History of the Island of Euboea
Ancient Times
The history of the island is largely linked to the history of its main cities; Chalcis and Eretria.
Both city-states, called Polis, were settled by the Ionians, an ancient tribe that arrived in what is now central and southern Greece, Sicily, and the coast of Macedonia around the second millennium BC.
People who traveled between islands and continents opened and enabled trade with Western civilization.
Chalcis and Eretria were important polis throughout the Mediterranean. This is confirmed by the fact that the scale of weights and measures developed by Euboea was used among Ionian cities, including Athens, until the end of the 7th century BC.
It is also believed that around 775–750 BC the Greek alphabet was first used in Euboea.
Chalcis and Eretria, although they were rivals, initially lived in harmony.
One of the earliest major military conflicts in Greek history took place between the aforementioned Polis, known as the Lelantine War, in which many other Greek city-states also participated.
In 490 BCE, Eretria was utterly destroyed by Persian armies, and its inhabitants were enslaved and deported to Persia. Although the city was restored after the Battle of Marathon, it never regained its former power.
In 480 BC, Persia occupied all of Euboea, but a year later, after a decisive defeat at the Battle of Plataea, the Persians withdrew from all their possessions in Euboea.
In the following years, both cities gradually lost influence to Athens.
Euboea became an important source of grain and cattle, and control of the island allowed Athens to prevent invasions and protect its own trade routes.
In 446 BC, Athens settled about 4,000 Atticans in Chalcis, which gradually but ultimately made the island completely dependent on Athens.
Another conflict between Euboea and Athens broke out in 446. Under Pericles' leadership, the Athenians crushed the uprising and captured Histiaea, a city in the north of the island. They established their own settlement.
By 410 BC, the island had regained its independence.
Euboea participated in Greek affairs until it came under the control of Philip II of Macedon in 338 BC.
In the 2nd century BC, Euboea was incorporated into the Roman Republic.
It is interesting to note that in 322 BC Aristotle died in Euboea, having come from Athens about a year earlier to visit his mother at the family estate in Chalcis.
From the early Hellenistic period, i.e. from the death of Alexander the Great, king of Macedon, in 323 BC, until the late period of the Roman Empire, the island was organised within the Euboean League.
Middle Ages
The final years of antiquity and the early Middle Ages brought a well-deserved peace to the island.
In 1157, all the coastal cities of Euboea were destroyed by Sicilian troops, while Chalcis was burned by the Venetians in 1171.
Euboea rose to prominence after the Fourth Crusade, which, after 1204, resulted in the island being occupied by Lombard families. They divided the island into three areas:
- Chalcis, the central part;
- Karistos, located in the south; and
- Oreoi, encompassing the northern part.
Euboea became a Crusader state known as the Triarchate of Negroponte. Chalcis then acquired a new name: Negroponte, often used to refer to the entire island.
The island's rulers quickly fell under the influence of the Republic of Venice, which secured control over trade. It gradually expanded its power until it gained full sovereignty in 1390.
Faced with growing fears of the Ottoman Empire, the city of Negroponte (present-day Chalkida) was heavily fortified. This proved to little avail, as on July 12, 1470, during the Turkish-Venetian War, after a prolonged and bloody siege, the city was captured by Sultan Mehmed II, known as Mehmed the Conqueror, and the entire island fell to the Ottoman Empire.
Doge Francesco Morosini besieged the city in 1688 but was forced to withdraw after three months.
The name Negroponte persisted in European languages until the 19th century, but the Ottomans called the city and island Egriboz or Agriboz, after the Euripos Strait.
After the end of the Greek War of Independence in 1830, the island returned to Greece and became part of the newly established independent Greek kingdom.
Interesting Fact:
From 1402, Albanians began gradually settling on Euboea.
By 1425, approximately 10,000 Albanians lived on the island, and their numbers continued to grow.
A 1687 report notes that in 1471, Greeks began leaving the island, and by 1687, almost all of Euboea was inhabited by Albanians.
While this is not confirmed by other reports, studies of the island's demographic situation indicate Albanian origins for many of its inhabitants.
According to Johann Georg von Hahn, a German specialist in the history, language, and culture of Albania, Albanians were present in all the towns of southern Euboea. The exception is the southern town of Karystos, which was inhabited exclusively by Greeks.
The modern period
As late as the late 20th century, the inhabitants of the village of Antia, located in southern Euboea, spoke a local whistled language called Sfyria. Sfyria is a whistled version of spoken Greek, in which letters and syllables correspond to different tones and frequencies. Today, few whistlers remain.
In late 1943, the Greek Resistance and British military intelligence MI11 smuggled 1,000 Greek Jews through Euboea. They were fleeing the Holocaust from Thessaloniki and Athens to Cesme, located in neutral Turkey.
A week-long major forest fire in 2021 destroyed over 50,000 hectares of forest and agricultural land in the north of the island. It was one of the largest forest fires in modern Greek history.