Dodecanese Day

All over the Dodecanese today is a local bank holiday to celebrate the incorporation of those islands with the rest of Greece in 1948.

The literal translation of Dodecanese is "Twelve Islands" although there are 16 inhabited ones and 27 in total. The Dodecanese have a distinct character and architecture due to their successive rulers - Venetian, Ottoman and Italian. Of the inhabited islands Rhodes and Kos are among the most popular and cosmopolitan in the Mediterranean. Kalymnos is famous for it's sponge divers, Tilos claims to be the last paradise in Greece, whilst the volcanic islands of Nyssiros, Lipsi , Pserimos and Halki are totally untouched by massive tourism. Symi is a picturesque small island which is popular, Karpathos is dramatically beautiful, Agathonisi and Kassos are hilly and difficult to reach. Patmos is the island where Saint John the Divine wrote the prophetic Apocalypse (Revelations). Leros is relatively quiet as are Astypalia and Castellorizo.

The Greek Revolution started in 1821 and managed to gain the independence of Greece in 1832; but the treaty signed in London did not include the islands of the Dodecanese as part of the newly built Greek State, and they remained under Turkish occupation. The Italians took all the islands of the Dodecanese in 1912, and stayed there until 1943, when the Germans took over. In 1945, the Germans left and the islands stayed autonomous until 1948 when all Dodecanese Islands joined the rest of independent Greece.

All across these islands today there will be parades, girls dressed in their traditional costumes, bands playing, wine drunk and general feasting and celebration.