Greece Host Community

Gazi County, with a population of about 20,000, is located near the city of Iraklion a few kilometers from the Aegean Sea. While Global Volunteers has been working at various locations in Greece since 1996, the programs in Gazi began in summer 2005. Gazi is considered a "bedroom community" for Iraklion, and provides a quiet, modern contrast to the island's economic and political center. Ancient sites - well within the boundaries of the greater Gazi area - tell of the nation's chaotic history.

The story of European civilization really begins on the island of Crete, with a civilization that probably thought of itself as Asian (in fact, Crete is closer to Asia than it is to Europe). The Minoan people were traders, developing the most advanced navy that had ever been seen. All of this concentrated mercantile activity produced great wealth, which went into massive building projects, art, and technological development. The Minoan palaces were centers of international trade. From the artifacts left behind, we know that they traded with other cultures of the eastern Mediterranean, such as Egypt. Knossos on Crete, one of the most important civilizations in Greek history, was probably the ceremonial and political center of the Minoan culture.

A Dark Age followed, until around 800 BC a new Hellenic Greece emerged. The term "Hellenic," is used often in referring to the people of Greece - the ancient civilization of Hellas in what is modern Greece. These people, called Hellenes, reached their peak of power duing the 5th century BC. It was this Greece of city-states that established colonies along the Mediterranean, resisted Persian invasions, and whose culture would be the basis of Hellenistic civilization that followed the empire of Alexander the Great. Around 1700 BC, a large disturbance, probably an earthquake, (or possibly an invasion from Turkey) devastated the society. But the population rose again, and the palaces were rebuilt even larger than before. Around 1400 AD the Turks (Ottoman Empire) savagely invaded and then occupied Greece for a period of about 400 years. Read more about Crete's culture and people.