Malvasia areas

Greece: Monemvasia, Paros, Crete

Monemvasia: the “Gibraltar of the East”

The Rock of Monemvasia, with its only entrance, the bordering precipices and the city enclosed by the fortifications, has always charmed visitors.

Through the centuries, it constituted a ‘kastron’, a fortress, which had protected its population, and only in the early fifties of the twentieth century was the walled city gradually drained of inhabitants. Many settled on the nearby mainland, where a new settlement developed, outside the narrow boundaries of the medieval city in which all activity had for centuries been confined.

The impression given today is that the Rock is connected to the mainland by a narrow strip of land, which has been cut and a small horizontal bridge constructed over the gap, under which small boats can pass. However, this arrangement is relatively recent, shortly after 1890 when the carriage road was extended from the mainland up to the gate of the Lower Town. Until then there had been an older, vaulted bridge, from the mainland to the Rock, whose superstructure was demolished and the rest embodied in the solid masonry embankments carrying the new road, with a permanent horizontal bridge in the middle of the distance. 

Yannis Ritsos, one of the greatest Greek poets, used to refer to his hometown Monemvasia as a “stone ship”, since the Rock of Monemvasia looks like a stranded ship that takes its visitors on an extraordinary journey.