Monuments
Ancient and Ecclesiastical Monuments of Nestorio and Grammos
Ancient monuments
The area around present-day Nestorio has been inhabited since ancient times, as evidenced by artifacts found around the perimeter and at the summit of the castle.
The Castle—that is, the hill above the present-day village—provided complete natural protection for the city’s acropolis, and thus fortifications would have been minimal: this explains why only traces of fortifications have been found.
From a column bearing a Roman-era inscription, we can infer that the area was called Vattyn. The inscription concerns the protection of the privately owned lands of the Vattynian people from Roman expansionism and is indicative of the social cohesion among the inhabitants.
The rest of the area was extensively settled, and no significant evidence has been found.
Religious monuments
Tsoukas Monastery
The Tsoukas Monastery is built on a steep cliff overlooking the Stenopotamos River, a tributary of the Aliakmon. The cliff on which the monastery stands is part of the rock formation that also forms the wall of the adjacent waterfall, which is naturally called the Tsoukas Waterfall.
The monastery took its name from the nearby settlement of Tsouka (which had since been renamed Archangelos), abandoned after the war. The monastery’s main church is a square, single-nave 13th-century structure (there was a dedicatory inscription dated 1225) dedicated to the Archangel Michael as Taxiarchis. During the post-Byzantine period, the church of Zoodochos Pigi was built atop the rock.
The monastery was destroyed during World War II. In 1961, it was designated a protected monument. Both churches in the complex were recently renovated.
Monastery of Saint George of Eptachorio
The Monastery of Saint George of Eptachori is located on the slopes of Mount Taliaros, above Eptachori. The complex consists of a quadrilateral arrangement of auxiliary buildings surrounding the main church.
The church was built in 1625, and the iconography was completed in 1632. It is a three-aisled church of the “Athonite type,” that is, a cruciform plan with an octagonal dome featuring a high drum and two smaller, also octagonal, domes above the narthex. The building was constructed of roughly hewn stones and is covered with slate tiles.
Inside, the church is covered with frescoes of fine post-Byzantine art. It is believed that these are the work of painters from Eptachori or Linotopi in Grammos.
Above the main church lies the small cemetery with the Church of the Presentation of the Virgin Mary, which is also adorned with 17th-century frescoes. The main church and the cemetery church have been designated as historically protected monuments.
Monastery of Saint Zacharias
The Monastery of Saint Zacharias was a monastery of the post-Byzantine period, built on the edge of a series of large meadows along the middle course of the Aliakmon River. The monastery was founded in the late 16th century, on the edge of a flat area of the Psoriarika massif, between the mountain’s agricultural and forested areas and in a location with a spring.
Lost amid the vastness of Grammos, the monastery shared the fate of the scattered settlements in the area. In the late 18th century, when Muslim settlers moved into the neighboring villages, the monastery was abandoned, its main church was converted into a mosque, and it gradually fell into disrepair.
Despite its short existence, the Monastery of Saint Zacharias was one of the few landmarks in the labyrinthine border region. Thus, following the liberation of Macedonia from Turkish rule, efforts were made to preserve and reconstruct the now-ruined monastery. More recently, the katholikon was fully restored to its original form, as a compact cruciform structure with an inscribed dome.
The high drum of the octagonal dome is made of high-quality poros stone, finely carved. The interior of the church was once covered with 17th-century frescoes of high artistic merit. In 1990, the church was designated a protected monument.
Panagia Of Grammosta
The elongated, rectangular church of Panagia stands in the center of the old core of the village of Grammosta (Grammos), next to a smaller, newer church of the same name. The church was originally built in 1887 on the site of an older church that had been destroyed in the early 19th century.
The church has a single nave with a large sanctuary niche. The building is stone-built and covered by a gabled roof with a tiled roof. The church was destroyed during the Civil War. The adjacent church, also a single-aisled, rectangular-plan church, was built to replace it. The Church of the Virgin Mary was rebuilt and recently returned to use.
In the past, the church housed the icon of “Panagia Grammoustiani,” a large depiction of the Virgin Mary that had been commissioned in Venice sometime in the 17th century. Panagia Grammoustiani is considered the patron saint of the Vlachs of Grammosta, and according to tradition, she accompanied their migrations, moving down to the lowlands in the winter and returning to Grammosta in a ceremonial procession in the summer. Specifically, the icon was kept in the church of the same name in Argos Orestiko. The Holy Gospel of Panagia Grammoustiani, crafted and printed in Venice in 1748, is also kept there.