Kosonakos

On the hilltop above Karyoupolis, in the Mani, stands the Kosonakos tower, a sturdy tower house raised in the first years after the Greek Revolution of 1821. It commands the landscape beside the fortress of Kavallierakis-Fokas, and its plain, defensive form speaks of a region where family strongholds multiplied in the troubled decades following independence. The tower is the most prominent remnant of the modern village, which should not be confused with Old Karyopolis, a medieval settlement now abandoned and ruined, lying a few kilometres to the west. Where the old town belongs to the deep past, Kosonakos belongs to the new Greece, a modest but assertive statement of local power in stone. Its condition is described as average, and while it lacks the elaborate battlements of older Maniot castles, its position and bulk still give it a commanding presence over the surrounding landscape.