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Modern Description: On the Emporeió to Pyrgí road (1.2 km northwest of Emporeió), a turning back to the south leads to the Genoese Tower of Dótia (2.2 km) which constituted the impressive, central keep of a fortified settlement in the midst of a wide area of mastic trees. At the centre of the villages of Mestá and Pyrgí there are similar towers, suggesting that Dótia, too, would have been a similar but smaller mediaeval village: although most is now rubble, the walls and corner bastions of the surrounding settlement are still visible. The tower itself, which stands to almost 20m in height and shows vestiges of three interior floors supported by brick vaults, is similar in design and material to the Genoese towers on the north coast of Samothrace which also date from the first years of the 15th century. The tower here is slightly larger and has greater elegance in the slight talus at its base. Like its predecessors, the Classical and Hellenistic towers of the Aegean, it was a multi-purpose construction, providing protection for agricultural land and, at the same time, functioning as a look-out and signalling tower.
Wikidata ID: Q25167226

Info: McGilchrist's Greek Islands

(From McGilchrist’s Greek Islands, © Nigel McGilchrist 2010, excerpted with his gracious permission. Click for the books)

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