Third Reich and Mount Athos 🇬🇷☦︎
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🇬🇷☦︎ 1944, German soldiers visit the St. Panteleimon Monastery. They meet the Greek monks, who show them around the gallery, which has a portrait of Adolf Hitler!
🇬🇷☦︎ May 22 1941, Wehrmacht officers visit a monastery in Mount Athos.
On April 13 1941, the holy bishopric of Mount Athos sent a letter to Germany, addressed to Hitler. They asked him to take the Athonite peninsula under his "high protection and guardianship." Also, they asked God to grant Hitler "health and longevity."
Hitler's response to the request was immediate and positive. Bulgarian troops were explicitly forbidden to enter Mount Athos. A small German presence of a few military policemen of the Feldgendarmerie and Wehrmacht soldiers was ordered to guard the peninsula.
In the summer of 1941, a German scientific team led by Franz Dölger (a German Byzantinologist) visited Mount Athos.
The visit was organized by the "Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg" taskforce with the goal of studying the most important documents and manuscripts that were kept in the monasteries, as well as photographing them.
The "Tragos" (parchment made of goat skin), the first Charter of Mount Athos (972 AD), with the signature of the emperor Ioannis Tsimiskis, which is kept in Karyes and is the most important relic of the Athonite State, opened for Franz Dölger.
We wanted to photograph an image of the Virgin Mary, an old monk shouted that this was impossible. But then, he turned around and said: "With you Germans the Virgin Mary can make an exception, because you are in a holy war against the enemies of God, the Bolsheviks!" - Dölger
"The synod of Mount Athos invokes the blessing of heaven upon the victorious arms of the Führer. Wherever the German divisions enter, religious life is reborn again."
Greek National-Socialist Newspaper "Νέα Ευρώπη" June 19, 1943.
Christmas 1943, German soldiers sit under the portrait of Hitler in a monastery in Mount Athos.
A German soldier and a Greek monk reading the Greek edition of the National-Socialist magazine "Signal".
One of the most fascinating stories is the emergency landing of a German seaplane near the beach of Agios Pavlos. There was one small problem: there was a woman on board! The female pilot could not step ashore as it is strictly forbidden for women to enter Mount Athos.
The problem was solved thanks to the wisdom of the monks. The woman was transferred to a fisherman's hut with stilts so she wouldn't touch the ground, and the hut was for a short period of time, declared autonomous from Mount Athos! They repaired the damage and left the next day.
Wehrmacht soldiers in the olive grove outside the Stavronikita Monastery.
German soldiers pose, one of them is wearing a cassock for the commemorative photo.
🇷🇴☦︎ Romanian monks of Mount Athos pose with Oberfeldwebel Hans Nageller in a room with portraits of King Charles I of Romania.
May 29 1944, Farewell on the beach of the Monastery of Iviron.
May 29 1944, German soldiers leaving Mount Athos by boat.
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