Ticket needed. Paid entry to the Gortyn archaeological site, open daylight hours. The tree stands at the back of the enclosure, near the Odeon and the Law Code, rather than by the entrance, so plan on buying a ticket.
The Evergreen Plane of Gortyn
age unknownOriental Planepin approximate
Every other oriental plane on Crete is bare in January. This one is not. The tree at Gortyn is Platanus orientalis var. cretica, an evergreen form of a deciduous species, reported from perhaps fifty places on the island and from almost nowhere else, and it holds its leaves straight through the winter. That is the reason to walk to the back of the archaeological site, and it is a better reason than the one the guidebooks give. The guidebook reason is Europa. Gortyn is where Zeus, in the shape of a bull, is said to have carried her, and their union under a plane tree is stamped on the city's own ancient coins. That story belongs to the place and not to this trunk, and nothing connects the two. Read the coins as evidence of how long people here have associated the site with a plane tree, which is genuinely interesting, and not as a birth certificate for the one growing there now. Nobody has dated it, and there is a botanical reason why nobody easily could. Planes regenerate from the root, so what looks eternal can be a succession of new stems on an old base, and the sources describing this one note that in its present form it is relatively small. It is protected, it is evergreen, and its age is an open question. If you know more, tell us.
The button above opens directions in your maps app. Gortyn lies beside the old national road at Agioi Deka, about 45 km south of Heraklion in the Messara plain. A car, or the Heraklion to Mires bus; the site entrance is on the main road.
The pin marks the right spot roughly, not the tree itself. It stands here, but we have not confirmed the precise position on the ground yet. Know exactly where it is?
- Species
- Oriental Plane (Platanus orientalis)
- Age estimate
- Location
- Gortyn archaeological site, Agioi Deka, Gortyna municipality, Heraklion regional unit, Crete, Greece (at the back of the archaeological site, near the Odeon and the Law Code)
- Access
- Paid entry to the Gortyn archaeological site, open daylight hours. The tree stands at the back of the enclosure, near the Odeon and the Law Code, rather than by the entrance, so plan on buying a ticket.
- Getting there
- Gortyn lies beside the old national road at Agioi Deka, about 45 km south of Heraklion in the Messara plain. A car, or the Heraklion to Mires bus; the site entrance is on the main road.
Trees nearby
Ticking this one off, walks past several more, and your collection growing city by city: that is the Ancient Trees app.
Get the appThis page was researched from a distance. If you know this tree, you know things we do not: the species, the age, the size, whether the photo shows the right tree, or that it is gone. Every field on this page can be corrected.
Correct a detail on this pageSuggest another tree