Mon, Apr 20, 2020
The church of St. Athanasius seems to have been built around 1600. It should be considered as very likely that it was burned in 1821 and then (apparently in the 1830s) was repaired. Initially, the main church had to be depicted, but the destruction of 1821 and the indifference to its frescoes brought many damage to the painting ensemble. Nowadays, a few fragments of frescoes on the north wall and the entire representation of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary are saved in the west. Characteristic of this representation is the illustration of the Apostles’ movement on clouds to arrive in time and attend the burial of the Virgin Mary.
Based on the stylistic details of the surviving frescoes, we can say that it is a work of the early 17th century and comes from a painter influenced by the tendencies of Cretan painting, as they were then manifested on Mount Athos.
Undoubtedly the frescoes of St. Athanasius are not unique works of art, they are the usual frescoes of the time, from which many examples exist in the Greek space. However, their presence in Halkidiki, along with the other few, we have mentioned, are the only remnants of an interesting phase of Halkidiki history. Moreover, they point out the tragic reason of the absence of monuments in Halkidiki: the Halkidikians of 1821 did not die alone, they accompanied them to their death and the monuments of their place.