The Agia Anastasia Monastery of Pharaoholytria is located at the southern foothills of Mount Ombrianos, a branch of Chortiatis, near the town of the basilica of the Prefecture of Thessaloniki. It is a monastery built in the monastery and was built in honor of Agia Anastasia of Pharaoholytria who martyred in 304 AD. during the persecutions of Diocletian.
According to the tradition was founded by Empress Theophano, wife of Leo VI Sofou (866 – 912), in 888 AD. The Saint donated to the Monastery Timios Wood and her dowry, hence the name “Vassilika” in settlement of the region. However, there is no historical evidence of the existence of a monastery during Byzantine times.
In 1522 the monk Theon (later metropolitan of Thessaloniki and the saint) founded the present monastery, in place of the old ruins. Specifically, in the life of the Saint written in the 18th century, it is reported that God and his escort, coming from Mount Athos, “worthy of the monastery of Saint Anastasia, which was then a monodrion, little by little, old and enthralled, , and very capable cells for the brethren, and Christ’s grace was upheld by a hundred and fifteen brothers and disobedient to the commonwealth. “
The acne of the monastery is presented during the Ottoman conquest, when the monastery develops spiritually and economically, as it displays agricultural land in northern Greece, Wallachia and Russia. During the second half of the 16th century, it reached its greatest prosperity after it arrived to mount there about 300 monks, but was destroyed in 1789. The monastery’s contribution to the Revolution of 1821 was important, when it sent privately merchant ships to the naval battle of Koroneos Gulf. It was destroyed again with the rest of the villages in the region during the suppression of the revolution on June 12, 1821.
It was rebuilt in 1832 to reach the beginning of the 20th century with 20 monks. It was rebuilt in 1853. Agios Prokopios later Metropolitan of Iconium, went to the Monastery in 1898 (then Bishop of Amphipolis) as an exarch of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in order to restore unity and peace between the monastic brotherhood. He later was elected Metropolitan of Iconium and martyred in Asia Minor in 1923.
In the later years, between 1921 and 1971, the Ecclesiastical School functioned. Today the monastery belongs to the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, its leader is the Sev. Titularius Metropolitan Miletus Apostolos and has 2 to 3 monks.
The southern and western wings of the monastery are part of the 16th century building. Its katholikon belongs to the type of three-aisled basilica with a dome and dates back to the years after the renovation of 1830.
The monastery also includes the chapel of Saints Kirykou and Ioulittis, which was painted by Galatsian painters in the 19th century, and is one of the few surviving samples of post-Byzantine painting in the area of Halkidiki.
On the outer gate of the monastery there is a Monument to the Battle of the Basilica and captain Captain Hapsa.
