Ithaca (; , ) was, in Greek mythology, the island home of the hero Odysseus. The specific location of the island, as it was described in Homer's Odyssey, is a matter for debate. Modern Ithaca has traditionally been accepted to be Homer's island, but alternative locations have been theorized.
The central characters of the epic, such as Odysseus, Achilles, Agamemnon and Hector, are traditionally considered fictional figures from folklore, but aspects of the Homeric story may have some basis in actual historical events or people. This, and the extremely detailed geographic descriptions in the epic itself, have invited investigation of the possibility that Homer's heroes might have existed and that the location of the sites described therein might be found.
Heinrich Schliemann believed he tracked down several of the more famous traditions surrounding these heroes. Many locations around the Mediterranean were claimed to have been the heroes' homes, such as the ruins at Mycenae and the little hill near the western Turkish town of Hissarlik. Schliemann's work and excavations proposed, to a very skeptical world, that Homer's Agamemnon had lived at Mycenae, and that "Troy" itself indeed had existed at Hisarlik. Much work has been done to identify other Homeric sites such as the palace of Nestor at Pylos. These attempts have been the subject of much scholarly research, archaeological work, and controversy.
Some of the first theories on the location of Homer's Ithaca were formulated as early as the 2nd century BC. Each approach to identifying a location has been different, varying in degrees of scientific procedure, empirical investigation, informed hypothesis, wishful thinking, fervent belief, and sheer fantasy. Each investigator and each investigation merits interest, as an indicator both of the temper of the times in which a particular theory was developed, and of the perennial interest in Odysseus and the possible facts of his life. Some of the latest approaches to locating Homer's Ithaca resemble some of the earliest.
Proposed locations Theorists, and excavations elsewhere, on the location of Homer's Ithaca:
Eratosthenes (276 BC – 194 BC), as recorded by Strabo, believed that there was no Ithaca—i.e., that it was entirely an imaginary invention of Homer's. Demetrius of Scepsis (near Troy)—writing mid-2nd century BC (near Troy)—source used by Strabo (below). See Bittlestone/Diggle/Underhill (below): James Diggle at p. 508. Apollodorus of Athens (born )—writing mid-2nd century BC—source used by Strabo (below), and Apollodorus also relied upon Demetrius of Scepsis (above). 244, F 154-207. See Bittlestone/Diggle/Underhill (below): James Diggle at p. 508. Strabo (63/4 BC – ) seems, at Geography 8.3.26, to identify Homer's Ithaca with Ithaki; but in 10.2.12, he seems rather to identify it with Lefkada.
William Gell—writing in 1807—believed that Homer's Ithaca was on the Aetos isthmus of Ithaki island, facing east, in or near the bay of Vathy.
William M. Leake—writing in 1835—thought Ithaca was on the northwestern coast of Ithaki island, near Polis Bay.
Théophile Cailleux—writing in 1878—located Ithaca in south-west Spain, in the delta of the Guadalete, near Cádiz.
Samuel Butler developed a controversial theory that the Odyssey came from the pen of a young Sicilian woman, who presents herself in the poem as Nausicaa, and that the scenes of the poem reflected the coast of Sicily, especially the territory of Trapani and its nearby islands. He described what he said was the evidence for this theory in his The Authoress of the Odyssey (1897) and in the introduction and footnotes to his prose translation of the Odyssey (1900). Robert Graves elaborated on this hypothesis in his novel Homer's Daughter. G. Volterras—writing in 1903—identified Ithaca with Paliki, believing that the latter may have once been an island due to the existence of "Strabo's channel" at the isthmus which now separates Paliki and Kefalonia (see Bittlestone et al., below).
A.E.H. Goekoop—writing in 1908—believed Ithaca was in southwestern Kefalonia island, on the St. George hilltop near Mazarakata village, southeast of the city of Argostoli, with its harbor at Minies near the modern airport.
Wilhelm Dörpfeld—writing in 1927, and having performed extensive excavations at various locations of Ithaca and Lefkada—proposed that the palace of Odysseus was located west of Nidri at the south coast of Lefkada.
Lord Rennell of Rodd—writing in 1927—believed that Ithaca was on Ithaki island.
Walter Abel Heurtley and his protégé Sylvia Benton—working in the late 1920s and early 1930s—believed that Ithaca was on Ithaki island; their excavations at the Polis Bay harbor turned up artifacts from the 8th- to 9th-centuries BC, and Benton also carried out excavations in the so-called Polis Cave that she interpreted in the light of an alleged connection to Odysseus. However, later research has shown that the structures there show no particular peculiarities for the possible lifetime of the hero.Deoudi, Maria (2008). Ithake: Die Polis-Höhle, Odysseus und die Nymphen [Ithake: The Polis Cave, Odysseus and the Nymphs]. Thessaloniki: University Studio Press, (see also the review of this work by Jorrit Kelder). C.H. Goekoop (grandson of A.E.H. Goekoop)—writing in 1990—thought that Ithaca was on Kefalonia, but in the northern Erissos region, near the town of Fiscardo.
E.S. Tsimaratos—published (posthumously) in 1998—thought that Ithaca was in central Kefalonia, agreeing with interpretations of Strabo that read him as indicating that Paliki was once cut off from the rest of Kefalonia.
J.V. Luce (1920-2011)—writing in 1998—believed that Ithaca was on Ithaki island.
Nicolas G. Livadas (author) and Constantine Bisticas (editor, translator) locate Odysseus' palace on the Paliki peninsula of Kefalonia, near the village of Livadi.
Henriette Putman Cramer and Gerasimos Metaxas believe that the center of Homeric Ithaca was in south-east Kefalonia, where the village of Poros (in the Eleios-Pronnoi municipality) is now situated.
Gilles Le Noan—writing in 1989–2005—suggested Paliki as the location of Ithaca, but discounted the geology supporting "Strabo's channel".
Christos Tzakos—writing 1999–2005—believed Ithaca was on Ithaki island.
Robert Bittlestone, James Diggle, and John Underhill—first working in 2003—believe that Paliki is the location of Ithaca, and previously also held that "Strabo's channel" once separated Ithaca from the rest of Cephalonia (see: Odysseus Unbound), though the team has since recanted this particular aspect of their original proposal. This theory has not been generally accepted on grounds of geology, archaeology,Christina Souyoudzoglou-Haywood, “Archaeology and the search for Homeric Ithaca: the case of Mycenaean Kephalonia,” Acta Archaeologica, vol. 89, no. 1 (December, 2018), pp. 145-158. philology,George Huxley, Review of Odysseus Unbound in Hermathena, no. 182 (Summer 2007), pp. 165-169Barbara Graziosi, Review of Odysseus Unbound in Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. 128 (November, 2008), pp. 178-180. or historical and Homeric analysis.Jonathan Brown, In Search of Homeric Ithaca (Canberra: Parrot Press, 2020), pp. 321-333. "What is clearly missing," wrote Dr. Christine Haywood, reviewing Odysseus Unbound, "is a good knowledge of the complexities of Homeric language, and the support of archaeology." Odysseus Unbound website Athenagoras Eleutheriuo argued that Paxos was Homeric Ithaca.
Dimitris I. Paizis-Danias published ten maps of Cephallenian theories, and argued that Homer's Ithaca was on Ithaki.
Felice Vinci has suggested that many Homeric places can be identified in the geographic landscape of the Baltic.
Manolis Koutlis placed Ithaca on Faial, in the Azores.
Professor Thanasis J. Papadopoulos located Ithaca on Ithaki, after a team from the University of Ioannina—led by himself and his wife, fellow archaeologist Professor Litsa Kontorli-Papadopoulou—excavated the "School of Homer" archaeological site in northern Ithaki. They concluded it was actually a Mycenaean citadel in line with a Bronze Age civilisation around the supposed time of Odysseus, or of a figure which may have inspired the Homeric poems. The site is now referred to as the "Palace of Odysseus" and was presented by the authors to the University in 2016.
Jane Cochrane—writing in 2019—located Ithaca on Ithaki after analysing the context provided in the poem against the geography and archaeology of the island, with the assistance of classics professor George L. Huxley.
Jonathan Brown located Ithaca on Ithaki after travelling to Kefalonia, Corfu, Sicily, Spain, Denmark, and the Azores to examine other theories; he has since published a meta-analysis on the topic, covering geographic, historical, and archaeological evidence. National Library of Australia, Trove Makis Metaxis, former Mayor of Cephalonia, located Ithaca on Cephalonia (also transcribed—as above—as Kefalonia) at the site of a Myceanean tholos.
See also Geography of the Odyssey Historicity of the Homeric epics Trojan War Where Troy Once Stood
Notes and references Notes
References
Several of the floruit dates above are taken from Wikipedia articles about the writers.
Further reading Brown, Jonathan. In search of Homeric Ithaca, Canberra, Parrot Press, 2020. Le Noan, Gilles. À la recherche d'Ithaque: essai sur la localisation de la patrie d'Ulysse, Quincy-sous-Sénart, Éd. Tremen, 2001.
External links www.friendsofhomer.gr Odysseus Unbound website; Odysseus Unbound discussion forum Collection of Homer-related links
Wake of Odysseus, on localization by Jonathan Burgess The Perseus Digital Library, Tufts University Perseus at Tufts, Greek & Roman materials Perseus at Tufts, a search on "homer*", which currently reaches 77 results, including "homeric": Art objects (1), Images (8), Reference articles (6), Text sections (19), Source citations (30), Texts (13)