Photos of the Amazing Medieval Grand Master Palace of Rhodes

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Photos of the Amazing Medieval Grand Master Palace of Rhodes and Rhodes Medieval City Walls. Home of the knights Hospitallers. Photos by photographer Paul E Williams .   (TIP – use the icons below the slideshow for thumbnail photos and info)

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Photos of the Amazing Medieval Grand Master Palace of Rhodes

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Photos of the Medieval Grand Master Palace and Medieval City Walls Rhodes (Rodos) , Greece.

Rhodes and Ancient Settlement

Rhodes is an Ancient Greek settlement and has been settled since pre history. Today the medieval city is dominated by the Palace of the Grand Master. This was built by the Knights Hospitallers who founded a hospital in Jerusalem in 1023 to care of sick and injured pilgrims in the Holy Land.

The Knights Hospitallers In Rhodes

After the First Crusade in 1099 the order became a religious military order. Following the fall of the Holy Land to Muslim forces in the 13th century the Knights Hospitallers set up their headquarters in Rhodes.

After the Knights Templar were dissolved in 1312 the Hospitallers were given their property and holdings in Rhodes. These were organised into Priories of eight languages, one each for the: Crown of Aragon: Auvergne: Castile: England: France: Germany: Italy, and Provence. Each of these was organised under a Grand Prior who inturn were under the Grand Master. As well as caring for the sick the Knights Hospitallers acted as a banking system for merchants from the west.

The End of the Knights Hospitallers in Rhodes

After the fall of Constantinople in 1453 Sultan Mehmed II made the overthrow of the Knights Hospitallers a priority target. It wasn’t until 1522 though that a force of 200,00 men under Suleiman the Magnificent forced the 7,000 Knights Hospitalers to abandon Rhodes and retreat to Sicily.

Mussolini Palace in Rhodes

In the second World War the Italian ruled Rhodes. Mussolini renovated the Palace of the Grand Master as a retreat for himself and King Victor Emmanuel.

The city has a Jewish quarter with a memorial to the Jews that lived there and died under fascist repression. There is also a Turkish quarter with mosques and the old shops of the Bazaar selling tourist trinkets.