According to mythology, Halkidiki was the place where a huge battle took place, opposing Zeus and the other Olympian Gods to the Giants, children of Gaea (Mother Earth) and Uranus. The region of Flegra in Chalkidiki -The Place of Fire- is where this epic battle occurred.

According to the myth, one of the Giants, named Egelados (the leader of the Giants), thrown by goddess Athena  was buried underneath. It is considered that Egelados did not die at that time and every so often he tries to struggle out from under the weight of rocks causing earthquakes (the Greek word for earthquake is egelados). Later data indicates that Kassandra took its name from Kassandros (a King of Macedonia).

The Athos peninsula was named after the giant Athos, who during the famous battle, threw a mountain (from Thrace) at the gods, but failed to find his target and the mountain landed at the edge of Chalkidiki.

The second prong received its name from Sithon, the son of God of War Ares or the Sea God Poseidon and Ossa. (The butterfly genre Sithon also got its name from the mythological King)

The lots of similar stories about the Battle of Giants fascinated later poets and artists, and as a result the conflict is one of the most common scenes depicted on ancient pottery and sculpture.

All these myths are connected with the geological phenomena, which are evident in Kassandra, like the subsidence in the centre of the peninsula, and the sulphur springs at Agia Paraskevi. The myths are part of the effort throughout the centuries to explain the oddness of the ground. Scientific research of course, has indicated that the geomorphology of Paleontological Chalkidiki was much more different than nowadays.