Patmos Island
The most northerly of the group is Patmos, and apart from Rhodes it is the most regularly visited by cruise liners. The island where St John the Divine (Agios Ioannis Theologos) wrote or dictated the Apocalypse is to the modern world what Delos was to the ancient the most sacred island in the sea.
It is mainly a barren island, formed by three large volcanic masses, the central mass being joined to the northern and much smaller southern section by narrow isthmuses. The harbour of Skala is really a fjord-like channel which almost cuts the island in two. The first thing you notice, coming here after Samos and Chios, is the predominantly Kykladic character of the buildings. This is especially true of the Chora, the upper town, which is a blinding surgical white. Gone are the red tiles and the Levantine muddle of Chios, and in their place we find once more the cubist pattern of light and shade, the square flat-roofed houses, and the patches of green vineyards vivid against a mainly bare landscape.
Skala harbour is not an attractive place today, largely because it has been overrun by the quick ‘in-and-out’ tourist trade. Chora, on the other hand, which is built on a ridge just south of the port, is a small town where it would be pleasant to spend a few days. It replaced as the capital the ancient town which occupied the isthmus at the head of the gulf. The best known reference in antiquity to Patmos is in the prologue to the Book of the Revelation, where the Authorized Version has these words:
I, John, who am also your brother and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the spirit on the Lord’s Day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying T am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last’, and ‘What thou seest, write in a book and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia …’.
Traditionally St John was exiled here by the Emperor Domitian in AD 95, but there is no certainty that he actually wrote the Apocalypse
here. (The Greek word is often misused today to mean ‘cataclysm’, but it properly means ‘uncovering’ or ‘revelation’.) The Acts of St John, written by his disciple Prochorus, describe the miracles per¬formed by the saint while he was in Patmos, but make no mention of the Revelation having been written or dictated here.
Half way between Skala and the Chora, to the left and below the road, is the Monastery of the Revelation. This is a complex of buildings, the heart of which is the Sacred Grotto, sometimes called the Cave of St Anne. In fact the chapel of St Anne is separate, and the Grotto is cut about twelve feet further down into the rock at the lowest level of the monastery. A monk is always on duty here, and he will point out a triple fissure in the rock from which came the voice of God. A ledge of rock served Prochorus as a desk, and a silver halo
marks the place where St John’s head rested in sleep. In the chapel above there is a delicate ikon representing St Anne, the mother of
Mary.The site was neglected for centuries, and it was not until 1088 that the Emperor Alexis Comnenus made a grant of Patmos and the surrounding islets to St Christodoulos so that he could found a mon¬astery to commemorate the Evangelist and author of the Apocalypse. Christodoulos was an outstanding figure in the early church, once a hermit, who had already founded monasteries in Caria, on Leros and on Kos. The site which he chose was the most commanding possible. It dominates the town, the bay and the whole island, and with the tremendous battlements added later it became a true fortress of God. Viewed from the outside it is awe-inspiring rather than beautiful, and it reached its present proportions when the waters of the Ikarian sea were infested by pirates. One feels that its thick frowning walls were designed to repel sea-rovers as much as the legions of the Evil One.
The winding climb to the monastery was not so long ago a matter of either foot-slogging or mule-riding, but now a modern road takes cars, taxis and buses almost to the gate. Buses leave every two hours from Skala, but more visitors arrive in coaches laid on for cruise tours. Even so, an early morning visit will often win you a conducted tour in a small party by a relaxed father of the Church.
There is a discreet approach to the entrance courtyard, which is a harmonious blending of some very mixed architecture. Its comple¬tion date is displayed as 1698, but the east side incorporates the outer porch of the chief monastery church, or Katholikon, which has ele¬ments derived from a classical temple of Artemis. The Katholikon is on a simple Greek cross plan and dates back to the eleventh-century foundation of Christodoulos. His marble sarcophagus is in a side chapel, and on top of it a silver-gilt reliquary displays a skeleton hand for the faithful to kiss.
Of more interest is the Chapel of the Theotokos (the Mother of Christ) on the south side of the main church. This was added as early as the twelfth century, and the frescos are said to be contemporary. They include a typical Byzantine group of the Virgin with an archan¬gel on each side wearing imperial robes. We owe the discovery of these frescos to an earthquake in 1956, when a later layer was dis¬lodged and careful treatment revealed the original painting. On the other hand the ancient marble templo was replaced in 1607 by the present one elaborately carved in wood.
An inner courtyard leads to the Refectory, which is a very
remarkable room. There is a long stone table down the centre, with spaces at intervals under each side for stowing plates and other utensils. There are more twelfth-century frescos on the walls, show¬ing very suitable scenes like the miracle of the loaves and fishes. From here a flight of stairs leads up to the Library, which holds about two thousand printed books, where you can see thirty-three pages from the Codex Porphyrios, a fifth or sixth-century manuscript of the Gospel of St Mark, of which the major part is in St Petersburg, though the British Museum has a few more leaves. There is a com¬plete seventh-century illuminated Book of Job; there is a twelfth-century illuminated text of all four Gospels, a miniature gem measur¬ing only eight inches by six. A reminder of ancient library practice is a parchment scroll still on its wooden spindle. Housed in a gilt frame is the eleventh-century deed (now unrolled from its spindle) which ceded the monastery site to St Christodoulos.
The pieces to be found in the Treasury are mostly silver-gilt vessels made in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, ornate and valuable; there are some marvellous copes and other ecclesiastical finery worked in gold and silver thread; the ikons displayed are mostly of the same date, with the exception of a twelfth-century figure of St Theodore in military uniform. None of these things approach the manuscripts in interest or beauty.
The ramifications of the monastery are too great to allow the visitor to see much more, but if you are lucky enough to be in a small party and not being hurried through, you should ask to see the Bak¬ery, a room concealed within the monastic quarters which is said to date from the original foundation. At one end a ten-foot-long hollowed-out boat was used as a kneading trough, at the other end is a wood-fired bread oven. Around are the quarters of the surviving monks, attended by a few women servants. One curious refinement of monastic life is a bar suspended in an upper gallery with one side of iron and the other of wood. This enables the duty monk to sound the regular signals for offices or prayers with a resounding clang or a discreet thump.
All visitors are taken up to the battlements, from which you have a magnificent view of the whole island. You can see how narrow is the peninsula on which the ancient capital was built - an excellent site, with the two anchorages of Merika and Skala on either side to give shelter at all times of year. It was recorded by the French traveller Thevenot in 1664 that the harbour of Patmos was much favoured by corsairs, who used it as a place to lie up and refit their ships. It is still
a good anchorage, dangerous only during south-easterly winds, but subject to strong squalls which whip down the surrounding slopes when the northerlies are blowing hard. There are a few other villages and some beaches to the north and south, but the latter are shingly or pebbly, and not inviting. Looking east from the battlements you can see the islets of Lipsi and Arki, to the south-east Leros, and far to the north the trident-shaped head of Mt Kerketeus on Samos shows white against the windwashed Aegean sky.