Feraklos Castle: A Byzantine and Hospitaller Fortress on Rhodes
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.5
- Popularity
- Low
- Country
- Greece
- Primary era
- Medieval
- Eras represented
- Medieval
- Civilizations
- Byzantine
- Site type
- Military
- Remains
- Castle
On this page7 sections
History
Feraklos Castle is a Byzantine-period defensive stronghold in Greece, standing above the bay of Charaki on Rhodes. The Byzantine Empire, the medieval Roman Empire centred on Constantinople, built and maintained strategic fortresses across the eastern Mediterranean. Feraklos later became an important stronghold of the Knights Hospitaller, a religious-military order that ruled Rhodes from 1309 until the Ottoman conquest in 1522–1523.
Byzantine stronghold and Hospitaller conquest
Feraklos was used by Arab pirates in the early fourteenth century. On 20 September 1306, the Knights Hospitaller captured it, making the castle the first fortress on Rhodes to fall to the order. The Hospitallers did not use Feraklos after taking it, and by 1408 the fortress had become a ruin.
Ottoman forces attacked Feraklos in 1445 during an early attempt to conquer Rhodes, but the castle withstood the assault. The Hospitaller grand masters Giovanni Battista degli Orsini, who held office from 1467 to 1476, and Pierre d’Aubusson, grand master from 1476 to 1503, later restored the fortress. Their work was intended to protect the fertile land around the bay and the anchorage used by ships. Feraklos consequently became one of the principal Hospitaller fortresses on Rhodes.
Refuge, imprisonment, and Ottoman capture
Documents from 1474 state that the fortress could provide refuge when necessary for the inhabitants of Maliona, Salia, Katagros, Zenodotou, and Kaminari. The Hospitallers also used Feraklos as a prison for prisoners of war and for Arab and Turkish merchants captured during naval raids in the eastern Mediterranean.
After a prolonged siege, Ottoman forces captured the castle on 3 January 1523. The Ottomans did not use Feraklos, and it was abandoned thereafter. The surviving fortress is classified as an archaeological monument of Greece and remains in ruins.
Remains
Feraklos stands approximately 85 metres above the bay of Charaki. Its polygonal plan is enclosed by walls with a perimeter of about 680 metres, surrounding an area of approximately 1,700 square metres. The surviving masonry includes Byzantine portions, later defensive work, and the remains of structures that formed the fortress settlement.
Walls, gateway, and approach
Sections of the northern and eastern walls survive from the Byzantine period. On the southern side, the remains of a gateway are protected by two round defensive towers. The walls retain square merlons, the raised sections of a parapet, while the parapet itself formed a protective edge for defenders. A road approaches the castle from the south, and the ruins include a surviving arch together with fragments of the northern and southern walls.
Interior settlement and water system
A settlement occupied the interior of the fortress, and its remains can still be seen among the ruins. The enclosed area also contains a water cistern, a built reservoir for collecting and storing water, along with remnants of interior rooms and buildings and several underground structures. An olive tree now grows among the surviving remains.
Underground tradition
Local legends claim that passages run beneath the castle. The existence of these underground routes remains uncertain.
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