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Skopelos Island

Skopelos is the largest of several islands which comprise the Northern Sporades island group, in the western Aegean sea, in Greece.

The island is located east of mainland Greece, northeast of the island of Evea and is part of the Thessaly Periphery. Skopelos is also the name of the main port and the municipal center of the island. The other communities of the island are Glossa and Neo Klima (Elios).

The geography of Skopelos includes two mountains over 500 meters; Delphi (681 m) in the center of the island, and Palouki (546 m) in the southeast. With an area of 96 km² (36.6 mi²) Skopelos is slightly larger than Mykonos (85 km²) and Santorini (73 km²).

The nearest inhabited islands are Skiathos to the west and Alonissos to the east.

Local food production

  • Olives and olive oil:

Olive oil plays a role in the Skopelos diet, being the basis of all recipes of traditional cuisine. The most prevalent olive is the «Pelion» variety, larger and rounder than the «Kalamata». For eating the olives are cured both in the unripened and the ripened stages.

  • Feta:

A semi-soft, crumbly, well-salted white cheese made from goat milk. Used in Skopelos cheese pie and other vegetable pies, added to salads and served with meals.

  • Cheese Pie:

Not by definition a real pie, but a tiropita, a deep fried spiral of cheese stuffed phyllo dough. The pie is generally about 15 cm in diameter and 3 cm high.

  • Honey:

Honey in Skopelos is mainly pine honey from conifer trees and flower-honey from the nectar of fruit trees and wild flowers.

  • Prunes:

Oven or sun dried Blue or Red Plums.

Its History

In legend, Skopelos island was founded by Staphylos or Staphylus (Greek for grape), one of the sons of the god Dionysos and the Princess Ariadne of Crete. Historically, in the Late Bronze Age Skopelos, then known as Peparethos (Πεπάρηθος) or Peparethus, was colonised by Cretans who introduced viticulture to the island.

Perhaps because of the legend of its founding by the son of the god of wine, the island was known throughout the ancient Greek cities of the Mediterranean Sea for its wine. The play Philoctetes (first performed at the Festival of Dionysus in 409 BC) by Sophocles includes a wine merchant lost on his way to «Peparethos – rich in grapes and wine».

In 1936 excavations in the area of Staphylos / Velanio uncovered a royal tomb of the era of Mycenaean Greece. The island was briefly under the control of the city-state Chalcis, Euboea since at least the 8th century BC.

In turn the island would come under the political influence or direct domination of:

  • Athens.
  • The Kingdom of Macedon (338 – 146 BC).
  • The Roman Republic (146 – 27 BC).
  • The Roman Empire (27 BC – 330 AD).
  • The Byzantine Empire (330 – 1204).
  • The Republic of Venice (Duchy of the Archipelago) known as Scopelo (1204 – 1538).
  • The Ottoman Empire (1538 until the Greek War of Independence).

Skopelos became part of the First Hellenic Republic under the London Protocol confirming its sovereignty (3 February 1830).
During World War II, Skopelos fell under Axis occupation. At first it was occupied by the Kingdom of Italy (June 1941 – September 1943) and then by Nazi Germany (September 1943 – October 1944). Skopelos and the rest of Greece returned to democratic style government in 1944.