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The Kythira semaphore telegraph: a 360° virtual tour of a lost monument, digitally reborn

At Cape Spathi, on the northern tip of Kythira, next to the Moudari lighthouse, there is a ruined building. Inside it worked one of the most advanced semaphore telegraphs Greece ever had.

Before radio, you spoke to ships by eye. And the strait between the Peloponnese and Kythira was busy water.

The building no longer stands as it was. The 360° virtual tour shows it both ways, as a ruin and digitally restored. 38 panoramas, from drone aerials down to the rooms where the signalmen worked.

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360 Virtual Tour Presentation

See the full project 360° virtual tour of the Kythira semaphore telegraph, Cape Spathi →

How the station spoke to ships

Semaphore telegraph systems were born in the Napoleonic Wars, first in France and very quickly in the other countries drawn in. They were part of a large nineteenth-century communication network.

On Kythira the answer was a rotating mast with articulated arms, worked from inside the building. Combinations of those arms produced letters, and whole phrases from a code signal book. Five telescopes on the observation platform let the signalmen read incoming signals at distance.

The station ran from the late nineteenth into the early twentieth century. A message that now leaves in a second once needed arms, a clear horizon and patience.

A monument that existed in no archive

Wireless telegraphy made it redundant. War damage followed, then looting, then simple decay. The monument was forgotten.

In August 2017 the academician Manolis Korres came upon the ruin by chance and recorded it in drawings, with whatever he had to hand.

The striking part came next. Nothing was found in the archives of the Naval History Service or the Lighthouse Service. No documentation at all. One of the most advanced semaphore telegraphs in the country was, literally, undeclared.

The research was first presented publicly in January 2018, by the Naval History Service. In October 2021 the results were presented to the Academy of Athens and published in dedicated proceedings.

From survey drawings to a 3D reconstruction

In late 2023 the Hellenic Institute of Naval History (ELINIS) began the digital restoration, presenting it at the Aikaterini Laskaridis Foundation in February 2024. The exterior first, then the interior. The work was funded in part by the Ministry of Culture, under the "Creative Greece 2025 / Digital Culture" programme.

The 3D modelling was done by 3dMastroCraft (Giorgos Mastrogeorgiou). The enriched virtual tour by us, 360photographers (Giorgos Makaronidis). Aerial footage by Giorgos Maragkoudakis, project coordination by Leonidas Tsiantoulas. Scientific advisor throughout, Manolis Korres.

Alongside it a digital repository is being built for the technology and operation of semaphore telegraphs in Greece, a subject almost entirely undocumented until now. The longer aim is to rebuild the building itself.

What you will see in the tour

38 panoramas, from the aerials down into the building.

You will see the digitally restored spaces: the signalling room, the supervisor's room, the dormitories, the galley, the dining room, the observation platform. You will also see Manolis Korres' architectural drawings, together with the mechanics of the signalling mast.

The floor plan is dual, keeping the drone and ground positions separate. There is narrative audio, and related video.

The project's full digital museum is hosted at navalhistory.gr. We have documented other Hellenic Navy monuments too, such as the destroyer Velos D-16 in Thessaloniki.

Do you look after a monument, even a ruined one, that deserves to be seen? Talk to us.

Sources: Kythira semaphore digital museum, navalhistory.gr · 3dMastroCraft