Kampos Κάμπος

Kambos10Jun16 copy
While up on the mountain the other day searching for some irony that had escaped, we saw this view of Kampos. – Kampos can mean either plain or open country (Oxford Dictionary of Modern Greek).

Due to the late afternoon light, the photo shows this vast area clearly as an alluvial lowland at the base of the ring of hills. Though we are not exactly sure of the area’s precise boundaries, the name Kampos refers to this general area which includes many other identified spots. Among these are Agios Iannis tou Kampou, Ag Artemios, Keramoto, Episkopi, Kseropigato, Agios Trifonas, Ag Nikolaos o Kryfos and others.

The Agios Nikolaos o Kryfos chapel is on the road out beyond the quarry so (according to Diamantios Sampson) we can assume that the general Kampos area ends where the main road begins to climb the mountain. We were informed some weeks ago that the placename of that area is Petralakia.

The naming is probably like the Stafilos name which denotes the entire landscape south of town and west of Palouki to the sea. Within that area there are a lot of specific place names but most of the time Stafilos is good enough.

One can imagine that in the olden days there may have been a well-worn pilgrimage path from the town out through Kampos and up the hillside to the Temple of Athena (now Panagia Polimistria), which, due to its size, must have been important. A path still exists but sadly not so well worn.

One thought on “Kampos Κάμπος

  1. Directions for the path up to Polimistri via Kambos are in my book. Last year I was doing some clearing there and near the top we met a bulldozer and two locals who were destroying the trail to make a road to a plot for development. One guy was somewhat hostile and abusive when challenged. I reported the incident to the mayor having found out the name of the man. Returning several days later the destruction had continued. The scalapati (near Petrovrissi) is in good condition and is in my program for future clearing.

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.