Before the Ottoman conquest the island was held by the Gattilusio family, a small Latin lordship with close ties to Byzantium, and from the reign of Murad I onwards that family kept the Turks away from the island through political manoeuvre.
Mehmed II's capture of İstanbul in 1453 and the end of the Byzantine empire brought the lordship down with it. When Dorino Gattilusio died his son Dominico sent Doukas as an envoy to the sultan, carrying the annual tribute — 3,000 gold pieces for Lesbos and 2,300 for Lemnos. Lemnos had been granted to the lord of Lesbos on condition of that yearly payment, and Gökçeada to the lord of Enez on condition of 1,200 gold pieces a year.
Other families behaved much as the Gattilusio had. The efforts of Kritoboulos, himself a native of the island, deserve particular notice: after the conquest he assembled a delegation and sent it to Mehmed II.
The islanders nearly left. When the officials appointed by Byzantium to Gökçeada, Lemnos and Thasos heard of the fall of İstanbul and the death of the emperor, those on Gökçeada left the country by Italian ships from Kefaloz point, and the island's people began preparing to migrate themselves. To prevent that, Kritoboulos sent an envoy to the sancak bey of Gallipoli and made an agreement with him that the islands would not be attacked. The beaches, the abandoned Greek villages and the salt lake each have their own page below.
