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The Medieval Fable of The Fisherman and the Fish

Fishing is a huge industry worldwide; every year about 1 to 2 trillion wild fish are caught, representing vastly more animal deaths than the annual slaughter of terrestrial vertebrates such as cows and chickens. Overfishing is a serious crisis. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in 2024, about 37% of monitored fish stocks across the globe were overfished. Additionally, a 2018 FAO report indicated that nearly 60% of fish stocks were “maximally sustainably fished,” meaning that these fish populations were being exploited to the very edge of sustainability.1 Regulations and guidelines aim to reduce “illegal, unreported and unregulated” (IUU) fishing, in order to mitigate the devastating effects of overfishing and maintain populations of these animals for future human use, but IUU fishing is still extremely widespread in practice.

Fish illustration in Der Naturen Bloeme, National Library of the Netherlands, KA 16, fol. 115r.

Below, I translate and discuss a medieval fable, that of The Fisherman and the Fish (Perry Index 18). The Fisherman and the Fish has a decidedly anti-conservationist bent. It depicts an individual fisherman who is angling (fishing with a line), seemingly for his own table rather than for recreation or profit. Though the man’s catch is given a speech, the fisherman gets the last word, saying that the more prudent thing is to kill and eat even a small fish that one has already caught, rather than to hold out for a larger one that may or may not come. Though the fable suggests we are meant to agree with the man’s judgment, I find the fish’s plea to the fisherman—one of many examples in fable where a vulnerable character begs a more powerful one for their life—quite affecting.

This version of The Fisherman and the Fish is by Avianus (ca. 400 CE); it is preceded by a Greek version by Babrius.2 I provide a Latin text of Avianus, and an English translation, below.

De piscatore et pisce
Piscator solitus praedam suspendere saeta
exigui piscis vile trahebat onus.
sed postquam superas captum perduxit ad auras
atque avido fixum vulnus ab ore tulit,
“parce, precor” supplex lacrimis ita dixit obortis;
“nam quanta ex nostro corpore dona feres?
nunc me saxosis genetrix fecunda sub antris
fudit et in propriis ludere iussit aquis.
tolle minas, tenerumque tuis sine crescere mensis:
haec tibi me rursum litoris ora dabit:
protinus immensi depastus caerula ponti
pinguior ad calamum sponte recurro tuum.”
ille nefas captum referens absolvere piscem,
difficiles queritur casibus esse vices:
“nam miserum est” inquit “praesentem amittere praedam,
stultius et rursum vota futura sequi.”3

The Fisherman and the Fish
A fisherman, who was accustomed to catch his prey hanging on a line,
drew up a little fish of paltry weight.
But after he had brought up the captive into the air above,
and a wound pierced through its hungry mouth,
the pleading fish said, “Spare me, please,” with tears springing up,
“for how much benefit will you get from my body?
Just now a fertile mother has spawned me under stony grottoes,
and told me to play in our own waters.
Remove these threats; I am young, let me grow up for your table.
This edge of the shore will give me to you again.
Soon, when I have fed on the depths of the vast sea,
I will come back fatter to your rod, of my own accord.”
The fisherman, replying that it would be a sin to set the caught fish free,
laments the hard conditions of fortune:
“It’s a shame,” he said, “to let go of the prey in hand,
and even more foolish to pursue future wishes again.”

The fish’s plea makes both an appeal to reason and an appeal to emotion. He reasons that his meager body is now of little worth as food, and that in time, once he has grown, he will make a better meal. He further suggests a sort of bargain: he will return “willingly” (sponte) to the fisherman when he is a well-grown adult.  

As for emotion, the little fish, in his abject entreaty, describes himself rather pathetically. The fish having been spawned“just now” (nunc) implies that he is very young and small indeed. Anthropomorphic touches, such as the fish’s tears, and the detail that his mother has told her children to “play” (ludere) in the waters, could prompt readers’ sympathy for the creature. The prospect of a playful “child-fish” having his life cut suddenly short is a pitiful one.

In terms of natural history, the premise of the fable—at least according to the fish’s speech—is that the fish is small (and of little worth to humans nutritionally or economically), but only because he is a very young member of a species that grows considerably larger. While the fish was spawned in “just now” (nunc), “under stony grottoes,” (sub antris saxosis), his life cycle entails feeding and growing in the sea, then returning once again to the same place, where he could perhaps be caught once more by the same fisherman. The word litoris in line 10 can mean the beach or sea shore, but it could also refer to a river bank.4 If one interprets it as the latter, the fish could be of an anadromous species (i.e., a type of fish which spends its adult life in the sea but returns to rivers or streams in order to spawn; examples of anadromous fish include salmon, sturgeon, and some smelt. Babrius’s version takes place at the sea shore). Avianus’s version of the fable doesn’t specify what kind of fish this is, only that he is currently a juvenile. Later versions deem the fish a flatfish or turbot (rombus)5 or pickerel (smaris).6

Fish illustration, British Library, Add MS 36684, fol. 27v.

Intriguingly, in a version of the fable found in the fourteenth-century Dialogus creaturarum, the little fish promises to bring the man a whole school of other piscine victims with him when he returns. In this version, the fish also persuades the man to cut off part of his tail, so that he can be identified when he comes back. The fish reneges on his promise to bring others along with him, and is killed by the man when he is caught for the second time.7

The moral of The Fisherman and the Fish runs rather contrary to the morals of some others (which is often the case in such a heterogeneous and adaptable genre). For example, in the fable of The Goose with the Golden Eggs, which I posted about a few months ago, the moral is to not be greedy and hasty, and, I argued, perhaps not to push nature past sustainable limits. In The Fisherman and the Fish, by contrast, the choice endorsed is to kill an animal as soon as the opportunity presents itself, regardless of whether this is an optimal use of natural resources (i.e., achieving “maximum yield”), because the future is unpredictable.

Fables often focus on interactions between individuals of different species, rather than commenting on species as collectives or populations (though there are exceptions, e.g., The Hares and the Frogs, The Frogs Asking for a King). The fable of The Fisherman and the Fish, too, represents a single encounter between two individuals. However, perhaps we can see this fable as a kind of microcosm of relationships between humans and wild fish. Fishing is essentially the last bastion of wild-caught food, for the majority of humanity, and, as mentioned above, we are exploiting these animals to their limits and beyond. Considering this fable versus The Goose with the Golden Eggs, this fable may speak to a harsher and more opportunistic approach to exploiting “wild” natural resources, compared to exploiting domestic animals and crops. Domestic animals and crops require the expenditure of human labor to raise or cultivate, for one thing, which may make them seem like more of an investment; perhaps, too, animal slaughter or crop harvesting is also viewed as more reliable, more under human control, than the outcome of a fishing or hunting expedition.

Though overfishing has increased significantly in the last several decades, the genesis of unsustainable practices can be found in the medieval period, argues Richard C. Hoffmann. “By the end of the Middle Ages, essential elements for present-day global fishery crises were in place in European waters…. Overexploitation, habitat destruction, selective predation on large or prestigious species, and human competition without regard for the resource were all part of medieval experience.”8 While The Fisherman and the Fish is a brief text and a small example, compared to Hoffmann’s sweeping environmental history, I think this fable can nevertheless be seen in light of medieval (and post-medieval) beliefs and practices regarding fish as natural resources.

Linnet Heald
PhD in Medieval Studies
University of Notre Dame

  1. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2018, p. 12. ↩︎
  2. Ben Edwin Perry, ed. and trans., Babrius and Phaedrus: Fables, Loeb Classical Library 436 (Harvard University Press, 1965), pp. 10–13. ↩︎
  3. Latin text from J. Wright Duff and A. M. Duff, eds., Minor Latin Poets, Volume II, Loeb Classical Library (Harvard University Press, 1934), p. 712. English translation is my own. ↩︎
  4. Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary (Clarendon Press, 1879), s.v. “lītus.” ↩︎
  5. Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary (Clarendon Press, 1879), s.v. “rhombus.” ↩︎
  6. Lewis and Short’s Latin dictionary defines smaris as “a small sea-fish of inferior quality.” Taxonomist Carl Linnaeus, in the mid-18th century, used smaris as the species name for a particular fish, the deep-body pickerel (Sparus smaris, now called Spicara smaris). ↩︎
  7. Francisco Rodríguez Adrados, The History of the Graeco-Latin Fable (Brill, 2003), vol. 3, p. 747. ↩︎
  8. Richard C. Hoffmann, The Catch: An Environmental History of Medieval European Fisheries (Cambridge University Press, 2023), p. 413. ↩︎

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Distilling Tradition: Anglo-Saxon Botany and the Beginning of Gin

Since moving to England, I’ve become very fond of gin, and the medievalist in me was thrilled when I was recently gifted a bottle of Ad Gefrin Distillery’s Thirlings Dry Gin. The gin is inspired by Northumbria’s Anglo-Saxon roots, what Ad Gefrin describes as “a time of welcome, celebration, and hospitality,” and it has been crafted with “a Northumbrian heart and Anglo-Saxon soul.”[1]  

The gin is gorgeous, both in its presentation and its finish. The bottle itself embodies the location’s Anglo-Saxon heritage: “Far from just being a vessel for the spirit, the bottle tells its own authentic story. The stepped punt reflects the 7th Century wooden Grandstand discovered on the ancient site and the holes/dimples in the glass represent the post holes which identified where the royal complex of buildings were and enabled archaeologists to calculate their size and height.”[2] Its botanical profile is comprised of “flavours inspired by Northumberland, heather and pine from the Cheviot hills, elderberry and dill from the hedgerows, and Irish moss and sea buckthorn from the coast.”[3] But the base of all gins, of course, is juniper.

In addition to its distillery that produces both gin and whisky, Ad Gefrin offers an impressive collection of Anglo-Saxon artefacts and an immersive experience of Northumberland’s Golden Age, including the richness and hospitality of the medieval hall. Photo courtesy of Ad Gefrin.

Juniper, a type of coniferous evergreen, is native to various parts of the northern hemisphere. There are approximately 30 species, but the common European species, Juniperus communis, is described as “a hardy spreading shrub or low tree, having awl-shaped prickly leaves and bluish-black or purple berries, with a pungent taste.”[4] These berries form the base of gin’s distinctive botanical flavor, which the Craft Gin Club aptly describes as “[r]esinous, piney and fresh on the palate and nose.”[5]

Juniper berries begin green but adopt a deeper blue to purple-black color as they mature. Common juniper is native to most of the northern hemisphere, including the United Kingdom. According to the Woodland Trust, the plant “thrives on chalk lowland, moorland, in rocky areas and old native-pine woodland” and functions as a source of food and shelter for a variety of birds.

The Anglo-Saxons recognized juniper primarily for its medicinal properties. Its Old English name was cwic-beam, which literally translates to “life-tree.”[6] In the Old English Herbarium, a popular medieval treatise dedicated to the identification and application of plants, juniper is listed as sabine or savine in accordance with its Latin name, Juniperus sabina. As a compilation and translation of originally separate Latin treatises, the Herbarium employs Latin alongside English, much in the same way modern medical textbooks maintain Latin terminology for conditions that are then described in English.

The treatise indicates that juniper can be used to treat “painful joints and foot swelling,” “headache,” and “carbuncles.”[7] In the first instance, the treatise advises that the plant be concocted into a drink; the entry reads: “For the king’s disease, which is called aurignem in Latin and means painful joints and foot swelling in our language, take this plant, which is called sabinam, and by another name like it, savine, give it to drink with honey. It will relieve the pain. It does the same thing mixed with wine.”[8] Here, the king’s disease – in Old English, “wiþ þa cynelican adle”– likely refers to jaundice related to gout.[9] For the treatment of headache, the plant was to be mixed into a kind of poultice and applied to the head and temples.[10] In the case of carbuncles, which refer to a cluster of boils, the plant would be made into a honey-based salve and applied to the infected area.[11]    

Entries for chamomile and heart clover in the only surviving illustrated Old English herbal, a book that primarily describes plants and their applications. As the British Library notes, “Remedies for poisonous bites were marked out with drawings of snakes and scorpions.” The manuscript, produced in England and dated 1000-1025, also contains information on animals and their medicinal properties, though not all of its contents are reliable. (British Library, Cotton MS Vitellius C III, f. 29v).

While juniper was available to the Anglo-Saxons, even in drinking form, distilling was not. In fact, distilled liquors were virtually unknown in medieval England.[12] Rather than spirits, the early medieval English drank beer and mead.

According to John Burnett, “Beer was probably the first drink deliberately made by man.”[13] In his book, Liquid Pleasures: A Social History of Drinks in Modern Britain, Burnett explains that beer brewed from fermented barley has been recorded as far back as the third millennium B.C. in the Bronze Age civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia, and beer production became common across Europe during the Celtic Iron Age.[14] In its earliest use, the Old English beor, “beer,” likely referred to any type of alcohol produced through fermentation, though it appears have been distinct from the less frequently used ealu, “ale.”[15] Beor may have referred to drinks brewed from malt, while ealu may have been a sweeter and stronger drink.[16] These terms may also have been used interchangeably until hops were introduced much later in the medieval period.[17]

The introduction of hops to the brewing process distinguished ale from beer; it also displaced women as the primary producers of the beverage. As A. Lynn Martin explains, “In England ale brewing was a domestic industry dominated by alewives. Their brew was usually sweet, sometimes flavored with herbs and spices, and spoiled if not consumed within several days. The addition of hops created a bitter drink that was stronger and lasted longer than ale.”[18]

Mead, however, was the predominant drink of the Anglo-Saxons and was made by fermenting a mixture of honey and water. The Old English word for “mead” is the same for “meadow”: medu, effectively evoking the beverage’s connection to the flowers and bees essential for the production of honey and, in turn, mead. The plant now known as meadowsweet, or medu-wyrt in Old English, was also sometimes used to flavor the drink.[19]

Additionally, the Anglo-Saxon hall was commonly called the medu-hall, or “mead hall,” indicating not only a primary attribute of the hall but also the centrality of the drink to Anglo-Saxon culture. The hall was an integral part of early medieval English society and functioned as a space for social and political discourse, as well as communal gatherings and feasting celebrations. Indeed, the speaker of the Old English elegy known as The Seafarer describes his loneliness in relation to the absent sounds of the hall, which function as a synecdoche for the communal bonds he craves: “A seagull singing instead of men laughing, / A mew’s music instead of meadhall drinking.”[20]  

Dated to the 5th century, this glass Anglo-Saxon drinking vessel, known as the Castle Eden Claw Beaker, was found at Castle Eden in Durham, England. The object is currently on display at Ad Gefrin’s Wooler Museum, on loan from the British Museum, and returned to the North East after more than 30 years. Photo credit Sally Ann Norman, courtesy of Ad Gefrin.

Because honey was used for a variety of purposes, including the making of both mead and medicine, beekeeping was also an important part of Anglo-Saxon society. In fact, sugar was not produced in medieval England, so honey was the primary sweetener, which is why it appears so frequently in culinary and medical recipes alike. The Old English “Charm for a Swarm of Bees,” a metrical incantation, serves as evidence of honey’s necessity. Essentially, the charm is a magic spell meant to entice a swarm of bees to a keeper and encourage them to remain:  

Charm for a Swarm of Bees

For a swarm of bees, take earth and throw it down with your right
hand under your right foot, saying:

I catch it under foot—under foot I find it.
Look! Earth has power over all creatures,
Over grudges, over malice, over evil rites,
Over even the mighty, slanderous tongue of man.

Afterwards as they swarm, throw earth over them, saying:

Settle down, little victory-women, down on earth—
Stay home, never fly wild to the woods.
Be wise and mindful of my benefit,
As every man remembers his hearth and home,
His life and land, his meat and drink.[21]

Eventually, mead went by the wayside, and wine became the more popular drink near the end of the Anglo-Saxon period – at least among the wealthy. As Burnett points out, while the consumption of wine was relatively high throughout the Middle Ages, “it never rivalled beer as the drink of the masses.”[22] 

By the 16th century, distilled drinks were “beginning to be served together with sweetmeats at the end of banquets as pleasurable, stimulating aids to digestion.”[23] Distillation describes the process of heating a liquid into a vapor, which is then condensed into a pure essence, and the procedure may have been known to the Chinese as early as 1,000 B.C.[24] Burnett explains that the “the requisite knowledge was brought to the West either by the Cathars or by returning Crusaders, who had seen distillation practised by Arab alchemists. A coded recipe for ‘aqua ardens’ appeared in a French monastic tract about 1190 alongside one for artificial gold, and through the medieval world spirits were regarded as mysterious, even magical, substances, used only medicinally for their stimulating, reviving qualities.”[25]

He continues: “English records of ‘aqua vitae’ distilled from wine appear in the fourteenth century, when it was made by monks and apothecaries, and became more widely known during the Black Death (1348-9) as a warming prophylactic. Spirits were also redistilled with herbs and flowers from the physic gardens of monasteries to make a variety of liqueurs with therapeutic properties, while in private households spirit-based ‘cordials’ were recommended for the treatment of palsey, the plague, smallpox, apoplexy, ague and other diseases.”[26]

Gin, from the Dutch genever, or “juniper,” because it was distilled with the plant’s berries, started being imported into England from the Netherlands during the late 16th century. The original product was “a highly flavoured, aromatic drink” that is still produced in the Netherlands and typically enjoyed neat.[27] By the mid-18th century, however, England had begun producing its own version in London, which was “less coarse and more subtly flavoured.”[28] By this time, spirits were being consumed largely for pleasurable, rather than medicinal, purposes.

While gin and distillation were not known to the Anglo-Saxons, juniper certainly was, and in this way, the spirit’s botanical roots are intertwined with medieval English history.

Emily McLemore, Ph.D.
Alumni Contributor, Department of English
Lecturer, Bishop Grosseteste University (U.K.)

[1] Ad Gefrin, https://adgefrin.co.uk/spirits/gin. Special thanks to Chris Ferguson and Claire Byers from Ad Gefrin for supplying additional information and wonderful photos.

[2] Ad Gefrin, https://adgefrin.co.uk/spirits/gin.

[3] Ad Gefrin, https://adgefrin.co.uk/spirits/gin.

[4] “juniper,” Oxford English Dictionary.

[5] Craft Gin Club, “The Gin Herbarium: A Guide to Herbal Gin Botanicals!,” https://www.craftginclub.co.uk/ginnedmagazine/guide-gin-herb-botanicals.

[6] “cwic-beam,” Bosworth Toller’s Anglo-Saxon Dictionary.

[7] Anne Van Arsdall, Medieval Herbal Remedies: The Old English Herbarium and Early Medieval Medicine, Routledge (2023), p. 113.

[8] Van Arsdall, Medieval Herbal Remedies, p. 165.

[9] Van Arsdall, Medieval Herbal Remedies, p. 165.

[10] Van Arsdall, Medieval Herbal Remedies, p. 165.

[11] Van Arsdall, Medieval Herbal Remedies, p. 165.

[12] William Edward Mead, The English Medieval Feast, Routledge (2019), p. 123.

[13] John Burnett, Liquid Pleasures: A Social History of Drinks in Modern Britain, Routledge (1999), p. 112.

[14] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 112.

[15] “beer,” Oxford English Dictionary.

[16] “ale,” Oxford English Dictionary.

[17] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 112.

[18] A. Lynn Martin, Alcohol, Sex, and Gender in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe, Palgrave (2001), p. 7.

[19] Emma Kay, Fodder and Drincan: Anglo-Saxon Culinary History, Marion Boyars Publishers, Ltd. (2023), p. 153.

[20] Craig Williamson (translator), The Complete Old English Poems, University of Pennsylvania Press (2017), p. 468.

[21] Williamson (translator), The Complete Old English Poems, p. 1081.

[22] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 142.

[23] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 160.

[24] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 160.

[25] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 160.

[26] Burnett, Liquid Pleasures, p. 160.

[27] “gin,” Oxford English Dictionary.

[28] “gin,” Oxford English Dictionary.

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Why Fortify?  A Short Introduction to Four Byzantine Fortifications in the Maeander Valley

I chose these four fortresses as representations of the observable differences between Byzantine fortified sites.  Not all fortifications were made equal.  Differences lie not only in the choice of how walls and towers are constructed, but also in the placement of these fortified sites in the landscape.  Careful analysis of these features can reveal the underlying assumptions and motivations of the builders.  I have chosen among these four fortifications a military base, a refuge, a center for agricultural exploitation, and a fortified residence within the Maeander River valley.

The Locations of the Fortresses, made by author in QGIS.

Kadıkalesi[1]

Kadıkalesi is a great example of a military fortress likely built and used by the Byzantine armed forces.  The entrances, not just the main one but the two postern entrances too, had a bent gate, which denies an attacker a good view inside the fortress (see Figure 2).  The towers project from the walls and include a larger circular tower which is more resilient to projectiles than a square tower.  Throughout the entire circuit of walls, platforms known as battlements were built for soldiers to be able to view the landscape.  The walls were caped with crenulations, which provided coverage for those soldiers from fire from below (see Figure 3).  This fortress was found on a small hill above a road, about 50 meters above sea level.  On the one hand, this elevation gave the soldiers good visibility of the surrounding countryside, but, on the other, it was low enough that the soldiers could quickly do something about a threat (see Figure 2). 

The Bent Gate of Kadıkalesi, photo by author.
The Battlements of Kadıkalesi, photo by author.

Fındıklı Kalesi[2]

Fındıklı Kalesi was a large fortress on the top of a mountain, enclosing an area of seven hectares at an elevation higher than 600 meters above sea level.  Like Kadıkalesi, the walls were built with military concerns in mind; a series of towers and periodic battlements defend the portions of wall spanning the gaps between rocks, while a double gate fortifies the most vulnerable part of the fortress in the southeast.  The size of the fortress was partly determined by geology; the walls follow the edges of a massive rock outcropping.  Unlike Kadıkalesi, however, the fortress was isolated from the Byzantine roads that cross the mountain and unable to serve in the policing of routes.  I agree with scholars who see Fındıklı Kalesi as a refuge for times of invasion with only a small permanent peacetime population.[3]  This was a fortress, not of lords or soldiers, but of farmers and shepherds, who needed its great size to house flocks of sheep and its isolated location to keep just far enough away from any potential raiders that this ‘bluff in stone’ may appear like a formidable military fortress. 

View North from Inside Fındıklı Kalesi, photo by author.

Mersinet İskelesi[4]

The impressive fortress found on the southern coast of Lake Bafa appears to be a military fort like Kadıkalesi.  The use of blind arches to support the battlements even shows an improvement over the thick walls of Kadıkalesi.  However, I argue that military effectiveness was not the main concern of this fortress.  The defining element of the fortress is a great tower bisected by the enceinte wall.  However, there is no communication between the walls and the tower; anyone stationed in the tower could not advance into the battlements in response to a threat.  Second, the tower does not protrude from the wall, which decreased its visibility and potential range of fire.  While Mersinet İskelesi’s position does provide a good view of the eastern half of Lake Bafa, nearby hills could provide a better view.  Instead, this fortress has more in common with the isolated towers found around Lake Bafa and in the wider Maeander Valley.  Mersinet İskelesi is an isolated tower with an increased budget.  I suspect that this fortress and the other towers have something to do with the exploitation of agricultural estates as these towers lie at the edge of the most plentiful area of farmable land adjacent to Lake Bafa, even if this fortress is usually interpreted as a fortified monastery[5] or military base.[6] 

View of Tower of Mersinet İskelesi from Lake Bafa, photo by author.
Central Tower of Mersinet İskelesi from inside the Fortress, photo by author.

The Monastery of Stylos[7]

The final fortress is the monastery of Stylos.  Its walls aided the defense of a community which resided in isolated places like a type of fortified residence.  However, this monastery was never intended to operate like a military fortress.  For instance, the battlements were limited to walls located at known entrances on the north and south side.  They were only interested in watching visitors who intended to use a proper gate and not in observing the wider region.  Nor was it a refuge.  While the monastery was deep in its mountain like Fındıklı Kalesi, Stylos is near a branch of an ancient road network, which gives the monastery a greater ability to interact with others on and off the mountain.  Finally, the division of interior fortification betrays a uniquely monastic concern: the proper veneration of the founder of the monastery.  The inner bastion of the monastery contains the hermitage of Saint Paul the Younger cut in a tower of rock and decorated with a painted program of religious images (see Figures 6 and 7).  I suspect the fortification of the hermitage likely served to encourage the veneration of their founder and to connect that founder with the builder of the walls, likely Christodoulos of Latros who would go on to found the Monastery of Saint John the Theologian on Patmos.  Whatever the purpose of the inner gate was, it is hard to imagine it served the defense of the monastery. 

The Inner Gate of Stylos Leading to the Hermitage, photo by author.
View of the Hermitage of Saint Paul the Younger, photo by author.

Tyler Wolford, PhD
Byzantine Studies Postdoctoral Fellowship
Medieval Institute
University of Notre Dame

[1] Wolfgang Müller-Wiener, “Mittelalterliche Befestigungen im südlichen Jonien,” IstMitt 11 (1961): 19-23.

[2] Hans Lohmann et al., Survey in der Mykale 1, Bonn: Rudolf Habelt, 2014-2017, II.510-513 (MYK 65).

[3] Jesko Fildhuth, Das byzantinische Priene, Berlin: DAI, 2017, 96-98; for an opposing view see Lohmann et al., Survey in der Mykale, I.284-290.

[4] Müller-Wiener, “Mittelalterliche Befestigungen,” 17-19.

[5] Urs Peschlow, “Latmos,” Reallexikon zur byzantinischen Kunst 5 (1995): 695-696.  

[6] Müller-Wiener, “Mittelalterliche Befestigungen,” 18-19.

[7] Theodor Wiegand, Der Latmos, Milet III.1, Berlin: Georg Reimer, 1913, 61-72.