Cooperatives were created in all the wine-growing villages of Samos with the establishment of the “Union” in 1934. For their accommodation, either existing building infrastructures were used, or new facilities were built that functioned mainly for secretarial support, representative elections, receiving grapes from the grape holders, subsidies and producer advance payments, etc.

These buildings were simple one-story or two-story structures with small auxiliary storage areas, most of them owned by the Union. After the removal of compulsion (2016) there was no reason to keep them and either they remain closed, or they have changed their use by giving them to voluntary groups or associations, or by renting them to private individuals.

The “huts” were simple rectangular (oblong or almost square) buildings, mainly on the ground and single-spaced. They were usually extended with auxiliary buildings, for storing harvests and housing donkeys. Above the basic rectangle, a wooden loft was formed that occupied about half of the area and was offered for overnight stay by winegrowers. Access was via a narrow wooden staircase. Often inside the hut there was also the stomping vat, built or wooden.  The buildings were made of mud, of mixed schist, dark colored stones (brownish-brown), grey (prevailing in the area of Kokkari) and white stones.
They had small doors and windows and pitched roofs. According to the testimonies of the owners of the huts that have survived, most Samian “huts” were built in the second half of the 19th century. Some small ruined huts reveal an earlier existence of buildings that refer to the 18th century. The coating of some of the huts was made with slates that abound in the area and ensured protection from the weather.

Stomping places on Samos were mainly family-owned and were built in the vineyards. Since the 19th century, they were constructed manually with local stones and mud, usually on the ground floor of the huts built in each vineyard of Samos. These are “tanks” where grapes were thrown after harvest. There they were crushed by family members and barefoot workers to collect the must in the “polymni” (the “hypolenion”).

In ancient times, “stepping on grapes in a stomping place” was called “linovato” and stompers were called “linovate”. Pottery painting images show that the “linovates” were facilitated in pressing the grapes by resting on a stick or holding a rope hanging over them.

The stomping place or linos is a permanent built or portable wooden tank – cistern plastered with sand (they put grated tile, sand and lime, made mud and plastered internally the sides and the bottom, to make stomping place waterproof), which is used for pressing the grapes with bare feet and extracting the must (glefkos). The permanent stomping place was made of stone or brick and mortar and had a rectangular or square shape. They were made within the floor, mainly in a rectangular or square shape, and were about one meter high. They had a sloping base and an opening to make it easy for the must to flow out. The must ran into the polymnium, which looked like a small well dug into the earth with a “porcelain” coating. Then the must was transferred to the houses with the “dermatia”.

The harvest began early in the morning, with the first light of day. They stepped on the grapes in the afternoon and in the morning, they carried the must, in “dermatia” loaded on donkeys led to the taverns by “mule-drivers”. Those who did not have their own stomping places could use their neighbours’ or relatives’.
After the establishment of the Cooperative in 1934, stomping places were gradually abandoned.

Today very few of them are still kept in family “huts”, in various locations. They have been located in Manolates, Vourliotes and Ampelos. They date from antiquity to modern times and some of them are two-roomed, with one room for stepping on the grapes and another, the hypolenium, with the necessary drainage cavity for the must.

In some cases, farmhouses have been identified near stomping places. Their archaeological and anthropological analysis shows that during harvest period, families migrated to the vineyards to be close to the production of wine.

Stafylodohi are raised tanks, about 3 meters high, supported on stone beams with a straight surface where the grape production was discharged. Permanent stafylodohi began to be created in all traditional wine villages of Samos, when the Union of Cooperatives was established in 1934. They were mainly made of local materials (stones and mud) with some cement mortar as a coating of the structure.

They included a ground floor section whose height was about 3 meters (to accommodate the loading and unloading vehicles), an elevated platform, a scale, tanks and an office space for recording the quantities. They were used until about the 70s and were gradually abandoned. Today, we come across stafylodohi scattered all over the island as we tour the wine-producing villages of Samos. They stand abandoned, but remain silent witnesses of another era when winemaking activity flourished on Samos.

The change in the use of the Cooperatives of Samos that belonged to the “Union” is recorded as follows:

• The building of Hydroussa Cooperative has been granted to the Fire Brigade for further use.
• Pandrosos Cooperative: Purchased by a private individual, converted into a house.
• Mesogios Cooperative: The ground floor is rented by a private individual and operates as a traditional coffee shop. The roof was granted to the Cultural Association of Mesogios and operates as a Folklore Museum.
• Pagoda Cooperative: The storage space has been rented to a private individual, the office building has remained closed.
• Hora Cooperative: Leased by the Swartz Foundation and converted into a recording studio.
• Cooperative of Mytilenii: It operates as an area of the Agricultural Cooperative of Mytilenii.
• Ano Vathi Cooperative: It has been sold to a private individual.
• Cooperative of Kokkari: It has been sold to a private individual. Using it as business premises.
• Cooperative Ag. Konstantinos: It has been granted to the Cultural Association “Aristarchus of Samos”.
• Cooperative of Vourliotes: The building is closed and unused.

Ampelos Cooperative: It has been granted for use to the local Fire Brigade

• Cooperative of Stavrinides: It has been granted to be used by the Community (of the local district)
• Platanos Cooperative: Maintained in use by the Agricultural Cooperative of Platanos.
• Cooperative of Karlovasi: Rented by a private individual, operates as a professional catering area
• The building of Lekka Cooperative has been granted for use, to the Fire Brigade of the area.
• The building of the Cooperative of Kontakeika was completely destroyed by the earthquake of 2020
• The building of the Cooperative of Kastania was rented to a private individual

“Taverns” were large stone wine warehouses in Kampos of Samos to serve the wine trade of the area. There, farmers sold their products to merchants and brokers during the years of the Turkish Hegemony of Samos. These are big stone buildings, mainly of the 19th century, with a height of about 6 meters and tiled roofs. The windows at the highest points of the buildings ensured ventilation conditions for better preservation of wine products.

On Samos, mainly coastal areas were chosen for the construction of “taverns” so that the sea breeze would ensure better conditions for the preservation of wines. The products  and especially the grapes and wine were gathered in the nearest “taverns”, but also in the small, but very fertile, plain of Vourliotes, where  farmers transported them on donkeys through the old paths. An old path of those that survive in good condition led from Manolates to Margarites, to Valeontades, to Agios Konstantinos and from there along the coast to the “Taverns” of Kampos. Taverns also existed in the settlements of Margarites, Valeontates and later in the seaside settlement of Agios Konstantinos.

Taverns maintained their use until the first post-war years and then they were either ruined or passed into the ownership of the Wine Cooperative of Samos and turned into wine loading and unloading areas, agricultural shops (in Vathi and Karlovasi) and the Wine Museum of UWC Samos in Malagari.
The term “tavern” (“taberna”) seems to have its roots in the years of the Roman Empire. In the Greek wine tradition, it has been associated with wine as a place of wine concentration and trading. Then, it passed into modern Greek as a place of wine consumption accompanied by food.

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