Tulips of Chios

Travelling around Chios, you as a visitor will recognize the beautiful purpure tulips growing naturally everywhere on this island.
Here you can find 6 of the 11 species of tulips existing. The Greek call them "lalades", which originates from the turkish word "lale". Depending of the kind of tulips, they are also called "Frangolalades", "Turkolalades", "kimatofilles" or "laladakia politika".

When the Dutch sailors passed Chios a long time ago, they saw these flowers and were so fascinated by them, that they took some to their own country to let them grow there. So this is how Holland became so famous for its tulips, although they were not naturally growing there, but the Aegean Ministry is working on a programme which has the goal to get a reclamation on the tulips.

Because of that a new kind of agriculture has been developed with the tulips and Chios is well known for its flowers besides of the "mastiche"-industry.