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Historical

According to ancient Greek mythology, the Patmos was first named Litois, in honour of the Goddess Artemis who was also called Litoida because she was the daughter of Lito. Legend says that Artemis saw the island sunken in the sea and with the help of Apollo, managed to persuade Zeus to bring it to the surface. As a sign of devotion, the islanders named it Litois. Patmos is also linked to another legend, the one of Orestes. He fled to the island after murdering his mother Clytemnestra, and was hunted by the Erynies.

Patmos has been inhabited since 3,000 BC. It is believed that its first inhabitants were the Carians, who migrated from Asia Minor. It was later occupied by the Dorians and then the Ionians. Excavations have unearthed various buildings, cemeteries, fortresses, and evidence of an ancient acropolis, attesting to the existence of a densely populated area in the past. During the Peloponnesian Wars, the Lacedemonians came to the island to escape from the Athenians. Ruins testify about the flourishing of the island during this period.

The earliest known mention of the island is found in the writings of the 5th century Greek historian Thucydides, but just as a geographical marker (Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War). According to ancient Greek mythology, the island of Patmos originally was underwater until Artemis persuaded Zeus to make the island rise out of the sea. In association with this legend, the island was named Letois in honor of the daughter of Leto, the goddess Artemis (Patmos Vera inscription). The later name, Patmos, may derive from Mount Latmos in nearby Asia Minor. Patmos is a volcanic island, so at one point in history it did “rise” out of the sea, with its highest point being 883 feet above sea level (Mount Elias). By about the 4th century BC, the town had a defensive wall and an acropolis.

In the Roman period, the island was known as part of the group of Sporades islands (Pliny, Natural History; Strabo, Geography). When sending a person off into exile, the Romans would often use remote islands, especially during the 1st and 2nd centuries AD (Pliny, Natural History; Tacitus, Annals). In particular, three other islands in the Sporades group, of which Patmos is a part, were named as islands utilized for exile (Tacitus, Annals; the islands of Donusa, Gyarus, and Amorgos). Roman Christians late in the reign of Domitian, even those of noble families connected to the Emperor, are known to have been banished to remote islands in the Aegean just as John was (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History; Suetonius, Domitian; Dio Cassius, Roman History; cf. Domitilla, Flavius Clemens, and other Christians). In the Roman period, Patmos was not an uninhabited, deserted prison colony, but had a harbor, a town, a temple to Artemis (under the Byzantine church), a temple to Apollo (Kastelli Acropolis), perhaps a temple to Dionysus (acropolis) and a temple to Aphrodite (on the coast, perhaps at Kalikatsou Rock), a gymnasium (2nd century BC inscription), and even a hippodrome/stadium (known from an inscription and Prochorus Acts, not excavated but perhaps located between Kastelli and the harbor). Orestes was supposedly the original builder of the Artemis temple on the island, the ruins of which are under the monastery (Patmos Vera inscription). However, Patmos was remote, and with John in isolation, he would have been unable to spread the Gospel, lead the church, or encourage the Christian community to avoid any participation in the worship of the Emperor.