History - Byzantine Epoch

During the Roman and Byzantine period the island was in decline. The Byzantines used it as a place of exile. After the conquest of Constantinopel by the Franks, the island was united with the Dukedom of Naxos and later passed into the administration of Guizi in the years of the reign of emperor Michael H' Palaiologos. It remained in his possession until 1453 AD when the inhabitants offered their island to the Venetians in order to escape the Turkish occupation.

In 1538 the Algerian pirate Barbarosa came to the island and slaughtered the inhabitants. Around 1600 survived and escaped to Evia and Thessaly but later returned to the island. Then the Turkish occupation started, though these occupiers treat the population more gently. The inhabitants were self governed and simply had the duty to pay their taxes and to assign 30 sailors to serve one year in the Turkish fleet. No citizen of Turkish origin ever settled on the island.

During 1750 AD the first Greek partisans and guerilla fighters started to come to the island from Olympus, Chalkidiki and Thessaly. But from 1810 onwards there were fights between the locals and the guerillas of central Greece. During the revolution of 1821 the captains of Skopelos helped their brothers wherever they were needed. When the revolution failed in Thessaly and Macedonia, 70.000 people, men, women and children settled again in the island - exhausted by epidemics and poverty. .

Finally Skopelos became part of the Greek state in 1830.

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