The following is an encore presentation of Everything Everywhere Daily.

In Northern Greece, lying off the larger Chalcadiki Peninsula

is a place that's unique on Earth. It only is a population of about 2,400 people

scattered across 20 settlements and some random people living by themselves. What makes this

area unique is that all 2,400 of its citizens are monks and men, and women are not allowed to enter.

Learn more about the Monastic Republic of Mount Athos on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. As you might might expect for most places in Greece, there's a lot of history around Mount Athos.

The name Athos itself comes from Greek mythology.

Athos was the name of one of the giants which challenged the Greek gods on Mount Olympus. The Peninsula has the destroyed off its coast in the year 492 BC, sinking 300 ships and killing 20,000 men.

The Persian king, Xerxes I, tried to cut a canal across the peninsula to let his

ship through to avoid the rough seas off the peninsula's tip.

After the death of Alexander the Great, the great Greek architect Dinocraties

had toyed with the idea of carving the entire mountain into a statue of Alexander in a reclined position.

But none of these things from the ancient world are what Mount Athos is best known for.

Mount Athos is known for being home to Orthodox Christian monasteries.

The Christian legend surrounding Mount Athos is that the Virgin Mary was traveling from what is today Jaffa Israel to Cyprus with St. John.

They were blown off course and landed on the shore of Mount

Athos. She thought it was so beautiful that she asked God to make it her own garden.

From that moment the peninsula was dedicated to Mary and as such it was out of bounds to all other women

When Christians actually arrived on the peninsula is unknown, but it was probably around the third or fourth century

when there were still pagans living in the area.

The Islamic conquest of Egypt in the seventh century closed many of the Orthodox monasteries there,

and monks from those monasteries found a new home on Mount Athos.

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