Arkadi Monastery

A school

By the 16th century the monastery had a school and a library

The current church dates from the 16th century. As early as then the monastery was a place of science and art, with a school and a rich library, and it became a great centre for the copying of manuscripts. It is surrounded by a thick and high wall.

Founding

Nobody knows exactly who founded it or when

The exact date of the founding is not known. Tradition attributes it sometimes to the Byzantine emperor Heraclius and sometimes to the emperor Arcadius in the 5th century. An inscription of the 14th century shows a monastery dedicated to Saint Constantine here.

A rich house

Tournefort found the richest monastery in Crete

For the traveller Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, Arkadi was the richest and most beautiful of the monasteries of Crete. There were 100 monks in the convent and 200 others in the countryside around it, and the wine made at Arkadi was well known.

1866

In 1866 the monastery sheltered 964 people, mostly women and children

Local residents, mostly women and children, took refuge in the monastery with their valuables. By 7 November 1866 it sheltered 964 people: 325 men, of whom 259 were armed. The hegumen and the monks had insisted that the monastery could be defended.

The assault

The powder room was set alight rather than surrender

On the morning of 8 November an army of 15,000 Ottomans arrived with 30 cannons. On the evening of November 9 the doors fell, and Konstantinos Giaboudakis set the powder alight in the room where women and children hid. Of 964 people, 846 were killed in combat or by the explosion.

846of the 964 people present were killed in combat or by the explosion