The island was first inhabited in the Neolithic times. The contacts that Karpathos had with the island of Crete played a significant role in the island's development in the Bronze Age. Back then, the island's most important port Potidaio (today's Pigadia) became home to settlers from Crete and it acquired a Minoan character. The contacts between the two islands continued throughout the 14th century B.C. period when the Myceneans took control of Karpathos island. Potidaio was deserted following a number of raids after 1200 B.C. The inhabitants of the island settled in more protected areas such as today's Aperi where they founded the city of Karpathos. Karpathians fought with Sparta in the Peloponnesian War in 431 BC and lost their independence to Rhodes in 400 BC.

After Christ in the middle of the first century, it was inhabited by the Romans under the reign of Emperor Dioclitianos. Before that general Loukoulos governed the island He used to send a special boat to fish the special fish that lived in these waters. In 330 A.C Constantine the Great legalised Christianity and in 395 Theodosius the 1st divided the Roman Empire to the Eastern and Western side. Karpathos belonged to the Eastern side. This is when Christian churches started getting built such as Agia Fotini, Agia Anastasia and others.

During the 5th century after Christ, Karpathos was plundered many times by the Arabs, Sericucians, Mauritanians and many other invaders. Thus the inhabitants fled to the mountains and created villages there. After the conquest of Constantinople by the Franks in 1204, Leon Gavalas and later his brother John took charge. Later from 1282 to 1306 the governing of the island was taken over by the brothers Andrew and Loudovikos Maresko from Genova and the island during that time was named Scarpanto.

After the Genouates came the Venetians. In 1306 Andrew Kornaros conquered it and in 1311 the Knights of Rhodes finally conquered it, up until 1315 when the Venetian sovereign seized it. During the reign of the house of Kornaros that lasted until 1537, many fortresses and churches were built, when Haiderin Barbarosa plundered the island and handed it over to the Turks, which were never interested in its improvement or even its maintenance.

The Turks never inhabited the island, they just sent Tax officers to collect the taxes and leave. This is why we do not have evidence the remind of the Turkish occupation on the island. It is evident that the Turks avoided inhabiting the island , because it was a target for pirates that become the threat and fear of those times.

When the time came for the revolution of April 1821, Karpathos like the other islands put up the Greek flag. The island during the revolution offered refuge, money, supplies and even repairs for the Greek ships in battle. Its independence came in 1823 when Karpathos joined up with Greece and was instated in the province of Santorini. But in 1830 with the London protocol, the Dodecanese islands were given back to Turkey and finally in 1912 the Italians took over.

The Italian Administration building was built on a high rocky coast on the west end of the harbour at Pigadia and it is today's Provincial building. During the 2nd World War in 1943 the German troops arrived on the island and joined up with the Italians. The Germans left on the 4th October 1944. The Karpathians started a revolution against their conquerors on the 5th October 1944, in the village Menetes were the men of the village turned their weapons against the Italians.

The village of Arkasa followed and in three days the villages of Mesochori and Olympus were also free. Because of the bad weather conditions the Allies did not arrive on time and hunger came over the island. Then seven brave men started out and arrived in Alexandria after 5 days, were they asked for help from the Greek government. They returned to the island on October 17th 1944 with two allied destroyers and this is when the official liberation of the island took place. On the March 7th , 1948 Karpathos joined up with Greece.