On the island of Chios, two rival parishes on facing hilltops mark Orthodox Easter night by firing tens of thousands of homemade rockets at each other’s church belfries — a “war” that neither side ever admits to losing.

Two churches, one grudge

Rouketopolemos, “rocket war”, is a local variation of the Greek custom of lighting fireworks at the Easter vigil. In Vrontados, a town on Chios in the eastern Aegean, the congregations of St Mark’s and Panagia Ereithiani, two churches on hilltops about 400 metres apart, fire tens of thousands of homemade rockets at each other, aiming especially for the belfry.

Direct hits on the belfries are supposedly counted the next day to decide the winner, but each parish always claims victory — so both agree to settle the score the following Easter, and the custom goes on. The rockets are made at home: a head filled with gunpowder-based propellant tied to a wooden guide stick, lined up by the hundreds and fired from angled, grooved platforms.

Cannons, complaints and rules

The origins are unclear, but local legend dates the custom to the Ottoman period and says that real cannons were once used, until the Ottoman authorities banned them in 1889. Some residents object to the explosive custom every year, though it brings in significant tourist income. The event was cancelled in 2016 after complaints of damage to property, and revived in 2017 with new rules limiting the length of the battle and the number of rockets.