Alexopoulos, G; Fouseki, K; (2016) Gender exclusion and local values versus universal cultural heritage significance: the Avaton debate on the monastic community of Mount Athos. European Journal of Post-Classical Archaeologies , 6 pp. 235-254.

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Abstract

This article explores the discrepancy between ‘universal values’ and ‘local values’ in the case of world heritage sites of sacred/religious nature. It focuses on the example of the world heritage site of Mount Athos, a self-administered peninsula in Northern Greece inhabited by an Orthodox monastic peninsula and accessible only to male visitors/pilgrims. Special emphasis will be placed on the Avaton rule (prohibition of access to women) which has constituted an issue of debate since the inclusion of Greece in the European Union and, to some extent, since the inscription of Mt Athos to the World Heritage List. The issue of Avaton generates the question: “should a religious site of local, national and international significance that excludes half of the world population be designated as a heritage place of universal value?”

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