Castle of Serifos

The Castle of Serifos crowns the hill above the island's modern Chora, the remnant of a fortified settlement that was ancient before it was Venetian. Xenophon records a fully developed town here, with temples and public buildings, and myth places Perseus on the island, with the Gorgon's head supposedly buried somewhere nearby. In 1207 Serifos passed to the Duchy of Naxos under Marco Sanudo, who divided it among four noble families. After a troubled interval of Genoese rivalry and piracy, Venice appointed Ermolao Menotto lord in 1355; he revived the iron mines after a millennium and shared profits with the locals, bringing rare prosperity. His successor, Niccolo Adoldo, proved disastrous, stripping the islanders of their wealth until the Senate deposed him. By 1434, with the population dwindling and pirates a constant threat, the Michieli family built the present castle: three concentric rings of houses whose outer walls served as fortification. Barbarossa sacked it in 1538, ending Venetian rule, though it remained the main town until the nineteenth century. Little survives beyond the church of St. Constantine, as the stone was reused for Chora.