Thessaloniki

Inscription reading "To Queen Thessalonike, (Daughter) of Philip", Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki

The original name of the city was Θεσσαλονίκη Thessaloníkē. It was named after the princess Thessalonike of Macedon, the half sister of Alexander the Great, whose name means "Thessalian victory", from Θεσσαλός Thessalos, and Νίκη 'victory' (Nike), honoring the Macedonian victory at the Battle of Crocus Field (353/352 BC).

Minor variants are also found, including Θετταλονίκη Thettaloníkē,^[19][20] Θεσσαλονίκεια Thessaloníkeia,^[21] Θεσσαλονείκη Thessaloníkē, and Θεσσαλονικέων Thessalonikéon.^[22][23]

The name Σαλονίκη Saloníki is first attested in Greek in the Chronicle of the Morea (14th century), and is common in folk songs, but it must have originated earlier, as al-Idrisi called it Salunik already in the 12th century. It is the basis for the city's name in other languages: Солѹнъ (Solunŭ) in Old Church Slavonic, סאלוניקו^[24][25] (Saloniko) in Judeo-Spanish (שאלוניקי prior to the 19th century^[25]) סלוניקי (Saloniki) in Hebrew, (Selenik) in Albanian language, سلانیك (Selânik) in Ottoman Turkish and Selânik in modern Turkish, Salonicco in Italian, Solun or Солун in the local and neighboring South Slavic languages, Салоники (Saloníki) in Russian, Sãrunã in Aromanian^[26] and Săruna in Megleno-Romanian.^[27]

In English, the city can be called Thessaloniki, Salonika, Thessalonica, Salonica, Thessalonika, Saloniki, Thessalonike, or Thessalonice. In printed texts, the most common name and spelling until the early 20th century was Thessalonica; through most of rest of the 20th century, it was Salonika. By about 1985, the most common single name became Thessaloniki.^[28][29] The forms with the Latin ending -a taken together remain more common than those with the phonetic Greek ending -i and much more common than the ancient transliteration -e.^[30]

Thessaloniki was revived as the city's official name in 1912, when it joined the Kingdom of Greece during the Balkan Wars.^[31] In local speech, the city's name is typically pronounced with a dark and deep L, characteristic of the accent of the modern Macedonian dialect of Greek.^[32][33] The name is often abbreviated as Θεσ/νίκη.^[34]

Discover more about Names and etymology related topics

Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon was the king (basileus) of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia from 359 BC until his death in 336 BC. He was a member of the Argead dynasty, founders of the ancient kingdom, and the father of Alexander the Great.

Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki

Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki

The Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki is a museum in Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia, Greece. It holds and interprets artifacts from the Prehistoric, Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic and Roman periods, mostly from the city of Thessaloniki but also from the region of Macedonia in general.

Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great

Alexander III of Macedon, commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to the throne in 336 BC at the age of 20, and spent most of his ruling years conducting a lengthy military campaign throughout Western Asia and Egypt. By the age of 30, he had created one of the largest empires in history, stretching from Greece to northwestern India. He was undefeated in battle and is widely considered to be one of history's greatest and most successful military commanders.

Nike (mythology)

Nike (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Nike was a goddess who personified victory in any field including art, music, war, and athletics. She is often portrayed in Greek art as Winged Victory in the motion of flight; however, she can also appear without wings as "Wingless Victory" when she is being portrayed as an attribute of another deity such as Athena. In Greek literature Nike is described as both an attribute and attendant to the gods Zeus and Athena. Nike gained this honored role beside Zeus during the Titanomachy where she was one of the first gods to offer her allegiance to Zeus. At Athens, Nike became a servant to Athena as well as an attribute of her due to the prominent status Athena held in her patron city. The fusion of the two goddesses at Athens has contributed to the ambiguity surrounding Nike's origins. It is unclear whether she originated from a character trait of the Greek goddess Athena or has always existed as an independent deity. Her origin story in Greek mythology is also slightly ambiguous, with the Theogony claiming Nike to be the daughter of Styx and Pallas while the Homeric Hymns describe Ares as being Nike's father. Her Roman equivalent was Victoria.

Battle of Crocus Field

Battle of Crocus Field

The so-called Battle of Crocus Field was a battle in the Third Sacred War, fought between the armies of Phocis, under Onomarchos, and the combined Thessalian and Macedonian army under Philip II of Macedon. In the bloodiest battle recorded in Ancient Greek history, the Phocians were decisively defeated by Philip's forces. Philip's victory secured his appointment as ruler of Thessaly, marking an important step in the rise of Macedon to political ascendancy in Ancient Greece. Opinion amongst historians is divided as to the year of the battle; some favour 353 BC, and others 352 BC.

Chronicle of the Morea

Chronicle of the Morea

The Chronicle of the Morea is a long 14th-century history text, of which four versions are extant: in French, Greek, Italian and Aragonese. More than 9,000 lines long, the Chronicle narrates events of the Franks' establishment of feudalism in mainland Greece. West European Crusaders settled in the Peloponnese following the Fourth Crusade. The period covered in the Chronicle was 1204 to 1292. It gives significant details on the civic organization of the Principality of Achaia.

Muhammad al-Idrisi

Muhammad al-Idrisi

Abu Abdullah Muhammad al-Idrisi al-Qurtubi al-Hasani as-Sabti, or simply al-Idrisi, was a Muslim Arab geographer, Egyptologist, and cartographer who served in the court of King Roger II at Palermo, Sicily. Muhammed al-Idrisi was born in Ceuta then belonging to the Almoravids. He created the Tabula Rogeriana, one of the most advanced medieval world maps.

Old Church Slavonic

Old Church Slavonic

Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic was the first Slavic literary language.

Judaeo-Spanish

Judaeo-Spanish

Judaeo-Spanish or Judeo-Spanish, also known as Ladino, is a Romance language derived from Old Spanish. Originally spoken in Spain, and then after the Edict of Expulsion spreading through the Ottoman Empire as well as France, Italy, the Netherlands, Morocco, and England, it is today spoken mainly by Sephardic minorities in more than 30 countries, with most speakers residing in Israel. Although it has no official status in any country, it has been acknowledged as a minority language in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Israel, France, and Turkey. In 2017, it was formally recognised by the Royal Spanish Academy.

Albanian language

Albanian language

Albanian is an Indo-European language and an independent branch of that language family. It is spoken by the Albanians in the Balkans and by the Albanian diaspora, which is generally concentrated in the Americas, Europe and Oceania. With perhaps as many as 7.5 million speakers, it comprises an independent branch within the Indo-European languages and is not closely related to any other modern language.

Italian language

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Together with Sardinian, Italian is the least divergent language from Latin. Spoken by about 85 million people (2022), Italian is an official language in Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, and Vatican City. It has official minority status in Croatia and in some areas of Slovenian Istria.

Slavic speakers of Greek Macedonia

Slavic speakers of Greek Macedonia

Slavic speakers are a minority population in the northern Greek region of Macedonia, who are mostly concentrated in certain parts of the peripheries of West and Central Macedonia, adjacent to the territory of the state of North Macedonia. Their dialects are called today "Slavic" in Greece, while generally they are considered Macedonian. Some members have formed their own emigrant communities in neighbouring countries, as well as further abroad.

From classical antiquity to the Roman Empire

Ancient coin depicting Cassander, son of Antipater, and founder of the city of Thessaloniki

The city was founded around 315 BC by the King Cassander of Macedon, on or near the site of the ancient town of Therma and 26 other local villages.^[35][36] He named it after his wife Thessalonike,^[37] a half-sister of Alexander the Great and princess of Macedonia as daughter of Philip II. Under the kingdom of Macedonia the city retained its own autonomy and parliament^[38] and evolved to become the most important city in Macedonia.^[37]

Twenty years after the fall of the Kingdom of Macedonia in 168 BC, in 148 BC, Thessalonica was made the capital of the Roman province of Macedonia.^[39] Thessalonica became a free city of the Roman Republic under Mark Antony in 41 BC.^[37][40] It grew to be an important trade hub located on the Via Egnatia,^[41] the road connecting Dyrrhachium with Byzantium,^[42] which facilitated trade between Thessaloniki and great centres of commerce such as Rome and Byzantium.^[43] Thessaloniki also lies at the southern end of the main north–south route through the Balkans along the valleys of the Morava and Axios river valleys, thereby linking the Balkans with the rest of Greece.^[44] The city became the capital of one of the four Roman districts of Macedonia;.^[41]

At the time of the Roman Empire, about 50 AD, Thessaloniki was also one of the early centres of Christianity; while on his second missionary journey, Paul the Apostle visited this city's chief synagogue on three Sabbaths and sowed the seeds for Thessaloniki's first Christian church. Later, Paul wrote letters to the new church at Thessaloniki, with two letters to the church under his name appearing in the Biblical canon as First and Second Thessalonians. Some scholars hold that the First Epistle to the Thessalonians is the first written book of the New Testament.^[45]

The fourth-century AD Rotunda of Galerius, one of several Roman monuments in the city and a UNESCO World Heritage Site

In 306 AD, Thessaloniki acquired a patron saint, St. Demetrius, a Christian whom Galerius is said to have put to death. Most scholars agree with Hippolyte Delehaye's theory that Demetrius was not a Thessaloniki native, but his veneration was transferred to Thessaloniki when it replaced Sirmium as the main military base in the Balkans.^[46] A basilical church dedicated to St. Demetrius, Hagios Demetrios, was first built in the fifth century AD and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

When the Roman Empire was divided into the tetrarchy, Thessaloniki became the administrative capital of one of the four portions of the Empire under Galerius Maximianus Caesar,^[47][48] where Galerius commissioned an imperial palace, a new hippodrome, a triumphal arch and a mausoleum, among other structures.^[48][49][50]

In 379, when the Roman Prefecture of Illyricum was divided between the East and West Roman Empires, Thessaloniki became the capital of the new Prefecture of Illyricum.^[41] The following year, the Edict of Thessalonica made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire.^[51] In 390, troops under the Roman Emperor Theodosius I led a massacre against the inhabitants of Thessalonica, who had risen in revolt against the detention of a favorite charioteer. By the time of the Fall of Rome in 476, Thessaloniki was the second-largest city of the Eastern Roman Empire.^[43]

Byzantine era and Middle Ages

Section of the Walls of Thessaloniki

From the first years of the Byzantine Empire, Thessaloniki was considered the second city in the Empire after Constantinople,^[52][53][54] both in terms of wealth and size,^[52] with a population of 150,000 in the mid-12th century.^[55] The city held this status until its transfer to Venetian control in 1423. In the 14th century, the city's population exceeded 100,000 to 150,000,^[56][57][58] making it larger than London at the time.^[59]

During the sixth and seventh centuries, the area around Thessaloniki was invaded by Avars and Slavs, who unsuccessfully laid siege to the city several times, as narrated in the Miracles of Saint Demetrius.^[60] Traditional historiography stipulates that many Slavs settled in the hinterland of Thessaloniki;^[61] however, modern scholars consider this migration to have been on a much smaller scale than previously thought.^[61][62] In the ninth century, the Byzantine missionaries Cyril and Methodius, both natives of the city, created the first literary language of the Slavs, the Old Church Slavonic, most likely based on the Slavic dialect used in the hinterland of their hometown.^{[63][64][65][66][67]}

A naval attack led by Byzantine converts to Islam (including Leo of Tripoli) in 904 resulted in the sack of the city.^[68][69]

Church of the Acheiropoietos (5th century) at the city's centre

The economic expansion of the city continued through the 12th century as the rule of the Komnenoi emperors expanded Byzantine control to the north. Thessaloniki passed out of Byzantine hands in 1204,^[70] when Constantinople was captured by the forces of the Fourth Crusade and incorporated the city and its surrounding territories in the Kingdom of Thessalonica^[71] — which then became the largest vassal of the Latin Empire. In 1224, the Kingdom of Thessalonica was overrun by the Despotate of Epirus, a remnant of the former Byzantine Empire, under Theodore Komnenos Doukas who crowned himself Emperor,^[72] and the city became the capital of the short-lived Empire of Thessalonica.^{[72][73][74][75]} Following his defeat at Klokotnitsa however in 1230,^[72][76] the Empire of Thessalonica became a vassal state of the Second Bulgarian Empire until it was recovered again in 1246, this time by the Nicaean Empire.^[72]

In 1342,^[77] the city saw the rise of the Commune of the Zealots, an anti-aristocratic party formed of sailors and the poor,^[78] which is nowadays described as social-revolutionary.^[77] The city was practically independent of the rest of the Empire,^[77][78][79] as it had its own government, a form of republic.^[77] The zealot movement was overthrown in 1350 and the city was reunited with the rest of the Empire.^[77]

The capture of Gallipoli by the Ottomans in 1354 kicked off a rapid Turkish expansion in the southern Balkans, conducted both by the Ottomans themselves and by semi-independent Turkish ghazi warrior-bands. By 1369, the Ottomans were able to conquer Adrianople (modern Edirne), which became their new capital until 1453.^[80] Thessalonica, ruled by Manuel II Palaiologos (r. 1391–1425) itself surrendered after a lengthy siege in 1383–1387, along with most of eastern and central Macedonia, to the forces of Sultan Murad I.^[81] Initially, the surrendered cities were allowed complete autonomy in exchange for payment of the kharaj poll-tax. Following the death of Emperor John V Palaiologos in 1391, however, Manuel II escaped Ottoman custody and went to Constantinople, where he was crowned emperor, succeeding his father. This angered Sultan Bayezid I, who laid waste to the remaining Byzantine territories, and then turned on Chrysopolis, which was captured by storm and largely destroyed.^[82] Thessalonica too submitted again to Ottoman rule at this time, possibly after brief resistance, but was treated more leniently: although the city was brought under full Ottoman control, the Christian population and the Church retained most of their possessions, and the city retained its institutions.^[83][84]

A mosaic of Saint George in Saint Demetrios Church

Thessalonica remained in Ottoman hands until 1403, when Emperor Manuel II sided with Bayezid's eldest son Süleyman in the Ottoman succession struggle that broke out following the crushing defeat and capture of Bayezid at the Battle of Ankara against Tamerlane in 1402. In exchange for his support, in the Treaty of Gallipoli the Byzantine emperor secured the return of Thessalonica, part of its hinterland, the Chalcidice peninsula, and the coastal region between the rivers Strymon and Pineios.^[85][86] Thessalonica and the surrounding region were given as an autonomous appanage to John VII Palaiologos. After his death in 1408, he was succeeded by Manuel's third son, the Despot Andronikos Palaiologos, who was supervised by Demetrios Leontares until 1415. Thessalonica enjoyed a period of relative peace and prosperity after 1403, as the Turks were preoccupied with their own civil war, but was attacked by the rival Ottoman pretenders in 1412 (by Musa Çelebi^[87]) and 1416 (during the uprising of Mustafa Çelebi against Mehmed I^[88]).^[89][90] Once the Ottoman civil war ended, the Turkish pressure on the city began to increase again. Just as during the 1383–1387 siege, this led to a sharp division of opinion within the city between factions supporting resistance, if necessary with Western help, or submission to the Ottomans.^[91]

In 1423, Despot Andronikos Palaiologos ceded it to the Republic of Venice with the hope that it could be protected from the Ottomans who were besieging the city. The Venetians held Thessaloniki until it was captured by the Ottoman Sultan Murad II on 29 March 1430.^[92]

Ottoman period

Hot chamber of the men's baths in the Bey Hamam (1444)

When Sultan Murad II captured Thessaloniki and sacked it in 1430,^[93] contemporary reports estimated that about one-fifth of the city's population was enslaved.^[94] Ottoman artillery was used to secure the city's capture and bypass its double walls.^[93] Upon the conquest of Thessaloniki, some of its inhabitants escaped,^[95] including intellectuals such as Theodorus Gaza "Thessalonicensis" and Andronicus Callistus.^[96] However, the change of sovereignty from the Byzantine Empire to the Ottoman one did not affect the city's prestige as a major imperial city and trading hub.^[97][98] Thessaloniki and Smyrna, although smaller in size than Constantinople, were the Ottoman Empire's most important trading hubs.^[97] Thessaloniki's importance was mostly in the field of shipping,^[97] but also in manufacturing,^[98] while most of the city's trade was controlled by Jewish people.^[97]

Demographics of Thessaloniki between 1500 and 1950^[99]

During the Ottoman period, the city's population of Ottoman Muslims (including those of Turkish origin, as well as Albanian Muslim, Bulgarian Muslim, especially the Pomaks and Greek Muslim of convert origin) and Muslim Roma like the Sepečides Romani grew substantially. According to the 1478 census Selânik (Ottoman Turkish: سلانیك), as the city came to be known in Ottoman Turkish, had 6,094 Christian Orthodox households, 4,320 Muslim ones, and some Catholic. No Jews were recorded in the census suggesting that the subsequent influx of Jewish population was not linked^[100] to the already existing Romaniots community.^[101] Soon after the turn of the 15th to 16th century, however, nearly 20,000 Sephardic Jews immigrated to Greece from the Iberian Peninsula following their expulsion from Spain by the 1492 Alhambra Decree.^[102] By c. 1500, the number of households had grown to 7,986 Christian ones, 8,575 Muslim ones, and 3,770 Jewish. By 1519, Sephardic Jewish households numbered 15,715, 54% of the city's population. Some historians consider the Ottoman regime's invitation to Jewish settlement was a strategy to prevent the Christian population from dominating the city.^[103] The city became both the largest Jewish city in the world and the only Jewish majority city in the world in the 16th century. As a result, Thessaloniki attracted persecuted Jews from all over the world.^[104]

The White Tower of Thessaloniki, on the edge of Nikis Avenue, a prominent Ottoman addition to the city walls, built in 1430 and rebuilt in 1535,^[93] and symbol of the city

Thessaloniki was the capital of the Sanjak of Selanik within the wider Rumeli Eyalet (Balkans)^[105] until 1826, and subsequently the capital of Selanik Eyalet (after 1867, the Selanik Vilayet).^[106][107] This consisted of the sanjaks of Selanik, Serres and Drama between 1826 and 1912.^[108]

With the break out of the Greek War of Independence in the spring of 1821, the governor Yusuf Bey imprisoned in his headquarters more than 400 hostages. On 18 May, when Yusuf learned of the insurrection to the villages of Chalkidiki, he ordered half of his hostages to be slaughtered before his eyes. The mulla of Thessaloniki, Hayrıülah, gives the following description of Yusuf's retaliations: "Every day and every night you hear nothing in the streets of Thessaloniki but shouting and moaning. It seems that Yusuf Bey, the Yeniceri Agasi, the Subaşı, the hocas and the ulemas have all gone raving mad."^[109] It would take until the end of the century for the city's Greek community to recover.^[110]

Thessaloniki was also a Janissary stronghold where novice Janissaries were trained. In June 1826, regular Ottoman soldiers attacked and destroyed the Janissary base in Thessaloniki while also killing over 10,000 Janissaries, an event known as The Auspicious Incident in Ottoman history.^[111] In 1870–1917, driven by economic growth, the city's population expanded by 70%, reaching 135,000 in 1917.^[112]

The last few decades of Ottoman control over the city were an era of revival, particularly in terms of the city's infrastructure. It was at that time that the Ottoman administration of the city acquired an "official" face with the creation of the Government House^[113] while a number of new public buildings were built in the eclectic style in order to project the European face both of Thessaloniki and the Ottoman Empire.^[113][114] The city walls were torn down between 1869 and 1889,^[115] efforts for a planned expansion of the city are evident as early as 1879,^[116] the first tram service started in 1888^[117] and the city streets were illuminated with electric lamp posts in 1908.^[118] In 1888, the Oriental Railway connected Thessaloniki to Central Europe via rail through Belgrade and to Monastir in 1893, while the Thessaloniki-Istanbul Junction Railway connected it to Constantinople in 1896.^[116]

20th century and beyond

The seafront of Thessaloniki, as it was in 1917

In the early 20th century, Thessaloniki was in the centre of radical activities by various groups; the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, founded in 1897,^[119] and the Greek Macedonian Committee, founded in 1903.^[120] In 1903, an anarchist group known as the Boatmen of Thessaloniki planted bombs in several buildings in Thessaloniki, including the Ottoman Bank, with some assistance from the IMRO. The Greek consulate in Ottoman Thessaloniki (now the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle) served as the centre of operations for the Greek guerillas.

During this period, and since the 16th century, Thessaloniki's Jewish element was the most dominant; it was the only city in Europe where the Jews were a majority of the total population.^[121] The city was ethnically diverse and cosmopolitan. In 1890, its population had risen to 118,000, 47% of which were Jews, followed by Turks (22%), Greeks (14%), Bulgarians (8%), Roma (2%), and others (7%).^[122] By 1913, the ethnic composition of the city had changed so that the population stood at 157,889, with Jews at 39%, followed again by Turks (29%), Greeks (25%), Bulgarians (4%), Roma (2%), and others at 1%.^[123] Many varied religions were practiced and many languages spoken, including Judeo-Spanish, a dialect of Spanish spoken by the city's Jews.

Constantine I of Greece with George I of Greece and the Greek army enter the city.

Thessaloniki was also the centre of activities of the Young Turks, a political reform movement, which goal was to replace the Ottoman Empire's absolute monarchy with a constitutional government. The Young Turks started out as an underground movement, until finally in 1908, they started the Young Turk Revolution from the city of Thessaloniki, which lead to of them gaining control over the Ottoman Empire and put an end to the Ottoman sultans power.^[124] Eleftherias (Liberty) Square, where the Young Turks gathered at the outbreak of the revolution, is named after the event.^[125] Turkey's first president Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who was born and raised in Thessaloniki, was a member of the Young Turks in his soldier days and also partook in the Young Turk Revolution.

Allied armies in Thessaloniki, World War I

The 1st Battalion of the Army of National Defence marches on its way to the Macedonian front.

As the First Balkan War broke out, Greece declared war on the Ottoman Empire and expanded its borders. When Eleftherios Venizelos, Prime Minister at the time, was asked if the Greek army should move towards Thessaloniki or Monastir (now Bitola, Republic of North Macedonia), Venizelos replied "Θεσσαλονίκη με κάθε κόστος!" (Thessaloniki, at all costs!).^[126] As both Greece and Bulgaria wanted Thessaloniki, the Ottoman garrison of the city entered negotiations with both armies.^[127] On 8 November 1912 (26 October Old Style), the feast day of the city's patron saint, Saint Demetrius, the Greek Army accepted the surrender of the Ottoman garrison at Thessaloniki.^[128] The Bulgarian army arrived one day after the surrender of the city to Greece and Tahsin Pasha, ruler of the city, told the Bulgarian officials that "I have only one Thessaloniki, which I have surrendered".^[127] After the Second Balkan War, Thessaloniki and the rest of the Greek portion of Macedonia were officially annexed to Greece by the Treaty of Bucharest in 1913.^[129] On 18 March 1913 George I of Greece was assassinated in the city by Alexandros Schinas.^[130]

In 1915, during World War I, a large Allied expeditionary force established a base at Thessaloniki for operations^[131] against pro-German Bulgaria.^[132] This culminated in the establishment of the Macedonian Front, also known as the Salonika front.^[133][134] And a temporary hospital run by the Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service was set up in a disused factory. In 1916, pro-Venizelist Greek army officers and civilians, with the support of the Allies, launched an uprising,^[135] creating a pro-Allied^[136] temporary government by the name of the "Provisional Government of National Defence"^[135][137] that controlled the "New Lands" (lands that were gained by Greece in the Balkan Wars, most of Northern Greece including Greek Macedonia, the North Aegean as well as the island of Crete);^[135][137] the official government of the King in Athens, the "State of Athens",^[135] controlled "Old Greece"^[135][137] which were traditionally monarchist. The State of Thessaloniki was disestablished with the unification of the two opposing Greek governments under Venizelos, following the abdication of King Constantine in 1917.^[132][137]

On 30 December 1915 an Austrian air raid on Thessaloniki alarmed many town civilians and killed at least one person, and in response the Allied troops based there arrested the German, Austrian, Bulgarian and Turkish vice-consuls and their families and dependents and put them on a battleship, and billeted troops in their consulate buildings in Thessaloniki.^[138]

Aerial photograph of the Great Fire of 1917

Most of the old centre of the city was destroyed by the Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917, which was started accidentally by an unattended kitchen fire on 18 August 1917.^[139] The fire swept through the centre of the city, leaving 72,000 people homeless; according to the Pallis Report, most of them were Jewish (50,000). Many businesses were destroyed, as a result, 70% of the population were unemployed.^[139] Two churches and many synagogues and mosques were lost. More than one quarter of the total population of approximately 271,157 became homeless.^[139] Following the fire the government prohibited quick rebuilding, so it could implement the new redesign of the city according to the European-style urban plan^[9] prepared by a group of architects, including the Briton Thomas Mawson, and headed by French architect Ernest Hébrard.^[139] Property values fell from 6.5 million Greek drachmas to 750,000.^[140]

After the defeat of Greece in the Greco-Turkish War and during the break-up of the Ottoman Empire, a population exchange took place between Greece and Turkey.^[136] Over 160,000 ethnic Greeks deported from the former Ottoman Empire – particularly Greeks from Asia Minor^[141] and East Thrace were resettled in the city,^[136] changing its demographics. Additionally many of the city's Muslims, including Ottoman Greek Muslims, were deported to Turkey, ranging at about 20,000 people.^[142] This made the Greek element dominant,^[143] while the Jewish population was reduced to a minority for the first time since the 14th century.^[144]

Registration of the male Jews of Thessaloniki in July 1942, Eleftherias Square. 96% of deported Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps.^[145]

Part of Eleftherias Square and Stein mansion during the Axis occupation

During World War II Thessaloniki was heavily bombarded by Fascist Italy (with 232 people dead, 871 wounded and over 800 buildings damaged or destroyed in November 1940 alone),^[146] and, the Italians having failed in their invasion of Greece, it fell to the forces of Nazi Germany on 8 April 1941^[147] and went under German occupation. The Nazis soon forced the Jewish residents into a ghetto near the railroads and on 15 March 1943 began the deportation of the city's Jews to Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps.^{[148][149][150]} Most were immediately murdered in the gas chambers. Of the 45,000 Jews deported to Auschwitz, only 4% survived.^[151][152]

Indian troops sweep for mines in Salonika, 1944.

During a speech in Reichstag, Hitler claimed that the intention of his Balkan campaign, was to prevent the Allies from establishing "a new Macedonian front", as they had during WWI. The importance of Thessaloniki to Nazi Germany can be demonstrated by the fact that, initially, Hitler had planned to incorporate it directly into Nazi Germany^[153] and not have it controlled by a puppet state such as the Hellenic State or an ally of Germany (Thessaloniki had been promised to Yugoslavia as a reward for joining the Axis on 25 March 1941).^[154]

As it was the first major city in Greece to fall to the occupying forces, the first Greek resistance group formed in Thessaloniki (under the name Ελευθερία, Elefthería, "Freedom")^[155] as well as the first anti-Nazi newspaper in an occupied territory anywhere in Europe,^[156] also by the name Eleftheria. Thessaloniki was also home to a military camp-converted-concentration camp, known in German as "Konzentrationslager Pavlo Mela" (Pavlos Melas Concentration Camp),^[157] where members of the resistance and other anti-fascists^[157] were held either to be killed or sent to other concentration camps.^[157] On 30 October 1944, after battles with the retreating German army and the Security Battalions of Poulos, forces of ELAS entered Thessaloniki as liberators headed by Markos Vafiadis (who did not obey orders from ELAS leadership in Athens to not enter the city). Pro-EAM celebrations and demonstrations followed in the city.^[158][159] In the 1946 monarchy referendum, the majority of the locals voted in favor of a republic, contrary to the rest of Greece.^[160]

After the war, Thessaloniki was rebuilt with large-scale development of new infrastructure and industry throughout the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Many of its architectural treasures still remain, adding value to the city as a tourist destination, while several early Christian and Byzantine monuments of Thessaloniki were added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1988.^[161] In 1997, Thessaloniki was celebrated as the European Capital of Culture,^[162] sponsoring events across the city and the region. Agency established to oversee the cultural activities of that year 1997 was still in existence by 2010.^[163] In 2004, the city hosted a number of the football events as part of the 2004 Summer Olympics.^[164]

Today, Thessaloniki has become one of the most important trade and business hubs in Southeastern Europe, with its port, the Port of Thessaloniki being one of the largest in the Aegean and facilitating trade throughout the Balkan hinterland.^[11] On 26 October 2012 the city celebrated its centennial since its incorporation into Greece.^[165] The city also forms one of the largest student centers in Southeastern Europe, is host to the largest student population in Greece and was the European Youth Capital in 2014.^[14][166]

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History of Thessaloniki

History of Thessaloniki

The history of the city of Thessaloniki is a long one, dating back to the ancient Macedonians. Today with the opening of borders in Southeastern Europe it is currently experiencing a strong revival, serving as the prime port for the northern Greek regions of Macedonia and Thrace, as well as for the whole of Southeastern Europe.

Cassander

Cassander

Cassander was king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia from 305 BC until 297 BC, and de facto ruler of southern Greece from 317 BC until his death.

Antipater

Antipater

Antipater was a Macedonian general and statesman under the subsequent kingships of Philip II of Macedon and his son, Alexander the Great. In the wake of the collapse of the Argead house, his son Cassander would eventually come to rule Macedonia as a king in his own right.

Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great

Alexander III of Macedon, commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to the throne in 336 BC at the age of 20, and spent most of his ruling years conducting a lengthy military campaign throughout Western Asia and Egypt. By the age of 30, he had created one of the largest empires in history, stretching from Greece to northwestern India. He was undefeated in battle and is widely considered to be one of history's greatest and most successful military commanders.

Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon was the king (basileus) of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia from 359 BC until his death in 336 BC. He was a member of the Argead dynasty, founders of the ancient kingdom, and the father of Alexander the Great.

Macedonia (ancient kingdom)

Macedonia (ancient kingdom)

Macedonia, also called Macedon, was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by the royal Argead dynasty, which was followed by the Antipatrid and Antigonid dynasties. Home to the ancient Macedonians, the earliest kingdom was centered on the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, and bordered by Epirus to the west, Paeonia to the north, Thrace to the east and Thessaly to the south.

Macedonia (Roman province)

Macedonia (Roman province)

Macedonia was a province of the Roman Empire, encompassing the territory of the former Antigonid Kingdom of Macedonia, which had been conquered by Rome in 168 BC at the conclusion of the Third Macedonian War. The province was created in 146 BC, after the Roman general Quintus Caecilius Metellus defeated Andriscus of Macedon, the last self-styled king of Macedonia in the Fourth Macedonian War. The province incorporated the former kingdom of Macedonia with the addition of Epirus, Thessaly, and parts of Illyria, Paeonia and Thrace.

Roman Republic

Roman Republic

The Roman Republic was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom and ending in 27 BC with the establishment of the Roman Empire, Rome's control rapidly expanded during this period—from the city's immediate surroundings to hegemony over the entire Mediterranean world.

Mark Antony

Mark Antony

Marcus Antonius, commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic from a constitutional republic into the autocratic Roman Empire.

Byzantium

Byzantium

Byzantium or Byzantion was an ancient Greek city in classical antiquity that became known as Constantinople in late antiquity and Istanbul today. The Greek name Byzantion and its Latinization Byzantium continued to be used as a name of Constantinople sporadically and to varying degrees during the thousand year existence of the Byzantine Empire. Byzantium was colonized by Greeks from Megara in the 7th century BC and remained primarily Greek-speaking until its conquest by the Ottoman Empire in AD 1453.

Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital city of Italy. It is also the capital of the Lazio region, the centre of the Metropolitan City of Rome, and a special comune named Comune di Roma Capitale. With 2,860,009 residents in 1,285 km2 (496.1 sq mi), Rome is the country's most populated comune and the third most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. The Metropolitan City of Rome, with a population of 4,355,725 residents, is the most populous metropolitan city in Italy. Its metropolitan area is the third-most populous within Italy. Rome is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio (Latium), along the shores of the Tiber. Vatican City is an independent country inside the city boundaries of Rome, the only existing example of a country within a city. Rome is often referred to as the City of Seven Hills due to its geographic location, and also as the "Eternal City". Rome is generally considered to be the "cradle of Western civilization and Christian culture", and the centre of the Catholic Church.

Great Morava

Great Morava

The Great Morava is the final section of the Morava, a major river system in Serbia.

Thessaloniki is located 502 kilometres (312 mi) north of Athens.

Thessaloniki's urban area spreads over 30 kilometres (19 mi) from Oraiokastro in the north to Thermi in the south in the direction of Chalkidiki.

Geology

Thessaloniki lies on the northern fringe of the Thermaic Gulf on its eastern coast and is bound by Mount Chortiatis on its southeast. Its proximity to imposing mountain ranges, hills and fault lines, especially towards its southeast have historically made the city prone to geological changes.

Since medieval times, Thessaloniki has been hit by strong earthquakes, notably in 1759, 1902, 1978 and 1995.^[167] On 19–20 June 1978, the city suffered a series of powerful earthquakes, registering 5.5 and 6.5 on the Richter scale.^[168][169] The tremors caused considerable damage to a number of buildings and ancient monuments,^[168] but the city withstood the catastrophe without any major problems.^[169] One apartment building in central Thessaloniki collapsed during the second earthquake, killing many and raising the final death toll to 51.^[168][169]

Panoramic view of the city from Kedrinos Lofos with Mount Olympus in the background

Climate

Thessaloniki's climate is directly affected by the Aegean Sea, on which it is situated.^[170] The city lies in a transitional climatic zone, so its climate displays characteristics of several climates. According to the Köppen climate classification, the city has a Mediterranean climate (Csa), bordering on a semi-arid climate (BSk), observed on the periphery of the region. Its average annual precipitation of 450 mm (17.7 inches) is due to the Pindus rain shadow drying the westerly winds. However, the city has a summer precipitation between 20 to 30 mm (0.79 to 1.18 inches), which increases gradually towards the north and west, turning some parts of the city humid subtropical (Cfa).^[171]

Winters are somewhat dry, with common morning frost. Snowfalls occur sporadically more or less every winter, but the snow cover does not last for more than a few days. Fog is common, with an average of 193 foggy days in a year.^[172] During the coldest winters, temperatures can drop to −10 °C (14 °F).^[172] The record minimum temperature in Thessaloniki was −14 °C (7 °F).^[173] On average, Thessaloniki experiences frost (sub-zero temperature) 32 days a year.^[172] The coldest month of the year in downtown Thessaloniki is January, with an average 24-hour temperature of 8 °C (46 °F). ^[174] Wind is also usual in the winter months, with December and January having an average wind speed of 26 km/h (16 mph).^[172]

Thessaloniki's summers are hot and quite dry.^[172] Maximum temperatures usually rise above 30 °C (86 °F),^[172] but they rarely approach or go over 40 °C (104 °F);^[172] the average number of days the temperature is above 32 °C (90 °F) is 32.^[172] The maximum recorded temperature in the city was 44 °C (111 °F).^[172][173] Rain seldom falls in summer, mainly during thunderstorms. In the summer months Thessaloniki also experiences strong heat waves.^[175] The hottest months of the year in downtown Thessaloniki are July and August, with an average 24-hour temperature of around 28 °C (82 °F). ^[176]

In 2021, Greece was taken to task by the European Commission for failing to curb consistently high air pollution levels in Thessaloniki.^[177]

Discover more about Geography related topics

Athens

Athens

Athens is a major coastal city in the Mediterranean and is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With its surrounding urban area’s population numbering over three million, it is also the seventh largest urban area in the European Union. Athens dominates and is the capital of the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, with its recorded history spanning over 3,400 years and its earliest human presence beginning somewhere between the 11th and 7th millennia BCE.

Chalkidiki

Chalkidiki

Chalkidiki (; Greek: Χαλκιδική [xalciðiˈci], also spelled Halkidiki, is a peninsula and regional unit of Greece, part of the region of Central Macedonia, in the geographic region of Macedonia in Northern Greece. The autonomous Mount Athos region constitutes the easternmost part of the peninsula, but not of the regional unit.

Mount Chortiatis

Mount Chortiatis

Mount Chortiatis or Hortiatis, known in Antiquity as Cissus or Kissos, is a mountain in Central Macedonia, Greece. It rises southeast of Thessaloniki, peaking at 1,201 metres. Besides the city of Thessaloniki, there are several suburbs and villages located on the foothills of Chortiatis, most notably Chortiatis and the affluent suburb of Panorama, both of them belonging in the Pylaia-Chortiatis municipality. The mountain's landscape is wooded, with part of these woods making up Thessaloniki's Seich Sou Forest National Park. A fall wind that occurs on the Thermaic Gulf was named after the mountain as well.

Mountain

Mountain

A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher than a hill, typically rising at least 300 metres above the surrounding land. A few mountains are isolated summits, but most occur in mountain ranges.

Earthquake

Earthquake

An earthquake is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those that are so weak that they cannot be felt, to those violent enough to propel objects and people into the air, damage critical infrastructure, and wreak destruction across entire cities. The seismic activity of an area is the frequency, type, and size of earthquakes experienced over a particular time. The seismicity at a particular location in the Earth is the average rate of seismic energy release per unit volume. The word tremor is also used for non-earthquake seismic rumbling.

1978 Thessaloniki earthquake

1978 Thessaloniki earthquake

The 1978 Thessaloniki earthquake occurred on 20 June at 23:03 local time. The shock registered 6.5 on the moment magnitude scale, had a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe), and was felt throughout northern Greece, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. It was the largest event in the area since the 1932 Ierissos earthquake.

Mount Olympus

Mount Olympus

Mount Olympus is the highest mountain in Greece. It is part of the Olympus massif near the Thermaic Gulf of the Aegean Sea, located in the Olympus Range on the border between Thessaly and Macedonia, between the regional units of Larissa and Pieria, about 80 km (50 mi) southwest from Thessaloniki. Mount Olympus has 52 peaks and deep gorges. The highest peak, Mytikas, meaning "nose", rises to 2,917 metres (9,570 ft). It is one of the highest peaks in Europe in terms of topographic prominence.

Köppen climate classification

Köppen climate classification

The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notably in 1918 and 1936. Later, German climatologist Rudolf Geiger (1894–1981) introduced some changes to the classification system, which is thus sometimes called the Köppen–Geiger climate classification.

Mediterranean climate

Mediterranean climate

A Mediterranean climate, also called a dry summer climate, described by Köppen as Cs, is a climate type that occurs in the lower mid-latitudes, characterized by warm to hot, dry summers and mild, fairly wet winters; these weather conditions are typically experienced in the majority of Mediterranean-climate regions and countries, but remain highly dependent on proximity to the ocean, altitude and geographical location.

Humid subtropical climate

Humid subtropical climate

A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents, generally between latitudes 25° and 40° and are located poleward from adjacent tropical climates. It is also known as warm temperate climate in some climate classifications.

Heat wave

Heat wave

A heat wave, or heatwave, or extreme heat, is a period of excessively hot weather, which may be accompanied by high humidity, especially in oceanic climate countries. While definitions vary, a heat wave is usually measured relative to the usual climate in the area and relative to normal temperatures for the season. Temperatures that people from a hotter climate consider normal can be called a heat wave in a cooler area if they are outside the normal climate pattern for that area.

Air pollution

Air pollution

Air pollution is the contamination of air due to the presence of substances in the atmosphere that are harmful to the health of humans and other living beings, or cause damage to the climate or to materials. It is also the contamination of indoor or outdoor surrounding either by chemical activities, physical or biological agents that alters the natural features of the atmosphere. There are many different types of air pollutants, such as gases, particulates, and biological molecules. Air pollution can cause diseases, allergies, and even death to humans; it can also cause harm to other living organisms such as animals and food crops, and may damage the natural environment or built environment. Air pollution can be caused by both human activities and natural phenomena.

Thessaloniki's urban and metropolitan areas as of 2011^[update]

According to the Kallikratis reform, as of 1 January 2011 the Thessaloniki Urban Area (Greek: Πολεοδομικό Συγκρότημα Θεσσαλονίκης) which makes up the "City of Thessaloniki", is made up of six self-governing municipalities (Greek: Δήμοι) and one municipal unit (Greek: Δημοτική ενότητα). The municipalities that are included in the Thessaloniki Urban Area are those of Thessaloniki (the city centre and largest in population size), Kalamaria, Neapoli-Sykies, Pavlos Melas, Kordelio-Evosmos, Ampelokipoi-Menemeni, and the municipal units of Pylaia and Panorama, part of the municipality of Pylaia-Chortiatis.^[3] Prior to the Kallikratis reform, the Thessaloniki Urban Area was made up of twice as many municipalities, considerably smaller in size, which created bureaucratic problems.^[179]

Thessaloniki Municipality

Mayor Konstantinos Zervas

The municipality of Thessaloniki (Greek: Δήμος Θεσαλονίκης) is the second most populous in Greece, after Athens, with a resident population of 317,778^[4] (in 2021) and an area of 19.307 square kilometres (7.454 square miles). The municipality forms the core of the Thessaloniki Urban Area, with its central district (the city centre), referred to as the Kentro, meaning 'centre' or 'downtown'.^[180]

The city's first mayor, Osman Sait Bey, was appointed when the institution of mayor was inaugurated under the Ottoman Empire in 1912. The incumbent mayor is Konstantinos Zervas. In 2011, the municipality of Thessaloniki had a budget of €464.33 million^[181] while the budget of 2012 stands at €409.00 million.^[182]

Other

The Government House, now the Ministry for Macedonia and Thrace, designed by Vitaliano Poselli in 1891

The Prefecture building (Villa Allatini)

Thessaloniki is the second largest city in Greece. It is an influential city for the northern parts of the country and is the capital of the region of Central Macedonia and the Thessaloniki regional unit. The Ministry of Macedonia and Thrace is also based in Thessaloniki, since the city is the de facto capital of the Greek region of Macedonia.

It is customary every year for the Prime Minister of Greece to announce his administration's policies on a number of issues, such as the economy, at the opening night of the Thessaloniki International Fair. In 2010, during the first months of the 2010 Greek debt crisis, the entire cabinet of Greece met in Thessaloniki to discuss the country's future.^[183]

In the Hellenic Parliament, the Thessaloniki urban area constitutes a 16-seat constituency. As of the 2019 Greek legislative election the largest party in Thessaloniki is the New Democracy with 35.55% of the vote, followed by the Coalition of the Radical Left (31.29%) and the Movement for Change (6.05%).^[184] The table below summarizes the results of the latest elections.

2019 election results for Thessaloniki A

Party	Votes	%	Shift	MPs (16)	Change
New Democracy	107,607	35.55%	10.26%	7 / 16 (44%)	3
Coalition of the Radical Left	94,697	31.29%	4.52%	5 / 16 (31%)	1
Movement for Change	18,313	6.05%	1.73	1 / 16 (6%)	0
Greek Solution	16,272	5.38%	5.38%	1 / 16 (6%)	1
Communist Party of Greece	16,028	5.30%	0.01%	1 / 16 (6%)	0
MeRA25	14,379	4.75%	4.75%	1 / 16 (6%)	1
Other parties (unrepresented)	35,364	11.68%	5.15%		0

Discover more about Government related topics

Thessaloniki metropolitan area

Thessaloniki metropolitan area

The Thessaloniki metropolitan area or larger urban zone (LUZ) is the complete area covered and directly influenced by Thessaloniki. The metropolitan area traditionally consisted of the municipality of Thessaloniki and its immediate surroundings, what is today referred to as the Thessaloniki urban area. However, since the mid to late 1990s, the areas surrounding the urban area, have succumbed to urban sprawl and what used to be agrarian communities are rapidly urbanizing and being developed into suburbs or exurbs. This is creating new problems for a region already facing issues such as pollution, traffic congestion and social ills.

Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

Kalamaria

Kalamaria

Kalamariá is among the most densely populated suburbs in Greece, located about 7 kilometres southeast of downtown Thessaloniki, with a population of 92,238.

Neapoli-Sykies

Neapoli-Sykies

Neapoli–Sykies is a municipality of the Thessaloniki Urban Area in the regional unit of Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia, Greece and part of the Thessaloniki Urban Area. The seat of the municipality is in Sykies. The municipality has an area of 12.903 km2.

Pavlos Melas (municipality)

Pavlos Melas (municipality)

Pavlos Melas is a municipality in the regional unit of Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia, Greece. It is named after a Greek revolutionary officer of the Macedonian Struggle, Pavlos Melas. It was formed during the administrative reform introduced by the Kallikratis plan and encompasses the former municipalities of Efkarpia, Polichni and Stavroupoli. The seat of Pavlos Melas is Stavroupoli.

Kordelio-Evosmos

Kordelio-Evosmos

Kordelio–Evosmos is a municipality of the Thessaloniki Urban Area in the regional unit of Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia, Greece. The seat of the municipality is in Evosmos. The municipality has an area of 13.358 km2 and a population of 105,426 people.

Ampelokipoi-Menemeni

Ampelokipoi-Menemeni

Ampelokipoi–Menemeni is a municipality of the Thessaloniki Urban Area in the regional unit of Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia, Greece. The seat of the municipality is in Ampelokipoi.

Pylaia

Pylaia

Pylaia is a former municipality in the Thessaloniki Prefecture of Greece. In the 2011 local government reform, Thessaloniki Prefecture became the regional unit of Thessaloniki, and Pylaia became a part of the new municipality of Pylaia-Chortiatis. Pylaia continues under its old boundaries as a municipal unit within Pylaia-Chortiatis.

Panorama, Thessaloniki

Panorama, Thessaloniki

Panorama is a suburb in the Thessaloniki regional unit, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Pylaia-Chortiatis, of which it is the seat and a municipal unit. Panorama has a population of 18,000 and is located at the foot of Mount Chortiatis. The municipal unit has an area of 21.321 km2.

Pylaia-Chortiatis

Pylaia-Chortiatis

Pylaia-Chortiatis is a municipality in the Thessaloniki regional unit, Central Macedonia, Greece, consisting of three suburbs of Thessaloniki. The seat of the municipality is Panorama. The municipality has an area of 155.63 km2.

Plan for central Thessaloniki by Ernest Hébrard. Much of the plan can be seen in today's city centre.

Architecture

Architecture in Thessaloniki is the direct result of the city's position at the centre of all historical developments in the Balkans. Aside from its commercial importance, Thessaloniki was also for many centuries the military and administrative hub of the region, and beyond this the transportation link between Europe and the Levant. Merchants, traders and refugees from all over Europe settled in the city. The need for commercial and public buildings in this new era of prosperity led to the construction of large edifices in the city centre. During this time, the city saw the building of banks, large hotels, theatres, warehouses, and factories. Architects who designed some of the most notable buildings of the city, in the late 19th and early 20th century, include Vitaliano Poselli, Pietro Arrigoni, Xenophon Paionidis, Salvatore Poselli, Leonardo Gennari, Eli Modiano, Moshé Jacques, Joseph Pleyber, Frederic Charnot, Ernst Ziller, Max Rubens, Filimon Paionidis, Dimitris Andronikos, Levi Ernst, Angelos Siagas, Alexandros Tzonis and more, using mainly the styles of Eclecticism, Art Nouveau and Neobaroque.

The city layout changed after 1870, when the seaside fortifications gave way to extensive piers, and many of the oldest walls of the city were demolished, including those surrounding the White Tower, which today stands as the main landmark of the city. As parts of the early Byzantine walls were demolished, this allowed the city to expand east and west along the coast.^[185]

The expansion of Eleftherias Square towards the sea completed the new commercial hub of the city and at the time was considered one of the most vibrant squares of the city. As the city grew, workers moved to the western districts, because of their proximity to factories and industrial activities; while the middle and upper classes gradually moved from the city-centre to the eastern suburbs, leaving mainly businesses. In 1917, a devastating fire swept through the city and burned uncontrollably for 32 hours.^[112] It destroyed the city's historic centre and a large part of its architectural heritage, but paved the way for modern development featuring wider diagonal avenues and monumental squares.^[112][186]

Panoramic view of Aristotelous Square, one of Thessaloniki's most recognizable areas, which was designed by Ernest Hébrard

City centre

The old Hotel Astoria on Tsimiski Street, typical beaux-arts architecture of the post-fire architecture boom

After the Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917, a team of architects and urban planners including Thomas Mawson and Ernest Hebrard, a French architect, chose the Byzantine era as the basis of their (re)building designs for Thessaloniki's city centre. The new city plan included axes, diagonal streets and monumental squares, with a street grid that would channel traffic smoothly. The plan of 1917 included provisions for future population expansions and a street and road network that would be, and still is sufficient today.^[112] It contained sites for public buildings and provided for the restoration of Byzantine churches and Ottoman mosques.

A street in Ladadika district

Also called the historic centre, it is divided into several districts, including Dimokratias Square (Democracy Sq. known also as Vardaris) Ladadika (where many entertainment venues and tavernas are located), Kapani (where the city's central Modiano market is located), Diagonios, Navarinou, Rotonda, Agia Sofia and Hippodromio, which are all located around Thessaloniki's most central point, Aristotelous Square.

Various commercial stoas around Aristotelous are named from the city's past and historic personalities of the city, like stoa Hirsch, stoa Carasso/Ermou, Pelosov, Colombou, Levi, Modiano, Morpurgo, Mordoch, Simcha, Kastoria, Malakopi, Olympios, Emboron, Rogoti, Vyzantio, Tatti, Agiou Mina, Karipi etc.^[187]

The western portion of the city centre is home to Thessaloniki's law courts, its central international railway station and the port, while its eastern side hosts the city's two universities, the Thessaloniki International Exhibition Centre, the city's main stadium, its archaeological and Byzantine museums, the new city hall and its central parks and gardens, namely those of the ΧΑΝΘ and Pedion tou Areos.

Ano Poli

Ano Poli (also called Old Town and literally the Upper Town) is the heritage listed district north of Thessaloniki's city centre that was not engulfed by the great fire of 1917 and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site by ministerial actions of Melina Merkouri, during the 1980s. It consists of Thessaloniki's most traditional part of the city, still featuring small stone paved streets, old squares and homes featuring old Greek and Ottoman architecture. It is the favourite area of Thessaloniki's poets, intellectuals and bohemians.

Panorama of the city from Ano Poli

Ano Poli is also the highest point in Thessaloniki and as such, is the location of the city's acropolis, its Byzantine fort, the Heptapyrgion, a large portion of the city's remaining walls, and with many of its additional Ottoman and Byzantine structures still standing. With the capture of Thessaloniki by the Ottomans in 1430, after a lengthy siege of the city from 1422 to 1430, the Ottomans settled in Ano Poli. This geographical choice was attributed to the higher level of Ano Poli, which was convenient to control the rest of the population remotely, and the microclimate of the area, which favoured better living conditions in terms of hygiene compared to the areas of the centre.

Today, the area provides access to the Seich Sou Forest National Park^[188] and features panoramic views of the whole city and the Thermaic Gulf. On clear days Mount Olympus, at about 100 km (62 mi) away across the gulf, can also be seen towering the horizon.

Other districts of Thessaloniki Municipality

Xirokrini neighbourhood

In the Municipality of Thessaloniki, in addition to the historic centre and the Upper Town, are included the following districts: Xirokrini, Dikastiria (Courts), Ichthioskala, Palaios Stathmos, Lachanokipoi, Behtsinari, Panagia Faneromeni, Doxa, Saranta Ekklisies, Evangelistria, Triandria, Agia Triada-Faliro, Ippokrateio, Charilaou, Analipsi, Depot and Toumba.

In the area of the Old Railway Station (Palaios Stathmos) began the construction of the Holocaust Museum of Greece.^[189][190] In this area are located the Railway Museum of Thessaloniki, the Water Supply Museum and large entertainment venues of the city, such as Milos, Fix, Vilka (which are housed in converted old factories). The New Thessaloniki Railway Station is located on Monastiriou street.

Other extended and densely built-up residential areas are Charilaou and Toumba, which is divided into "Ano Toumpa" and "Kato Toumpa". Toumba was named after the homonymous hill of Toumba, where extensive archaeological research takes place. It was created by refugees after the 1922 Asia Minor disaster and the population exchange (1923–24). On Exochon avenue (Rue des Campagnes, today Vasilissis Olgas and Vasileos Georgiou Avenues), was up until the 1920s home to the city's most affluent residents and formed the outermost suburbs of the city at the time, with the area close to the Thermaic Gulf, from the 19th-century holiday villas which defined the area.^[191][192]

Thessaloniki urban area

The cultural centre (including MOMus–Museum of Modern Art–Costakis Collection and two theatres of the National Theatre of Northern Greece), former Catholic Lazarist Monastery (Moni Lazariston)

Other districts of the wider urban area of Thessaloniki are Ampelokipi, Eleftherio - Kordelio, Menemeni, Evosmos, Ilioupoli, Stavroupoli, Nikopoli, Neapoli, Polichni, Paeglos, Meteora, Agios Pavlos, Kalamaria, Pylaia and the Sykies. Northwestern Thessaloniki is home to Moni Lazariston, located in Stavroupoli, which today forms one of the most important cultural centres for the city, including MOMus–Museum of Modern Art–Costakis Collection and two theatres of the National Theatre of Northern Greece.^[193][194]

In northwestern Thessaloniki many cultural premises exist, such as the open-air Theater Manos Katrakis in Sykies, the Museum of Refugee Hellenism in Neapolis, the municipal theatre and the open-air theatre in Neapoli and the New Cultural Centre of Menemeni (Ellis Alexiou Street).^[195] The Stavroupolis Botanical Garden on Perikleous Street includes 1,000 species of plants and is a 5-acre (2.0 ha) oasis of greenery. The Environmental Education Centre in Kordelio was designed in 1997 and is one of a few public buildings of bioclimatic design in Thessaloniki.^[196]

Northwest Thessaloniki forms the main entry point into the city of Thessaloniki with the avenues of Monastiriou, Lagkada and 26is Octovriou passing through it, as well as the extension of the A1 motorway, feeding into Thessaloniki's city centre. The area is home to the Macedonia InterCity Bus Terminal (KTEL), the New Thessaloniki Railway Station, the Zeitenlik Allied memorial military cemetery.

Monuments have also been erected in honour of the fighters of the Greek Resistance, as in these areas the Resistance was very active: the monument of Greek National Resistance in Sykies, the monument of Greek National Resistance in Stavroupolis, the Statue of the struggling Mother in Eptalofos Square and the monument of the young Greeks who were executed by the Nazis on 11 May 1944 in Xirokrini. In Eptalofos, on 15 May 1941, one month after the occupation of the country, the first resistance organization in Greece, "Eleftheria", was founded, with its newspaper and the first illegal printing house in the city of Thessaloniki.^[197][198]

Villa Mordoch (arch. Xenophon Paionidis) on Vasilissis Olgas Avenue

Today southeastern Thessaloniki has in some way become an extension of the city centre, with the avenues of Megalou Alexandrou, Georgiou Papandreou (Antheon), Vasileos Georgiou, Vasilissis Olgas, Delfon, Konstantinou Karamanli (Nea Egnatia) and Papanastasiou passing through it, enclosing an area traditionally called Ντεπώ (Depó, lit. Dépôt), from the name of the old tram station, owned by a French company.

The municipality of Kalamaria is also located in southeastern Thessaloniki and was firstly, inhabited mainly by Greek refugees from Asia Minor and East Thrace after 1922.^[199] There are built the Northern Greece Naval Command and the old royal palace (called Palataki), located on the most westerly point of Mikro Emvolo cape.

Hagia Sophia, Thessaloniki

Paleochristian and Byzantine monuments (UNESCO)

The church of Saint Demetrius, patron saint of the city, built in the fourth century, is the largest basilica in Greece and one of the city's most prominent Paleochristian monuments.

Panagia Chalkeon church in Thessaloniki (1028 AD), one of the 15 UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the city

The Byzantine Bath of the Upper Town

Because of Thessaloniki's importance during the early Christian and Byzantine periods, the city is host to several paleochristian monuments that have significantly contributed to the development of Byzantine art and architecture throughout the Byzantine Empire as well as Serbia.^[161] The evolution of Imperial Byzantine architecture and the prosperity of Thessaloniki go hand in hand, especially during the first years of the Empire,^[161] when the city continued to flourish. It was at that time that the Complex of Roman emperor Galerius was built, as well as the first church of Hagios Demetrios.^[161]

By the eighth century, the city had become an important administrative centre of the Byzantine Empire, and handled much of the Empire's Balkan affairs.^[200] During that time, the city saw the creation of more notable Christian churches that are now part of Thessaloniki's UNESCO World Heritage Site, such as the Church of Saint Catherine, the Hagia Sophia of Thessaloniki, the Church of the Acheiropoietos, the Church of Panagia Chalkeon.^[161] When the Ottoman Empire took control of Thessaloniki in 1430, most of the city's churches were converted into mosques,^[161] but have survived to this day. Travellers such as Paul Lucas and Abdulmejid I^[161] document the city's wealth in Christian monuments during the years of Ottoman control of the city.

The church of Hagios Demetrios burned down during the Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917, as did many other city monuments, but it was rebuilt. During World War II, the city was extensively bombed and as such many of Thessaloniki's paleochristian and Byzantine monuments were heavily damaged.^[200] Some of the sites were not restored until the 1980s. Thessaloniki has more monuments listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site than any other city in Greece, a total of 15 monuments.^[161] They have been listed since 1988.^[161]

Urban sculpture

The equestrian statue of Alexander the Great on the promenade

There are around 150 statues or busts in the city.^[201] Probably the most famous one is the equestrian statue of Alexander the Great on the promenade, placed in 1973 and created by sculptor Evangelos Moustakas. An equestrian statue of Constantine I, by sculptor Georgios Dimitriades, is located in Demokratias Square. Other notable statues include that of Eleftherios Venizelos by sculptor Giannis Pappas, Pavlos Melas by Natalia Mela, the statue of Emmanouel Pappas by Memos Makris, Chrysostomos of Smyrna by Athanasios Apartis, such as various creations by George Zongolopoulos.

Thessaloniki 2012 Programme

Aerial view of the newest section of the promenade (Nea Paralia), which was opened to the public in January 2014

With the 100th anniversary of the 1912 incorporation of Thessaloniki into Greece, the government announced a large-scale redevelopment programme for the city of Thessaloniki, which aims in addressing the current environmental and spatial problems^[202] that the city faces. More specifically, the programme will drastically change the physiognomy of the city^[202] by relocating the Thessaloniki International Exhibition Centre and grounds of the Thessaloniki International Fair outside the city centre and turning the current location into a large metropolitan park,^[203] redeveloping the coastal front of the city,^[203] relocating the city's numerous military camps and using the grounds and facilities to create large parklands and cultural centres;^[203] and the complete redevelopment of the harbour and the Lachanokipoi and Dendropotamos districts (behind and near the Port of Thessaloniki) into a commercial business district,^[203] with possible highrise developments.^[204]

The plan also envisions the creation of new wide avenues in the outskirts of the city^[203] and the creation of pedestrian-only zones in the city centre.^[203] Furthermore, the program includes plans to expand the jurisdiction of Seich Sou Forest National Park^[202] and the improvement of accessibility to and from the Old Town.^[202] The ministry has said that the project will take an estimated 15 years to be completed, in 2025.^[203]

Part of the plan has been implemented with extensive pedestrianisations within the city centre by the municipality of Thessaloniki and the revitalisation the eastern urban waterfront/promenade, Νέα Παραλία (Néa Paralía, lit. new promenade), with a modern and vibrant design. Its first section opened in 2008, having been awarded as the best public project in Greece of the last five years by the Hellenic Institute of Architecture.^[205]

The municipality of Thessaloniki's budget for the reconstruction of important areas of the city and the completion of the waterfront, opened in January 2014, was estimated at €28.2 million (US$39.9 million) for the year 2011 alone.^[206]

Discover more about Cityscape related topics

Ernest Hébrard

Ernest Hébrard

Ernest Hébrard (1875–1933) was a French architect, archaeologist and urban planner, best known for his urban plan for the center of Thessaloniki, Greece, after the great fire of 1917.

Pietro Arrigoni

Pietro Arrigoni

Pietro Arrigoni was an Italian architect from Milan, mostly known for his work in the city of Thessaloniki in northern Greece.

Ernst Ziller

Ernst Ziller

Ernst Moritz Theodor Ziller was a German-born university teacher and architect who later became a Greek national. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, he was a major designer of royal and municipal buildings in Athens, Patras, and other Greek cities.

Eclecticism

Eclecticism

Eclecticism is a conceptual approach that does not hold rigidly to a single paradigm or set of assumptions, but instead draws upon multiple theories, styles, or ideas to gain complementary insights into a subject, or applies different theories in particular cases. However, this is often without conventions or rules dictating how or which theories were combined.

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: Jugendstil in German, Stile Liberty in Italian, Modernisme in Catalan, and also known as the Modern Style in English. It was popular between 1890 and 1910 during the Belle Époque period, and was a reaction against the academic art, eclecticism and historicism of 19th century architecture and decoration. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and flowers. Other characteristics of Art Nouveau were a sense of dynamism and movement, often given by asymmetry or whiplash lines, and the use of modern materials, particularly iron, glass, ceramics and later concrete, to create unusual forms and larger open spaces.

Baroque Revival architecture

Baroque Revival architecture

The Baroque Revival, also known as Neo-Baroque, was an architectural style of the late 19th century. The term is used to describe architecture and architectural sculptures which display important aspects of Baroque style, but are not of the original Baroque period. Elements of the Baroque architectural tradition were an essential part of the curriculum of the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the pre-eminent school of architecture in the second half of the 19th century, and are integral to the Beaux-Arts architecture it engendered both in France and abroad. An ebullient sense of European imperialism encouraged an official architecture to reflect it in Britain and France, and in Germany and Italy the Baroque Revival expressed pride in the new power of the unified state.

Eleftherias Square

Eleftherias Square

Eleftherias Square is a central square in downtown Thessaloniki, Greece. It takes its name from the Young Turk Revolution, which began in the square in 1908. The square is currently a car park, but a public competition was launched by the Municipality of Thessaloniki in 2013 to select a design for its redevelopment into a park. Construction was initially expected to start in 2018 at a cost of €5.1 million.

Social class

Social class

A social class is a grouping of people into a set of hierarchical social categories, the most common being the upper, middle and lower classes. Membership in a social class can for example be dependent on education, wealth, occupation, income, and belonging to a particular subculture or social network.

Aristotelous Square

Aristotelous Square

Aristotelous Square is the main city square of Thessaloniki, Greece and is located on Nikis avenue, in the city center. It was designed by French architect Ernest Hébrard in 1918, but most of the square was built in the 1950s. Many buildings surrounding the central square have since been renovated and its northern parts were largely restored in the 2000s.

Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917

Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917

The Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917 destroyed two thirds of the city of Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece, leaving more than 70,000 homeless. The fire burned for 32 hours and destroyed 9,500 houses within an extent of 1 square kilometer. Half the Jewish population emigrated from the city as their livelihoods were gone. Rather than quickly rebuilding, the government commissioned the French architect Ernest Hébrard to design a new urban plan for the burned areas and for the future expansion of the city. His designs are still evident in the city, most notably Aristotelous Square, although some of his most grandiose plans were never completed due to a lack of funds.

Tsimiski Street

Tsimiski Street

Tsimiski Street is a major avenue in Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece. It starts from the area of the Thessaloniki International Fair grounds, between Aggelaki Street and Nikolaou Germanou Street and ends in the crossroad with Ionos Dragoumi Street, on the western side of the city centre. Tsimiski Street was named after the Byzantine Emperor, Ioannis Tzimiskis and is nowadays one of the busiest streets in Thessaloniki's city center and the country. The busiest point of Tsimiski Street is its crossroad with Aristotelous Square which is a major meeting-point for Thessalonians, also forming a cultural axis with Aristotelous Square.

Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire remained the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe. The terms "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" were coined after the end of the realm; its citizens continued to refer to their empire as the Roman Empire, and to themselves as Romans—a term which Greeks continued to use for themselves into Ottoman times. Although the Roman state continued and its traditions were maintained, modern historians prefer to differentiate the Byzantine Empire from Ancient Rome as it was centred on Constantinople instead of Rome, oriented towards Greek rather than Latin culture, and characterised by Eastern Orthodox Christianity.

The old building of Banque de Salonique, now Stoa Malakopi

A building of the Bank of Greece

Thessaloniki rose to economic prominence as a major economic hub in the Balkans during the years of the Roman Empire. The Pax Romana and the city's strategic position allowed for the facilitation of trade between Rome and Byzantium (later Constantinople and now Istanbul) through Thessaloniki by means of the Via Egnatia.^[210] The Via Egnatia also functioned as an important line of communication between the Roman Empire and the nations of Asia,^[210] particularly in relation to the Silk Road. With the partition of the Roman Emp. into East (Byzantine) and West, Thessaloniki became the second-largest city of the Eastern Roman Empire after New Rome (Constantinople) in terms of economic might.^[52][210] Under the Empire, Thessaloniki was the largest port in the Balkans.^[211] As the city passed from Byzantium to the Republic of Venice in 1423, it was subsequently conquered by the Ottoman Empire. Under Ottoman rule the city retained its position as the most important trading hub in the Balkans.^[97] Manufacturing, shipping and trade were the most important components of the city's economy during the Ottoman period,^[97] and the majority of the city's trade at the time was controlled by ethnic Greeks.^[97] Plus, the Jewish community was also an important factor in the trade sector.

Historically important industries for the economy of Thessaloniki included tobacco (in 1946 35% of all tobacco companies in Greece were headquartered in the city, and 44% in 1979)^[212] and banking (in Ottoman years Thessaloniki was a major centre for investment from western Europe, with the Banque de Salonique having a capital of 20 million French francs in 1909).^[97]

Services

View of the port

The service sector accounts for nearly two-thirds of the total labour force of Thessaloniki.^[213] Of those working in services, 20% were employed in trade; 13% in education and healthcare; 7.1% in real estate; 6.3% in transport, communications and storage; 6.1% in the finance industry and service-providing organizations; 5.7% in public administration and insurance services; and 5.4% in hotels and restaurants.^[213]

The city's port, the Port of Thessaloniki, is one of the largest ports in the Aegean and as a free port, it functions as a major gateway to the Balkan hinterland.^[11][214] In 2010, more than 15.8 million tons of products went through the city's port,^[215] making it the second-largest port in Greece after Aghioi Theodoroi, surpassing Piraeus. At 273,282 TEUs, it is also Greece's second-largest container port after Piraeus.^[216] As a result, the city is a major transportation hub for the whole of south-eastern Europe,^[217] carrying, among other things, trade to and from the neighbouring countries.

In recent years Thessaloniki has begun to turn into a major port for cruising in the eastern Mediterranean.^[214] The Greek ministry of tourism considers Thessaloniki to be Greece's second most important commercial port,^[218] and companies such as Royal Caribbean International have expressed interest in adding the Port of Thessaloniki to their destinations.^[218] A total of 30 cruise ships are expected to arrive at Thessaloniki in 2011.^[218]

The GDP of Thessaloniki in comparison to that of Attica and the rest of the country (2012)

Companies

• Recent history

After WWII and the Greek Civil War, heavy industrialization of the city's suburbs began in the mid-1950s.^[219]

During the 1980s, a spate of factory shutdowns occurred, mostly of automobile manufacturers, such as Agricola, AutoDiana, EBIAM, Motoemil, Pantelemidis-TITAN and C.AR. Since the 1990s, companies took advantage of cheaper labour markets and more lax regulations in other countries, and among the largest companies to shut down factories were Goodyear,^[220] AVEZ pasta industry (one of the first industrial factories in northern Greece, built in 1926),^[221] Philkeram Johnson, AGNO dairy and VIAMIL.

However, Thessaloniki still remains a major business hub in the Balkans and Greece, with a number of important Greek companies headquartered in the city, such as the Hellenic Vehicle Industry (ELVO), Namco, Astra Airlines, Ellinair, Pyramis and MLS Multimedia, which introduced the first Greek-built smartphone in 2012.^[222]

• Industry

In early 1960s, with the collaboration of Standard Oil and ESSO-Pappas, a large industrial zone was created, containing refineries, oil refinery and steel production (owned by Hellenic Steel Co.). The zone attracted also a series of different factories during the next decades.

Titan Cement has also facilities outside the city, on the road to Serres,^[223] such as the AGET Heracles, a member of the Lafarge group, and Alumil SA.

Multinational companies such as Air Liquide, Cyanamid, Nestlé, Pfizer, Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company and Vivartia have also industrial facilities in the suburbs of the city.^[224]

• Foodstuff

Foodstuff or drink companies headquartered in the city include the Macedonian Milk Industry (Mevgal), Allatini, Barbastathis, Hellenic Sugar Industry, Haitoglou Bros, Mythos Brewery, Malamatina, while the Goody's chain started from the city.

The American Farm School also has important contribution in food production.^[225]

Macroeconomic indicators

In 2011, the regional unit of Thessaloniki had a Gross Domestic Product of €18.293 billion (ranked second amongst the country's regional units),^[207] comparable to Bahrain or Cyprus, and a per capita of €15,900 (ranked 16th).^[207] In Purchasing Power Parity, the same indicators are €19,851 billion (2nd)^[207] and €17,200 (15th) respectively.^[207] In terms of comparison with the European Union average, Thessaloniki's GDP per capita indicator stands at 63% the EU average^[207] and 69% in PPP^[207] – this is comparable to the German state of Brandenburg.^[207] Overall, Thessaloniki accounts for 8.9% of the total economy of Greece.^[207] Between 1995 and 2008 Thessaloniki's GDP saw an average growth rate of 4.1% per annum (ranging from +14.5% in 1996 to −11.1% in 2005) while in 2011 the economy contracted by −7.8%.^[207]

Discover more about Economy related topics

Economy of Greece

Economy of Greece

The economy of Greece is the 53rd largest in the world, with a nominal gross domestic product (GDP) of $222.008 billion per annum. In terms of purchasing power parity, Greece is the world's 54th largest economy, at $387.801 billion per annum. As of 2021, Greece is the sixteenth-largest economy in the European Union. According to the International Monetary Fund's figures for 2022, Greece's GDP per capita is $20,876 at nominal value and $36,466 at purchasing power parity.

Banque de Salonique

Banque de Salonique

The Banque de Salonique was a regional bank headquartered in Thessaloniki and Istanbul. Created in 1886 under the initial leadership of the Salonica Jewish Allatini family with Austrian, Hungarian and French banking partners, it contributed to the development of the Eastern Mediterranean and Southern Balkans during the late Ottoman Empire. In the Interwar period its activity was mainly focused on Northern Greece, where it operated until the German occupation, and Turkey, where it kept operating until 2001, albeit under different names after 1969. Its preserved headquarters buildings are landmarks, respectively, of Valaoritou Street, a significant thoroughfare of downtown Thessaloniki, and of Bankalar Caddesi in the Karaköy neighborhood of Istanbul.

Bank of Greece

Bank of Greece

The Bank of Greece is the central bank of Greece. Its headquarters is located in Athens on Panepistimiou Street, but it also has several branches across the country. It was founded in 1927 and its operations started officially in 1928. The building that currently houses its headquarters was completed ten years later in 1938. Until January 2001 the bank was responsible for the former national Greek currency, the drachma. Use of physical drachma notes and coins continued until 31 December 2001, as denominations of the euro.)

Balkans

Balkans

The Balkans, also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the whole of Bulgaria. The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by the Adriatic Sea in the northwest, the Ionian Sea in the southwest, the Aegean Sea in the south, the Turkish straits in the east, and the Black Sea in the northeast. The northern border of the peninsula is variously defined. The highest point of the Balkans is Musala, 2,925 metres (9,596 ft), in the Rila mountain range, Bulgaria.

Pax Romana

Pax Romana

The Pax Romana is a roughly 200-year-long timespan of Roman history which is identified as a period and as a golden age of increased as well as sustained Roman imperialism, relative peace and order, prosperous stability, hegemonial power, and regional expansion, despite several revolts and wars, and continuing competition with Parthia. It is traditionally dated as commencing from the accession of Augustus, founder of the Roman principate, in 27 BC and concluding in 180 AD with the death of Marcus Aurelius, the last of the "Five Good Emperors". Since it was inaugurated by Augustus at the end of the final war of the Roman Republic, it is sometimes also called the Pax Augusta. During this period of about two centuries, the Roman Empire achieved its greatest territorial extent and its population reached a maximum of up to 70 million people. According to Cassius Dio, the dictatorial reign of Commodus, later followed by the Year of the Five Emperors and the Crisis of the Third Century, marked the descent "from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust".

Byzantium

Byzantium

Byzantium or Byzantion was an ancient Greek city in classical antiquity that became known as Constantinople in late antiquity and Istanbul today. The Greek name Byzantion and its Latinization Byzantium continued to be used as a name of Constantinople sporadically and to varying degrees during the thousand year existence of the Byzantine Empire. Byzantium was colonized by Greeks from Megara in the 7th century BC and remained primarily Greek-speaking until its conquest by the Ottoman Empire in AD 1453.

Constantinople

Constantinople

Constantinople became the de facto capital of the Roman Empire upon its founding in 330, and became the de jure capital in AD 476 after the fall of Ravenna and the Western Roman Empire. It remained the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, the Latin Empire (1204–1261), and the Ottoman Empire (1453–1922). Following the Turkish War of Independence, the Turkish capital then moved to Ankara. Officially renamed Istanbul in 1930, the city is today the largest city and financial centre of the Republic of Turkey (1923–present). It is also the largest city in Europe.

Istanbul

Istanbul

Istanbul, formerly known as Constantinople, is the largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, cultural and historic hub. The city straddles the Bosporus strait, lying in both Europe and Asia, and has a population of over 15 million residents, comprising 19% of the population of Turkey. Istanbul is the most populous European city, and the world's 15th-largest city.

Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire remained the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe. The terms "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" were coined after the end of the realm; its citizens continued to refer to their empire as the Roman Empire, and to themselves as Romans—a term which Greeks continued to use for themselves into Ottoman times. Although the Roman state continued and its traditions were maintained, modern historians prefer to differentiate the Byzantine Empire from Ancient Rome as it was centred on Constantinople instead of Rome, oriented towards Greek rather than Latin culture, and characterised by Eastern Orthodox Christianity.

Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire, historically and colloquially the Turkish Empire, was an empire that controlled much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, and Northern Africa between the 14th and early 20th centuries. It was founded at the end of the 13th century in northwestern Anatolia in the town of Söğüt by the Turkoman tribal leader Osman I. After 1354, the Ottomans crossed into Europe and, with the conquest of the Balkans, the Ottoman beylik was transformed into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed the Conqueror.

Greeks

Greeks

The Greeks or Hellenes are an ethnic group and nation native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Albania, Anatolia, parts of Italy and Egypt, and to a lesser extent, other countries surrounding the Eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea. They also form a significant diaspora, with many Greek communities established around the world.

Bank

Bank

A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets.

Historical ethnic statistics

The tables below show the ethnic statistics of Thessaloniki during the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century.

Population growth

The municipality of Thessaloniki is the most populous in the Thessaloniki Urban Area. Its population has increased in the latest census and the metropolitan area's population rose to over one million. The city forms the base of the Thessaloniki metropolitan area, with latest census in 2021 giving it a population of 1,091,424.^[226]

Population of the Municipality and Metropolitan areas of Thessaloniki

Year	Municipality	Metropolitan area	rank
2001	363,987[229]	954,027[229]	2nd
2011	325,182[226]	1,030,338[226]
2021	317,778[4]	1,091,424	2nd

Jews of Thessaloniki

Paths of Jewish immigration to the city

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The Jewish population in Greece is the oldest in mainland Europe (see Romaniotes). When Paul the Apostle came to Thessaloniki, he taught in the area of what today is called Upper City. Later, during the Ottoman period, with the coming of Sephardic Jews from Spain, the community of Thessaloniki became mostly Sephardic. Thessaloniki became the largest centre in Europe of the Sephardic Jews, who nicknamed the city la madre de Israel (Israel's mother)^[149] and "Jerusalem of the Balkans".^[231] It also included the historically significant and ancient Greek-speaking Romaniote community. During the Ottoman era, Thessaloniki's Sephardic community was half of the population according to the Ottoman Census of 1902 and almost 40% the city's population of 157,000 about 1913; Jewish merchants were prominent in commerce until the ethnic Greek population increased after Thessaloniki was incorporated into the Kingdom of Greece in 1913. By the 1680s, about 300 families of Sephardic Jews, followers of Sabbatai Zevi, had converted to Islam, becoming a sect known as the Dönmeh (convert), and migrated to Salonika, whose population was majority Jewish. They established an active community that thrived for about 250 years. Many of their descendants later became prominent in trade.^[232] Many Jewish inhabitants of Thessaloniki spoke Judeo-Spanish, the Romance language of the Sephardic Jews.^[233]

Jewish family of Salonika in 1917

From the second half of the 19th century with the Ottoman reforms, the Jewish community had a new revival. Many French and especially Italian Jews (from Livorno and other cities), influential in introducing new methods of education and developing new schools and intellectual environment for the Jewish population, were established in Thessaloniki. Such modernists introduced also new techniques and ideas from the industrialised Western Europe and from the 1880s the city began to industrialize. The Italian Jews Allatini brothers led Jewish entrepreneurship, establishing milling and other food industries, brickmaking and processing plants for tobacco. Several traders supported the introduction of a large textile-production industry, superseding the weaving of cloth in a system of artisanal production. Notable names of the era include among others the Italo-Jewish Modiano family and the Allatini. Benrubis founded also in 1880 one of the first retail companies in the Balkans.

After the Balkan Wars, Thessaloniki was incorporated into the Kingdom of Greece in 1913. At first the community feared that the annexation would lead to difficulties and during the first years its political stance was, in general, anti-Venizelist and pro-royalist/conservative. The Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917 during World War I burned much of the centre of the city and left 50,000 Jews homeless of the total of 72,000 residents who were burned out.^[140] Having lost homes and their businesses, many Jews emigrated: to the United States, Palestine, and Paris. They could not wait for the government to create a new urban plan for rebuilding, which was eventually done.^[234]

After the Greco-Turkish War in 1922 and the bilateral population exchange between Greece and Turkey, many refugees came to Greece. Nearly 100,000 ethnic Greeks resettled in Thessaloniki, reducing the proportion of Jews in the total community. After this, Jews made up about 20% of the city's population. During the interwar period, Greece granted Jewish citizens the same civil rights as other Greek citizens.^[140] In March 1926, Greece re-emphasized that all citizens of Greece enjoyed equal rights, and a considerable proportion of the city's Jews decided to stay. During the Metaxas regime, the stance towards Jews became even better.

"Jews not welcomed" sign during the Axis occupation

Monastir Synagogue

World War II brought a disaster for the Jewish Greeks, since in 1941 the Germans occupied Greece and began actions against the Jewish population. Greeks of the Resistance helped save some of the Jewish residents.^[149] By the 1940s, the great majority of the Jewish Greek community firmly identified as both Greek and Jewish. According to Misha Glenny, such Greek Jews had largely not encountered "anti-Semitism as in its North European form."^[235]

In 1943, the Nazis began brutal actions against the historic Jewish population in Thessaloniki, forcing them into a ghetto near the railroad lines and beginning deportation to concentration and labor camps. They deported and exterminated approximately 96% of Thessaloniki's Jews of all ages during the Holocaust.^[236] The Thessaloniki Holocaust memorial in Eleftherias ("Freedom") Square was built in 1997 in memory of all the Jewish people from Thessaloniki murdered in the Holocaust. The site was chosen because it was the place where Jewish residents were rounded up before embarking to trains for concentration camps.^[237][238] Today, a community of around 1200 remains in the city.^[149] Communities of descendants of Thessaloniki Jews – both Sephardic and Romaniote – live in other areas, mainly the United States and Israel.^[236] Israeli singer Yehuda Poliker recorded a song about the Jewish people of Thessaloniki, called "Wait for me, Thessaloniki".

Others

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Since the late 19th century, many merchants from Western Europe (mainly from France and Italy) were established in the city. They had an important role in the social and economic life of the city and introduced new industrial techniques. Their main district was what is known today as the "Frankish district" (near Ladadika), where the Catholic church designed by Vitaliano Poselli is also situated.^[240][241] A part of them left after the incorporation of the city into the Greek kingdom, while others, who were of Jewish faith, were exterminated by the Nazis.

The Albanian community of the city has always been great and important. Albanians belong to two religions and they are Muslims and Christians. This has been the reason that they have never been numbered as a separate community, but sometimes they were numbered as Muslims and sometimes as Christians, then sometimes as Turkish and sometimes as Greek. It is thought that until 1922 the Albanian community was the largest in the city, after the Jewish community. The old Albanian cemeteries of the city are located in what is now called Triandria (they were destroyed in 1983).

The Bulgarian community of the city increased during the late 19th century.^[242] The community had a Men's High School, a Girl's High School, a trade union and a gymnastics society. A large part of them were Catholics, as a result of actions by the Lazarists society, which had its base in the city.

Another group is the Armenian community which dates back to the Byzantine and Ottoman periods. During the 20th century, after the Armenian genocide and the defeat of the Greek army in the Greco-Turkish War (1919–22), many fled to Greece including Thessaloniki. There is also an Armenian cemetery and an Armenian church at the centre of the city.^[243]

Discover more about Demographics related topics

Greece

Greece

Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkan Peninsula, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to the northeast. The Aegean Sea lies to the east of the mainland, the Ionian Sea to the west, and the Sea of Crete and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. Greece has the longest coastline on the Mediterranean Basin, featuring thousands of islands. The country consists of nine traditional geographic regions, and has a population of approximately 10.4 million. Athens is the nation's capital and largest city, followed by Thessaloniki and Patras.

History of the Jews in Thessaloniki

History of the Jews in Thessaloniki

The history of the Jews of Thessaloniki reaches back two thousand years. The city of Thessaloniki housed a major Jewish community, mostly Eastern Sephardim, until the middle of the Second World War. Sephardic Jews immigrated to the city following the expulsion of Jews from Spain by Catholic rulers under the Alhambra Decree of 1492. It is the only known example of a city of this size in the Jewish diaspora that retained a Jewish majority for centuries. This community influenced the Sephardic world both culturally and economically, and the city was nicknamed la madre de Israel.

Paul the Apostle

Paul the Apostle

Paul, commonly known as Paul the Apostle and Saint Paul, was a Christian apostle who spread the teachings of Jesus in the first-century world. Generally regarded as one of the most important figures of the Apostolic Age, he founded several Christian communities in Asia Minor and Europe from the mid-40s to the mid-50s AD.

Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire, historically and colloquially the Turkish Empire, was an empire that controlled much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, and Northern Africa between the 14th and early 20th centuries. It was founded at the end of the 13th century in northwestern Anatolia in the town of Söğüt by the Turkoman tribal leader Osman I. After 1354, the Ottomans crossed into Europe and, with the conquest of the Balkans, the Ottoman beylik was transformed into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed the Conqueror.

Islam

Islam

Islam is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion centered around the Quran and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam, called Muslims, number approximately 1.9 billion globally and are the world's second-largest religious population after Christians.

Dönmeh

Dönmeh

The Dönme were a group of Sabbatean crypto-Jews in the Ottoman Empire who converted outwardly to Islam, but retained their Jewish faith and Kabbalistic beliefs in secret. The movement was centered mainly in Thessaloniki. It originated during and soon after the era of Sabbatai Zevi, a 17th-century Sephardic Jewish Rabbi and Kabbalist who claimed to be the Jewish Messiah and eventually feigned conversion to Islam under threat of death from the Sultan Mehmed IV. After Zevi's forced conversion to Islam, a number of Sabbatean Jews purportedly converted to Islam and became the Dönme. Some Sabbateans lived on into 21st-century Turkey as descendants of the Dönme.

Judaeo-Spanish

Judaeo-Spanish

Judaeo-Spanish or Judeo-Spanish, also known as Ladino, is a Romance language derived from Old Spanish. Originally spoken in Spain, and then after the Edict of Expulsion spreading through the Ottoman Empire as well as France, Italy, the Netherlands, Morocco, and England, it is today spoken mainly by Sephardic minorities in more than 30 countries, with most speakers residing in Israel. Although it has no official status in any country, it has been acknowledged as a minority language in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Israel, France, and Turkey. In 2017, it was formally recognised by the Royal Spanish Academy.

Italian Jews

Italian Jews

Italian Jews or Roman Jews can be used in a broad sense to mean all Jews living in or with roots in Italy, or, in a narrower sense, to mean the Italkim, an ancient community living in Italy since the Ancient Roman era, who use the Italian liturgy as distinct from those Jewish communities in Italy dating from medieval or modern times who use the Sephardic liturgy or the Nusach Ashkenaz.

Livorno

Livorno

Livorno is a port city on the Ligurian Sea on the western coast of Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Livorno, having a population of 158,493 residents in December 2017. It is traditionally known in English as Leghorn.

Mill (grinding)

Mill (grinding)

A mill is a device, often a structure, machine or kitchen appliance, that breaks solid materials into smaller pieces by grinding, crushing, or cutting. Such comminution is an important unit operation in many processes. There are many different types of mills and many types of materials processed in them. Historically mills were powered by hand or by animals, working animal, wind (windmill) or water (watermill). In modern era, they are usually powered by electricity.

Brick

Brick

A brick is a type of construction material used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term brick denotes a unit primarily composed of clay, but is now also used informally to denote units made of other materials or other chemically cured construction blocks. Bricks can be joined using mortar, adhesives or by interlocking. Bricks are usually produced at brickworks in numerous classes, types, materials, and sizes which vary with region, and are produced in bulk quantities.

Allatini (company)

Allatini (company)

Allatini is the name of a historic flour milling company, founded in 1858 by Moses Allatini and his brother, in Thessaloniki, Greece.

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Leisure and entertainment

The building of the Society of Macedonian studies, seat of the National Theatre of Northern Greece

Thessaloniki is regarded not only as the cultural and entertainment capital of northern Greece^[200][244] but also the cultural capital of the country as a whole.^[12] The city's main theaters, run by the National Theatre of Northern Greece (Greek: Κρατικό Θέατρο Βορείου Ελλάδος) which was established in 1961,^[245] include the Theater of the Society of Macedonian Studies, where the National Theater is based, the Royal Theater (Βασιλικό Θέατρο)-the first base of the National Theater-, Moni Lazariston, and the Earth Theater and Forest Theater, both amphitheatrical open-air theatres overlooking the city.^[245]

Thessaloniki Concert Hall

The title of the European Capital of Culture in 1997 saw the birth of the city's first opera^[246] and today forms an independent section of the National Theatre of Northern Greece.^[247] The opera is based at the Thessaloniki Concert Hall, one of the largest concert halls in Greece. Recently a second building was also constructed and designed by Japanese architect Arata Isozaki. Thessaloniki is also the seat of two symphony orchestras, the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra and the Symphony Orchestra of the Municipality of Thessaloniki. Olympion Theater, the site of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival and the Plateia Assos Odeon multiplex are the two major cinemas in downtown Thessaloniki. The city also has a number of multiplex cinemas in major shopping malls in the suburbs, most notably in Mediterranean Cosmos, the largest retail and entertainment development in the Balkans.

Thessaloniki is renowned for its major shopping streets and lively laneways. Tsimiski Street, Mitropoleos and Proxenou Koromila avenue are the city's most famous shopping streets and are among Greece's most expensive and exclusive high streets. The city is also home to one of Greece's most famous and prestigious hotels, Makedonia Palace hotel, the Hyatt Regency Casino and hotel (the biggest casino in Greece and one of the biggest in Europe) and Waterland, the largest water park in southeastern Europe.

The city has long been known in Greece for its vibrant city culture, including having the most cafes and bars per capita of any city in Europe; and as having some of the best nightlife and entertainment in the country, thanks to its large young population and multicultural feel. Lonely Planet listed Thessaloniki among the world's "ultimate party cities".^[248]

Parks and recreation

Marina of Aretsou

Part of the coastline of the southeastern suburb of Peraia on the Thermaic Gulf, with views towards Thessaloniki

Although Thessaloniki is not renowned for its parks and greenery throughout its urban area, where green spaces are few, it has several large open spaces around its waterfront, namely the central city gardens of Palios Zoologikos Kipos (which is recently being redeveloped to also include rock climbing facilities, a new skatepark and paintball range),^[249] the park of Pedion tou Areos, which also holds the city's annual floral expo; and the parks of the Nea Paralia (waterfront) that span for 3 km (2 mi) along the coast, from the White Tower to the concert hall.

The Nea Paralia parks are used throughout the year for a variety of events, while they open up to the Thessaloniki waterfront, which is lined up with several cafés and bars; and during summer is full of Thessalonians enjoying their long evening walks (referred to as "the volta" and is embedded into the culture of the city). Having undergone an extensive revitalization, the city's waterfront today features a total of 12 thematic gardens/parks.^[250]

Thessaloniki's proximity to places such as the national parks of Pieria and beaches of Chalkidiki often allow its residents to easily have access to some of the best outdoor recreation in Europe; however, the city is also right next to the Seich Sou forest national park, just 3.5 km (2 mi) away from Thessaloniki's city centre; and offers residents and visitors alike, quiet viewpoints towards the city, mountain bike trails and landscaped hiking paths.^[251] The city's zoo, which is operated by the municipality of Thessaloniki, is also located nearby the national park.^[252]

Other recreation spaces throughout the Thessaloniki metropolitan area include the Fragma Thermis, a landscaped parkland near Thermi and the Delta wetlands west of the city centre; while urban beaches that have continuously been awarded the blue flags,^[253] are located along the 10 km (6 mi) coastline of Thessaloniki's southeastern suburbs of Thermaikos, about 20 km (12 mi) away from the city centre.

Museums and galleries

View of the Museum of Byzantine Culture

Because of the city's rich and diverse history, Thessaloniki houses many museums dealing with many different eras in history. Two of the city's most famous museums include the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki and the Museum of Byzantine Culture.

The Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki was established in 1962 and houses some of the most important ancient Macedonian artifacts,^[254] including an extensive collection of golden artwork from the royal palaces of Aigai and Pella.^[255] It also houses exhibits from Macedon's prehistoric past, dating from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age.^[256] The Prehistoric Antiquities Museum of Thessaloniki has exhibits from those periods as well.

View of the Thessaloniki Science Centre and Technology Museum (also known as NOESIS) on the road to Thermi

The Museum of Byzantine Culture is one of the city's most famous museums, showcasing the city's glorious Byzantine past.^[257] The museum was also awarded Council of Europe's museum prize in 2005.^[258] The museum of the White Tower of Thessaloniki houses a series of galleries relating to the city's past, from the creation of the White Tower until recent years.^[259]

One of the most modern museums in the city is the Thessaloniki Science Centre and Technology Museum and is one of the most high-tech museums in Greece and southeastern Europe.^[260] It features the largest planetarium in Greece, a cosmotheatre with the country's largest flat screen, an amphitheater, a motion simulator with 3D projection and 6-axis movement and exhibition spaces.^[260] Other industrial and technological museums in the city include the Railway Museum of Thessaloniki, which houses an original Orient Express train, the War Museum of Thessaloniki and others. The city also has a number of educational and sports museums, including the Thessaloniki History Centre and the Thessaloniki Olympic Museum.

The Atatürk Museum in Thessaloniki is the historic house where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder of modern-day Turkey, was born. The house is now part of the Turkish consulate complex, but admission to the museum is free.^[261] The museum contains historic information about Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his life, especially while he was in Thessaloniki.^[261] Other ethnological museums of the sort include the Historical Museum of the Balkan Wars, the Jewish Museum of Thessaloniki and the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle, containing information about the freedom fighters in Macedonia and their struggle to liberate the region from the Ottoman yoke.^[262] Construction on the Holocaust Museum of Greece began in the city in 2018.^[190]

The Museum of Byzantine Culture, Thessaloniki

The city also has a number of important art galleries. Such include the Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art, housing exhibitions from a number of well-known Greek and foreign artists.^[263] The Teloglion Foundation of Art is part of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and includes an extensive collection of works by important artists of the 19th and 20th centuries, including works by prominent Greeks and native Thessalonians.^[264] The Thessaloniki Museum of Photography also houses a number of important exhibitions, and is located within the old port of Thessaloniki.^[265]

Archaeological sites

View of the Roman Forum (Ancient Agora)

Thessaloniki is home to a number of prominent archaeological sites. Apart from its recognized UNESCO World Heritage Sites, Thessaloniki features a large two-terraced Roman forum^[266] featuring two-storey stoas,^[267] dug up by accident in the 1960s.^[266] The forum complex also boasts two Roman baths,^[268] one of which has been excavated while the other is buried underneath the city.^[268] The forum also features a small theater,^[266][268] which was also used for gladiatorial games.^[267] Although the initial complex was not built in Roman times, it was largely refurbished in the second century.^[268] It is believed that the forum and the theater continued to be used until at least the sixth century.^[269]

Another important archaeological site is the imperial palace complex which Roman emperor Galerius, located at Navarinou Square, commissioned when he made Thessaloniki the capital of his portion of the Roman Empire.^[47][48] The large octagonal portion of the complex, most of which survives to this day, is believed to have been an imperial throne room.^[267] Various mosaics from the palatial complex have also survived.^[270] Some historians believe that the complex must have been in use as an imperial residence until the 11th century.^[269]

Not far from the palace itself is the Arch of Galerius,^[270] known colloquially as the Kamara. The arch was built to commemorate the emperor's campaigns against the Persians.^[267][270] The original structure featured three arches;^[267] however, only two full arches and part of the third survive to this day. Many of the arches' marble parts survive as well,^[267] although it is mostly the brick interior that can be seen today.

Other monuments of the city's past, such as the Incantadas, a Caryatid portico from the ancient forum, have been removed or destroyed over the years. The Incantadas in particular are on display at the Louvre.^[266][271] Thanks to a private donation of €180,000, it was announced on 6 December 2011 that a replica of the Incantadas would be commissioned and later put on display in Thessaloniki.^[271]

The construction of the Thessaloniki Metro inadvertently started the largest archaeological dig not only of the city, but of Northern Greece; the dig spans 20 km² (7.7 sq mi) and has unearthed 300,000 individual artefacts from as early as the Roman Empire and as late as the Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917.^[272][273] Ancient Thessaloniki's Decumanus Maximus was also found and 75 metres (246 ft) of the marble-paved and column-lined road were unearthed along with shops, other buildings, and plumbing, prompting one scholar to describe the discovery as "the Byzantine Pompeii".^[274] Some of the artefacts will be put on display inside the metro stations, while Venizelou will feature the world's first open archaeological site located within a metro station.^[275][276]

Festivals

Olympion Theatre, seat of the International Film Festival

Thessaloniki is home of a number of festivals and events.^[277] The Thessaloniki International Fair is the most important event to be hosted in the city annually, by means of economic development. It was first established in 1926^[278] and takes place every year at the 180,000 m² (1,900,000 sq ft) Thessaloniki International Exhibition Centre. The event attracts major political attention and it is customary for the Prime Minister of Greece to outline his administration's policies for the next year, during event. Over 250,000 visitors attended the exposition in 2010.^[279] The new Art Thessaloniki, is starting first time 29.10. – 1 November 2015 as an international contemporary art fair. The Thessaloniki International Film Festival is established as one of the most important film festivals in Southern Europe,^[280] with a number of notable film makers such as Francis Ford Coppola, Faye Dunaway, Catherine Deneuve, Irene Papas and Fatih Akın taking part, and was established in 1960.^[281] The Documentary Festival, founded in 1999, has focused on documentaries that explore global social and cultural developments, with many of the films presented being candidates for FIPRESCI and Audience Awards.^[282]

The Dimitria festival, founded in 1966 and named after the city's patron saint of St. Demetrius, has focused on a wide range of events including music, theatre, dance, local happenings, and exhibitions.^[283] The "DMC DJ Championship" has been hosted at the International Trade Fair of Thessaloniki, has become a worldwide event for aspiring DJs and turntablists. The "International Festival of Photography" has taken place every February to mid-April.^[284] Exhibitions for the event are sited in museums, heritage landmarks, galleries, bookshops and cafés. Thessaloniki also holds an annual International Book Fair.^[285]

Between 1962–1997 and 2005–2008, the city also hosted the Thessaloniki Song Festival,^[286] Greece's most important music festival, at Alexandreio Melathron.^[287]

In 2012, the city hosted its first pride parade, Thessaloniki Pride, which took place between 22 and 23 June.^[288] It has been held every year ever since, however in 2013 transgender people participating in the parade became victims of police brutality. The issue was soon settled by the government.^[289] The city's Greek Orthodox Church leadership has consistently rallied against the event, but mayor Boutaris sided with Thessaloniki Pride, saying also that Thessaloniki would seek to host EuroPride 2020.^[290] The event was given to Thessaloniki in September 2017, beating Bergen, Brussels, and Hamburg.^[291] Since 1998, the city host Thessaloniki International G.L.A.D. Film Festival, the first LGBT film festival in Greece.

Sports

Kaftanzoglio National Stadium

The main stadium of the city is the Kaftanzoglio Stadium (also home ground of Iraklis F.C.), while other main stadiums of the city include the football Toumba Stadium and Kleanthis Vikelidis Stadium home grounds of PAOK FC and Aris F.C., respectively, all of whom are founding members of the Greek league.

Being the largest "multi-sport" stadium in the city, Kaftanzoglio Stadium regularly plays host to athletics events; such as the European Athletics Association event "Olympic Meeting Thessaloniki" every year; it has hosted the Greek national championships in 2009 and has been used for athletics at the Mediterranean Games and for the European Cup in athletics. In 2004, the stadium served as an official Athens 2004 venue,^[292] while in 2009 the city and the stadium hosted the 2009 IAAF World Athletics Final.

Thessaloniki's major indoor arenas include the state-owned Alexandreio Melathron, P.A.O.K. Sports Arena and the YMCA indoor hall. Other sporting clubs in the city include Apollon FC based in Kalamaria, Agrotikos Asteras F.C. based in Evosmos and YMCA. Thessaloniki has a rich sporting history with its teams winning the first ever panhellenic football (Aris FC),^[293] basketball (Iraklis BC),^[294] and water polo (AC Aris)^[295] tournaments.

During recent years, PAOK FC has emerged as the strongest football club of the city, winning also the Greek championship without a defeat (2018–19 season).

The city played a major role in the development of basketball in Greece. The local YMCA was the first to introduce the sport to the country, while Iraklis B.C. won the first ever Greek championship.^[294] From 1982 to 1993 Aris B.C. dominated the league, regularly finishing in first place. In that period Aris won a total of 9 championships, 7 cups and one European Cup Winners' Cup. The city also hosted the 2003 FIBA Under-19 World Championship in which Greece came third. In volleyball, Iraklis has emerged since 2000 as one of the most successful teams in Greece^[296] and Europe – see 2005–06 CEV Champions League.^[297] In October 2007, Thessaloniki also played host to the first Southeastern European Games.^[298]

The city is also the finish point of the annual Alexander The Great Marathon, which starts at Pella, in recognition of its Ancient Macedonian heritage.^[299] There are also aquatic and athletic complexes such as Ethniko and Poseidonio.

Main sports clubs in Thessaloniki

Club	Founded	Venue	Capacity	Notes
GS Iraklis	1908 (originally as Macedonikos Gymnasticos Syllogos)	Kaftanzoglio National Stadium	27,770
		Ivanofeio Indoor Hall		Panhellenic titles in football, basketball, rugby, volleyball. Volleyball Champions League finalists (3 times)
Maccabi Thessaloniki	1908			Historically representative of the Jewish community. Today members of any religious faith
AC Aris Thessaloniki	1914	Kleanthis Vikelidis Stadium	22,800
		Alexandreio Melathron (Palais des Sports)	5,500	Panhellenic titles in football, basketball, volleyball, waterpolo. Three European Cups in basketball
YMCA Thessaloniki (ΧΑΝΘ)	1921			Presence in A1 basketball. Major role in introduction of basketball in Greece
Megas Alexandros	1923			Presence in First Division of Football Panhellenic Championship
P.A.O.K.	1926	Toumba Stadium	28,703
		P.A.O.K. Sports Arena	10,000	Panhellenic titles in football, basketball, volleyball, handball. Two European Cups in basketball. Most time winners in women's football
Apollon Kalamarias/Pontou	1926	Kalamaria Stadium	6,500
M.E.N.T.	1926			Presence in A1 basketball
V.A.O.	1926			Presence in A1 basketball. Panhellenic titles in handball
Makedonikos F.C.	1928	Makedonikos Stadium	8,100	Presence in first division of men's football
Agrotikos Asteras F.C.	1932	Evosmos Stadium
Aias Evosmou	1967	DAK Evosmou

Media

Thessaloniki is home to the ERT3 TV-channel and Radio Macedonia, both services of Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation (ERT) operating in the city and are broadcast all over Greece.^[300] The municipality of Thessaloniki also operates three radio stations, namely FM100, FM101 and FM100.6; and TV100, a television network which was also the first non-state-owned TV station in Greece and opened in 1988. Several private TV-networks also broadcast out from Thessaloniki, with Makedonia TV being the most popular.

The city's main newspapers and some of the most circulated in Greece, include Makedonia, which was also the first newspaper published in Thessaloniki in 1911 and Aggelioforos. A large number of radio stations also broadcast from Thessaloniki as the city is known for its music contributions.

TV broadcasting

• ERT3 (Panhellenic broadcasting)
• Makedonia TV (Panhellenic)
• 4E TV (Panhellenic)
• TV 100 (Regional)
• Vergina TV (Regional)
• Atlas TV (Regional)

Press

• Makedonia (national publication)
• Aggelioforos (national)
• Metrosport (sports, national)
• Fair Play (sports, national)
• Aris Ise (sports, weekly, national)
• Forza (sports, weekly, national)
• Thessaloniki (weekly, national)
• Ikonomiki (financial)
• Parallaxi (daily, online)

Notable Thessalonians

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Mosaic of Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki in the Church of Saint Demetrius in Thessaloniki

Throughout its history, Thessaloniki has been home to a number of well-known figures. It was also the birthplace or base of various Saints and other religious figures, such as Demetrius of Thessaloniki, Cyril and Methodius (creators of the first Slavic alphabet), Saint Mitre (Saint Demetrius, not to be confused with the previous), Gregorios Palamas, Matthew Blastares, Eustathius of Thessalonica and Patriarch Philotheus I of Constantinople. Other Byzantine-era notable people included jurist Constantine Armenopoulos, historian Ioannis Kaminiates, Demetrius Triclinius, Thomas Magistros, the anti-Palamian theologians Prochoros and Demetrios Kydones, such as scholars Theodorus Gaza (Thessalonicensis) and Matthaios Kamariotis.

Many of the country's best-known musicians and movie personalities are from Thessaloniki, such as Zoe Laskari, Costas Hajihristos, Stella Haskil, Giannis Dalianidis, Maria Plyta, Harry Klynn, Antonis Remos, Paschalis Terzis, Nikos Papazoglou, Nikolas Asimos, Giorgos Hatzinasios, Alberto Eskenazi, Stavros Kouyioumtzis, Giannis Kalatzis, Natassa Theodoridou, Katia Zygouli, Kostas Voutsas, Takis Kanellopoulos, Titos Vandis, Manolis Chiotis, Dionysis Savvopoulos, Marinella, Yvonne Sanson and the classical composer Emilios Riadis. Additionally, there have been a number of politicians born in the city: Ioannis Skandalidis, Alexandros Zannas, Evangelos Venizelos, Christos Sartzetakis, fourth President of Greece, and Yiannis Boutaris. Sports personalities from the city include Nikos Galis, Georgios Roubanis, Giannis Ioannidis, Faidon Matthaiou, Alketas Panagoulias, Panagiotis Fasoulas, Eleni Daniilidou, Traianos Dellas, Giorgos Koudas, Kleanthis Vikelidis, Christos Kostis, Dimitris Salpingidis and Nikos Zisis. Benefactor Ioannis Papafis, architect Lysandros Kaftanzoglou and writers, such as Grigorios Zalykis, Manolis Anagnostakis, Kleitos Kyrou, Albertos Nar, Elias Petropoulos, Kostis Moskof, Rena Molho and Dinos Christianopoulos are also from Thessaloniki.

The city is also the birthplace or base of a number of international personalities, which include Bulgarians (Atanas Dalchev), Jews (Moshe Levy, Maurice Abravanel, Isaak Benrubi, Isaac and Daniel Carasso, Raphaël Salem, Baruch Uziel, Shlomo Halevi Alkabetz, Salamo Arouch, Avraam Benaroya), Slav Macedonians (Dimo Todorovski), Italians (Luisa Poselli, Giacomo Poselli, Vittorio Citterich), French (Louis Dumont), Spanish (Juana Mordó), Turks (Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Nâzım Hikmet, Afet İnan, Cahit Arf, Mehmet Cavit Bey, Sabiha Sertel, Abdul Kerim Pasha, Hasan Tahsin Uzer, Hasan Tahsin) and Armenians (Jean Tatlian).

Cuisine

Frappé coffee

Bougatsa, typical Thessalonian treat

Because Thessaloniki remained under Ottoman rule for about 100 years longer than southern Greece, it has retained a lot of its Eastern character, including its culinary tastes.^[301] Spices in particular play an important role in the cuisine of Thessaloniki,^[301] something which is not true to the same degree about Greece's southern regions.^[301] Thessaloniki's Ladadika borough is a particularly busy area in regards to Thessalonian cuisine, with most tavernas serving traditional meze and other such culinary delights.^[301]

Bougatsa, a breakfast pastry, which can be either sweet or savory, is very popular throughout the city and has spread around other parts of Greece and the Balkans as well. Another popular snack is koulouri.

Notable sweets of the city are Trigona, Roxákia, Kourkoubinia and Armenonville. A stereotypical Thessalonian coffee drink is Frappé coffee. Frappé was invented in the Thessaloniki International Fair in 1957 and has since spread throughout Greece and Cyprus to become a hallmark of the Greek coffee culture.

Kapani or Agora Viali is the oldest central market in Thessaloniki, with shops selling fish, meat, vegetables, fruits, drinks, olives, sweets, nuts, spices^{[302][303][304]} and Modiano Market is located nearby.^[305]

Tourism

Hotel Luxemvourgo on Komninon Street (1924, arch. Eli Modiano)

View of the Makedonia Palace on the promenade

A tourism boom took place in the 2010s, during the years of mayor Boutaris, especially from the neighboring countries, Austria, Israel and Turkey. In 2010, overnight stays of foreign tourists in the city were around 250,000. In 2018, overnight stays of foreign tourists were estimated to reach 3,000,000 people. Thessaloniki is known as "the city that never sleeps" and a "party capital" due to its thriving nightlife, young atmosphere and famous 24-hour culture.^[306]

Music

The city is viewed as a romantic one in Greece, and as such Thessaloniki is commonly featured in Greek songs.^[307] There are a number of famous songs that go by the name 'Thessaloniki' (rebetiko, laïko etc.) or include the name in their title.^[308]

During the 1930s and 1940s, the city became a centre of the Rebetiko music, partly because of the Metaxas censorship, which was stricter in Athens. Vassilis Tsitsanis wrote some of his best songs in Thessaloniki.

The city is the birthplace of significant composers in the Greek music scene, such as Manolis Chiotis, Stavros Kouyioumtzis and Dionysis Savvopoulos. It is also notable for its rock music scene and its many rock groups; some became famous such as Xylina Spathia, Trypes or the pop rock group Onirama.

Between 1962–1997 and 2005–2008 the city also hosted the Thessaloniki Song Festival. In the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 Greece was represented by Koza Mostra and Agathonas Iakovidis, both from Thessaloniki.

In popular culture

• In May 1936, a massive strike by tobacco workers led to general anarchy in the city and Ioannis Metaxas (future dictator, then PM) ordered its repression. The events and the deaths of the protesters inspired Yiannis Ritsos to write the Epitafios.
• On 22 May 1963, Grigoris Lambrakis, pacifist and MP, was assassinated by two far-right extremists driving a three-wheeled vehicle. The event led to political crisis. Costa Gavras directed Z (1969) based on it, two years after the military junta had seized power in Greece.
• Notable films set or shot in Thessaloniki, among others, include Mademoiselle Docteur/Salonique, nid d'espions (1937) by Georg Wilhelm Pabst, The Barefooted Battalion (1954) by Greg Tallas (Gregory Thalassinos), O Atsídas (1961) by Giannis Dalianidis, Parenthesis (1968) by Takis Kanellopoulos, Triumph of the Spirit (1989) by Robert M. Young, Eternity and a Day by Theo Angelopoulos (1998) and Ouzeri Tsitsanis (2015) by Manousos Manousakis.

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National Theatre of Northern Greece

National Theatre of Northern Greece

The National Theatre of Northern Greece, an institution promoting theatrical plays in Thessaloniki and northern Greece, was founded in 1961 by Sokratis Karantinos, its first director. The Drama School and the Dance Theatre are integral parts of the National Theatre.

Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

European Capital of Culture

European Capital of Culture

A European Capital of Culture is a city designated by the European Union (EU) for a period of one calendar year during which it organises a series of cultural events with a strong pan-European dimension. Being a European Capital of Culture can be an opportunity for a city to generate considerable cultural, social and economic benefits and it can help foster urban regeneration, change the city's image and raise its visibility and profile on an international scale. Multiple cities can be a European Capital of Culture simultaneously.

Arata Isozaki

Arata Isozaki

Arata Isozaki was a Japanese architect, urban designer, and theorist from Ōita. He was awarded the Royal Gold Medal in 1986 and the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2019. He has taught at Columbia University, Harvard University, and Yale University.

Mediterranean Cosmos

Mediterranean Cosmos

Mediterranean Cosmos is a shopping mall located in Pylaia, a municipality of Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece. It is the largest retail and entertainment development in Northern Greece.

Makedonia Palace

Makedonia Palace

The Makedonia Palace is a 5-star hotel located in Downtown Thessaloniki, Greece. The hotel is located on Megalou Alexandrou Avenue, by Thessaloniki's eastern urban waterfront.

Lonely Planet

Lonely Planet

Lonely Planet is a travel guide book publisher. Founded in Australia in 1973, the company has printed over 150 million books.

Nea Aretsou

Nea Aretsou

Nea Aretsou is a district of Kalamaria, Thessaloniki, Greece. It was created in the 1920s and populated by Greek refugees from the town of Aretsou in Turkey.

Peraia, Thessaloniki

Peraia, Thessaloniki

Peraia is a suburb of Thessaloniki, Greece. It is part of the municipality Thermaikos. Peraia is located on the south coast of the Thermaic Gulf, 15 km south of Thessaloniki city centre and 4 km west of Thessaloniki International Airport.

Thermaic Gulf

Thermaic Gulf

The Thermaic Gulf, also called the Gulf of Salonika and the Macedonian Gulf, is a gulf constituting the northwest corner of the Aegean Sea. The city of Thessaloniki is at its northeastern tip, and it is bounded by Pieria Imathia and Larissa on the west and the Chalkidiki peninsula on the east, with Cape Kassandra at the southeasternmost corner. It is named after the ancient town of Therma, modern Thessaloniki. It is about 100 km (62 mi) long.

Pieria (regional unit)

Pieria (regional unit)

Pieria is one of the regional units of Greece located in the southern part of the Region of Central Macedonia, within the historical province of Macedonia. Its capital is the town of Katerini.The name Pieria originates from the ancient Pieres tribe. In Pieria, there are many sites of archeological interest, such as Dion, Pydna, Leivithra and Platamonas. Pieria contains Mount Pierus, from which Hermes takes flight in order to visit Calypso, and is the home of Orpheus, the Muses, and contains the Pierian Spring. Mount Olympus, the highest mountain in Greece and throne of the ancient Greek gods, is located in the southern part of Pieria. Other ancient cities included Leibethra and Pimpleia.

Chalkidiki

Chalkidiki

Chalkidiki (; Greek: Χαλκιδική [xalciðiˈci], also spelled Halkidiki, is a peninsula and regional unit of Greece, part of the region of Central Macedonia, in the geographic region of Macedonia in Northern Greece. The autonomous Mount Athos region constitutes the easternmost part of the peninsula, but not of the regional unit.

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Aerial view of the campus of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (to the right), the largest university in Greece and the Balkans

Thessaloniki is a major centre of education for Greece. Three of the country's largest universities are located in central Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the University of Macedonia and the International Hellenic University. Aristotle University was founded in 1926 and is currently the largest university in Greece^[15] by number of students, which number at more than 80,000 in 2010,^[15] and is a member of the Utrecht Network. For the academic year 2009–2010, Aristotle University was ranked as one of the 150 best universities in the world for arts and humanities and among the 250 best universities in the world overall by the Times QS World University Rankings,^[309] making it one of the top 2% of best universities worldwide.^[310] Leiden ranks Aristotle University as one of the top 100 European universities, at number 97, and the best university in Greece.^[311] Since 2010, Thessaloniki is also home to the Open University of Thessaloniki,^[312] which is funded by Aristotle University, the University of Macedonia and the municipality of Thessaloniki.

Additionally, a TEI (Technological Educational Institute), namely the Alexander Technological Educational Institute of Thessaloniki, is located in the western suburb of Sindos; home also to the industrial zone of the city. Numerous public and private vocational institutes (Greek: IEK) provide professional training to young students, while a large number of private colleges offer American and UK academic curriculum, via cooperation with foreign universities. In addition to Greek students, the city hence attracts many foreign students either via the Erasmus programme for public universities, or for a complete degree in public universities or in the city's private colleges. As of 2006^[update] the city's total student population was estimated around 200,000.^[313]

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University of Macedonia

University of Macedonia

The University of Macedonia is a public research university in Thessaloniki, Macedonia, Greece. It is a modern institution, renowned for the quality, freedom, democracy, meritocracy and individual development it provides to its members.

Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

The Aristotle University of Thessaloniki is the sixth oldest, and among the most highly ranked, tertiary education institution within Greece. Named after the philosopher Aristotle, who was born in Stageira, about 55 km east of Thessaloniki, it is the largest university in Greece and its campus covers 230,000 square metres in the centre of Thessaloniki, with additional educational and administrative facilities elsewhere.

International Hellenic University

International Hellenic University

The International Hellenic University is a university in Greece. It was initially established in October 2005 and was based in Thessaloniki, Greece.

List of universities in Greece

List of universities in Greece

Universities in Greece form one part of constitutionally-recognized institutions with degree awarding powers. According to Greece's Constitution, higher education institutions (HEIs) include universities, polytechnics, some specialist HEIs, and formerly technological educational institutes (TEIs). In Greece, all universities are publicly owned and funded having state-accredited university title and authorization of university degree awarding powers at level 6 under the Bologna Process and the National Qualification Framework of Greece which is officially named Hellenic Qualification Framework.

Utrecht Network

Utrecht Network

The Utrecht Network is a network of European universities. Founded in 1987, the network promotes the internationalisation of tertiary education through summer schools, student and staff exchanges and joint degrees.

Sindos

Sindos

Sindos (Greek: Σίνδος; Latin: Sindus; is a suburb of Thessaloniki, Greece. It is the seat of the municipality of Delta. Sindos is home to the main campus of the Alexander Technological Educational Institute of Thessaloniki and the Industrial Zone of the city. The community Sindos has an area of 47.248 km2. The population was 9,289 at the 2011 census.

IEK

IEK

IEK is a Greek abbreviation name for the Ινστιτούτο Επαγγελματικής Κατάρτισης.

Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

United States

United States

The United States of America, commonly known as the United States or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territories, nine Minor Outlying Islands, and 326 Indian reservations. The United States is also in free association with three Pacific Island sovereign states: the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. It shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south and has maritime borders with the Bahamas, Cuba, Russia, and other nations. With a population of over 333 million, it is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous in the world. The national capital of the United States is Washington, D.C. and its most populous city and principal financial center is New York City.

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Tram

The old tram lines on Agiou Mina Street

Tram was the main, oldest and most popular public urban mean of Thessalonians in the past. It was in operation from 1893 to 1957, when it was disestablished by the government of Konstantinos Karamanlis. The French Compagnie de Tramways et d' Éclairage Électrique de Salonique operated it from 1912 until 1940, when the company was purchased by the Hellenic State. The operating base and tram station was in the district of Dépôt.

Before the economic crisis of 2009, there were various proposals for new tram lines.^[314]

Bus

An OASTH bus

Thessaloniki Urban Transport Organization (OASTH) operates buses as the only form of public transport in Thessaloniki. It was founded in 1957 and operates a fleet of 604 vehicles on 75 routes throughout the Thessaloniki metropolitan area.^[315] International and regional bus links are provided by KTEL at its Macedonia InterCity Bus Terminal, located to the west of the city centre.^[316]

Metro

Map of the Thessaloniki Metro under construction (Lines 1 and 2), and its planned extensions

The creation of a metro system for Thessaloniki goes back as far as 1918, when Thomas Hayton Mawson and Ernest Hébrard proposed the creation of a Thessaloniki Metropolitan Railway.^[317] In 1968, a circular metro line was proposed, and in 1987 the first serious proposal was presented and construction briefly started in 1988, before stalling and finally being abandoned due to lack of funding.^[318] Both the 1918 and 1988 proposals ran almost the identical route to the current Line 1.

Construction on Thessaloniki's current metro began in 2006 and is classified as a megaproject: it has a budget of €1.57 billion ($1.77 billion).^[319] Line 1 and Line 2 are currently under construction and will enter service, in phases, between 2023 and 2024.^[320][321] Line 1 is 9.5 kilometres (5.9 mi) long and stops at 13 stations, while Line 2 is 4.8 kilometres (3.0 mi) long and stops at a further five stations, while also calling at 11 of the Line 1 stations.^[322][323] Important archaeological discoveries have been made during construction, and some of the system's stations will house archaeological exhibitions.^[324] One stop, Venizelou, will house the only open archaeological site within a metro station anywhere in the world.^[325]

Line 2 is to be expanded further, with a loop extension to the western suburbs of the city, towards Evosmos and Stavroupoli, and one overground extension towards the Airport.^[326] The western extension is more high-priority than the airport one, as the airport will be served by a 10-minute shuttle bus to the terminus of Line 2, Mikra.^[323]

Once it opens in 2023, it is expected that 320,000 people will use the metro every day, or 116 million people every year.^[327]

Commuter/suburban rail (Proastiakos)

Suburban Railway services

Commuter rail services have recently been established between Thessaloniki and the city of Larissa (the service is known in Greek as the "Proastiakos", meaning "Suburban Railway"). The service is operated using Siemens Desiro EMU trains on a modernised electrified double track and stops at 11 refurbished stations, covering the journey in 1 hour and 33 minutes.^[328] Furthermore, an additional line has also been established, although with the use of regional trains, between Thessaloniki and the city of Edessa.

Thessaloniki Airport "Makedonia"

Thessaloniki International Airport

International and domestic air traffic to and from the city is served by Thessaloniki Airport "Makedonia". The short length of the airport's two runways means that it does not currently support intercontinental flights, although a major extension – lengthening one of its runways into the Thermaic Gulf – is under construction,^[329] despite considerable opposition from local environmental groups. Following the completion of the runway works, the airport will be able to serve intercontinental flights and cater for larger aircraft in the future. After long delays, the new runway of the airport was completed in spring 2019. Construction of a second terminal began in September 2018^[330] and finished in February 2021, three months ahead of schedule.^[331]

Railways

New railway station

Because of the Greek economic crisis, all international train links from the city were suspended in February 2011.^[332] Until then, the city was a major railway hub for the Balkans, with direct connections to Sofia, Skopje, Belgrade, Moscow, Vienna, Budapest, Bucharest and Istanbul, alongside Athens and other destinations in Greece. Daily through trains to Sofia and Belgrade were restarted in May 2014 but stopped again for COVID-19. Thessaloniki remains one of Greece's most important railway hubs and has the biggest marshalling yard in the country.

Regional train services within Greece (operated by TrainOSE, the Hellenic Railways Organization's train operating company), link the city with other parts of the country, from its central railway passenger station, called the "New railway station" located at the western end of Thessaloniki's city centre.

Port

The Port of Thessaloniki connects the city with seasonal ferries to the Sporades and other north Aegean islands, with its passenger terminal, being one of the largest in the Aegean Sea basin; having handled around 162,731 passengers in 2007.^[333] Meanwhile, ongoing actions have been going on for more connections and the port is recently being upgraded, as Thessaloniki is also slowly turning into a major tourist port for cruising in the eastern Mediterranean.

Motorways

Road map of Thessaloniki and its suburbs from OpenStreetMap

Part of the ring road (Peripheriaki Odos)

Thessaloniki lies on the crossroads of the A1/E75, A2/E90 and A25 motorways; which connect the city with other parts of the country, as well as the Republic of North Macedonia, Bulgaria and Turkey.

The city itself is bypassed by the C-shaped Thessaloniki Inner Ring Road (Esoteriki Peripheriaki Odos, Greek: Εσωτερική Περιφεριακή Οδός), which all of the above motorways connect onto it. The western end of the route begins at the junction with the A1/A2 motorways in Lachanagora District. Clockwise it heads northeast around the city, passing through the northwestern suburbs, the forest of Seich Sou and through to the southeast suburb/borough of Kalamaria. The ring road ends at a large junction with the A25 motorway, which then continues south to Chalkidiki, passing through Thessaloniki's outer southeast suburbs.

The speed limit on this motorway is 90 kilometres per hour (56 mph); it currently has three traffic lanes for each direction and forms the city's most vital road link; handling more than 120,000 vehicles daily,^[334] instead of the 30,000 vehicles that it was originally designed to handle in 1975.^[335] An outer ring road known as Eksoteriki Peripheriaki Odos (Greek: Εξωτερική Περιφεριακή Οδός, outer ring road) carries all traffic that completely bypasses the city. It is Part of Motorway 2.^[336]

Future plans

Taxi in Thessaloniki

Despite the large effort that was made in 2004 to improve the motorway features of the Thessaloniki ring road, the motorway is still insufficient to tackle Thessaloniki's increasing traffic and metropolitan population. To tackle this problem, the government has introduced large scale redevelopment plans throughout 2011^[337] with tenders expected to be announced within early 2012;^[337] that include the total restructuring of the A16 in the western side of the city, with new junctions and new emergency lanes throughout the whole length of the motorway.^[337] In the eastern side an even larger scale project has been announced, for the construction of a new elevated motorway section above the existing, which would allow faster travel for drivers heading through to the airport and Chalkidiki that do not wish to exit into the city, and will decongest the existing motorway for city commuters.^[338] The plans also include adding one more lane in each direction on the existing A16 ring road and on the A25 passing through Thessaloniki's southeast suburbs, from its junction with the A16 in Kalamaria, up to the airport exit (ΕΟ67); which will make it an 8 lane highway.^[337]

Additional long-term plans include the extension of the planned outer ring road known as Eksoteriki Peripheriaki Odos (Greek: Εξωτερική Περιφεριακή Οδός, outer ring road) to circle around the entire Thessaloniki metropolitan area, crossing over the Thermaic Gulf from the east, to join with the A1/E75 motorway. Preliminary plans have been announced which include a 4.5 km (3 mi) bridge over the gulf, as part of the southern bypass of the city; to cater for the large number of travellers from Macedonia and the rest of Greece heading to the airport, and to the increasingly popular tourist region of Chalkidiki.^[339]

• Motorways:
  • A1/E75 W (Republic of North Macedonia, Larissa, Athens)
  • A2/E90 W (Kozani, Ioannina, Igoumenitsa) N (Kavala, Xanthi, Alexandroupolis, Turkey)
  • A25 (ΕΟ12)/Ε79 Ν (Serres, Bulgaria)
  • A25 (ΕΟ67) S (Airport, Nea Moudania)
• National Roads:
  • ΕΟ2/Ε86 W (Edessa, Giannitsa)
  • ΕΟ12/Ε79 Ν (Serres, Drama)
  • ΕΟ16, SW (Polygyros, Ouranopolis)
  • ΕΟ65, Ν (Kilkis, Doirani)

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Konstantinos Karamanlis

Konstantinos Karamanlis

Konstantinos G. Karamanlis, commonly anglicised to Constantine Karamanlis or just Caramanlis, was a four-time Prime Minister of Greece and two-term president of the Third Hellenic Republic. A towering figure of Greek politics, his political career spanned portions of seven decades, covering much of the latter half of the 20th century.

Greek government-debt crisis

Greek government-debt crisis

Greece faced a sovereign debt crisis in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2007–2008. Widely known in the country as The Crisis, it reached the populace as a series of sudden reforms and austerity measures that led to impoverishment and loss of income and property, as well as a small-scale humanitarian crisis. In all, the Greek economy suffered the longest recession of any advanced mixed economy to date. As a result, the Greek political system has been upended, social exclusion increased, and hundreds of thousands of well-educated Greeks have left the country.

Thessaloniki Urban Transport Organization

Thessaloniki Urban Transport Organization

The Thessaloniki Urban Transport Organisation, abbreviated OASTH, is a mass transport company operating in Thessaloniki, Greece.

Thessaloniki metropolitan area

Thessaloniki metropolitan area

The Thessaloniki metropolitan area or larger urban zone (LUZ) is the complete area covered and directly influenced by Thessaloniki. The metropolitan area traditionally consisted of the municipality of Thessaloniki and its immediate surroundings, what is today referred to as the Thessaloniki urban area. However, since the mid to late 1990s, the areas surrounding the urban area, have succumbed to urban sprawl and what used to be agrarian communities are rapidly urbanizing and being developed into suburbs or exurbs. This is creating new problems for a region already facing issues such as pollution, traffic congestion and social ills.

KTEL (Greece)

KTEL (Greece)

KTEL is the main intercity public transport bus service in Greece. It is a cooperation of 62 regional bus companies, usually named after the regional unit they serve, e.g. KTEL Imathias for Imathia. KTEL was founded in 1952.

Thessaloniki Bus Station

Thessaloniki Bus Station

Intercity Bus Station of Thessaloniki "Macedonia", also known as the KTEL Macedonia Intercity Bus station, is the main bus station of Thessaloniki, Greece and the largest bus terminal in Greece. It is located just 5km from the city center in Menemeni. Construction began in October 1996 and it was opened to the public in September 2002. It serves about 20 to 25 thousand passengers and 800 coaches departures per day to various cities all over Greece, as well as some routes to Albania, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Germany and Turkey. It is connected with the rest of the city via OASTH, which operates about 120 buses per hour. The company, which operates the buses and owns the station is named KTEL. This terminal serves 40 KTEL routes, as well as some other bus lines internationally.

Thessaloniki Metro

Thessaloniki Metro

The Thessaloniki Metro is an underground rapid-transit system under construction in Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city. Estimates for the cost of the megaproject are €1.62 billion ($1.83 billion) for the main line and €640 million ($723 million) for the Kalamaria extension, for a total of €2.26 billion ($2.55 billion). The project is primarily funded with loans from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and funds from the Greek government. Construction by a Greek-Italian consortium is overseen by Attiko Metro S.A., the Greek state-owned company which oversaw construction of the Athens Metro and Athens Tram.

Line 1 (Thessaloniki Metro)

Line 1 (Thessaloniki Metro)

Line 1 of the Thessaloniki Metro, also known as the Base Project, is a deep-level underground rapid transit line in Thessaloniki, Greece, connecting N. Sid. Stathmos in the west with Nea Elvetia in the east, before continuing on to the Pylaia depot. The line was set to open in 2023. Discovery of historical sites in 2019 halted work for 28 months while excavations took place. Of the line's 13 stations, 11 are also stops for Thessaloniki Metro's Line 2, as they will share tunnels.

Line 2 (Thessaloniki Metro)

Line 2 (Thessaloniki Metro)

Line 2 of the Thessaloniki Metro, also known as the Kalamaria Extension, is a deep-level underground rapid transit line in Thessaloniki, Greece, connecting N. Sid. Stathmos in the west with Mikra in the south-east. The section of the line between Neos Sidirodromikos Stathmos and 25 Martiou stations is set to open in 2023, with the rest of the line becoming operational in 2024. Of the line's 16 stations, 11 are also stops for Thessaloniki Metro's Line 1, as they will share tunnels.

Thomas Hayton Mawson

Thomas Hayton Mawson

Thomas Hayton Mawson, known as T. H. Mawson, was a British garden designer, landscape architect, and town planner.

Ernest Hébrard

Ernest Hébrard

Ernest Hébrard (1875–1933) was a French architect, archaeologist and urban planner, best known for his urban plan for the center of Thessaloniki, Greece, after the great fire of 1917.

Megaproject

Megaproject

A megaproject is an extremely large-scale investment project. According to the Oxford Handbook of Megaproject Management, "Megaprojects are large-scale, complex ventures that typically cost $1 billion or more, take many years to develop and build, involve multiple public and private stakeholders, are transformational, and impact millions of people". However, $1 billion is not a constraint in defining megaprojects; in some contexts a relative approach is needed, such as in developing countries, where a much smaller project could constitute a megaproject. Therefore, a more general definition is "Megaprojects are temporary endeavours characterized by: large investment commitment, vast complexity, and long-lasting impact on the economy, the environment, and society".

Commemorative stele in Melbourne

Consulates

Twin towns – sister cities

Thessaloniki is twinned with:^[340]

Other cooperation

Thessaloniki also cooperates with:^[340]

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Albania

Albania

Albania, officially the Republic of Albania, is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is situated in the Balkans, and is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares land borders with Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, North Macedonia to the east, and Greece to the south. The country displays varied climatic, geological, hydrological, and morphological conditions, in an area of 28,748 km2 (11,100 sq mi). The landscape ranges from the snow-capped mountains in the Albanian Alps and the Korab, Skanderbeg, Pindus, and Ceraunian Mountains, to the hot and sunny coasts of the Adriatic and Ionian Seas along the Mediterranean. Tirana is its capital and largest city, followed by Durrës, Vlorë, and Shkodër.

Austria

Austria

Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous city and state. Austria is bordered by Germany to the northwest, the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia to the northeast, Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west. The country occupies an area of 83,871 km2 (32,383 sq mi) and has a population of 9 million.

Australia

Australia

Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi), Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east.

Belgium

Belgium

Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to the southwest, and the North Sea to the northwest. It covers an area of 30,528 km2 (11,787 sq mi) and has a population of more than 11.5 million, making it the 22nd most densely populated country in the world and the 6th most densely populated country in Europe, with a density of 376/km2 (970/sq mi). Belgium is part of an area known as the Low Countries, historically a somewhat larger region than the Benelux group of states, as it also included parts of northern France. The capital and largest city is Brussels; other major cities are Antwerp, Ghent, Charleroi, Liège, Bruges, Namur, and Leuven.

Brazil

Brazil

Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America and in Latin America. At 8.5 million square kilometers (3,300,000 sq mi) and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area and the seventh most populous. Its capital is Brasília, and its most populous city is São Paulo. The federation is composed of the union of the 26 states and the Federal District. It is the only country in the Americas to have Portuguese as an official language. It is one of the most multicultural and ethnically diverse nations, due to over a century of mass immigration from around the world, and the most populous Roman Catholic-majority country.

Bulgaria

Bulgaria

Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, and the Black Sea to the east. Bulgaria covers a territory of 110,994 square kilometres (42,855 sq mi), and is the sixteenth-largest country in Europe. Sofia is the nation's capital and largest city; other major cities are Plovdiv, Varna and Burgas.

Canada

Canada

Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over 9.98 million square kilometres, making it the world's second-largest country by total area. Its southern and western border with the United States, stretching 8,891 kilometres (5,525 mi), is the world's longest binational land border. Canada's capital is Ottawa and its three largest metropolitan areas are Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.

Croatia

Croatia

Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe. Its coast lies entirely on the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro to the southeast, and shares a maritime border with Italy to the west and southwest. Its capital and largest city, Zagreb, forms one of the country's primary subdivisions, with twenty counties. The country spans 56,594 square kilometres, and has a population of nearly 3.9 million.

China

China

China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and borders fourteen countries by land, the most of any country in the world, tied with Russia. With an area of approximately 9.6 million square kilometres (3,700,000 sq mi), it is the world's third largest country by total land area. The country consists of 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities, and two special administrative regions. The national capital is Beijing, and the most populous city and largest financial center is Shanghai.

Cyprus

Cyprus

Cyprus, officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. It is geographically in Western Asia, but its cultural ties and geopolitics are overwhelmingly Southeastern European. Cyprus is the third-largest and third-most populous island in the Mediterranean. It is located north of Egypt, east of Greece, south of Turkey, and west of Lebanon and Syria. Its capital and largest city is Nicosia. The northeast portion of the island is de facto governed by the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

Denmark

Denmark

Denmark is a Nordic constituent country in Northern Europe. It is the most populous and politically central constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the autonomous territories of the Faroe Islands and Greenland in the North Atlantic Ocean. Metropolitan Denmark is the southernmost of the Scandinavian countries, lying south-west and south of Sweden, south of Norway, and north of Germany, with which it shares a short land border, its only land border.

Finland

Finland

Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, across from Estonia. Finland covers an area of 338,455 square kilometres (130,678 sq mi) with a population of 5.6 million. Helsinki is the capital and largest city. The vast majority of the population are ethnic Finns. Finnish and Swedish are the official languages, Swedish is the native language of 5.2% of the population. Finland's climate varies from humid continental in the south to the boreal in the north. The land cover is primarily a boreal forest biome, with more than 180,000 recorded lakes.