Samos in the context of "Southern Sporades"

The Lamian War or the Hellenic War (323–322 BC), was an unsuccessful attempt by Athens and a large coalition of Greek states to end the hegemony of Macedonia over Greece just after the death of Alexander the Great. It was the last time Athens played a significant role as an independent power.

War was simmering in Greece after Alexander the Great issued the Exiles' Decree (in 324 BC), which ordered the Greek states to return all the people they had forced into exile. This decree meant that Athens had to surrender the island of Samos, colonised by Athenian clerurchs since 365 BC, while the Aetolian League had to leave Oiniadai, taken c.330 BC. Once the death of Alexander became known in June 323 BC, most states in mainland Greece revolted and founded the Hellenic League, recalling the alliance forged during the Persian Wars; this time with Macedonia in the role of the foreign invader. The Greeks were initially successful under their Athenian commander in chief Leosthenes, who managed to besiege Antipater, the Macedonian general in Europe, in the city of Lamia, which gave its name to the war. At this point however, the arrival of a large Macedonian fleet commanded by Cleitus the White from the Levant turned the tide in favour of Macedonia. Even though Athens had more ships than Macedonia, it did not have enough crews to man them all and its overextended navy was defeated off the Echinades island and Amorgos.

Lesbos or Lesvos (Greek: Λέσβος, romanized: Lésvos [ˈlezvos]) is a Greek island located in the northeastern Aegean Sea. It has an area of 1,633 km (631 sq mi), with approximately 400 kilometres (249 miles) of coastline, making it the third largest island in Greece and the eighth largest in the Mediterranean. It is separated from Asia Minor by the narrow Mytilini Strait. On the southeastern coast is the island's capital and largest city, Mytilene (Μυτιλήνη), whose name is also used for the island as a whole. Lesbos is a separate regional unit with the seat in Mytilene, which is also the capital of the larger North Aegean region. The region includes the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Ikaria, Lemnos, and Samos. The total population of the island was 83,755 in 2021. A third of the island's inhabitants live in the capital, while the remainder are concentrated in small towns and villages. The largest are Plomari, Agia Paraskevi, Polichnitos, Agiassos, Eresos, Gera, and Molyvos (the ancient Mythimna).

According to later Greek writers, Mytilene was founded in the 11th century BC by the family Penthilidae, who arrived from Thessaly and ruled the city-state until a popular revolt (590–580 BC) led by Pittacus of Mytilene ended their rule. In fact, the archaeological and linguistic records may indicate a late Iron Age arrival of Greek settlers, although references in Late Bronze Age Hittite archives indicate a likely Greek presence then. According to Homer's Iliad, Lesbos was part of the kingdom of Priam, which ruled from Troy. In the Middle Ages, it was under Byzantine and then Genoese rule. Lesbos was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in 1462. The Ottomans then ruled the island until the First Balkan War in 1912, when it became part of the Kingdom of Greece.

Ionia (/aɪˈoʊniə/ eye-OH-nee-ə) was an ancient region encompassing the central part of the western coast of Anatolia. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. Never a unified state, it was named after the Ionians who had settled in the region before the archaic period.

Ionia proper comprised a narrow coastal strip from Phocaea in the north near the mouth of the river Hermus (now the Gediz), to Miletus in the south near the mouth of the river Maeander, and included the islands of Chios and Samos. It was bounded by Aeolia to the north, Lydia to the east and Caria to the south. The cities within the region figured significantly in the strife between the Persian Empire and the Greeks.

Leipsoi (Greek: Λειψοί [lipˈsi]; also: Lipsi; Ancient Greek: Λέψια, Lepsia) is an island south of Samos and to the north of Leros in Greece. It is well served with ferries passing between Patmos and Leros and on the main route for ferries from Piraeus. Leipsoi is a small group of islets at the northern part of the Dodecanese near Patmos island and Leros. The larger Leipsi-Arkoi archipelago consists of some 37 islands and islets of which only three are larger than 1 square kilometre (247 acres): Leipsoi (15.95 square kilometres (6.16 sq mi)), Arkoi (6.7 square kilometres (2.59 sq mi), part of Patmos municipality) and Agreloussa (1.32 square kilometres (0.51 sq mi), part of Patmos municipality). Only Leipsoi, Arkoi, and Marathos are inhabited. Leipsoi is a municipality, part of the Kalymnos regional unit, which is part of the South Aegean region. The municipality has an area of 17.350 square kilometres (6.699 sq mi). In ancient times, it contained a town named Lepsia.

Ikaria, also spelled Icaria (/aɪˈkɛəriə/; Greek: Ικαρία [ikaˈri.a]), is a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, 10 nautical miles (19 km) southwest of Samos.

Administratively, Ikaria forms a separate municipality within the Ikaria regional unit, which is part of the North Aegean region. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Agios Kirykos. The historic capitals of the island include Oenoe and Evdilos.

A xoanon (/ˈzoʊ.ənɒn/ , Greek: ξόανον; plural: Greek: ξόανα xoana, from the verb Greek: ξέειν, xeein, to carve or scrape [wood]) was a wooden cult image from Archaic Greece. Classical Greeks associated such cult objects, whether aniconic or effigy, with the legendary Daedalus. Many such cult images were preserved into historical times, though none are known to have survived to the modern day, except as copies in stone or marble. In the 2nd century CE, Pausanias described numerous xoana in his Description of Greece, notably the image of Hera in her temple at Samos. "The statue of the Samian Hera, as Aethilos [sic] says, was a wooden beam at first, but afterwards, when Prokles was ruler, it was humanized in form". In Pausanias' travels he never mentions seeing a xoanon of a "mortal man".