Nea Roda is a village southeast of

Thessaloniki Thessaloniki (; ), also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, Salonika, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece (with slightly over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area) and the capital cit ...

, on the narrowest point of the Athos peninsula in the

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

Stagira-Akanthos Stagira-Akanthos () is a former municipality in Chalkidiki, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Aristotelis, of which it is a municipal unit. Population 8,274 (2021). The seat of the former municipality was ...

Chalkidiki Chalkidiki (; , alternatively Halkidiki), also known as Chalcidice, 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 reg ...

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

Ancient history

In 480 BC, Xerxes, King of

Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

, opened a canal for his fleet to pass through. He did this in order to avoid rounding the edge of Athos peninsula, where Mardonius saw his fleet being destroyed ten years earlier due to extreme weather conditions. This is the place where the first attempt of the Persians to conquer the Greek cities-states had failed. The canal needed several years to be built and hundreds of residents of the area (mainly Acanthians, since

Acanthus Acanthus (: acanthus, rarely acanthuses in English, or acanthi in Latin), its feminine form acantha (plural: acanthae), the Latinised form of the ancient Greek word acanthos or akanthos, or the prefix acantho-, may refer to: Biology *Acanthus ...

, modern

Ierissos Ierissos () is a small town on the east coast of the Akti peninsula in Chalkidiki, Greece. It is located 115 km from Thessaloniki, and 10 km from the border of the Autonomous Monastic State of the Holy Mountain, or Mount Athos. It is th ...

, is situated only 5 km away, but also residents of Sani and Ouranoupolis) were used by Xerxes as slaves for the completion of the canal. It is commonly regarded as the site of the world's first offshore wind farm.

Modern origins

The village today is populated by the descendants of immigrants from Roda (now Narlı), and people from various other villages who were forced to leave during the

population exchange between Greece and Turkey The 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey stemmed from the "Convention Concerning the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations" signed at Lausanne, Switzerland, on 30 January 1923, by the governments of Greece and Turkey. It involv ...

. It is considered, by many, to be the largest settlement of refugees coming to North Halkidiki after the

Greek Genocide The Greek genocide (), which included the Pontic genocide, was the systematic killing of the Christian Ottoman Greek population of Anatolia, which was carried out mainly during World War I and its aftermath (1914–1922) – including the T ...

Etymology and Roda of Asia Minor

Nea Roda is named after the original village called Roda (now the Turkish village of Narlı). Rodi (Ρόδι), meaning pomegranate, is the root of the word Roda which means "many pomegranates"; preceded by "Nea" (Νέα), meaning new. This due to an abundance pomegranate trees in the original village. This can be seen even today in the new village, where many people still have pomegranate trees in their backyard. Roda/Narli is a coastal village in the western part of the Cyzicus Peninsula, 12 km northwest of Artaki (today called

Erdek Erdek is a municipality and district of Balıkesir Province, Turkey. Its area is 307 km2, and its population is 31,902 (2022). Located on the Kapıdağ Peninsula, on the north coast of the Gulf of Erdek at the south of the Sea of Marmara, ...

) and 28 km west of Michaniona. The Greek name of the settlement was Roda (registered in the book of the metropolis) and the Turkish (presented in official Ottoman documents) was Rutya. In the early 20th century, the village had almost 200 houses, 150 of which were christian and 50 of which were muslim. The village inhabitants spoke the Greek language but on the contrary, the only ones knowing the Turkish language were those occupied in shipping. Millennia of Greek habitation and history was erased in a few short years in order to rid the region of the indigenous Greek Orthodox Christian peoples of Turkey.

Today

Today, Nea Roda is a modern village with 1,192 residents (2011 census), making it the second biggest town of the municipal unit of Stagira-Akanthos after

Fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment (Freshwater ecosystem, freshwater or Marine ecosystem, marine), but may also be caught from Fish stocking, stocked Body of water, ...

tourism Tourism is travel for pleasure, and the Commerce, commercial activity of providing and supporting such travel. World Tourism Organization, UN Tourism defines tourism more generally, in terms which go "beyond the common perception of tourism as ...

and

agriculture Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

are the people's main occupations.

Gallery

File:IMG_Nea_Roda.JPG, View of the village File:102_voulitsa.JPG, ''Voulitsa'' beach File:Nea_Roda_Beach.JPG, Beach in Nea Roda

References

External links

Nea RodaOfficial website of Municipality of Stagíra-Ákanthos

360° virtual tour and information about Nea Roda, from 360sites.gr
{{Aristotelis div Populated places in Chalkidiki Aristotelis (municipality)