 |
Rio and Antirio on the map; within the yellow circles
lie Makyneia (centre-left in the picture) and Nafpaktos (top right).
(map © ROAD Publications) |
Nafpaktos is the exquisite diamond set on the golden ring that is the Gulf
of Corinth. A splendid, small castle-city built upon the protruding rocks
of the highest peak (Rigani of 1469 m. height) of the Mountains of Nafpaktia,
overseeing the blue sea.
Centuries of history run through this small stone backbone. The Dorians have
crossed this region on their way to conquer the Peloponnese. It is actually said
that it is shipbuilding that lend the city its name; the name of Nafpaktos, also
spelled Naupactos or Naupactus, is a compound word from nafs (naus=ship, compare
to "nautical") and the verb pegnimi=build, a form of which is pakt
or pact (compare to compact), so Nafpaktos actually means "where ships are
built". When the Spartans chased the Messinians away from their land, the
Athenians helped them to settle in Nafpaktos which was their most important naval
base. It was then that the city began its fortification plan. Following the defeat
of the Athenians and the end of the Peloponnesian War in 404 B.C., Nafpaktos
was handed over to the Spartans. In the next years, the city changed many rulers.
In 338 B.C., Philip the Second of Macedontakes over Nafpaktos from the Achaeans
and delivers it to the Aetolians. Pausanias mentions Nafpaktos as his final stop
in his ten-year journey in Greece. In 218 B.C., Nafpaktos becomes the capital
of the Aetolic Confederation.
Frorm the 7
th until the 10
th century
A.D., Nafpaktos was the capital city of the Despotate or Principality of Epirus.
In 1210, the Franks took control of the city and from 1407 to 1499 A.D., the
Venetians conquered it, re-fortified and renamed it to Lepanto. Nafpaktos is
chiefly celebrated for the victory, which the united papal, Spanish, Venetian,
and Genoese fleets, under Don Juan of Austria, gained over the Turkish fleet
on Oct. 7, 1571, in Patras bay thus halting temporarily the spread of the Ottoman
Empire. The city fell successively from the Venetians to the Turks and was finally
surrendered to the Greeks.
