Tucked away in the mountains in northwest Greece lies a village that is one of the country’s best-kept secrets. Located on the northeastern slopes of Mount Kasidiaris overlooking the valley of Ano Kalamas, some 29 miles from Ioannina, the capital of Epirus, lies the abandoned mountain village of Paleo Mavronoros. Its long history speaks of courageous resistance to tyrannical overlords.
Sometime between the mid-19th century, a band of Greek villagers from the nearby villages of Glusta, Gardiki, Vortopia and Tziouboukatika, who were unhappy under Ottoman rule, banded together and made a pact to create a new village. Searching for a place that would be remote enough to protect them from their Ottoman overlords, they decided to climb up Cassidiari Mountain. There, at an altitude of approximately 3,200 feet, they built the new village of Paleo Mavronoros. It earned its name, “The Black Mountain” in Greek, thanks to how dark and ominous the site felt each time a storm swept through the region.
One of the first buildings the new band of villagers constructed was the church of Saint George. The villagers’ houses were all two-storey high and made of rock. For around half a century, the new townspeople got on with their lives until 1912, when the Turks attacked and burned down the entire village of Paleo Mavronoros.
Only 50 years after the new settlement was founded, the villagers suffered yet again from destruction caused by hatred and war. However, the people of Mavronoros refused to surrender and rebuilt the town.
However, people began to leave the village during the decades immediately after the creation of the modern Greek state. Many families who moved out went to a new settlement, established at a lower altitude in the years after World War 2. The last man who lived in the village moved away in 1964. Paleo Mavronoros has sat abandoned ever since, falling into a state of disrepair. Today, visitors have the chance to explore a mountain village that acts like a time machine back to the 1960s.
Yet, the eerie town of Paleo Mavronoros is far from alone. Across Europe and further afield, there are an abundance of abandoned settlements that have since been reclaimed by nature and are waiting to be explored by brave tourists with a craving for the darker side of history.
This includes a colourful Spanish town, founded in the ninth century, was once a powerful hub with some 15 municipalities under its control. However, in the 1950s, dictator Francisco Franco ordered plans to build a series of dams, the largest of which was the Gabriel y Galán reservoir, which surrounded the town of Granadilla. The government confiscated the land, and the residents were forced to leave their homes due to the threat of possible floods.
The last residents left in 1964, and many moved to surrounding towns with the hope that they could return. However, some 50 years later, the town has still not flooded, and the residents are no closer to moving back.
“They kicked us out, claiming that the dam would flood the town, which was impossible because the town is higher than the dam,” Eugenio Jiménez, president of the Association Sons of Granadilla, told the BBC in 2022. “But those were times of dictatorship, and we had no rights. But what truly frustrates me is that during democratic times, I’ve been struggling for the recovery of Granadilla with the former children’s association, and no government has listened to us.”
On the other side of the planet sits an eerie ghost town in China, home to over 100 empty mansions. The massive complex known as the State Guest Mansions project was meant to be a lavish neighbourhood housing 260 European-style villas. However, today, it lies abandoned, taken over by farmers, and with animals roaming around.