Holy Church of Saint Panteleimon — Attraction in Municipality of Thessaloniki

Right where Arrianou and Iasonidou streets are met, and really close to the Arch of Galerius and the Rotonda church, there stands the Church of Agios Panteleimon. The naming of the church is generally new, depending on the churche’s age. It has its origins deep in the byzantian history of the Theotokou Perivleptou church (aka Isaac’s church) named after its founder, archbishop Jacob (1295-1314), later to be monk Isaac.

This church was a spiritual center during the 14th century and was a key point of reference of the writing and teaching activities of the great non-Greeks Thomas Magistros and Matthew Blastaris.

Agios Panteleimon church belongs to a characteristic architectonic specimen of the Palaiologian renaissance in Thessaloniki. This type of churches was spread through the city with more than one domes and two tunnels leading to little side chapels to be preferable for that time period.

The wall painting are dated to the late 13th century to the start of the 14th one, and several of them still exist today in good condition. The most iconic being the picturing of Saint Jacob the Adelfotheon, who shares the same name as the archbishop and founder of the temple.

In the middle of the 16th century (1568-1571) the church was converted to a mosque by the name of “Isaacie Mosque” (meaning= Isaac’s mosque). All the wall paintings and the front of the church are calcined and a minaret is built, of which the base is still saved till today, and a marble fountain is also built out in the curtilage.

After the great earthquake of the 1978, many restorations took place in the church and it reached the state it...

The Church of Saint Panteleimon is a late Byzantine church in Thessaloniki, Greece, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Interior

The church lies in the eastern part of the old city, near the Tomb of Galerius (the "Rotunda"). Its current dedication to Saint Panteleimon was given to the church after the end of Ottoman rule in 1912, and its original dedication is therefore disputed. In Ottoman times, it was converted into a mosque in 1548 and became known as Ishakiye Camii ("Mosque of Ishak [Isaac]"), which in the prevailing scholarly interpretation points to an identification with the late Byzantine Monastery of the Virgin Peribleptos, also known as the Monastery of Kyr Isaac after its founder Jacob, who was the city's metropolitan bishop in 1295–1315 and became a monk with the monastic name of Isaac.

The church is of the tetrastyle cross-in-square type, with a narthex and a (now destroyed) ambulatory that is connected to two chapels (still extant). Very few of the building's original wall paintings survive. Ottoman remains include the base of the demolished minaret and a...

Small in size church located near the old Cassadrean Gate and north of the Byzantine central avenue, Leoforos. The temple is close to Rotunda and the arch of Galerius. An unearthly touch created by radians of natural light shining in front of the temple make the visitor feel closer to the creator. The church is of the tetrastyle cross-in-square type, with a narthex and a (now destroyed) ambulatory that is connected to two chapels (still extant). The architectural style is following the typical style of the Byzantine churches in Thessaloniki during the Paleologian Era (1261-1453). The few surviving frescoes are from the early...