Fortress of Firkas

On the northwestern side of the city of Chania, the Venetians constructed the Revellino Del Porto, a fortification that was capable of repelling any possible enemy and danger from the harbor.

Its construction started in the middle of the 16th century and was completed some years before the fall of the city to the Ottomans in 1645. Inside there were barracks and ammunition storehouses. It was also the headquarters of the military governor of the city. In the middle of the enclosure there is a large vaulted reservoir that collected the rain water of the roofs.

On the northern side of the Revellino there is a complex of six successive vaults, each with a “casemate”, designed to allow the gunfire to cover the entrance of the port.

During the Ottoman rule, the Revellino was used mainly as barracks (Firka = barracks), a name it has until today. The vaulted firing posts have been used as prisons from the Ottoman rule to the Civil War. On December 1st 1913 the flag of the Union of Crete with Greece was raised symbolically on the small tower at the corner of the fortress.

(Author: 28th Ephorate of Byzantine Antiquities