The history of the island of Samos in Greece

Around 1000 BC the Ionians came to Samos, and repressed the pré-Greek population, and established themselves. The Ionians made Samos prosper. The island became an important economical and cultural centre and had an important share in Greek colonisation. Under the tyran Polycrates (approx. 540 v.Chr.-521 v.Chr.) this reached a peak, because of the large public works he achieved and sea power he gave to Samos. It doid not succeed Sparta and Korinth to make an end to his reign. The Persians brought Polycrates to a fall however, at fall and put his brother Syloson in his place. After the Persian wars in 479 v.Chr. and the battle at Mycale samo was cut loose from the Persians and found the island and made the connection with the association of Delos as a non-taxable member. A attempt to cut loose from the association of Delos lead to the Samian war (441 v.C.-439 v.Chr.) against Athens, which Samos lost. Afterwards Samos remained faithful to Athens to the end of the Peleponnesian war (404 v.Chr.). In 365 BC the Athenian admiral Timotheus succeeded to conquer Samos back after in 387 BC it was under Persian influence again. He established a community of 2000 Athenian klèrouchoi, who in 322 v.Chr. by order of the macedonische king Perdiccas had to leave the island. In the Hellenistic period Samos to 197 BC Samos was one of the pillars for the Ptolemaeën (Egyptian Dynasty). In 132 BC Samos became Roman. The Greek mathematician and philosopher pythagoras, wellknown from the Pythagorean theory (a2+b2=c2), was born on the island. The city Pythagorio, which lies in the south west of the island to the coast, has been named after him since 1955. Here there you find also the statue of Pythagoras, who has been made by Nikolaos Ikaris in 1989. At several places of Samos in antiquity the godess Hera was honoured. This was a godess of fertility. Even before the Mycenians established themselves here, there probably already was such a cultus on the island. At the west side of Pythagorio is itself there is a Hera sanctuary. In antiquity the island was also famous for red earthenware that was produced here. The island was successively part of the Persian realm, the Hellenic realm, the Roman realm, the Byzantine realm, the republic Venice and the Ottoman Empire, and it became a part of Greece in 1912.