Ithaca / Thiaki

(Local Name: Ithakí) Area of island: 93 sq. km/36 sq. mi

Altitude: 808m/2,500ft

Population: 4,000

Chief town: Vathy (Itháki)

Ithaca (popularly called Thiaki) is a rocky island separated from Kefalloniá by a channel 4 km/2.5 mi wide and almost cut in two by the long Gulf of Mólos on its east side; the isthmus joining the two halves, at Mt Aetós (380 m/1,247ft), is only 600m/660yd wide. In the north of the island rises the Ani range of hills (Mt Neritos, 808 m/2,651ft), in the south Mt Stefani (671 m/2,202 ft). Much of the island has been marked by karstic action, but agriculture is possible in a few fertile valleys. Present-day Ithaca is generally accepted as being Odysseus's island of Ithaca, as described in the "Odyssey", though Wilhelm Dörpfeld located the Homeric Ithaca on the island of Lefkás.

The earliest finds of pottery point to a first settlement of the island towards the end of the third millennium B.C. A number of Mycenaean sites have been identified, though their poverty is difficult to reconcile with the wealthy Homeric Ithaca, which is dated to the Mycenaean period. During the first millennium B.C., however, the island seems to have attained a degree of prosperity through an active trade with mainland Greece and Italy.

From Roman times Ithaca shared the destinies of the other Ionian Islands. During the Middle Ages the inhabitants were driven out by pirates, who established their base in what is now Vathy. In the 17th century the island was resettled by peasants from Kefalloniá. After a long history of devastating raids and earthquakes practically all Ithaca's older buildings have been destroyed.

Ferry from Patras via Sámi (Kefalloniá), several times weekly.