Jeff—Saturday
These days way too many people in way too many places around the world are saying, "if things don't change, I'm getting out of here." Wherever "here" may be. That got me to thinking about a place I'd written about some years back, and well, for those of you who have the means and true desire to flee all the "action," do have I a place (with a view) for you to consider. Magnificent Meteora ... though likely a bit much for those of you with a thing about heights.
Once upon a time, or more accurately sixty million years ago, a sea existed in the middle of northern Greece. Then
the earth started pushing the seabed up toward the sky and, with the
help of water, wind, and temperature, massive pillars of gray stone
emerged near the northwestern edge of today’s Thessaly plain by the
mighty Pindus mountain range (the “spine of Greece”) and the wide and
fertile Pineios river basin.
Carbon dating conducted in a cave by those natural rock towers revealed human presence in the area 50,000 years ago. But
that cave of Theopetra is not the big draw to the region (in fact, the
cave has been closed to the public), nor is it what makes that complex
of sandstone and conglomerate cliffs among the most revered sites in
Eastern Orthodoxy, second in Greece only to Mount Athos.
To find the reason for Meteora’s significance you must look heavenward two thousand feet or so.
Welcome to the scene of more than twelve-hundred years of monastic life “suspended in air,” the literal meaning of meteora. The first recorded dwellers among the cliffs were 9th Century hermit monks, and although no one knows precisely when the first monastery was built, by the beginning of the 12th Century a rudimentary monastic state had evolved around the church of Theotokos (the mother of God). That church still stands today.
By the end of the 12th Century many had come to join the community, but it was not until the 14th Century that work began on architectural contributions that still stun the imagination. The
Byzantine Empire was crumbling and Turkish pirates were on the
rampage—notably against vulnerable Mount Athos monasteries sitting on an
Aegean peninsula 150 miles northeast of Meteora.
Three Mount Athos monks fed up with
battling brigands left in search of what they’d heard was a place of
miracles and prayer in the land of the “great rock forest.” There
they scaled the heights of the cliffs and with the Serbian emperor as
benefactor erected the Grand Metereron (aka Monastery of the
Transfiguration). By the 16th Century twenty-four monasteries were built on Meteora, and of the six that survive, Grand Metereron is one of them.
Today,
the cliff-side monasteries welcome visitors with roads, steps, and
paths, none of which existed in Meteora’s heyday of isolation from the
world below. To shuttle between
their fields and flocks down in the valley the monks relied upon
ladders as long as 130 feet and hand-cranked hoists to lift baskets and
nets well over 1000 feet in the air. Everything going up and down in those nets, particularly the monks, trusted their fate to the strength of their brethren.
Scary huh? But wait, there’s more. Legend has it that the ropes were only replaced “when the Lord let them break.” Now that’s the sort of workday commute I’d call a true leap of faith.
But the glory years of Meteora’s 15th
Century monastic life faded as the unscrupulous plundered the
monasteries, squatters took over, and moral direction deteriorated to
where one monk lived in a monastery with two women dressed as monks. There were brief interludes of monastic revival but by the 18th Century it was more a refuge for Greeks fleeing Ottoman overlords and later for 19th Century Greeks fighting Turks in their battle for Independence. The most serious toll on the monasteries and their treasures, though, came during Greece’s occupation in World War II.
Meterora in the crosshairs |
But all that’s in the past, and
today Meteora is a UNESCO World Heritage site and an absolute must see
for anyone interested in architectural brilliance amid magnificent
natural beauty. Particularly if you’re female, because Greece’s other site of such wonder, Mount Athos, forbids women.
And for those armchair travellers among us, you can catch a bit of it in the James Bond film, For Your Eyes Only, where one of the monasteries serves as the bad guy’s hideout. The more things change…
—Jeff
It looks absolutely stunning! When do we leave?
ReplyDeleteBefore November 3, 2020, because after the place may get mobbed.
DeleteTerribly beautiful. Thanks, Jeff!
ReplyDeleteNo need to thank me, EvKa, bringing terrible beauty to you is my duty. :)
DeleteIt looks rather Tolkienesque. And rather beautiful.
ReplyDeleteYes, you're right as usual, Caro, it does ring true.
DeleteMy Bro, i would have be blindfolded to arrive in such a place and stay blindfolded while there. Which would kinda make it a wasted trip. Thanks for the pix. I know vicariously is the only way I will ever go there.
ReplyDeleteThat's why you have such a keen imagination...you travel so well in your mind, sis.
Delete