1. Introduction
Travel writings (15th-20th cent.) provide very rich material on the recent history of Hellenism. The world described by travelers includes matter-of-fact elements (everyday life, traditions), objects of particular interest (ancient sites, monuments), and the fascinating events which took place in the area (political expediencies, wars). They also, however, contain each traveler’s personal view, his ideology, individual or collective vision, personal myths. The Hellenic world which emerges out of these texts is a pairing of a people and a place.
At the beginnings of the movement, the traveler composed vague islets of reality about the place and the people (16th – beg. 17th century). Gradually, western man began to view the past as well as the present with increased sensitivity and knowledge (end 17th – 18th century). With the rise of the Enlightenment and anthropological interests however, an unprecedented enrichment at ideological but also realistic level took place (18th century). Finally, in the 19th century, there existed not only the traveler-writer and the theoretical-historical past of the place or the monumental present of the Greek. During this time, the traveler met the human dynamic face-to-face. During the 20th century a deep faith and worship of all things Greek continued along different paths.
Access to a place is determined either by its position along land or sea routes during each particular historical period or by its historical past. Thus, travelers’ movement to a particular place was owed, on the one hand, to commercial or political reasons and, on the other, to cultural ones, as much of the place’s past as of the intellectual background of the travelers themselves. Later, the popularity of earlier chronicles possibly intensified interest in a particular place. Past visits and experiences or publication successes formed further reasons of attraction for travelers.
The employment of the area and the people of the Greek islands faithfully followed the tidal wave of all intellectual, political and cultural movements which, during the 15th to the 20th centuries, swept the Europeans along in the great game of history. Travelers’ theoretical knowledge, visions or ideologies came into conflict with their experiences and composed stereotypes with which travel texts were cross contaminated. Political, ideological, religious or personal reasons defined their travels and their course.
Routes followed by travelers destined for Constantinople – capital of the Ottoman Empire and major player in European political life – or Jerusalem, usually passed through Venice which, until the end of the 17th century had dominions throughout the eastern Mediterranean, secured necessary provisions and, furthermore, handled and organized the pilgrims’ journeys. Successively large numbers of commercial or pilgrim boats set sail from her ports; these loaded supplies, stopped and moved travelers to and from her dominions, the great ports of the Adriatic and the Ionian islands. Thus, Corfu and then Zakynthos, Kithira further south and, to a lesser extent, Cephalonia, were necessary stops for ships before they set sail for the open sea towards Crete and the Middle East. From Venice, travelers reached the Holy Land via Ragouza, the Ionian Islands, Crete and Cyprus. They reached the Empire’s capital via Crete and Chios which, until 1566, was under Genovese rule.
Later, ships from Marseilles became more comfortable than Venetian galleys; they were more elegant and safer against pirate attacks due to better equipment, speed and experienced crews. The journey from Marseilles via Sardinia, Barbaria, Malta or Kithira, followed the same routes towards the Archipelago or the Dardanelles. From Constantinople with stopovers at Chios or Smyrna – which was commercially connected to the Asia Minor interior – and Rhodes, travelers reached Palestine and Alexandria.
At this point, there will be no mention of the conditions of the journey, the various types of ship, the supplies and provisions travelers were obliged to have, the agreements between travelers and captains, dietary habits and obligatory stopovers, the interpreters and escorts, the travel guides and maps, the dangers and piracy, the difficulties and the tribulations posed by months at sea, and to all those details which recreate the picture of sea travel during these years. All these or each on its own are subjects which travel texts themselves can present better through excerpts and pictures.
Dates following travelers’ names refer to the dates of their travels, while for scholarly works they refer to dates of publication.
2. Lemnos
Limnos was favoured by the island itineraries of travelers. Apart from the obligatory position it holds, like all Aegean islands, in the list of islands recommended by Cr. Buondelmonti and all those whose copied, imitated and modified his scholarly geographical works (isolarii), up to the 17th century (B. Borbone, 1528, Th. Porcacchi, 1572, G. Rosaccio, 1580, Fr. Piacenza, 1680, V. Coronelli, 1687, Ol. Dapper, 1688), Lemnos, it occupied a distinct position in the itinerary (1547), and chronicle (1553) of the French doctor and naturalist P. Belon, and became a stereotype – and object of plagiarism – for many travelers.
This happened because the island, from as early as the 16th century, was mining the therapeutic mud known as “Limnian earth” and Belon wanted to see the vein and the stamps of the terra sigillata for himself. The traveler’s botanological interests and his recording of the island’s particular fauna, combined with his humanistic curiosity, his acuteness and objective observations, produced a rich passage about the island, which was used by many latter travel writers; most repeated the information provided by him (cultivations, products, traditions and customs, the castle, the villages, ancient and historical information), while very few visited the island until the end of the 18th century (A. Thevet, World Cosmography…, 1575, which includes the unique reproduction of the mining; J. Breüning, 1579, J. Palerne, 1582, G. Sandys, 1610, Du Loir, 1641, J. Covel, 1677, R. Pococke, 1739, Frieseman, 1788).
In the monumental work by Choiseul-Gouffier (1782-1822), the combination of archaeological pursuits, anthropological interests and iconographic representation of the area (e.g. women of Lemnos and farmhouse), introduced a new perception of the Hellenic world. At the beginning of the 19th century the botanist J. Sibthorp, the cleric Ph. Hunt and the art historian and ethnographer Ot. Richter visited the island and provided brief but interesting testimonies. Richer are the 19th century texts, scholarly works and travel experiences (R. Curzon, 1837, L. Lacroix, 1847, Al. Conze, 1858, H. F. Tozer, 1889, L. de Launay, 1894). Through lively writing, detailed descriptions of everyday life and events, historical and mythological elements, archaeological research and identifications, information on the public and private life of the inhabitants, geographical and geological observations, these travel works, most with literary claims, immersed the reader into the travel experience and fully conveyed the island’s uniqueness and individuality.
3. Mytilini
From the 16th to the 19th century, the NE Aegean was a welcome or necessary stopover for travelers along the sea routes to and from Constantinople. Texts which refer to journeys during the 16th century include excerpts on Lesvos, but these do not occur from tours around the island. Lesvos emerges onto the Aegean travel map in the 15th century with the publication of Buendelmonti’s work but is elevated during the 18th and 19th centuries, a period of pursuit fueled by ancient Greek exaltations, findings and local colour. In the more mature works, those written in the pre-revolutionary period (C. Sonnini, Choiseul-Gouffier, G. Olivier, J. Dallaway, A. Castellan, A. Didot, W. Turner), the town and port of Mytilini, the cultivation of olives, Molyvos and the life of the inhabitants as well as the island’s geomorphology are recorded vividly and in detail. The same vibrant and detailed picture of the island is recorded in the 19th century: villages and settlements, ancient towns and sanctuaries, cultivations and products, the inhabitants’ activities and customs, everyday public and private life, commercial traffic, the relations of the island with the wider Hellenic world and, of course, the great figures of ancient politics and literature (Michaud-Poujoulat, 1830, Giraudeau, 1833, Ad. Slade, 1837, Ch. Newton, 1852, Boutan, 1855, Emily Beaufort, 1859, Fouqué, 1867, L. Lacroix, 1881, H. Tozer, 1886, Mary Walker, 1886, De Launay, 1897).
4. Chios
Chios holds a particular position in travel writings already from the 16th century, which it holds until the end of the 19th century thanks to its peculiarities, its tragic historical experiences and its direct relations with Smyrna, feeding with these stereotypes all types of travel texts. An important port along the route from Constantinople to Rhodes and Alexandria or to Cyprus and the Holy Land throughout more recent times, but also a commercial crossroads comparable to Smyrna for trade with the Asia Minor hinterland, the port of Chios with its bustling traffic is mentioned in almost all texts. The cultivation of the unique and precious mastic (indicatively: G. Sandys, 1610, J. Covel, 1670), the rich plane with its fragrant orchards, fruit of exquisite quality, its formidable castle and tamed partridges are subjects which were not only mentioned but described in detail.
The women of Chios hold a distinct position in travel texts. Their kindness, grace and beauty, their modesty and attractive appearance are regularly mentioned. There are also detailed descriptions of their rich clothes and ornate headdresses and their participation in communal events (indicatively: J. de Gontaut Biron, 1605, G. Sandys, 1610, B. de Monconys, 1639, A. de Barres, 1673, Le Bruyn, 1678, R. Pococke, 1739, j. Galland, 1747, P. A. de Guys, 1748, J. Dallaway, 1794, G. A. Olivier, 1794). Determinative was the pioneering representation of types of women of Chios by N. de Nicolay (1551). During the 18th century, mainly, we have the most impressive depictions of women of Chios, a subject not neglected in almost all the important illustrated editions (C. Le Bruyn, C. de Ferriol, J. Pitton de Tournefort, A. de La Mottraye, Choiseul-Gouffier, J. Grasset de Saint-Sauveu, G. A. Olivier and O. M. von Stackelberg).
In more recent texts, the Nea Moni (New Monastery) (J. Covel, 1677), commerce (J. Galt, 1809), silk, wine, Daskalopetra- the supposed location of “Homer’s school” - (C. Le Bruyn, Choiseul-Gouffier), education and the School of Chios (P. E. Laurent, 1819), but also comparisons with and historical retrospection to the Genovese period and Ottoman rule are presented in notable excerpts. The terrible destruction of Chios with the massacre and enslavement of its inhabitants in 1822 was a landmark event for travelers which influenced their texts (MacFarlane, 1827). The most complete picture of the island, however, (geomorphic information, climate, history, settlements, economy, commerce, public and private life, customs and traditions), was presented a few years before the destructive earthquake of 1881 by the French doctor Ad. Testevuide (1877).
5. Samos
Samos, on the route from Constantinople to Alexandria and the Holy Land is mentioned by most travelers during the 16th and 17th century (Dallam, 1599, Castela, 1600, De Brèves, 1605, Beauvau, 1605, G. Sandys, 1610, H. Blount, 1634, J. Thevenot, 1656, P. Ricaut, 1675, B. Randolph, 1676). However, the island – in most cases - was not actually visited by these authors; they simply circumnavigated it. Some anchored there due to bad weather or to load provisions (W. Biddulph, 1600, L. Deshayes de Courmenin, 1621, A. de La Mottraye, 1699).
The text by de Tournefort (1717), product of his week-long stay on the island, defined, as for the other islands in the archipelago which are recorded in his work, the type and quality of information which was recycled by later travelers at least until the middle of the 19th century, with the exemption the additions, at the end of the 18th century, made by Choiseul-Gouffier and L. Mayer, mainly through illustrative enrichment. Tournefort mentioned almost all the villages, described the natural landscape and its particularities, offered an image of the administrative and financial state of the island, stayed overnight at monasteries, wrote about the womens’ clothes, the cultivations, the products, exports, flora and fauna, mentioned the mines, commented on the anchorages and, of course, gave a first, detailed description of the ruins of ancient locations.
It is curious that throughout the rest of the 18th century, despite its important antiquities, the island remained off the list of desirable destinations, with few, notable exceptions (Ch. Thompson, 1730, R. Pococke, 1739, J. Riedesel, 1768, J. Dallaway, 1794).
6. Ikaria
An island which does not possess important antiquities or safe and secure ports does not attract visits by travelers. The information is sporadic and probably confused, almost certainly repeating facts from the explanatory texts of the isolarii or/and verbal accounts. Most travelers who mention the island did not disembark. During the last twenty years of the 17th century Ikaria is mentioned in three important travel works: the essay by the archbishop of Samos Iosif Georgeirinis, the travel chronicle by British merchant B. Randolph and, of course, the work by J. Pitton de Tournefort (1717), which, however, contains information (about the bread, wine, language), which he collected from verbal accounts. In the 19th century, following the structured autopsies executed for particular surveys of the island (flora, populations), or antiquities by the German archaeologist L. Ross (1841), the island begins to be recorded and described in the travel memorandums of Europeans who sailed on the sea of Ikaria on their way, always, to other destinations.
7. The Dodecanese
The Dodecanese were never considered by travelers as an island entity worthy of visiting or recognition. From the early centuries of travel only Rhodes was not excluded by almost any traveler/pilgrim of the 16th century to/from the Holy Land, because of the presence of the Knights, its geographical position along the sea route from the Black Sea and Constantinople to Alexandria and the Middle East, and the security her port had to offer. Of particular interest are the texts by P. Belon (1547), J. Palerne (1582), and W. Lithgow (1610). Their stays, only a few days long in most cases, their descriptions (until 1522 confined to anything related to the Order of the Knights and the their buildings, while after the island’s occupation by the Ottomans they refer to the inhabitants, the markets and the fortress), present a reasonably complete picture of Rhodes town with a complete absence of information on the rest of the island apart from the Monastery of the Panagia at Filermo, a place of pilgrimage and offerings for sailors. The blueprint repeatedly reproduced in many forms up to and including the 18th century - with the first impressions of the town and port – is from the chronicle by the pilgrim Br. Breyndenbach, the first work to contain pictures of the port towns on the sea route from Venice to Jerusalem.
Up to the third quarter of the 17th century information on Rhodes is recycled, with the inclusion sometimes of additional descriptive details, or of some supplementary historical events. In the works of C. Le Bruyn (1674-1693) and J. Mersius (1675), Rhodes finally holds a notable position. At the same time, the scholarly, geographical productions by the workshop mainly of V. Coronelli in Venice and his followers (e.g. Ol. Dapper and J. Enderlin), offered the public the accumulated knowledge from ancient sources and contemporary cosmographies. In the 18th century, the works of Ch. Thompson (1730), R. Pococke (1739), and J. Egmont (1757), because of the travelers’ stay on the island and their new attitudes towards the visited lands, as well as the diligence with which they sought to present their accounts, construct a first clear picture of the island, as much of its historical past as of the public and private life of its inhabitants. However, more complete is the image of Rhodes in the works of Choiseul-Gouffier (1776-1785) and Cl. E. Savary (1779). The first distinguishes himself mainly with the illustrated section of his monumental edition, while the second through his revealing writing. Rhodes is not excluded as a stopover in traveler’s journeys even at the end of the 18th century, a time of military-political-archaeological operations by Western Europeans in the eastern Mediterranean. Important travelers of the pre-revolutionary period but also of the first decade after the establishment of the Greek State are included in the list of visitors and travel texts on Rhodes mainly, but also other islands of the complex (J. Michaud, Al. Lamartine, L. Marcellus, and others). L. Ross, an important German archaeologist of the Ottoman period included the Dodecanese in his archaeological pursuits, excavations and texts.
The diluvial influx of visitors to the eastern Mediterranean in the 19th century brought a number of travelers to the SE corner of the Aegean. Works dedicated exclusively to Rhodes are those by E. Flandin (1844), Ch. Cottu (1844), V. Guérin (1854). Works of general historic-geographical content on the islands of the Aegean are those by L. Lacroix (1853), H. Tozer (1886), and, of course, the monographs with wonderful drawings by E. Rottiers (1828) and Al. Berg (1862).
Without overlooking the complex’s other islands we shall concentrate a little on Patmos. Similar texts on other islands, smaller than Rhodes are rare, as they were not included on the commercial shipping routes. All texts which come from the scholarly lists of islands are notable; these however, from the 15th to the 17th century, recycle all the mainly theoretical historic-geographical knowledge of these islands. It is worth noting that the sparse accounts of the early centuries of travel and the plethora of visitors during the 19th century include most of the islands. Some exceptions in interests brought numerically more visitors respectively to Kos, Kalymnos, Karpathos, Kastelorizo, Leros, Symi and Nisyros.
Thus Patmos, which owes its reputation to St. John the Evangelist, author of the Revelation, is mentioned in almost all chronicles, in most cases however without having been visited by the travelers/authors. From the mid 17th century (Randolph, 1671, Georgirenes, 1677, and in all scholarly works, e.g. Coronelli, Dapper), it is considered an important destination and the sanctity of the place, common to all Christianity, is emphasized and dominates all texts. In the 18th century the notable text by the Russian monk Gregorovitz Barsky (1723-1747), apart from information on the monastery also notes the intense commercial and shipping activities of the inhabitants of Patmos; during the same time, the monastery’s library becomes a centre of attraction, not always for selfless reasons, for travelers (E. D. Clarke, 1801). The island holds an important position in chronicle descriptions after the sensational work by Choiseul-Gouffier, which distinguishes itself for its illustrative richness. Important travelers are included among the island’s visitors over the next fifty years and the richness of information on the monastery, the settlements, the inhabitants and their activities reveal the island’s more recent history in detail (W. Turner, J. Brewer, L. Ross, G. H. Schubrt, C. Tischendorff, A. Valon, G. Thompson, C. T. Newton). Of course, Patmos remained one of the desirable places of “recognition – reading” for those travelers who, along their route, sought the seven churches of the Revelation, especially in the 19th century.
8. The Cyclades
It would not be possible to present the over twenty islands that compose the complex of the Cyclades either as a uniform entirety or as individual destinations for travelers. Travelers sometimes anchored at one out of necessity, sometimes a fair wind brought them to the quiet waters of their shores, sometimes, on their way to other, more attractive destinations, leaning against a ship’s bulwark they heard stories about the passing shorelines, and sometimes they spent months wondering around a single island. Sometimes specific research or antiquarian interests brought them to some of these, and sometimes a few hours were enough for them to note their impressions of a single Cycladic island.
Information on the Cyclades from the island list of Cr. Buondelmonti (c. 1420), was later literally rehashed, used in its entirety, or enriched throughout the next two centuries, as presented in the works of B. Bordone (1528), T. Porcacchi (1572), M. Boschini (1658). The superiority and arrogance of the immediately subsequent series of works is detected in the scholarly writings of Ol. Dapper (1688), F. Piacenza (1688), and V. M. Coronelli (1696), in which various facts about the islands (mythology, contemporary geographical and demographic parameters, literary narrations), are combined in a style entirely appropriate to the era.
Information on the Cyclades is little and sparse until the journey (1700-1702), and resulting work (1717), by de Tournefort, which overthrew not only the public’s perception of the islands of the archipelago but also opened up new and attractive travel routes. After Tournefort, in the 18th century, travelers’ observations focused mainly on the inhabitants, their activities, customs, traditions and everyday life. Of notable interest for the entire Cycladic area are the works by P. di Krienen (1770), and Frieseman (1789). The landscape of information changes however gradually from the beginning of the 19th century with the change of sea routes, the growth of particular ports (Syros), the decline of piracy and specialized travel interests: archaeology on Delos, Naxos (E. D. Clarke, 1800), Kea (Ol. Bronstend, 1811), Milos (Comte de Marcellus, 1840), geology on Santorini, etc.
Of the limitless richness of islands and travelers we will mention indicatively the movement of travelers to some islands, concentrating mainly on cases of travelers who actually visited the areas, leaving aside the texts brought about through theoretical knowledge or verbal accounts. So, for example, for Andros we have J. Thevenot (1665), offering the oldest description, P. Lucas (1706), Ch. Thomson (1732), G. A. Oliver (1793-99), and J. Galt (1811), visiting parts of the island and showing interest, and W. Turner (1811), B. G. Depping (1832) and Fr. Thiersch (1829), providing reliable material. For Santorini, original and rich remains the work by Fr. Richard (1650). The aforementioned authors on Andros provide even more information on Santorini, while we must also add the accounts and illustrations from the works by C. S. Sonnini (1779), and Choiseul-Gouffier (1776). The latter provided us with a unique work in which human types, particularly women, revealed a new, inspiring and fascinating image of the Archipelago. Sources on Syros were more favourable particularly during the post-revolutionary period. Life at its vibrant port is recorded in insightful detail and behavioral psychograms combine politics and ethnography (Marchebeus / J. Giraudeau, 1833, Goupil-Fesquet / Horace Vernet, 1839-40, Th. Gautier, 1852, Th. Bent, 1885, and others).
In all the sea journeys of European travelers, whether along commercial sea routes, for scientific in situ research, for topographical and archaeological descriptions, for the quenching of collecting manias, in search of Greek everyday life, for a combination of botanological observations and travel impressions, the unique and precious grace of the Cycladic island identity always shines through.
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