Fronted by the town’s impressive (and massive) cobbled square, at the monastery’s entrance stands a statue commemorating a former abbot, Dositheos, who was murdered by Turkish troops during the Greek War of Independence in 1821. Acting as the parish church today, the monastery was originally built around 1150 and was extended and extensively remodelled in the 19th century. Several of the outbuildings now house small museums.
These include the harrowing National Struggle Museum . This museum is small and simple but the memories evoked by the black-and-white photos of the men and women killed (some reputedly tortured) by British forces between 1955 and 1959 might linger in your mind long after you leave.
Another outbuilding houses the Museum for the Preservation of Lace with delicate examples of the pipilies (needlepoint lacework) for which the village is famed.
