Rethymno: Tales of Renaissance and Resistance

Rethymno, one of Greece’s most interesting cities, on Crete’s northern coast, with an impressive tradition in the arts and letters, is like an open book telling the tales of its long history.

**Aerial view of Rethymnon [Credit: Web]**

Originally spread across a promontory that juts into the sea for some 700 meters, today Rethymno offers a unique combination of sea and city in a way that is quite different to some of Crete’s other conurbations.

“The city moved inland from the coast with great caution, as if wary of becoming overstretched, and so, in 10 or 12 or even more centuries perhaps, it remained small and contained, like an innocent creature with its feet in the water, reluctant to drag them a little further,” novelist Pantelis Prevelakis wrote about his hometown in 1938.

Tourism has since helped the creature shed its caution and innocence, but old Rethymno, with its slender minarets, the lighthouse, the bell tower and above all the imposing mass of the Venetian fort, the Fortezza, still beckons visitors to train their cameras on it, much like cartographers and painters have done for centuries.

Under Venetian rule in the Middle Ages, Rethymno not only became a financial and administrative center but was also infused with the spirit of the Italian Renaissance, ample evidence of which is still offered by the old town, where a Renaissance festival is held every summer.

Under the Turks, who conquered it after a dramatic siege in 1646, the city went into decline, but the blend of Venetian and Ottoman legacies in the old quarter is by far the strongest component of Rethymno’s special character today. The place is a maze of narrow alleyways, graceful balconied houses and ornate Venetian monuments. The highlights include the Rimondi Fountain. Built in the Renaissance style in 1626, it has four columns with Corinthian capitals and three lion head spouts from which the water gushes.

A large section of the waterfront is pedestrianized in summer, making an ideal promenade area which, however, has not been spared the usual unsightly symptoms of fast tourist development. The same goes for the approaches from the modern town, which has spread out beyond the promontory, dotted by large package hotels along the fine beach.

The presence of a large section of the University of Crete has been a strong booster to Rethymno, having revitalized the city’s intellectual and literary tradition and making a substantial contribution to its economic life through the large student population.

The greater area of Rethymno has a great deal in store for the visitor. Chiefly mountainous, it boasts Crete’s highest summit on snow-capped Psiloritis (2,453 meters), spectacular ravines, caves and picturesque highland villages. Some of the island’s finest beaches are found where the gorges meet the sea, such as those of Preveli or Aghios Pavlos on the southern coast.

**Venetian era fountain, Rethymno [Credit: Web]**

The 16th-century Monastery of Arkadi, 23 kilometers from Rethymno, became the symbol of Crete’s liberation struggle against the Turks, when in 1866 hundreds of besieged fighters and refugees blew up themselves and many of their attackers rather than surrender. The event is commemorated on November 8.

Spili, 27 km from Rethymno and 25 km from the pristine southern beaches of Aghia Galini and Plakias, is a lovely lush semi-mountainous village with cobbled streets and rustic houses. Its main attraction is a unique Venetian fountain which spurts water from 19 lion heads.
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The Melidoni Cave, about 30 km east of Rethymno, is one of the island’s best known, with huge chambers and giant stalagmites and stalactites resembling columns. Research showed it was used as a place of worship until Roman times.

The well-maintained Preveli Monastery, standing in splendid isolation high above the Libyan Sea, is one of Crete’s largest and also has a long history of resisting occupiers. Repeatedly a center of revolt against the Turks, it also gave shelter to many allied soldiers during World War II before they were spirited away by submarine to Egypt. Preveli beach, with the palm trees at the mouth of the Kourtaliotis Gorge below the monastery, is one of the island’s most photographed locations.

Author: Haris Argyropoulos | Source: ekathimerini [November 01, 2011]

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