The Hellenic Republic, or Greece for short, was a republican state located in the southeastern corner of Europe, at the southern tip of the Balkan Peninsula. The country consists of more than 3,000 islands in the Peloponnese in the south of the peninsula and in the Aegean Sea. Greece is a strategic connection between Europe, Asia and Africa, and the mainland is bordered by Albania, North Macedonia and Bulgaria from the northwest to the north, and the border with Turkey in the northeast. It is bordered from east to west by the Aegean Sea, the Mediterranean Sea and the Ionian Sea.
Greece is regarded as the birthplace of Western civilization, dating back to ancient Greece. From 3000 BC to 1100 BC, a Minoan civilization appeared in Crete, and a Mycenaean civilization appeared in the Peloponnese Peninsula from 1600 BC to 1050 BC. A slave state was formed in 800 BC and developed into the heyday of the Greek city-states represented by Athens and Sparta in the 5th century BC. It was incorporated into the Roman Empire in 146 BC. It was later the core of the Byzantine Empire, dominated by the Greek language and Greek culture. It was ruled by the Ottoman Empire in the mid-15th century. In 1821, the Greek War of Independence broke out. The Kingdom of Greece was established in 1832. It was changed to a republic in 1974 through a referendum.
Greece is the birthplace of democracy, Western philosophy, the Olympic Games, Western literature, history, political science, scientific and mathematical principles, and Western drama. Greek cultural and technological advances had a great influence on world history, spreading to the Western and Eastern worlds through Alexander the Great and the Byzantine Empire.
Greece is a developed capitalist country and a member of the European Union, the Eurozone, the Schengen Area, and NATO. Greece has a high quality of life and a very high human development index. Its unique culture, tourism, shipping industry and strategic position make it one of the most powerful among the best.
