HISTORY

The church of Agia Marina is a three-aisled basilica dating back to the 17th century. The church was built in 1650 while Greece was under the Turkish occupation. The large size of the temple and the fact that was built in the main square of the village indicates that was built with Turkish permission.

This style however was forbidden during the Turkish reign because it was a much more impressive place of worship than their own religious structures.

It should also be mentioned that in the village of Kissos, which is the location of this church, a silver mine was discovered.

In the olden days, when the villagers were talking about gold and silver, they were saying k’sos and argiros, which stood for “Chrisos” – Gold and “Argiros” – Silver.

From the villagers using these words, the name of the village, Kissos, was probably derived, although some maintain that the name came from the “Ivy” that grew in abundance in the village. Probably the craftmen used material from this mine for the plating of the iconostasis.

At first, the church was dedicated to three saints, ( Trishypostatate ). The north side of the temple was dedicated to Saint George, the Central to Saint Marina and the South was dedicated to the Saint Athanasios. Today the temple is dedicated only to Saint Marina.

The iconostasis inside the church was built in the 1700 – 1720 by technicians from Hepirus using lime wood. It has internal carvings and was gold plated in 1793, as is reported on the north gate of the Iconostasis. Tradition says that, it took 60 years to complete the carving on the iconostasis.

The hagiographies and frescos on the temple date from 1802 and were made by Konstantinos Pagonis of Hionaditi, as reported on the first right pillar of the temple ( which is the men’s section ).

The frescos have theological content, but are given in free performance by the artist. The content of certain hagiographies while it is theological, is supported however in the free output of painter.

On the frescos are topics from the New and Old testament, the Revelation, from Natural History, and geography. The reason for this variety of topics was due to the fact that the temple also functioned as secret Greek school, whilst Greece was under the Ottoman domination.