In the Ancient World, Greece consisted of Athens and Sparta, as well as the many other city states, and

was the beginning of democracy, laying the foundation for many aspects of Rome. With an approximate
population of 10,775,643 people as of July 2015, the mountainous region of Greece has existed longer
than many of its modern day European counterparts. Although the initial residents of Greece had explored
the Mediterranean as early as the 8th century B.C.E., they did not begin to consolidate into city states, or
polis, until around the 5th century B.C.E. These states initially formed because of Greeces mountainous
topography, and this contributed to why Greece never became a truly unified empire, and why the city
states typically grew as separate entities. In 328 B.C.E., the Macedonian forces from the North began
their invasion of Greece, and soon afterwards their leaders, Philip II and his son Alexander the Great had
begun to build their empire East until India, and South until Egypt. They launched what would be known
as the Hellenistic Age, when Greek culture, particularly art and writing styles, were transferred around the
new territory conquered by Alexander the Great. This newly built state made it much easier for the
Romans to gain land once they invaded Greece, as they inherited the conquests of Alexander the Great, as
well as the intense cultural presence that remained because of the Hellenistic Age. This Greek Culture
became a huge part of Rome, the pre-Christianity religion consisting of a nearly exact copy of the old
Greek religion. Once the Roman Empire split and the West subsequently fell in 476 C.E., Greece became
a territory of the Byzantine Empire. In 1453 when the Byzantines fell to the Turks, Greece can under
Ottoman control, and remained that way until the early 1800s, when Greece again became an independent
state. Greece maintained its present size for a while longer, but was invaded by Nazi forces during World
War Two. Even after Germany withdrew from the country after the war, civil war broke out, with
communist parties vying to overthrow the monarchy that had been set up in place of dictatorship. Even
though the communists were defeated by the existing forces, they still lingered, causing turmoil among
the population. The monarchy eventually was overthrown, however, and today is a Democratic Republic.
Galaktoboureko, besides being very hard to pronounce, is a dish whose origins are profoundly
Greek, and reflect all the different cultures who have influenced that of the traditional Greeks throughout
history. The Albanian/Turkish phyllo pastry, combined with the Roman love for fruit and wine, and the
Greek tradition of custard pies make up this dessert, just as each nation contributed to what is Greece
today. The dessert is baked in a deep dish, and the phyllo pastry is placed along the sides of the dish, a
sort of crust for the filling that is inside.