History of the Cyclades Roman province. Under Diocletian, there existed a “province of the islands” that included the Cyclades. Christianisation seems to have occurred very early in the Cyclades. The catacombs at Trypiti on Milos, unique in the Aegean and in Greece, of very simple workmanship, as well as the very close baptismal fonts, confirms that a Christian community existed on the island at least from the 3rd or 4th century. From the 4th century, the Cyclades again experienced the ravages of war. In 376, the Goths pillaged the archipelago. When the Roman Empire was divided, control over the Cyclades passed to the Byzantine
History of the Cyclades a neighbourhood in the center of the island's main village. Thus, they too enjoyed a certain administrative autonomy, as they dealt directly with the Ottoman authorities, without passing through the Orthodox representatives of their island. For Catholics, this situation also created the feeling of being besieged by “the Orthodox enemy”. In 1800 and 1801, noteworthy Naxiot Catholics were attacked by part of the Orthodox population, led by Markos Politis. When North Africa had been definitively integrated into the Ottoman Empire, and above all when the Cyclades passed to the Kapudan Pasha, there was no longer any question of the Barbary