Καλλιτεχνικός Σύλλογος Δημοτικής Μουσικής Δόμνα Σαμίου

The legendary Castle of the Beauty, a castle with a multitude of names which change, like those of the Bridge of Arta, depending on the region to which the tradition or song spread, preserves one of the most readily recognizable traditions in the folk repertoire. There are very few places indeed within the Greek world which do not claim to be near a mythified ruined ‘castle’ which was defended by some mythic princess of great beauty who, when the situation looked hopeless or the castle was taken, threw herself into the nearest ravine to preserve her virtue. It is a tradition, which - like this song - can be read on any number of mythological and symbolic levels.

The song's style - that of a mediaeval legend - led earlier researchers to relate its poetic with a historical fall, and specifically the capture of Amorio in Phrygia by the Arabs in 838, and hence to include it in the Akritic cycle.

Modern research has rejected these arbitrary theories and shone light on the mythological and ethnological elements and motifs of this enigmatic song. In his study on the subject¹, K. Gotsis reveals the symbolic nature of the castle and the siege, as well as the renegade who, disguised as a woman, tricks their way into the castle. Equating the castle's fall with the violation of the independent, beautiful maiden, he shows how the whole story refers to eternal issues of identity and the relationship between the sexes, with the apparent historical details serving a purely metaphorical function. Miranda Terzopoulou (2017)

¹ Κ.G. Gotsis, Το Κάστρο της Ωριάς, Revue des Études Néo-helléniques 2.1-2/ (1993), pp. 145-162

Domna Samiou recorded the song in 1976, in the village Mesta on Chios island.