ANDROS, or ANDRO  , an island of the Greek archipelago, the most northerly of the Cyclades, 6 m . S.E. of Euboea, and about 2 M . N. of Tenos; it forms an eparchy in the modern kingdom of Greece . It is nearly 25 M. long, and its greatest breadth is 10 m . Its surface is for the most part mountainous, with many fruitful and well-watered valleys . Andros, the capital, on the east coast, contains about 2000 inhabitants . The ruins of Palaeopolis, the ancient capital, are on the west coast; the town II . Ipossessed a famous temple, dedicated to Bacchus . The island has about 18,000 inhabitants . The island in ancient times contained an Ionian population, perhaps with an admixture of Thracian blood . Though originally dependent on Eretria, by the 7th century B.C. it had become sufficiently prosperous to send out several colonies to Chalcidice (Acanthus, Stageirus, Argilus, Sane) . In 48o it supplied ships to Xerxes and was subsequently harried by the Greek fleet .

Though enrolled in the Delian

League it remained disaffected towards Athens, and in 447 had to be coerced by the settlement of a cleruchy . In 411 Andros proclaimed its freedom and in 408 withstood an Athenian attack . As a member of the second Delian League it was again controlled by a garrison and an archon . In the Hellenistic period Andros was contended for as a frontier-post by the two naval powers of the Aegean Sea, Macedonia and Egypt . In 333 it received a Macedonian garrison from Antipater; in 308 it was freed by . Ptolemy I . In the Chremonidean War (266-263) it passed again to Macedonia after a battle fought off its shores . In 200 it was captured by a combined Roman, Pergamene and Rhodian fleet, and remained a possession of Pergamum until the dissolution of that kingdom in 133 B.C . Before falling under Turkish rule, Andros was from A.D . 1207 till 1566 governed by the families Zeno and Sommariva under Venetian protection .