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Mesogeios - Pandrosos

Four km northeast of Pyrgos you’ll find the village of Mesogeios and less than a km up the road is the village of Pandrosos which is the highest one in Samos.

Their old name was Arvanites (Upper for Pandrosos and Lower for Mesogeia) and they were named after their current named quite recently (40 years ago).

The origin of their old name Arvanites (old Greek term for Albanians) has various explanations. Ep. Stamatiades supports the idea that the first inhabitants of the village were two families of Albanian warriors fighting the Turks under their leader George Kastriotes which after his death were dispersed all over to escape from the Turks. Their only difference from the rest of the Samians was their linguistic idiom.

Nikos Zafeiriou supports the idea that there were more than two families but they were Greek Epirots that their neighboroughs from Pyrgos and Mavratzaioi named them disparagingly “Arvanites” (Albanians). He continues that if they were Albanians there must have been Albanian homonyms in the region while there aren’t any. Moreoover their linguistic idiom has nothing to do with Albanian but on the countrary it is amazingly similar to the idiom of Tinos island and that is where he identifies the origin of these two villages from.
Most of the inhabitants are farmers producing mainly wine and olive oil.
 

Its highest ever-recorded population was recorded in the 1940 census, 386 residents for Mesogeio and 661 for Pandroso.
 

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