Windmills of Rhodes 

Although seemingly unrelated to Dorset windmills, these windmills have a number of features in common with the Portland (Easton) tower mills. The writer believes that the Portland stone tower mills were influenced by technology perhaps brought via trading or by someone from the Mediterranean area.

An extract of this research was published as an article in The International Molinological Society (TIMS) Pub 56 - (July 1998) following a holiday on the island in 1992 during which a brief study of the windmills was made including a full measured survey of one almost intact windmill at Vation. (now signed as Papagiorgi) My daughter and family visited this mill in July 2025 (see below)

Some Windmills of the  Island of Rhodes, Greece     by Richard Crumbleholme (published in The International Molinological Society (TIMS ) (Ref : IM1998   56 : 11-17)

I have been researching two old stone tower windmills on the Isle of Portland near my home in Weymouth, Dorset, UK for a number of years. They ceased working in the late 1890's but the stone towers are still in fair condition with the old oak windshaft and one sailstock from the north mill in the nearby museum. The mills are recorded in a land revenue account of 1608 appear to be the among the earliest surviving windmill towers in Britain perhaps predating this earliest record by up to a century. The stone towers are parallel sided and are of the typical Southern Mediterranean type.

By chance, a visit to the island of Rhodes in 1992 allowed me to study this type of windmill at first hand. With the inevitable spread of mass tourism, the former way of island life is changing and the once common windmills or Anemomili are fast disappearing and deteriorating. Due to limited time, only a brief survey of the windmills easily accessible by road was possible. However, one particular almost intact windmill in the south east of the island was surveyed in greater detail. 

This survey has been of great assistance in formulating a conjectural reconstruction of the Portland mill, both having a single pair of overdriven stones, all timber components and of almost identical size. In many ways, the

Rhodes mill design is more refined, due probably to being one of many similar windmills on a relatively small island. The two Portland windmills on the other hand were fairly unique to their area as to date only approximately 40 windmills are known to have existed in Dorset, many were of early date and the majority known to be timber post mills. 

The island of Rhodes is the largest of the Dodecanese group in the Aegean Sea and throughout its history has played an important role as a strategic base in the eastern Mediterranean. It apperas that the European Crusaders initially took small timber post mills with them to the Holy Land. In Europe, these early post mills were simple machines which were dismantled and rebuilt often as a result of fierce arguments due to wind energy being harnessed in opposition to long established watermill rights.

It is quite possible that the still emerging technologies of the European allies were pooled on Rhodes but were forced to compromise over the shortage of indigenous timber. Stone tower mills had appeared in Europe in the late 13th century. Stone was readily available and used in massive quantities for the fortifications whose walls often incorporated windmills to provide integral milling facilities. Stone towered mills would have been far less vulnerable to attack than fragile timber post mills. With fairly constant wind available in Rhodes, windmills offered an ideal solution to milling corn on a large scale at this medieval military base. 

Although fixed direction horseshoe shaped Monopatos and Taralis horizontal and vertical types of windmill existed on many Greek islands, the classic southern Mediterranean type of tower windmill known as a Xetroharis emerged as the common windmill throughout the Aegean. 

However on Rhodes, these primitive windmills with a single pair of overdriven millstones and cylindrical stone tower evolved with a distinctive type of rotating timber cap. Below the conical roof, the cap has a skirt of vertical timber boarding enclosing a cylindrical casing, the whole cap turning on rebated timber kerbs. Internally, this enlarged cap houses the windshaft and an additional gallery type of floor from where the grain hopper is filled and the cap is turned to the wind by means pegs and levers. Unlike most small tower mills, this arrangement gives the miller a fairly spacious, light & relatively safe working area.

Where greater capacity was required, multiple mills were built which also allowed for stone recutting and other maintenance works to be accommodated. Earth tremors, which are fairly frequent in the area, caused fracturing of the towers which no doubt caused some mills to be abandoned. It would appear that many of the windmills were owned by the church and were named after Saints. Some of the surviving windmills, although of primitive form, may have only been built fairly recently in the last century and certainly many remained in use well into the 20th century.

The situation today, many years after my visit, is likely to be very grim indeed and I fear for the survival of these unique windmills. Copies of my detailed survey have been lodged with the museum in Rhodes Town  and TIMS. 

The South Windmill at Vation  (now signposted as Windmill "Papagiorgi")

Location : The surviving mill, sited on a small ridge to the south of the village, now has little evidence of any an access trackway.  Whilst the present rather awkward climb up  through the dense gorse has probably helped to preserve the mill, there must have been at least a mule track in the past. Being sited on a small ridge, there is no mill mound or platform surrounding the tower.

History :  No information was available on the site apart from some early 20th century pencil calculations and dates made presumably by past millers. Sadly some modern graffiti exists. The mill also surveyed at nearby Gennadi appears to be identical in many respects and suggests that these mills were all constructed in the same" tradition" perhaps even by the same group of craftsmen. 

Two of the mills at Gennadi have motif plaques dated 1926. This would seem to indicate the date of the last refurbishment during the interwar years when Rhodes was in Italian occupation. The Vation mill has a simple cross motif but this is undated. The original construction date is unknown but it would not seem unreasonable to assume a reasonably early date bearing in mind the 15th century dating of the mills in Rhodes Town. This mill may have been built on the site of an earlier even more primitive one. Whether any records were kept of village activities during the long Turkish occupation is unknown.

My daughter with her family visited the mill in July 2025 - (see below)

There is now a sign naming the windmill as "Papagiorgi"

Construction : The mill is extremely well built with granite like stonework tower. The construction and jointing techniques of the timber cap, circular rebated kerbs, windshaft and other internal components exhibiting a high degree of carpentry skill.

The Measured Survey (June 1992)  (Richard & Simon Crumbleholme)

Please refer to annotation numbers in the drawings below 

Below :  Left  - Upper floor with windshaft & decking                                                 Right :   Main wheel, wallower gear & chute

Below : Photos taken by my granddaughter Freya Bellamy during a visit made to the site with her family in July 2025

Comment (July 2025): The windmill sadly seems to be abandoned and left to decay. It makes me glad that I made the above full measured study which has at least recorded it when almost intact some 33 years ago.

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