The state of Greece (officially - the Greek Republic) is located in Europe, in its southern tip. The population of Greece also (the fourth part) lives on the islands located in the Aegean Sea. Most people are concentrated in especially large cities such as Athens (the capital of the state) and Thessaloniki. According to data for 2008, the urban population of Greece was 61% of the total population.
According to the census
According to the 2012 census, the bulk (93%) of the inhabitants are Greeks. The remaining population of Greece is composed of Albanians, Turks, Armenians, Russians, Ukrainians, Bulgarians, Romanians, Georgians. It should be noted that Greece is one of the few EU states that in 1998 and 2001 carried out mass legalization of all foreign citizens (illegal immigrants) in the country. As a result, more than half a million people legalized their stay in the country, which is certainly an impressive figure for the 11 millionth republic. They also replenished the population of Greece.
Background
Such a diversity of nationalities is due to historical conditions. Greeks are a nation that began to form at the beginning of the second millennium BC. e. The beginning was the invasion of the Achaean, Ionian and Doric tribes that came from Illyria and the Danube on the Balkan Peninsula. Initially, the population of Ancient Greece was called Epirus Dorians. Residents of the then Italy (Italica) designated this name all the tribes that inhabited the Balkan Peninsula.
Hellenes
The Greeks themselves called themselves exclusively Hellenes (Indo-European group of peoples). These tribes moved in several streams. As a result of the last Doric invasion, the islands of the Aegean Sea (including the once-powerful Crete, which had weakened and had fallen into decay by that time) and the coast of Asia Minor were settled. The Greeks settled along the Black Sea coast and also in the Mediterranean. During the Hellenistic period, associated with the campaigns of Alexander the Great, the Greeks penetrated and settled in the Near East and Central Asia. In 148 BC e. the Romans conquer Macedonia, and Greece becomes part of the Roman Empire. Then, during the partition of the Roman Empire, the Greek provinces passed to Byzantium. Subsequently, the penetration of barbarians (primarily Slavic tribes) to the Balkans in the 6th â 7th centuries BC followed. e., however, their settlements in southern Macedonia were completely destroyed by the Greek population.
Turkish rule
About four centuries, Greece was under the oppression of Ottoman Turkey, but Turkish influence was negligible. At the end of the First World War, there was a wave of mass migrations, which led to an increase in the homogeneity of the composition of the country. By the middle of the 20th century, the Greek population (the bulk) was made up of Greeks.
Today's situation
Now the increase in women in the Greek Republic is 200 thousand more than men. The reason is simple - the male population goes abroad in search of work, which has become commonplace for Greece. They leave mainly from economically undeveloped areas, such as the islands of the Aegean and Ionian Seas, Peloponnese, Epirus and Thrace. It is believed that the Greeks are an aging nation. However, this statement can be called controversial, if only because Greece occupies the 26th place in the world in terms of average life expectancy, you see, not the least. For men, this is 77.11 years old, for women - 82.37. The total figure is 79.66 years. However, in terms of growth, Greece in 2012 took 188th place in the world. For one hundred people, the birth rate is 9.34. This figure indicates that the average number of children born by Greek women is 1.37 children per year.
Religion
As for religion, for the most part it is Orthodoxy. And the Catholic faith is distributed mainly on the islands of the Aegean. Muslims can only be found on the island of Rhodes.
According to studies conducted in 2013, the population of Greece living in an area of ââ131,957 square kilometers amounted to about 11.3 million people. According to these indicators, Greece ranked 74th in the world.