"Far away from the worries of the rest of humanity, the Simonopetra Monastery towers high above the Aegean Sea on a small peninsula of northeastern Greece. Founded in the mid-14th century, it stands like a fortress with 19 other Eastern Orthodox monasteries and a host of small compounds in a religious community named after snowcapped Mount Athos, background."
—From "The Byzantine Empire: Rome of the East," December 1983, National Geographic magazine
