Once upon a time there was a Samolis…..

But where did this Samolis start from?  Here you can find the story of the Samolis family – the Greeks/ Cretan at this stage.

Samolis name and historyThe Samolis family looks that has their origin from Anogia in the precinct of Mylopotamos in Rethymno, Crete. We do not know when some of them moved to the nearby village Aimonas. Like many people know most surnames in Crete are ending in -akis like the most surnames on the island of Crete. This was a diminutive given from the Turks to make Cretans feel small. There seemed to be some whose surname must have been Samolakis. Possibly some who lived on valleys had this surname and the rest who lived on the mountaints were Samolis – looks Samolis are rebels! Possibly today there must not be any Samolakis more.

Some Samolis’ probably left from Crete and migrated the island of Kephalonia and other islands of Greece. Another scenario is that the surname Samoilis also comes from Samolis (there are plenty on facebook).

Afterwards came Internet and facebook.  Irene Samolis from the village Anogia created the facebook group Samolis Family. Searching we found people with the surname Samolis from different parts of the world. We found many Samolis residents of the USA, but whose origin is from Lithuania. After an online chatt with with one of them, I found out that his grandparents where from Lithuania, but their inital surname was something like Samoulous. When they arrived to USA approximately 1914 they changed it to Samolis.

Historically Samolis could not be found anywhere while searching on the web. However Emmanouil Kontogiannis mentioned in his book about his village Aimonas in 1986 a Samolis from  the village Aimonas. His name was Georgios Samolis, also known as the sweet tongue, as he speech was so polite and educated. Georgios might be the first historically recorded Samolis in the Greek Samolis Family.

Read more about Georgios Samolis

Should anyone know any other story of any Samolis you are welcome to contact us and we can publish it on our website.

Anyway, Samolis seem to be all over the world and this website is dedicated to all these whose surname is Samolis.
After a reseach there seem to be Samolis found in almost all professional sectors:

  • Artists
  • Writers
  • Doctors
  • Journalists
  • Lawyers
  • Several businessmen

Meet the Samolis.family

Share your story with a Samolis

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