Etia - Venetian Villa

Bring the whole family to this great place with lots of room for fun. The space Etia or Ethia is an abandoned medieval village of the Armenians community of the municipality of Sitia, of the regional unit of Lasithi, in eastern Crete. According to the 2011 census, the village has no permanent population. It is built at an altitude of 510 meters, 14 kilometers south of Sitia. The village was one of the largest in Venetian Crete and a large Venetian mansion is preserved in the village. It has been designated as a traditional settlement The Venetian villa of De Mezzo at the northern end of the village is one of the most representative examples of Venetian architecture in the whole of Crete. The building is described as originally being three-storey but after successive disasters today only the ground floor is preserved. Above the main entrance are the coats of arms of Dei Mezzo. The mansion was surrounded by a courtyard with an impressive entrance, which no longer exists. To the right of the entrance, on the east side of the courtyard, Bishop Meletios of Trivizas built a fountain in 1701. The village also preserves the church of Agios Ioannis, with frescoes, and the church of Agia Aikaterini, which during the Turkish occupation had been converted into a mosque and functioned as such until 1897 Registration details 00002159426