Easter Customs in the Cyclades

It is the hour when the light shifts over the Cyclades. Winter has departed, the whitewashed lanes gleam, and a scent of candle wax, incense and blossoming lilac hangs in the air. You follow the sound of a bell tolling mournfully, turn a corner, and suddenly find yourself inside something ancient: the island Easter, the largest and richest in folk tradition of all the island world’s celebrations. Here, on each Cycladic island in its own way, the Passion and Resurrection of Christ come alive again through age-old customs that have endured for centuries.

Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the full moon of the Spring Equinox — by which time spring has already dressed the islands in its colors. And on each of them, the same story is told just a little differently.

Holy Week begins with whitewash and dough

Before Holy Week has even properly begun, the hands of the island’s housewives are already at work. On Lazarus Saturday, in Amorgos, Ios and Mykonos, the “lazarakia” or “koukliakia” are shaped — raisin breads and cookies molded into human forms, small figures kneaded to recall the raising of Lazarus. In Amorgos the week opens with the traditional whitewashing of houses and streets, until the whole village gleams.

In Santorini the custom takes on monumental proportions: in the village squares a “Lazarus” is erected, an enormous wooden cross wound with rosemary and flowers. And in Sifnos, on Holy Thursday, the housewives prepare the “birds of Easter,” festive ring-shaped breads shaped like animals and birds, decorated with red eggs — while the Resurrection “greeting” will last a full forty days.

The Epitaphios: processions with torches, rosewater and the sea

There is no image more moving in the Cyclades than the procession of the Epitaphios on Good Friday. In Paros, in Marpissa, a crowd chanting the Lamentations follows the procession through the village’s picturesque cobbled lanes, while along the route the “Re-enactments” of the Passion of Christ come to life: children and adults alike, dressed as Roman soldiers or disciples, re-enact the entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, the prayer on the Mount of Olives, the ordeal of the Crucifixion.

In Koufonisia, the harbor is lit from end to end with torches as the Epitaphios passes. In Amorgos and Santorini, women shower the procession with perfumes and rosewater from their courtyards. In Pyrgos, Santorini, after the Deposition, the “Tantalo” is carried out into the streets to announce the event, the bells toll mournfully, and the procession is marked by small flames in little lanterns.

In Tinos, in Chora, the Epitaphios processions converge on the marble platform by the seafront — and the Epitaphios of the Parish of Agios Nektarios ends up in the sea itself, at Kionia, in a breathtaking scene. In Ios, the Lamentations are chanted by choirs of women and girls; while in Naxos young women clean the churches and adorn the Epitaphios before the procession.

Two faiths, one feast: Easter in Syros

Nowhere else in Greece does Easter wear the face it wears in Syros. Here the island’s two religious communities, Orthodox and Catholic, celebrate together. In Ermoupoli, the Orthodox Epitaphios processions set out from the parishes of Agios Nikolaos, the Dormition and the Transfiguration, wind through the streets and converge at Miaouli Square, where a joint prayer service is held. The procession is followed by the faithful bearing poles from which hang a tunic, a sponge and dice, symbols of the Passion.

On the morning of Holy Saturday, in the Orthodox church of the Resurrection, on Vrontado hill, the First Resurrection is accompanied by loud banging on the pews. And after the liturgy, the Catholics carry the statue of Jesus in a golden canopy covered with violets, lemon blossoms and lilacs, with the colorful banners of the brotherhoods fluttering.

The night of the Resurrection: gunpowder, bonfires and “Judas”

“Christ is Risen” in the Cyclades is not whispered — it explodes. In Andros, on the night of the Resurrection, young men plant iron pipes in the ground, fill them with gunpowder and set them off. In Milos, in the courtyards of the churches of Agios Spyridon and Agios Georgios, the custom of “the gunpowder” is revived, while on Sunday the “burning of Judas” takes place. In Paros, the Resurrection in Marpissa is celebrated with peals of bells and a multitude of fireworks.

Everywhere, an effigy is symbolically burned. In Mykonos “Judas” is consigned to the flames in the afternoon, in the island’s square. In Serifos the effigy is made after the Resurrection. In Sifnos, in the central square of Apollonia, the burning of Judas is organized by the island’s cultural association. And in Santorini, in several villages a folk “trial” is staged for the “Ovraios,” a cloth effigy that is “convicted,” hanged and burned with makeshift firecrackers — while in Emporio the residents take to the streets banging on metal objects to exorcise “evil.”

Elsewhere, the night is more solemn. In Serifos, families arrive at church with a small basket — cheese, ring-shaped breads and as many red eggs as there are family members — and on returning home with the Resurrection flame, they trace a cross with it above the door’s lintel. In Kythnos, the “sychorio” of Holy Saturday is an act of remembrance: the faithful bring meat, wine and bread to church to be blessed by the priest, then share them for the repose of souls. And in Folegandros, the icon of the Virgin sets out on Easter Sunday on a three-day journey from Chora and the narrow lanes of the Kastro, amid volleys of fireworks, until it blesses the houses and boats in the harbor of Karavostasis.

Christ is Risen! — Truly He is Risen!The Resurrection greeting, from island to island

The Easter table: kid goat, the wood-fired oven and the “mastelo”

After the fast, the table is laid with the finest the land has to offer. In Anafi, on the afternoon of Holy Saturday, the whole village smells of vine cuttings burning in the “fourni” — there, the kid goat is placed in a pan with local Anafi cheese, well covered, and the oven door is sealed with mud along with the chimney, so no air can get through. Also prized are the yellow bread (the local cheese pie) and “meliterá” made with fresh mizithra.

In Naxos, king of the table is “batoudo,” kid goat stuffed with offal, vegetables, rice, eggs and cheese, roasted in the oven. In Iraklia and Koufonisia, kid goat stuffed with rice slow-roasts in the wood-fired oven until the Resurrection service is over. In Andros, the “lambriatis” — lamb or kid goat stuffed with vegetables — is the dish of the day.

In Sifnos, the Easter lamb is cooked in the famous “mastelo,” a clay vessel, with dill and local red wine; alongside it, homemade xinomizithra and honey pie made with honey, mizithra and eggs. Throughout the Cyclades, the sweets carry the flavor of the land: the “melitinia” of Iraklia and the meliterá of Anafi, made with fresh goat’s mizithra. In Santorini, after the Resurrection, everyone returns home with a ring-shaped bread and a red egg to eat the “sgardoumia.”

Games, swings and “Tables of Love”

When solemnity gives way to joy, the islands fill with play. In Kythnos and Ios the custom of the “swing” is revived: on Easter Sunday a swing is set up in the square where boys and girls in traditional costume swing back and forth — once, a way of pledging marriage. In Andros, Sifnos and Schinoussa, “tsounia” (or “bilious”) is played, a traditional game resembling bowling, with a wooden ball and nine pins. In Ios, on Good Friday, young people play “the balls,” with small red and green iron spheres.

And then come the communal feasts. In Paros, at midday on Sunday, the “Table of Love” is laid on the football pitch in Marpissa, with the traditional spit-roast and island revelry. In Tinos, on Easter Monday, the village of Ktikados revives the same custom, while on Easter Thursday Volakas celebrates with a splendid festival and Easter delicacies. In Iraklia, residents gather in the courtyards, roast lambs and make merry with song and dance until dawn.

From Anafi to Folegandros and from Syros to Sifnos, Easter in the Cyclades is not a celebration you watch — it is one that swallows you whole. The gunpowder that tears through the night, the rosewater falling upon the procession, the kid goat roasting behind a sealed oven door, the swing suspended in the afternoon light: all of it says the same thing, in a thousand different ways. That here, on the islands of the Aegean, spring and Resurrection are one and the same.

Cycladic Easter in pictures