Other places in Peloponnese

Argolida Laconia Messinia Patra

A Greek magical Mystra tour

As you approach from the north, the ruins are almost invisible. In the half-light of dawn, they blend like crumbling cliffs into the mountain backdrop.
'You still can't see them?' asks Georgia, my guide. 'There...and there...and there...'
I look to left and right, and suddenly a startling sight emerges. On the steep, shrub-covered hillside the broken ruins of an entire city slowly appear. A castle; a palace; a huge, domed monastery.
This, then, is the fabled Mystra - once the jewel in the crown of Greece's Peloponnese It's one of the great, lost cities of the medieval world - a thriving metropolis that died suddenly and unexpectedly.
Like Pompeii, it was snuffed out by an outside force. Like Pompeii, its evocative ruins allow a fascinating glimpse into another world. Now, it's being restored.
I'm here to take a trip back through time. Georgia, chief architect of the restoration programme, has promised to guide me back through half a millennium, to the days when Mystra was one of the most fabulous cities of the Byzantine empire.
As the imperial capital, Constantinople (now Istanbul), was besieged - and the once-great empire collapsed into ruins - her philosophers, artists and poets flocked to the safety of Mystra.
It was to this distant city that the descendants of Plato and Sophocles carted their boxes of manuscripts. They read them, they discussed them and, after receiving an invitation to stay with the Medici family, transported them to Italy.
There are many who argue that Mystra's scholars provided the spark that started the Renaissance.
Compared to most Greek cities, Mystra is an upstart. Nearby Sparta was already a ruin when Mystra's myrtlecovered slopes were first cleared of their wild goats. It was not until the 13th Century that the first foundation stones of this great city were laid.

Read more in our destination guide to Peloponnese.