
Chalcidice is a peninsula of Greece, located within Greek Macedonia. The three-fingered peninsula was first settled by Greek settlers from Chalcis and Eretria in the 8th century BC, hence its name, and a second wave of settlers from Andros arrived in the 6th century BC. Chalcidice was an important theater of the Peloponnesian War, and it was later conquered by King Philip II of Macedon. The region later passed through Roman, Byzantine, Thessalonican, and Ottoman rule, and it was important for its gold mining under Ottoman rule. The peninsula was incorporated into the Kingdom of Greece in 1912 after the Balkan Wars, and many Greek refugees from Thrace and Anatolia were settled in Chalcidice after the Turkish War of Independence. Chalcidice's tourism industry surpassed its agricultural industry during the 1980s, and, by 2021, Chalcidice had a population of 101,324 people.