Tzerefochori

The Tzerefochori Tower stands as a lonely remnant of a vanished settlement in the hilly country north of Faraklo, near Neapolis in Laconia. Its history is largely a matter of informed guesswork. The place name comes from a village recorded in the Venetian Grimani census of 1700, alongside Faraklo and Vatika, but of that community only this tower and a restored chapel of Panagia Pantanassa survive. The building itself offers few certainties. It shows arched openings and vaulted ceilings with a broadly Byzantine character, yet no defensive features are apparent. An archaeologist, K. Diamantis, classified it as Byzantine in the Archaeological Bulletin of 1998, and that judgement is generally accepted, though with caution. The structure might equally date from the Ottoman period, or from the brief Venetian occupation of the Epidaurus Limera peninsula during the First Venetian-Turkish War (1463-1479). Today it survives in rather poor condition, a modest tower house whose original purpose and builders remain unresolved.