The transformation of Mount Athos from a sparsely inhabited wildness to one of the great monastic centres of the Eastern Mediterranean is a complex story. The origins of the “Hagiorite” (literally “Holy Mountain”) monastic community are thought to lie with Peter the Athonite (eighth-ninth century), a semi-legendary figure. According to his vita, Peter spent five decades in isolation on Mount Athos. His legend served as a model for the communities of hermits that arose on the Holy Mountain, and which dominated monastic life there until the middle of the tenth century. From that time onward, Mount Athos became the site of great communal monasteries, with institutions like the Great Lavra, Vatopedi, and Iviron housing hundreds of monks and exercising considerable cultural, economic, and even political power.
The very first surviving imperial privilege for Mount Athos—an ordinance of Emperor Basil I (r. 867–886) of the rule, which prohibited the presence of women and female animals on the Holy Mountain, in theory excluded visits by female pilgrims and patrons.