1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Andros

ANDROS, or Andro, an island of the Greek archipelago, the most northerly of the Cyclades, 6 m. S.E. of Euboea, and about 2 m. N. of Tenos; it forms an eparchy in the modern kingdom of Greece. It is nearly 25 m. long, and its greatest breadth is 10 m. Its surface is for the most part mountainous, with many fruitful and well-watered valleys. Andros, the capital, on the east coast, contains about 2000 inhabitants. The ruins of Palaeopolis, the ancient capital, are on the west coast; the town possessed a famous temple, dedicated to Bacchus. The island has about 18,000 inhabitants.

The island in ancient times contained an Ionian population, perhaps with an admixture of Thracian blood. Though originally dependent on Eretria, by the 7th century B.C. it had become sufficiently prosperous to send out several colonies to Chalcidice (Acanthus, Stageirus, Argilus, Sane). In 480 it supplied ships to Xerxes and was subsequently harried by the Greek fleet. Though enrolled in the Delian League it remained disaffected towards Athens, and in 447 had to be coerced by the settlement of a cleruchy. In 411 Andros proclaimed its freedom and in 408 withstood an Athenian attack. As a member of the second Delian League it was again controlled by a garrison and an archon. In the Hellenistic period Andros was contended for as a frontier-post by the two naval powers of the Aegean Sea, Macedonia and Egypt. In 333 it received a Macedonian garrison from Antipater; in 308 it was freed by Ptolemy I. In the Chremonidean War (266–263) it passed again to Macedonia after a battle fought off its shores. In 200 it was captured by a combined Roman, Pergamene and Rhodian fleet, and remained a possession of Pergamum until the dissolution of that kingdom in 133 B.C. Before falling under Turkish rule, Andros was from A.D. 1207 till 1566 governed by the families Zeno and Sommariva under Venetian protection.