Páros

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white marble.

The island's considerable prosperity has depended since ancient times on agriculture, favored by fertile soil and an abundance of water, and on the working of marble, which is still quarried on a small scale. In recent years the rapid development of the tourist trade has brought changes in the island's landscape, economy and social structure.

Excavations on the islet of Saliangos, which was once joined to Páros, have yielded evidence of settlement in the late Neolithic period (fifth-fourth millennium B.C.).

The island, which has preserved its ancient name, was already well populated in the age of the Cycladic culture (third millennium B.C.). In the first millennium B.C. Ionian Greeks settled on Paros and made it a considerable sea power, minting its own coins, and in the seventh century B.C. Paros founded colonies on Thasos and in Thrace. In the sixth and fifth centuries Paros was celebrated for its school of sculptors. It was a member of the first Attic maritime league, and its unusually large contributions to the league (30 talents in 425 B.C.) are evidence of its wealth in the fifth century B.C.

In Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine times Paros was of no importance. In the ninth century A.D. it was depopulated as a result of raids by Arab pirates who ravaged and plundered the island. From 1207 to 1389 it belonged to the duchy of Náxos, and thereafter was ruled by various dynasts until its conquest by the Turks in 1537. It was reunited with Greece in 1832, after the establishment of the new Greek kingdom.

Regular flights from Athens, several times daily; also from Iráklion (Crete) and Rhodes.

Regular boat service from and to Athens (Piraeus), several times daily (cars carried). Local connections, daily, with the neighboring islands of Náxos, Ios, Santorin, Syros and Antíparos.