 On the way to Ithaca…
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 Ithaca of Odysseus, the homeland of this ingenious Homeric hero is still the “nostimo imar” (the desire of returning to a favorite destination) for several researchers and travelers. For the sake of Ithaca Odysseus suffered a lot, but returned to his homeland a winner.
The researches of Homer’s Ithaca will start their researches in the island in a few months. The Dutch Fugro NV company will use its modern equipment, which normally uses in finding oil sites, to locate the homeland of Odysseus. A team of British archaeologists thinks that Ithaca was in Kefalonia and not in the present homonym island. The researches will begin in August and will last three years.
More specifically, they will focalize their researches to the peninsula of Paliki in Kefalonia, which is thought to be a different island.
The British amateur archaeologist Robert Bittlestone inspired this theory in 2003, as he was reading about Greece. The two British academics, James Dingle ( Professor of Ancient Greek Language in the University of Cambridge) and John Anderhill (Professor of Statigraphy in the University of Edinburg) soon adopted Bittlestone’s stances.
According to British researchers, Homer says that Ithaca was the most distanced Ionian island with low mountains. The recent Ithaca though is hilly and closest to the Epirotic Greece, while Paliki peninsula is flat. These three researchers believe that Ithaca was divided from Kefalonia through a narrow strip of sea, which was disappeared after several earthquakes.
Having full support of the Greek Geological Company and the Dutch Fugro NV, the team of the British archaeologists will start the researches in order to prove that Ithaca was in Kefalonia. They are planning on examining the subsoil between Paliki and the rest of Kefalonia in order to find out if it is consisted of rocks or lees.
They will use the modern technology, which is normally used in finding oil sites. The company will insert a sensor in the bores and will map the bottom of the sea with a sonar.
Date: 29/3/2007
Author: KONTOSOROU ANTHI |
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