Tatoi Palace 3.88

Tatoi was the summer palace and 10,000 acre estate of the former Greek Royal Family, and the birthplace of George II of the Hellenes. The area is a densely wooded southeast-facing slope of Mount Parnitha, and its ancient and current official name is Dekeleia. It is located 27 km from the city centre of Athens.Development of the Estate and ownership disputesGeorge I of the Hellenes obtained the estate during the 1880s, purchasing it with private funds he had brought from Denmark. In 1916, during World War I, the house was burned down, possibly at the instigation of the Greek secret police; Queen Sophia being a sister of the Kaiser, the Greek Royal Family was suspected of being pro-German. (See National Schism).In the 1920s, most of the estate was stolen from its owners, but in 1936 it was returned to George II of the Hellenes.During the Second World War, when George II of the Hellenes was in exile and Greeks suffered considerable hardships under German occupation, the woods at Tatoi were chopped down for fuel and corpses were buried in shallow graves.