Siteía

Siteía is a port on the northeastern coast of Crete. Under Venetian rule it was fortified, with the Kazarma fortress overlooking the harbour. The town suffered an earthquake in 1508 and a raid by Hayreddin Barbarossa in 1538.

During the Cretan War, Venice fought to retain the island against the Ottoman Empire. In 1651 the Venetians destroyed Siteía's defences and withdrew the garrison to Heraklion; inhabitants moved westward and the town site was abandoned for a long period. The fortress remains a reminder of the Venetian harbour town and its troubled seventeenth-century end.