Mitato

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Greek term describing a shelter or lodging

title: "Mitato" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["byzantine-secular-architecture", "byzantine-law", "crete", "mountain-huts", "vernacular-architecture", "pastoral-shelters"] description: "Greek term describing a shelter or lodging" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitato" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Greek term describing a shelter or lodging ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/Nida_Plateau_-_Mitata.jpg" caption="Nida Plateau - Mitata"] ::

Mitato (, archaic form: μιτᾶτον or μητᾶτον, from , "to measure off/to pitch camp") is a term meaning "shelter" or "lodging" in Greek.

Appearing in the 6th century, during the Byzantine period it referred to an inn or trading house for foreign merchants, akin to a caravanserai. By extension, it could also refer to the legal obligation of a private citizen to billet state officials or soldiers. Alternatively, in the 10th century, Constantine Porphyrogenitus uses the term to refer to state-run ranches in Anatolia.

In modern Greece, and especially on the mountains of Crete, a mitato (in the plural mitata) is a hut built from locally gathered stones to provide shelter to shepherds, and is used also for cheese-making. Mount Ida (also called Mount Psiloritis) in central Crete is particularly rich in flat stones suitable for dry stone construction.

References

[[Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium]], p. 1385.
Antonis Plymakis, ''Koúmoi-Mitáta kai Boskoi sta Leuká Ori kai Psiloriti'' ("Shepherd's huts and shepherds in the Lefka Ori and the Psiloritis"), Chania, 2008, 630 p.
[https://www.penn.museum/sites/expedition/pastoral-life-in-the-mountains-of-crete/ Harriet Blitzer, Pastoral Life in the Mountains of Crete. An Ethnoarchaelogical Perspective], in ''Expedition'', vol. 32, No 3, 1990, pp. 34-41; archived [https://web.archive.org/web/20160421135131/http://www.penn.museum/sites/expedition/pastoral-life-in-the-mountains-of-crete/ here] (on the shepherd's huts of Eastern Crete.
Sabine Ivanovas, ''Where Zeus Became a Man (with Cretan Shepherds)'', Efsthiadis Group Editions, 2000, 183 p. (Life in the corbelled dry stone huts of central Crete).

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