Qualla: Mithymna https://qualla.com/mithymna en-us © 2026 Bendyline Thu, 23 Jul 2026 20:34:08 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Mithymna https://qualla.com/mithymna Mithymna: Introduction https://qualla.com/mithymna/ Photo credit Afbeelding4, CC BY-SA 4.0. From the pebbled beach, look up. The town climbs the hillside in tiers of red-roofed stone houses, and at the very top, crowning the hill, sits a fortress the Genoese rebuilt more than six hundred years ago. Most people call this place Molyvos. The old name, Methymna, is older still, and the town has worn its history the way the hill wears its houses, layer above layer, each generation building on the one below. Roughly fourteen hundred people live here now, but for most of antiquity Methymna was the second city of Lesbos, rich enough and proud enough to spend centuries quarreling with its great rival in the south.

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Image: Afbeelding4 | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/swfx-mithymna-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Mithymna: The Castle on the Hill https://qualla.com/mithymna/ Photo credit Original uploader was Chrill at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. The fortress that defines the skyline has guarded this hill for a very long time. An acropolis stood here from the 5th century BC; the Byzantines raised a fortress over it; and in 1373 the Genoese lord Francesco I Gattilusio rebuilt it into much of what survives today. Gattilusio...

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Image: Original uploader was Chrill at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/swfx-mithymna-the-castle-on-the-hill.mp3 0:06 2 full Mithymna: Achilles at the Gates https://qualla.com/mithymna/ Photo credit Sailko, CC BY 3.0. Methymna's founding myth gave it a daughter of Macar, married to the personification of Lesbos itself. But its darkest old story belongs to the Trojan War. In the epic tradition, Achilles besieged the city, and a Methymnian princess named Pisidice fell in love with him from the w...

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Image: Sailko | CC BY 3.0

]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/swfx-mithymna-achilles-at-the-gates.mp3 0:06 3 full Mithymna: A Rivalry Across the Island https://qualla.com/mithymna/ Photo credit Vladimir V. Samoilov (User:Rolleiflex, vs at fotography.ru), CC BY 2.5. For centuries Methymna defined itself against Mytilene. During the Peloponnesian War, when Mytilene revolted against Athens in 428 BC, Methymna alone among the island's cities stayed loyal to Athens, and was rewarded for it: after Athens crushed the revolt, only Methymna kept its...

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Image: Vladimir V. Samoilov (User:Rolleiflex, vs at fotography.ru) | CC BY 2.5

]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/swfx-mithymna-a-rivalry-across-the-island.mp3 0:06 4 full Mithymna: Mansions, Merchants, and the Sea https://qualla.com/mithymna/ Photo credit .marc., CC BY-SA 3.0. Under the Ottomans the town was called Molova, and the first centuries were hard, marked by heavy taxation and confiscations that pushed many families to the opposite coast in search of a better life. But after the reforms of the late 18th and 19th centuries, commerce returned to...

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]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/w/f/x/mithymna-wp/swfx-mithymna-mansions-merchants-and-the-sea.mp3 0:06 5 full