Aiolis - Lesvos

Aiolis - Lesvos

Lesbos is after Crete and Euboea the largest of the Aegean islands, with a maximum length of 43 ½ m., a width extending to 28 m., and an area of 630 sq. miles. It lies close to Asia Minor, its Northeast coast facing the Gulf of Edremit (Adramyti), and is 187 m. from Athens. To the North is Lemnos and to the South Khios.

Its geographical situation and its many harbors made Lesbos a center for trade and communications from the earliest times and it is only recently that the division between Greece and Turkey has, by severing its connections with Asia Minor, frustrated its natural role as an intermediary between the mainland and the Aegean. Prehistoric remains indicating occupation from c. 3300 B.C. until destruction by fire at the end of the Mycenean period relate closely to those at ancient Troy. According to Homer, Lesbos, siding with Troy, was invaded by both Achilles and Odysseus. The inhabitants were probably Pelasgian, but in the 10th century B.C., the island and the mainland opposite were colonized by Aiolians under the leadership of the Penthelides, the last of whom was murdered in 659 B.C. A struggle developed between Methymna and Mytilene for the leadership of the island, and although Mytilene won and has remained the capital, a tradition of independent resistance was fostered in the West part of the island, which was to recur at critical moments. Lesbos was governed oligarchically with increasing chaos until Pittacus, one of the Seven Sages (589-579), calmed the island and as Aesymnetes (dictator) gave it its period of greatest prosperity and cultural importance. A large fleet and wide mercantile interests (especially in Egypt) were combined with a high standard of education and a comparative freedom for women, two traditions still noticeable today. Terpander, the father of Greek music, and Arion, who invented dithyrambic poetry, had already made Lesbos famous in the 7th century, but it was with Alcaeus and Sappho, both aristocrats and enemies of Pittacus, that the island reached its cultural climax. In 527 Lesbos fell under Persian domination and was not freed until 479, when it joined the Athenian League.

In 428 soon after the Peloponnesian war started, Mytilene tried to break away with Spartan help, but the plan was betrayed by Methymna to Athens. The Mytileneans were severely punished. This was the dramatic occasion when a second galley with a reprieve was sent after the first had left with orders for wholesale massacre, and arrived in time.

In 405 Lesbos fell to the Spartans and thereafter changed hands frequently, being ruled by Persia, Maedonia, and the Ptolemies until Mithridates occupied it (in 88-79 B.C.)