The name Ithaca comes from the Homeric word 'ἰθὺς', which means straight. This implies that we should assume that the coasts of Ithaca should consist of straight shorelines.
The only reason the Paliki peninsula of Kefalonia was called ITHACA in Homeric times is this alignment,
because the word ITHYS means straight. The photos are from Lepeda and Longo near LIXOURI.
Sometimes the mind turns back to the student years in Thessaloniki…
…Back then, as a Geologist, I accidentally found near Pentalofos of Thessaloniki, on the way to Kilkis, bones from prehistoric animals! As confirmed by the Paleontology Department of Aristotle University, I had discovered (intuitively) the continuation of the rich deposit in such material along the Axios River: Pentalofos 1 deposit.
It was to this fact, then, that my mind turned when I was writing the book THE ISLAND WITH STRAIGHT LINES.
The work of the Symposium on HOMERIC ITHACA in Kritonou had been completed in August 2002, and I took on the task of guiding two “luminaries” of Heidelberg and the ARGOLIS field, in what ultimately "fit" into the 2003 book THE LAST CHANCE.
Es waren der Archäologe Jörg Schäfer und seine Frau Maria, now retired.
-Call us George and Maria. As for Schäfer, it means Shepherd (in perfect Greek)!
-You mean Seferis? (Giorgos Seferis was a great Greek poet awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature) They smiled.
There, in the submerged Alalkomenes, our walk in the open sea with a meter of water in the middle of nowhere remained unforgettable for 'George'.
They cried like little children when I read them pages from my MOZART, my first literary book titled "GOD APOLLO DIED on December 5, 1791 and ASCENDED TO HEAVEN on March 26, 1827", while we were waiting for our food at Mrs. Tasía Mourelátou's restaurant. Schäfer was also a flutist!
A little earlier, and since it was their first time in Paliki, I had taken them to visit Lepeda.
That day, so charged with emotion, upon reaching exactly the spot in this photo, that is, the parking lot of the Municipal Beach of Lixouri, Lepeda, I pulled the handbrake and said something I had thought for the first time:
-Come and see why Paliki was called ITHACA in prehistoric times!
... Many times the greatness of certain things cannot be described.
So many years of research… So many theories struggling to answer the unanswerable, and in the end, all of them, from within, self-criticize and wonder: “Well, these 10 correct arguments of ours… how will we respond to this, if anyone at our book presentation asks us? And that other one? Will anyone even notice?”
…And to be standing before that landscape, which gave the name ITHACA. …To have the STRAITS before you and to wonder:
- Why me?
- Why me, who turned my back on Geology in ’85? Why me, who left behind work and discoveries to become a chess coach?
- Why me, the last one?
-Why should LIVADAS leave for the 'eternal solitude'? WHY?
It is not, my friends, Paliki the HOMERIC ITHACA, just because κεῖται πρὸς ζόφον, αἱ δέ τ᾿ἂνευθε πρὸς ἠῶ τ᾿ ἠέλιόν τε -
it lies to the WEST, while those are in contrast toward the sun and the east.
It is not Homeric Ithaca just because it is χθαμαλὴ πανυπερτάτη low farther away – remote …
… it is HOMERIC ITHACA because it is the only place in the world that has, simply because GOD HAS WRITTEN IT so, straight (STRAIGHT = ΙΘΥΣ) coastlines, scandalously over many visible kilometers.
Just as ONLY in VERGINA is the tomb of Philip...
...Just as the magnificent temple of Athena is destroyed on the ACROPOLIS...
...Just as the PYRAMIDS have stood upright for 5,000 years...
...Just as man is a rational being...
So too must the research into which is the HOMERIC ITHACA come to an end here.
As for the findings: EVERYWHERE, Kefalonia is full, and from EVERYWHERE the PRECIOUS items of 3,000 years had been surgically removed, from areas that no one wanted and no one allowed themselves to admit were the true Ithaca.
When deliberately the research was directed ELSEWHERE, and secretly EVERYTHING was taken because it had been ANONYMOUS for 3,000 years!
Dozens of carved tombs are empty.
Determinations are random because someone wanted them to be.
But even what we say is justified by another fact: It seems to arise from the needs created by the MOVEMENT of POPULATIONS. LEAVING, they took with them whatever they could catch!
Isn't this what we also highlight, by acknowledging that the TOMB of ODYSSEUS, of this HOMERIC ITHACA – of Paliki – is in TZANNATA of PRONNIE, Kefalonia?
And those who plundered it, didn't they coincidentally forget to take the SEAL STONE that was discovered later, just one centimeter deep?
So no one will ever find a clear answer with the archaeological findings in KEFALONIA.
The answer will be given GEOGRAPHICALLY, and it is apart from the low altitude (ΧΘΑΜΑΛΗ) and towards TO THE WEST (ΖΟΦΟΝ)…
It is THE STRAIGHT LINES, the 'ἰθὺς'.
We thank all those who, with anxiety for the truth and the belief that their land was Homeric Ithaca, fought all these years…
We thank them for loving HOMER and everything he SANG.
However, the performance has ended. PALIKI was HOMERIC ITHACA, not because it was separated from the rest of Kefalonia (this never needed to be proven). It was HOMERIC ITHACA once when they spoke the Homeric dialect. Once when 'ἰθὺς' meant STRAIGHT.
Exactly at the time when Odysseus was returning from Troy.
Then, in the years of the ODYSSEY.
At that time, entering the VAST (ΠΟΛΥΒΕΝΘΗ) port of LIVADI, people were impressed by this LEFT coastline, which seemed to have been created as a PORT work by giants.
Like a HARBOR PIER.
Everything STRAIGHT.
All the reefs, all the shoals, ALL THE HAZARDS for their ships.
Back when, according to mythology, if a gentleman tried to dock in this 3rd largest natural harbor of the Mediterranean, to moor his ship ITHYS-AGON (Going straight ahead), he might even have been called ITHAKOS as a nickname?
The Kefalonians know this landscape well. That’s why they love me. Who was I, after all, to them before the book THE ISLAND WITH THE STRAIGHT LINES?
I am highlighting a discovery that cannot be stolen. Something that anyone who has come to Kefalonia can easily see: THE EASTERN STRAIGHT COASTLINE OF PALIKI.
There’s no way this wouldn’t convince even all the well-intentioned Homeric researchers.
STUDY OF THE EASTERN COASTS OF PALIKI
It is not at all difficult for the ordinary reader to understand…
Thirteen successive geological layers inclined at an angle as shown in photo 6. Thirteen successive layers that pass beneath Michalitsata and define the eastern coast of Paliki.
They are perfectly aligned and, after temporarily retreating to a greater depth due to the WEIGHT of the river deposits in the Lixouri area, the deposition there of the rubble from the 1953 earthquake, as well as EROSION, they continue by passing under the hospital's coastal wall and reach Saint Demetrios.
From the research book on Homeric Ithaca 'THE ISLAND WITH THE STRAIGHT LINES,' pages 227 and 228.
The numbering here refers to the color photographs.
ASKYLAKAS
(Margaic Limestone), II Latin, which is shown in photograph 18-black and white (color no. 6), resembles the bottom of Megalakko or Xi. On top of it, the sand of Lepeda (I) was deposited and then that of Xi, which over millions of years became compressed, dried, and took the granular form of sandstone seen in various photographs. In the 6th-18th photograph, the curve of the former seabed between the two geological layers is also visible.
... Only that due to tectonic pressures and therefore seismic movements, it 'tilted to the right' and took an inclination of 30-45 degrees.
This happened slowly and periodically, as the depth of the sea and the distance from the shore changed. Thus, after a marl-μαργαϊκή period a sandstone-ψαμμίτη period followed, and so on.
During the many millions of years that separate us from the Pliocene (geological period), this phenomenon repeated at least 13 times concerning the straight eastern coast of Paliki.
COMPOSITION of the ROCKS of PALIKI according to the Institute of Geological and Mineral Research (IGME).
In the memorandum of the Geological Map, which we presented on page 79 of the book "THE LAST CHANCE" 2003, we read about the composition of the rocks that make up these layers:
“PLIOCENE: Conglomerate, sandstone, and limestone. In the Lower Pleistocene, there is a small stratigraphic gap and a well-stratified, clastic conglomerate phase. Near the base, there is a limestone layer containing an abundance of Echinolampas, which upward transitions into yellowish sand, sandstone, and sandy limestone with occasional thin marl interbeds. Upwards, blue marls dominate, enclosing a rich mollusk fauna, but in the upper part, sequences of fine-grained sandstones and sandy marls reappear. Thickness 100 to 250 m.”
We remind that conglomerates are the rocks that contain rounded old beach pebbles.
Sandstone (I) is a 'coagulated' old beach.
Marl (II) is ASKYLAKAS.
Limestone is the rock that makes up most Greek rocks! It is the one from which we carve stones, break for gravel, see it containing fossils because it was once seabed, and finally, if we drop acid on it, it produces carbon dioxide bubbles:
Finally, if I remember correctly, Echinolampas is the scientific name for that round sea urchin remnant that looks like a lampshade!
Initially, sedimentary rocks, as sediments, are horizontal. Due to pressures, they can be uplifted like a PACKAGE...
Lime Sandstone
Marl
At least 13 layer changes
Pressure of the African Lithospheric Plate beneath the Eurasian Plate.
we will notice that the contact of geological layer (I) with the sea defines a straight line.
Subsequently, the gray of ASKYLAKAS, because it has lower cohesion, is eroded by the disintegration caused by seawater and the force of the waves, leaving behind the limestone-sandstone (of Lepeda), which protrudes...
...And because the whole package, STEREOMETRICALLY, rests against the horizontal surface of the sea, which intersects it in a straight line...
...This contact will THUS DEFINE a STRAIGHT LINE.
THE WORD 'ἰθὺς' IN THE ODYSSEY AND HOW IT IS TRANSLATED - INTERPRETED
In the book "THE ISLAND WITH STRAIGHT LINES" I had borrowed ALL the ITHYS from THE ODYSSEY so that from their interpretation we could be convinced that ITHYS means STRAIGHT. And since Paliki has this alignment and only Paliki, it is therefore the Homeric Ithaca:
.... he went straight to the threshold, ...
Odyssey α' 1.110
... and they immediately raised the sails as the ship was entering ...
Odyssey γ' 3.10
... but come now, go straight to Nestor, leader of horses: ...
Odyssey γ' 3.17
... taking three, who always, in fact, were immediately persuaded ...
Odyssey δ' 4.454
... he scratched carefully and αlign with the leveling string. ...
Odyssey ε' 5.245
... and then he made a rudder, so that it might go straight. ...
Odyssey ε' 5.255
... Then he steered the rudder skillfully ...
Odyssey ε' 5.270
... Then they tried to shoot a ball straight up. ...
Odyssey θ' 8.377
... both the wind and the helmsman guided it straight. ...
Odyssey λ' 11.10
... beautifully, glorious Odysseus, nearby to steer the ship ...
Odyssey μ' 12.82
... both the wind and the helmsman guided it straight. ...
Odyssey μ' 12.152
... shall I go straight to your mother and to your house? ...
Odyssey ο' 15.514
... but just the two of us, you and I, we will immediately examine the nature of women: ...
Odyssey π' 16.304
... and then, shedding tears, she went straight away: ...
Odyssey ρ' 17.33
... and he went straight into the hall among the noble suitors ...
Odyssey ρ' 17.325
... but go and speak a word to your child, and do not hide it, ...
Odyssey σ' 18.171
... he scratched carefully and αlign with the leveling string ...
Odyssey φ' 21.44
πᾶσι μίαν μακρήν, καὶ ἐπὶ στάθμην ἴθυνεν,
ἀμφὶ δὲ γαῖαν ἔναξε: ..."
... first of all he set up the axes, having dug trench
for everyone, a long , and he leveled it flat,
and piled the soil all around ... (to secure it)
Odyssey φ' 21.120-122
... but go, noble Eumaeus, ...
Odyssey χ' 22.157
... went to shout, the terrible things he saw ... (another popular idiom)
Odyssey χ' 22.408
δειρῇ βάλλ᾿ Ὀδυσῆϊ, κάρη δ᾿ ἔκυσ᾿ ἠδὲ προσηύδα: ..."
... but then, weeping, she ran straight at him, and with her hands
she struck Odysseus on the neck, and kissed his head and spoke to him: ...
Odyssey ψ' 23.207-208
... Then they, amazed, went straight ...
Odyssey ω' 24.101
... Thinking about these things, divine Odysseus immediately approached him. ...
Odyssey ω' 24.241
ἀμφοτέρας, Ὀδυσεῦς δὲ λαβὼν κύσε χεῖρ᾿ ἐπὶ καρπῷ, ..."
... Thus he spoke, and Dolios immediately stretched out
both hands, and seizing, Odysseus kissed hands on the wrist ...
Odyssey ω' 24.397-398
We are situated between ΙΘΥΣ-η and ιθυσ-ζ, the one with the rocky outcrops that are visible at Cape Saint George in many photographs. The image extends southward, toward this cape (Proposed name for Alithersis Beach). We turn 180 degrees and photograph toward the north: In the foreground is ΙΘΥΣ-η. In the background is the location of Ai Giannis andΙΘΥΣ-θ, -ι, -ια as a cape, that is, stratigraphic packages No. 9, 10, 11. Slope 30-45 degrees.
MEDON: These things we see here are aligned with the Lepeda, ΙΘΥΣ-ιγ No. 13.
Here the rocks are a few meters away from the beach. The slope of 30-45 degrees is also observed here. They resemble teeth, and I suggest the name MEDONTAS, because Medon was a noble of Ithaca, like those who have estates near this location! ...And because these small Lepeda resemble TEETH-ΟΔΟΝΤΑΣ.
