek Ioannikios the Great - respected Byzantine Christian saint, sage, theologian, prophet and wonderworker, the hermit of Mount Olympus , monk and abbot...
(752 - 846) in one of his miracles freed the island of Thasos from a multitude of snakes.
Ottoman Era
Thasos was part of the Eastern Roman Empire, later known as Byzantine EmpireByzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
. It was captured by the Turks
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
in 1462. Under the Turks the island was known as Ottoman Turkish
Ottoman Turkish language
The Ottoman Turkish language or Ottoman language is the variety of the Turkish language that was used for administrative and literary purposes in the Ottoman Empire. It borrows extensively from Arabic and Persian, and was written in a variant of the Perso-Arabic script...
: طاشوز Taşöz. A brief revolt against Ottoman rule in 1821, led by Hajiyorgis Metaxas, failed. The island was given by the Sultan Mahmud II
Mahmud II
Mahmud II was the 30th Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1808 until his death in 1839. He was born in the Topkapi Palace, Istanbul, the son of Sultan Abdulhamid I...
to Muhammad Ali of Egypt
Muhammad Ali of Egypt
Muhammad Ali Pasha al-Mas'ud ibn Agha was a commander in the Ottoman army, who became Wāli, and self-declared Khedive of Egypt and Sudan...
of as a personal fiefdom in the late 1820s, as a reward for Egyptian intervention in the War of Greek Independence
Greek War of Independence
The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution was a successful war of independence waged by the Greek revolutionaries between...
(which failed to prevent the creation of the modern Greek state). Egyptian rule was relatively benign (by some accounts Muhammad Ali had either been born or spent his infancy on Thasos) and the island became prosperous, until 1908, when the New Turk regime asserted Turkish
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
control. It had the status of a sanjak
Sanjak
Sanjaks were administrative divisions of the Ottoman Empire. Sanjak, and the variant spellings sandjak, sanjaq, and sinjaq, are English transliterations of the Turkish word sancak, meaning district, banner, or flag...
in the vilayet of Salonici until the Balkan Wars
Balkan Wars
The Balkan Wars were two conflicts that took place in the Balkans in south-eastern Europe in 1912 and 1913.By the early 20th century, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia, the countries of the Balkan League, had achieved their independence from the Ottoman Empire, but large parts of their ethnic...
. On October 20, 1912 during the First Balkan War
First Balkan War
The First Balkan War, which lasted from October 1912 to May 1913, pitted the Balkan League against the Ottoman Empire. The combined armies of the Balkan states overcame the numerically inferior and strategically disadvantaged Ottoman armies and achieved rapid success...
, a Greek naval detachment claimed Thasos as part of Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, which it has remained since.
World War II
During Axis occupation (1941–1944) Thasos, along with the rest of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, was under Bulgarian control. The Bulgarians planned to annex the territory under their control and closed down schools as a first step towards forced BulgarizationBulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
. Under Bulgarian rule the island was called Тасос. Mountainous terrain facilitated small-scale resistance activity. The Greek Civil War
Greek Civil War
The Greek Civil War was fought from 1946 to 1949 between the Greek governmental army, backed by the United Kingdom and United States, and the Democratic Army of Greece , the military branch of the Greek Communist Party , backed by Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Albania...
affected the island in the form of skirmishes and Communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
guerilla attacks until 1950, almost a year after the main hostilities were over on the mainland
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
.
Modern Era
Thasos, the capital (now informally known as Limenas, or "the port"), stood on the north side of the island, and had two harbors. Archilochus described Thasos as "an ass's backbone crowned with wild wood," and the description still suits the mountainous island with its forests of fir and pine. Besides its gold mines, the wine, nuts and marble of Thasos were well known in antiquity. Thasian wine (a light bodied wine with a characteristic apple scent) was, in particular, quite famous; to the point where all Thasian coins carried the head of the wine god Dionysos on one side and bunches of grape of the other.Thasos is served by ferry routes to and from Kavala
Kavala
Kavala , is the second largest city in northern Greece, the principal seaport of eastern Macedonia and the capital of Kavala peripheral unit. It is situated on the Bay of Kavala, across from the island of Thasos...
and Keramoti. The latter is a port close to Kavala International Airport
Kavala International Airport
Kavala International Airport "Alexander the Great" is located in the municipality of Nestos, in Greece....
, and has the shortest possible crossing to the island.
Administration
Thasos is a separate regional unit of the East Macedonia and ThraceEast Macedonia and Thrace
East Macedonia and Thrace is one of the thirteen regions of Greece. It consists of the northeastern parts of the country, comprising the eastern part of the region of Macedonia along with the region of Thrace, and the islands of Thasos and Samothrace....
region, and the only municipality
Communities and Municipalities of Greece
For the new municipalities of Greece see the Kallikratis ProgrammeThe municipalities and communities of Greece are one of several levels of government within the organizational structure of that country. Thirteen regions called peripheries form the largest unit of government beneath the State. ...
of the regional unit. As a part of the 2011 Kallikratis government reform, the regional unit Thasos was created out of part of the former Kavala Prefecture
Kavala Prefecture
Kavala is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the of East Macedonia and Thrace. Its capital is the town of Kavala. Kavala regional unit is the easternmost within the geographical region of Macedonia.-Geography:...
. The municipality, unchanged at the Kallikratis reform, includes a few uninhabited islets besides the main island Thasos.
Geography
Most villages were placed inland, as the population was chiefly engaged in agriculture and stockbreeding. Those villages had their harbors at nearest points on the shore, often connected with stairways ("Skalas") and the population gradually migrated there, as tourism began to emerge as an important source of income. Thus, there are several pairs of villages such as Marion–Skala Maries, where the former is inland and the latter on the coast.
Geology
Kavala
Kavala , is the second largest city in northern Greece, the principal seaport of eastern Macedonia and the capital of Kavala peripheral unit. It is situated on the Bay of Kavala, across from the island of Thasos...
. The Island is formed mainly by gneiss
Gneiss
Gneiss is a common and widely distributed type of rock formed by high-grade regional metamorphic processes from pre-existing formations that were originally either igneous or sedimentary rocks.-Etymology:...
es, schist
Schist
The schists constitute a group of medium-grade metamorphic rocks, chiefly notable for the preponderance of lamellar minerals such as micas, chlorite, talc, hornblende, graphite, and others. Quartz often occurs in drawn-out grains to such an extent that a particular form called quartz schist is...
s and marble
Marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite.Geologists use the term "marble" to refer to metamorphosed limestone; however stonemasons use the term more broadly to encompass unmetamorphosed limestone.Marble is commonly used for...
s of the Rhodope
Rhodope
Rhodope may mean:* Queen Rhodope, a figure of Greek mythology* Rhodope Mountains, in Bulgaria and Greece* Rhodope Prefecture, of Greece* Rhodope * 166 Rhodope, an asteroid...
Massif. Marble sequences, corresponding to the Falacron Marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses, are up to 500m thick and are separated from the underlying gneisses by a transition zone about 300 m thick termed the T-zone consisting of alternances of dolomitic and calcitic marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses.
The rocks have undergone several periods of regional metamorphism, to at least upper amphibolite
Amphibolite
Amphibolite is the name given to a rock consisting mainly of hornblende amphibole, the use of the term being restricted, however, to metamorphic rocks. The modern terminology for a holocrystalline plutonic igneous rocks composed primarily of hornblende amphibole is a hornblendite, which are...
facies, and there was a subsequent phase of retrograde metamorphism. At least three periods of regional deformation have been identified, the most important being large scale isoclinal folding with axes aligned north-west. The T-zone is deformed and is interpreted by some authors as a regional thrust of pre-major folding age. There are two major high angle fault systems aligned north-west and north-east respectively. A large low-angle thrust cuts the gneiss, schist and marble sequence at the south-west corner of the island, probably indicating an overthrusting of the Serbomacedonian Massif onto the Rodope Massif.
The Late Miocene oil-producing Nestos-Prinos basin is located between Thassos island and the mainland. The floor of the basin is around 1,500 m deep off the Thassos coast(South Kavala ridge; Proedrou, 1988) and up to 4.000-5.000 m in the axial sector between Thassos and the mainland. The basin is filled with Late Miocene-Pliocene sediments, including ubiquitously repeated evaporite layers of rock salt and anhydrite-dolomite that alternate with sandstones, conglomerates, black shales, and uraniferous
Uranium
Uranium is a silvery-white metallic chemical element in the actinide series of the periodic table, with atomic number 92. It is assigned the chemical symbol U. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons...
coal measures (Proedrou, 1979, 1988; Taupitz, 1985). Stratigraphically equivalent rocks on the mainland are clastic sediments with coal beds, marine to brackish fluvial units and travertines.
Mining history
Mining activities for base and precious metals started in the 7th century B.C. with the Phoenicians, followed in the 4th century by the Greeks and then the Romans. The mining was both open - pit and underground, and concentrated on the numerous karstKARST
Kilometer-square Area Radio Synthesis Telescope is a Chinese telescope project to which FAST is a forerunner. KARST is a set of large spherical reflectors on karst landforms, which are bowlshaped limestone sinkholes named after the Kras region in Slovenia and Northern Italy. It will consist of...
hosted calamine deposits for lead and silver although there was also minor exploitation of gold and copper. Worth mentioning is the discovery of a paleolithic addit located at Tzines iron mine, whose age has being estimated at approximately 15.000 years old, (Kovkouli et al. 1988) for the exploitation of limonitic
Limonite
Limonite is an ore consisting in a mixture of hydrated iron oxide-hydroxide of varying composition. The generic formula is frequently written as FeO·nH2O, although this is not entirely accurate as limonite often contains a varying amount of oxide compared to hydroxide.Together with hematite, it has...
ochre.
More recently, mining companies such as Speidel
Speidel
Speidel is a manufacturer of watchbands and related items based in East Providence, Rhode Island, United States.-History:Friedrich Speidel founded the world renowned Speidel Company in 1867; known today as Speidel. With an initial investment equivalent to $10, Speidel started making gold and silver...
(1905–1912) and Vielle Montagne (1925–1930) exploited the Zn
Zinc
Zinc , or spelter , is a metallic chemical element; it has the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is the first element in group 12 of the periodic table. Zinc is, in some respects, chemically similar to magnesium, because its ion is of similar size and its only common oxidation state is +2...
-Pb
Lead
Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...
(calamine
Calamine
Calamine is a mixture of zinc oxide with about 0.5% ferric oxide . It is the main ingredient in calamine lotion and is used as an antipruritic to treat mild pruritic conditions such as sunburn, eczema, rashes, poison ivy, chickenpox, and insect bites and stings...
) ores, which had reported grades over 12% Zn+Pb. In 1905 a metallurgical plant was erected at Limenaria for the calcination of the calamines in vertical and Oxland
Oxland
Oxland is located in Alexandria, Louisiana. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on December 5, 1984....
furnaces to produce ZnO. Later (1926) the calcination plant was rebuilt by Vieille Montagne with Waelz system rotary furnaces. Iron ore mining became important during the years 1954-1964. Several mining companies (Krupp and Apostolopoulos A.E., Chondrodimos S.A.) exploited the iron ore deposits of the island. It is estimated that total mineral production during the period 1905-1964 was about 2 million tonnes of calamine (12% Zn+Pb) and 3 million tonnes of iron ore (44% Fe). Since 1964 there has been no mining activity on the island.
A new exploration effort was initiated in 1976 by IGME aimed at locating hidden primary base metal mineralization. Core drilling resulted in the discovery at the Marlou prospect, in 1979, of a stratabound primary Zn
Zinc
Zinc , or spelter , is a metallic chemical element; it has the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is the first element in group 12 of the periodic table. Zinc is, in some respects, chemically similar to magnesium, because its ion is of similar size and its only common oxidation state is +2...
-Pb
Lead
Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...
deposit at a depth of 200 m. The marble quarrying had a parallel history with the mining activity of the Byzantine
Byzantine
Byzantine usually refers to the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages.Byzantine may also refer to:* A citizen of the Byzantine Empire, or native Greek during the Middle Ages...
period. In the present era, starting about forty years ago, marble quarrying has been the only activity extracing the mineral wealth of Thasos.
Economy
The main agricultural production on the island are honeyHoney
Honey is a sweet food made by bees using nectar from flowers. The variety produced by honey bees is the one most commonly referred to and is the type of honey collected by beekeepers and consumed by humans...
and olive oil
Olive oil
Olive oil is an oil obtained from the olive , a traditional tree crop of the Mediterranean Basin. It is commonly used in cooking, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and soaps and as a fuel for traditional oil lamps...
as well as wine
Wine
Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...
, sheep, goat
Goat
The domestic goat is a subspecies of goat domesticated from the wild goat of southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the Bovidae family and is closely related to the sheep as both are in the goat-antelope subfamily Caprinae. There are over three hundred distinct breeds of...
herding and fishing. Other industries includes lumber and tourism. Mining industry includes lead, zinc and marble, especially in the Panagia area where one of the mountains near the Thracian Sea has a large marble quarry. Now abandoned marble quarry in the south (in the area of Aliki) has been mined during the ancient times. By far the most important economic activity is tourism.
Communities
Towns and villages with over 100 inhabitants are:- Agios Georgios (pop. 149)
- AstrisAstrisIn Greek mythology, Astris was one of the Heliades, daughters of Helios, either by the Oceanid Clymene or the Oceanid Ceto. She married the river god Hydaspes and became mother of Deriades, king in India....
(129) - Kallirachi (651)
- Kinyra (104)
- Limenaria (2,441)
- Maries (182)
- Ormos Prinou (122)
- Panagia (820)
- PotamiaPotamia (Thasos), GreecePotamia is a village on the island of Thasos, Greece. It is built in the valley at the foot of Mount Ipsario, and surrounded to the south and east by pine and sweet chestnut forests. Its coastal annexe is the holiday resort of Skala Potamias, and it is only 3 km away from one of the best...
(1,216) - Potos (688)
- Prinos (1,185)
- Rachoni (365)
- Skala Kallirachis (631)
- Skala Marion (377)
- Skala Rachoniou (206)
- Skala Sotirou (368)
- ThasosThasos townThasos is a municipality on the island of Thasos in northern Greece. It is the capital and main town of the island. The town is also called Limenas Thasou or for short just Limenas to distinguish the town from the island on which it is situated...
(Limenas Thasou) (3,130) - Theologos (731)
Historical population
| Year | Town | Municipality |
|---|---|---|
| 1981 | 2,312 | - |
| 1991 | 2,600 | - |
| 2001 | - | 13,765 |
Notable people
- Archilochos (7th c. BC) warrior and poet. "You led us a thousand strong at Thasos, fields fattened by corpses."
- AglaophonAglaophonAglaophon was an ancient Greek painter, born on the island of Thasos. He was the father and instructor of Polygnotus. He had another son named Aristophon. As Polygnotus flourished before the 90th Olympiad, Aglaophon probably lived around the 70th Olympiad, that is, around the late 6th or early...
(6-5th c. BC) painter, teacher and father of Polygnotus and Aristophon. - Hegemon of ThasosHegemon of ThasosHegemon of Thasos was a Greek writer of the Old Comedy. Hardly anything is known of him, except that he flourished during the Peloponnesian War. According to Aristotle he was the inventor of a kind of parody; by slightly altering the wording in well-known poems he transformed the sublime into the...
comedian, inventor of parody - LeodamasLeodamas of ThasosLeodamas of Thasos was a Greek mathematician and a contemporary of Plato, about whom little is known.There are two references to Leodamas in Proclus's Commentary on Euclid:...
(4th century BC) mathematician - Neseus of Thasos, painter
- Polygnostos Vagis (1892–1965) Thasos-born US sculptor
- PolygnotusPolygnotusPolygnotus was an ancient Greek painter from the middle of the 5th century BC, son and pupil of Aglaophon. He was a native of Thasos, but was adopted by the Athenians, and admitted to their citizenship....
(middle of 5th c.BC), painter - StesimbrotosStesimbrotos of ThasosStesimbrotos of Thasos , doubtless raised at Thasos, was a sophist, a rhapsode and logographer, a writer on history, and an opponent of Pericles and reputed author of a political pamphlet On Themistocles, Thucydides, and Pericles. Plutarch used writings by Stesimbrotos in his Life of Pericles,...
(c. 470 BC-c. 420 BC) sophist - Theagenes Olympic boxer (480 BC), PankratiastPankrationPankration was a martial art introduced into the Greek Olympic Games in 648 BC and founded as a blend of boxing and wrestling but without any rules. The term comes from the Greek , literally meaning "all powers" from "all" + "strength, power". Spartans were taught to use this ancient...
(476 BC) and runner. - Vassilis VassilikosVassilis Vassilikos-Biography:A native of the northern Greek island of Thasos, Vassilikos grew up in Thessaloniki, graduating from law school there before moving to Athens to work as a journalist....
(1934) poet and author - Demetrios Vassiliades (1958) Indologist scholar and author
Bibliographic references
- Agelarakis A., "Linen Thread Fragment". Ed. Chi. Koukouli-Chrysanthaki. “Proto-Historic Thasos”, Archaeologiko Deltio 2.45 (1992–1993): 803
- Agelarakis A., "Investigations of Archaeo-Anthropological Nature at the Classical Necropolis of the Island of Thasos between 1979-1996", Archaiologiko Ergo sti Makedonia kai Thraki, 10B (1997): 770-794.
- Agelarakis A., "On the Anthropological and Palaeopathological Records of a Select Number of Human Individuals from the Ancient Necropolis of Thasos Island". In
by Sgourou M., BSA 96 (2001): 355-364. - Agelarakis A., "Investigations of Physical Anthropology & Palaeopathology at the Ancient Necropolis of Thasos”, In M. Sgourou, Excavating houses and graves: exploring aspects of everyday life and afterlife in ancient Thasos>, BAR International series 1031 (2002): 12-19.
- Antje and Günther SchwabGünther SchwabGünther Schwab was an Austrian writer and author, and member of the Nazi party. He founded the World Union for Protection of Life.-Early life:...
: Thassos - Samothraki, 1999, ISBN 3-932410-30-0. - N. Epitropou et al.: "The discovery of primary stratabound Pb – Zn mineralization at Thassos Island", L’ Industria Mineraria n. 4, 1982.
- N. Epitropou, D. Konstantinides, D. Bitzios: "The Mariou Pb – Zn Mineralization of the Thassos Island Greece.", Mineral deposits of the Alps and of Alpine Epoch in Europe ed. by H. J. Echneibert, Spring – Verlag Berlin Heilderberg, 1983.
- N. Epitropou et al.: "Le mineralizzazioni carsiche a Pb – Zn dell’ isola di Thassos, Grecia.", Mem. Soc. Geol. H. 22, 1981, pp. 139-143.
- Omenetto P., Epitropou N., Konstantinides D.: "The base metal sulphides of W. Thassos Island in the Geological Metallogenic Frame work of Rhodope and Surrounding Regions.", International Earth Sciences Congress on AEGEAN Regions, 1–6 October 1990, Izmir -Turkey.
- Epitropou N., Omenetto P., Constantinides D., "Μineralizations a Pb – Zn comparables au type ' Mississippi Valley'. L'example de l'ile de Thassos ( Macedoine, Grece du Nord)", MVT WORKSHOP, Paris, France, 1993.