Prehistory Lesbos has been inhabited since at least 3000 BC. The oldest artifacts found on the island may date to the late
Paleolithic period. Important archaeological sites on the island are the
Neolithic cave of
Kagiani, probably a refuge for shepherds, the Neolithic settlement of
Chalakies, and the extensive habitation of Thermi (3000–1000 BC). The largest habitation is found in Lisvori, dating back to 2800–1900 BC, part of which is submerged in shallow coastal waters. Lesbos is mentioned in two
Hittite texts from the
Late Bronze Age, a period during which the island appears to have been a dependent of the
Seha River Land. The
Manapa-Tarhunta letter recounts an incident in which a group of purple-dyers from Lesbos defected from the Sehan king.
Ancient and Classical era , According to Classical
Greek mythology, Lesbos was the
patron god of the island.
Macareus of Rhodes was reputedly the first king whose many daughters bequeathed their names to some of the present larger towns. In Classical myth his sister,
Canace, was killed to have him made king. The place names with female origins are claimed by some to be much earlier settlements named after local goddesses, who were replaced by gods; however, there is little evidence to support this.
Homer refers to the island as "
Macaros edos," the seat of Macar.
Hittite records from the Late
Bronze Age name the island
Lazpa and must have considered its population significant enough to allow the Hittites to "borrow their gods" (presumably idols) to cure their king when the local gods were not forthcoming. It is believed that emigrants from mainland Greece, mainly from
Thessaly, entered the island and
Aeolis in the opposite coast, in the Late Bronze Age, and bequeathed it with the
Aeolic dialect of the Greek language, whose written form survives in the poems of
Sappho, amongst others. In classical times, the cities of the island formed a
pentapolis, comprising
Mytilene,
Methymna,
Antissa,
Eresos, and
Pyrrha. Pyrrha was destroyed in an earthquake in 231 BC, and Antissa by the
Roman Republic in 168 BC. Two of the
nine lyric poets in the Ancient Greek canon, Sappho and
Alcaeus, were from Lesbos.
Phanias wrote history. The seminal artistic creativity of those times brings to mind the myth of
Orpheus to whom
Apollo gave a
lyre and the
Muses taught to play and sing. When Orpheus incurred the wrath of the god Dionysus he was dismembered by the Maenads and of his body parts his head and his lyre found their way to Lesbos where they have "remained" ever since.
Pittacus was one of the
Seven Sages of Greece. In classical times,
Hellanicus advanced historiography and
Theophrastus, the father of botany, succeeded
Aristotle as the head of the Lyceum. Aristotle and
Epicurus lived there for some time, and it is there that Aristotle began systematic zoological investigations.
Theophanes, the historian who recorded
Pompey's campaigns, was also from Lesbos. As the Greek novel
Daphnis and Chloe is set on Lesbos, the author,
Longus, is usually assumed to be from the island. The abundant grey pottery ware found on the island and the worship of
Cybele, the great mother-goddess of
Anatolia, suggest the cultural continuity of the population from
Neolithic times. When the Persian king
Cyrus the Great defeated
Croesus (546 BC) the Ionic Greek cities of Anatolia and the adjacent islands became Persian subjects and remained such until the Persians were defeated by the Greeks at the
Battle of Salamis (480 BC). The island was governed by an
oligarchy in
archaic times, followed by quasi-democracy in
classical times. Around this time,
Arion developed the type of poem called
dithyramb, the progenitor of tragedy, and
Terpander invented the seven-note musical scale for the lyre. For a short period it was a member of the
Athenian confederacy, its apostasy from which is recounted by
Thucydides in the
Mytilenian Debate, in Book III of his
History of the Peloponnesian War. In
Hellenistic times, the island belonged to various
Diadochi of
Alexander the Great until 79 BC, when it passed into
Roman hands. Remnants of its Roman medieval history are three impressive castles. The cities of Mytilene and Methymna have been bishoprics since the 5th century. By the early 10th century, Mytilene had been raised to the status of a
metropolitan see. Methymna achieved the same by the 12th century. The island served as a gathering base for the fleet of the rebel
Thomas the Slav in the early 820s. In the 10th century, it was part of the
theme of the
Aegean Sea, while in the late 11th century it formed a (fiscal district) under a in Mytilene. Lesbos prospered from trade, and Mytilene was considered the busiest Ottoman port in the
Aegean Sea. West European representatives are attested in the city already in 1700, acting as vice-consuls for the consulates in Smyrna. The island exported olives and olive oil, wheat, grapes, raisins and wine, figs, fish, dairy products, acorns, soap, leather and hides, pitch and livestock. Twenty years later, during
World War II,
Nazi Germany conducted an invasion of Greece and
Yugoslavia, with both being defeated in 1941 and subsequently divided between the
Axis powers. Lesbos was occupied by Germany until 10 September 1944, when Greece was liberated. The poet
Odysseus Elytis, the descendant of an old family of Lesbos, received the
Nobel Prize in Literature in 1979. ==Tourism==