Mykonos history is irrevocably linked with the sacred island of Delos, which is natural, given their geographic affinity. Some even attribute its name to the hero Mykonos, son of the Mythical king of Delos, Anius, who was the son of Apollo and the Nymph Rhodeo. Another mythical tradition has Hercules burying the Giants he killed in battle underneath the island’s enormous granite cliffs.
Homer, Virgil and Apollodorus report that Thetis buried Ajax the Locrian in Mykonos, after he drowned near the island during his return from Troy. Recent excavations in Ftelia at Panormos, confirm the existence of Neolithic settlement and date the island’s first inhabitation to the 5th millennium BC, by Carians and Phoenicians. Early Cycladic tombs have been located at Mt. Diakoftis, in the same area, two chiseled domed tombs from the Mycenaean period (1400-1200 BC) have been revealed. Later the island was inhabited by Ionians from Attica, who arrived here led by Hippocles, son of Neleus.
When the Persian army was defeated in Marathon (490 BC), Datis and Artafernes apparently stopped at Mykonos for a while. According to inscriptions, Mykonos belonged to the First Athenian Alliance in 478 BC and contributed 1,5 talents to the Delian treasury, an amount indicative of the poverty ravaging the island; in fact, “Mykonian” came to signify “greedy” and, by extension, “bad neighbor”. In Historical years, it is deduced by sources that there were two cities on Mykonos, which merged circa 200 BC. Archaeological research has yet to locate them; however, the first must have been where Hora is today, and the second in Paleokastro (Ftelia). Under Macedonian rule Mykonos belonged to the Islanders’ Common, and coins minted on the island until the reign of the Emperor Augustus indicate some autonomy during the Roman years. In the Byzantine years, Mykonos belonged first to the administrative Achaian Theme and, after the 6th century, to the Aegean Theme. When Constantinople was taken by Franks, Mykonos came under the Venetians Andrea and Geremia Gizi (1207) and the Duchy of the Aegean, where it remained until 1390, when it was directly passed to the Venetian Republic.
Mykonos island was destroyed in attacks by the Catalans (1292) and Hayreddin Barbarossa (1537); after the latter many Mykonians landed ad slave markets, and those who managed to escape immigrated to neighboring Tinos. During the Turkish occupation, Mykonos began to prosper thanks to the privileged regime of the Cycladic islands, however, its bays and ports –like those in neighboring, desolate Delos- were pirate havens until the early 19th century. Thanks to piracy, shipping and commerce, the island met with great prosperity in the 18th century, evidenced by the large sea power gathered here at dawn of the Greek Revolution. A fleet of 22 warships and 450 men actively participated in battle, while the local heroine Manto Mavrogenous (1797-1840) was one of the Revolution’s most prominent figures.
In 1830 Mykonos was included in the newly-founded Greek state; however, the growth of steam shipping resulted in the island’s gradual decline, which followed in the footsteps of other islands. Then, immigration to the Danube countries and to America completed the decline, which lasted until the 1950s, when Mykonos began being established as an international tourist destination. |
