Day Five: Rhodes, City of the Knights

On the morning of December 24, 2025, the early light fell across the glass beside the deck, reflecting a neighboring ship and the sea. Our cruise ship had left Ephesus in Turkey the night before, quietly turning the page as it sailed through the darkness. By first light, we were already docked at the Greek island of Rhodes.

Looking to the other side, I watched the walls and low-rise houses of Rhodes gradually emerge in the morning light. The massive stone ramparts, pockets of greenery, and white houses made it clear that this was no expanse of broken ruins like Ephesus, but an ancient city still very much alive.

The Old Town stands right beside the port. As our group gathered, I asked where we would board the bus. The guide laughed: “No bus today. We can just walk in.” The walls extend for four kilometers. First built by the Byzantines, they were strengthened and expanded during the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, when Rhodes was ruled by the Knights Hospitaller, to withstand sieges by the Ottoman Empire.

After entering the Old Town through Liberty Gate, we came to the ruins of the Church of the Virgin of the Burgh (Panagia tou Bourgou), a Gothic Roman Catholic church begun in the fourteenth century. The outlines of its three pointed-arched aisles remain clearly visible.

The church was badly damaged by bombing during the Second World War, leaving only these open stone arches and fragments of wall. With no roof to contain it, light now passes freely through what was once an enclosed place of worship, allowing the ruin itself to tell its story to those who come after.

Seen up close, the walls are built of rough-hewn stones, with plants poking through the crevices and clinging stubbornly to the ground.

Farther inside, the Archaeological Museum of Rhodes occupies the fifteenth-century Hospital of the Knights of Saint John. Its collection consists chiefly of Greek and Roman sculptures, jewelry, grave stelae, mosaics, pottery, and other antiquities.

The museum was closed for the Christmas holiday. We could only peer through the archway into the courtyard, where its iconic recumbent lion sculpture lay at the center of the surrounding galleries.

Outside the museum, a street vendor was selling little birds that could chirp. When blown, they sent a brief, bright birdsong echoing through the Old Town before it quickly faded, adding a playful flicker of life to this ancient, weighty place.

To reach the Palace of the Grand Master, we had to follow the famous Street of the Knights. Roughly 200 meters long, this cobbled lane is one of the best-preserved medieval streets in Europe. The stone buildings lining it belonged to the Order’s seven “langues,” or linguistic divisions. Each had its own inn, which served both as a residence for its knights and as an administrative center.

A brightly dressed woman hurried along the Street of the Knights,perhaps on her way to a performance or a Christmas gathering. Her flowing silk dress stood in striking contrast to the austere stone buildings.

Before us stoodthe Old Town’s most emblematic building,the Palace of the Grand Master. Built in the fourteenth century on the remains of an earlier Byzantine fortress, it served as both the residence and administrative headquarters of the grand masters of the Knights Hospitaller, as well as the city’s final line of defense.

Inside the palace, massive stone walls, successive arches, and interconnected chambers emphasize order and axial symmetry.

The palace presents an array of halls and period furnishings. This room is exceptionally spare: massive stone arches support a lofty vaulted ceiling, while a long table enclosed by wooden chairs forms a clearly defined center.

The palace also contains sculptures of many kinds. On this statue of a knight in armor, the breastplate is decorated with reliefs depicting mythological scenes.

Climbing the stairs, we passed into still more floors and spaces.

This is the interior of the Thyrsus Chamber. High-backed wooden seats and heavy woodwork line the walls, underscoring hierarchy and order. The word “thyrsus” comes from the ceremonial staff carried in ancient Greek rites of Dionysus, a symbol of authority and ritual. The chamber was most likely used for formal discussions or ceremonial gatherings.

As my gaze moved gradually from the walls and furniture to the floor, I found that what truly made me stop in the Palace of the Grand Master was its mosaics.

Tiny stones are fitted precisely into geometric frameworks, forming plants, vessels, animals, and abstract designs. Only when you slow your pace do their patterns and rhythms begin to emerge.

Beneath the weight of the architecture, these mosaics seem all the more vivid. Birds, flowers, vessels, and flowing curves bring an added layer of classical aesthetic order to a space built for military defense.

The gilded mirror reflected the world outside, drawing my gaze toward the window.

Beyond the window, the view passed over the city walls and straight out to sea. The cruise ship lying quietly at anchor contrasted sharply with the medieval fortifications—on one side, high walls built to keep outsiders at bay; on the other, a passenger ship designed to bring visitors from afar. For a moment, past and present overlapped within a single window frame.

At another window, light fell across the stone wall and openings opposite, drawing us onward into the palace courtyard.

The Knights Hospitaller—formally, the Order of the Knights of the Hospital of Saint John—were not founded for war. In the late eleventh century, they established a hospital in Jerusalem to care for sick and wounded pilgrims. As the Crusades unfolded, this religious order devoted to aid gradually took up arms and assumed responsibility for escort and defense. After losing the Holy Land, the knights moved through the Mediterranean before arriving on Rhodes in the early fourteenth century. Here they created a knightly state that was at once hospital, monastery, and military stronghold. This courtyard stood at the heart of both their power and their daily life.

Many of the classical statues in the courtyard are headless or missing limbs; others appear wrapped in bandages. This is no coincidence. Most survive from ancient Greece and Rome and were later collected by the knights and installed in the palace, both as decoration and as symbols of a spiritual connection with classical civilization. Their incomplete bodies reflect the damage wrought by time, but later viewers have also interpreted them as metaphors for being “wounded yet still standing”—much like the Order itself, whose members were both warriors and healers. The bandages seem like a silent reminder that healing and war were never separate here.

In 1522, the Order was defeated by the Ottoman Empire and expelled from Rhodes, eventually making its way to Malta. Over years of abandonment, rebuilding, and restoration, this courtyard gradually became part of a museum. Those who stand here today are no longer knights, patients, or pilgrims, but tourists.

Rusty iron studs and door rings preserve the marks of time’s repeated touch. Behind the door lies a history in which knighthood, war, and faith intertwine; outside are the light of the present day and passing visitors. Our tour ended here, though stories of guardianship, power, and vulnerability still lingered among the stone walls and echoes. We returned to the present, using our free afternoon simply to wander through the Old Town.

Beneath the Old Town walls, ranks of arches recede inward as light and shadow rebound between the stones. They served both as passageways and as elements of the defenses.

Looking down from the walls, we saw several stone cannonballs scattered across the grass. Once part of warfare, they were used to stop or destroy attackers. Now they lie quietly in the sun.

Looking back from the walls, the Palace of the Grand Master occupies the center of the view with a massive yet restrained presence. Its high walls, battlements, and towers stand out distinctly. It no longer issues commands, but it still dominates the city’s silhouette, like a historical backdrop that cannot be avoided.

Looking around, I saw a minaret pointing straight into the sky, a sign of the faith left by later conquerors. In the background, crisscrossing chemtrails lingered in the blue, now a commonplace sight in European skies. Religion, war, and the modern world overlapped in a single frame, impossible to ignore.

Along the Old Town streets, purple bougainvillea blazed in the sunlight.

In a narrow alley, a motorcycle stood against the wall. Metal shutters were closed and awnings hung low. With none of the usual tourist clamor, the colors and rhythms of daily life were tucked into these unassuming details.

Beneath an archway, a cobbled lane continued inward. Restaurant chairs were stacked neatly to one side, as if service had just ended—or had yet to begin. Time seemed to move more slowly here, though there was also a sense that it had come to a standstill.

Through a weathered wooden window, the branches of a lemon tree drooped beneath plump, bright fruit. The plaster was peeling and the frame was old, but that flash of yellow offered a reminder: beyond decay, life goes on.

A quiet wooden door, its knocker like a hand held motionless, hesitating between knocking and turning away.

In an afternoon doorway, an elderly man sat in the shade, head lowered and lost in thought.

At a table outside a little shop, a simple meal unfolded at its own pace. There was no conversation, yet it did not feel lonely.

Beside a shop window on the corner, an elderly man leaned against the wall, scrolling through his phone. Few people passed by, but the city was not deserted; it had simply been left more fully to those who had chosen to remain.

A cat sauntered across the flagstones and into an alley, as though the order of the place had long since learned to make way for it. Even when visitors crowd these streets, the rhythm of daily life remains slow and steady. The cats know every route and have long been accustomed to the city’s age and quiet.

Another cat looked down over the street from atop the wall. Sunlight, wind, and time converged there. Life in Rhodes seemed quietly watched over by the gaze of those who stayed.

As it was Christmas Eve, many shops had already closed and there were few tourists about. Those still open felt especially warm and welcoming, and we were glad to step inside—a small show of support for the shopkeepers who were still holding the fort.

Several times we saw groups of children taking to the streets to sing songs of blessing, a local tradition known as Kalanta. They gathered outside shops and offered their good wishes in song, while the adults responded with smiles or small gifts.

Beneath the city gate, the sea continued to sound. Visitors sat quietly looking out over the water, while residents passed at an easy pace; time here seemed neither hurried nor restless. Our day of wandering finally returned us to this open space between sea and sky, where history no longer clamored and life had no need to rush. Rhodes Old Town revealed an everyday existence whose sharp edges had been worn smooth by time—slow and leisurely, yet ordered in its own way. As I left, I carried with me an admiration for this slower life, and a faint longing for it.

Once beyond the Old Town walls, the view opened wide. At the end of the breakwater, the Fort of Saint Nicholas quietly guarded the harbor entrance. Its round tower and stone walls recalled a time when this was the front line against threats from the sea. Its military role has long since receded, leaving only a tranquil scene where the history and present day of Rhodes meet.

Back aboard the ship, our time in Rhodes came to an end. From the knights’ Palace of the Grand Master to the lanes of the Old Town, and from its massive walls to the fortress at the harbor mouth, the outlines of the “City of the Knights” gradually came into focus. It exists not only in stone walls and fortifications, but also in the island’s slow, ordered daily life.

Had it not been Christmas, we would have called at Crete the following day. Instead, the ship would remain at sea, with no port of call tomorrow. As the land receded, the city and people of Rhodes stayed with me—the most composed and substantial stop on this voyage.

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Day Five: Rhodes, City of the Knights

Ancient Mediterranean Treasures Cruise

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Day Five: Rhodes, City of the Knights

Day Six: Christmas—Taking Gains and Losses as They Come

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