The Rest of Mytilene

The rest of the day in Mytilene was a lot of looking around and enjoying the lovely place. Here are a few pictures of the places that stood out to me:

A pretty street

According to the guide, this is the only church in Mytilene dedicated to St. Paul.

The guide told us that when Greece became independent from Turkey, the two countries made laws requiring all Greeks in Turkey to move to Greece and all Turks in Greece to move to Turkey. This statue is of a Greek woman arriving in Mytilene after losing her home in Turkey; if I remember correctly, she's looking back towards Turkey.

This flag was next to the statue of the Asia Minor Mother. There's a picture of it unfurled below.

Just because he's cute...

I cannot find this church on the internet, but I am still looking. The guide told us that it was built while Mytilene was still under Ottoman rule.

Here's the flag from earlier. The image on the flag is the double-headed eagle of the Byzantine Empire.

A look at Mytilene from walking around the harbor.

Looking back from the boat.

An ancient building we passed on the boat ride back to Turkey

That was my day in Greece. I am still looking for that church somewhere else on the internet, because I've forgotten what it's called, but when I find it, I will update this. 

Mytilene - Castle, Part II

After the Madrassa, we walked around the castle grounds and up on the castle walls some.

This was the entrance to the cistern, where all the water was kept

 The next pictures are of the cisterns:

And now the views from the walls:

  As you can see, the castle was quite sprawling. Did anyone else ever play that old PC game Stronghold Legends? In some respects, Mytilene's castle reminded me a little of that game. The walls are very far-flung and there is lots of space inside for people to live and store weapons. I guess you really can learn a lot from the right kinds of computer games.

Anyway, the next pictures are from the walk back down the way we came up. This time the guide told us the story of the grove of trees we walked through: they were planted by Greek soldiers in 1912, when Lesvos became independent from the Ottoman Empire.

Just for some context (that completely blows my mind), Theodosius died in 395 AD and left the Roman Empire to his two sons, one to rule in the west (Rome) and one to rule in the east (Byzantium/Constantinople) and it was never unified again (except when the Byzantine emperors conquered parts of Italy, much later). Then, the Ottoman Empire captured Constantinople, the last strong Byzantine city, in 1453. Then the Ottomans were driven from Lesvos in 1912, two years before WWI. In short only two empires separate WWI from the Roman Empire. (I think Lesvos was overrun by other groups and pirates, etc., so they weren't only under those two empires, but to the best of my understanding, those two were the biggest powers in Greece until WWI.) To me, this is mind-blowing. The Ottomans defeated the direct heir of the Roman Empire, and then they were defeated in a war that had airplanes. 

Anyway, below are some more pictures from Mytilene:

The guide said these were old pieces of pottery that were used for decoration in modern houses

And this is the house I call Red Lobster. It's where they found the mosaic of that crab-haired guy in the museum.

All for now - more to follow!

Mytilene - Castle, Part I

I have no idea how many parts there will be. This was a big castle. Here goes!

This was from the walk up, looking back down.

This castle was either built by the Byzantines or mostly redone by the Byzantines - I do not remember which. I do vaguely remember someone saying the red stones were typical of the Byzantine era. 

The next two pictures are the symbols of people who ruled there. I think the eagle on the top is the symbol of the Gattilusio family, who lived in the castle. Beneath it are three more symbols; the middle one is the double-headed eagle of the Byzantine Empire. 

These are four "G's", and one of them stands for "Gattilusio", the family name. I have completely forgotten what the other ones stand for.

This was the foundation to the temple or shrine of pagan goddesses. Wikipedia says it's for Demeter, Kore, and Cybele, 

These next pictures were of a foundation of a building that was first a church and then a mosque.

This would have been at the entrance

More buildings:

I believe the guide said this was the powder magazine

These are from the Ottoman times

This next building was built by the Byzantines, but the Ottomans added the bricks to keep the moisture out:

More of the outside:

The next building, which was fenced off, was used as a madrassa, or a Muslim school. Wikipedia says that they can be any type of school, secular or religious, but I'm pretty sure the guide said this one was strictly religious.

And that's the end of the first part. More pictures of the castle next!