The site was identified by 19th-century scholars with ancient
Charadrus, until
N. G. L. Hammond established its modern identification with the ancient city of Bouchetion. Bouchetion was an
Elean colony founded in the 7th century BC, and served as the port for the inland settlements of Elatria (at the modern village of Palaioroforos, 10 km west of Rogoi) and Baties (modern Kastro Rizovouni, some 7 km to the north of Rogoi). In the 4th century, Bouchetion was incorporated into the unified
kingdom of Epirus by the
Molossian king
Alexander I ( BC). The town followed the fortunes of the Epirote state. In 167 BC, it was sacked during the
Third Macedonian War. Although its strategic location ensured that the site remained occupied thereafter, it was eventually abandoned after the foundation of
Nicopolis in 28 BC. The new settlement of Rogoi is first attested in the
Notitiae Episcopatuum of the
Patriarchate of Constantinople as the seat of a
bishopric, a
suffragan of the
Metropolis of Naupaktos, under the
Byzantine emperor Leo VI (). It was likely resettled in the course of the 9th century, during the Byzantines' recovery of Epirus from the
Slavic invaders who had taken it over in the late 6th and early 7th century. Indeed, the name "Rogoi" has been suggested as being of Slavic origin, but more likely derives from a
Sicilian Greek term for "granaries", and may indicate that Sicilian settlers were brought in to establish the new settlement. In the period between and , the local inhabitants changed the course of the Louros river to its present form, aiming to drain its marshes and increase the available farmland, and possibly to enhance the protection of the castle itself, which was now surrounded on three sides by the river. The medieval settlement appears in historical sources chiefly in the 14th–15th centuries, when it played a role in the wars of various local potentates for control over Epirus. Thus it was attacked without success by
Philip I, Prince of Taranto in 1303/4, when
Anna Palaiologina Kantakouzene, the regent of the
Despotate of Epirus, refused to acknowledge
Angevin suzerainty. In 1338/9, the castle of Rogoi, along with the Epirote capital,
Arta, and the fortress of Riniasa or
Thomokastron, was seized by Epirote rebels under Alexios Kabasilas, who rose up against the annexation of Epirus into the Byzantine Empire in the previous year. Emperor
Andronikos III Palaiologos and his
Grand Domestic,
John Kantakouzenos, blockaded Rogoi, which was eventually persuaded to surrender by Kantakouzenos. Epirus fell into the hands of the
Serbian Empire during the
Byzantine civil war of 1341–47. In 1361, the
Serbian emperor Simeon Urosh confirmed
John Tzaphas Orsini, a relative of his wife, as lord of Rogoi and other areas in Epirus, but the actual effect of this proclamation was probably negligible, as Serbian rule was soon challenged by the attacks of
Albanian tribes. By 1367, Rogoi and
Arta were in the hands of the Albanian chieftain
Pjetër Losha. After Losha's death in 1374, his domain was taken over by the fellow Albanian ruler of the
Acheloos River area,
Gjin Bua Shpata. The town remained in the hands of the Shpata family until 1416, when the last Albanian ruler,
Yaqub Shpata, was defeated by the
Count palatine of Cephalonia and Zakynthos,
Carlo I Tocco, who in 1411 had become master of
Ioannina. Carlo and his brother,
Leonardo II Tocco, took possession of Arta and Rogoi, thereby restoring the Despotate of Epirus to its traditional boundaries. Rogoi was finally abandoned after the
Ottoman conquest of the region in 1449.
Ciriaco de' Pizzicolli visited the castle in 1436 and 1448, and recorded that the relics of
Saint Luke were kept in a church there; according to contemporary Serbian texts, these had been moved there from
Constantinople after the fall of the city to the
Fourth Crusade. In 2019, the title of Bishop of Rogoi was revived and given to
Filotheos Theodoropoulos, when he was elected as assistant bishop of the
Archbishopric of Athens. == Castle layout==