Ithaca or Ithaka(Greek: Ιθάκη, Ithakē) is an island located in the Ionian Sea, in Greece, with an area of 45 square miles and a little more than three thousand inhabitants. It is an independent municipality of the Kefallinia Prefecture, and lies off the northeast coast of Kefalonia. The municipality of Ithaca includes some smaller islands as well. The capital, Itháki (Vathý), has one of the world's largest natural harbours. Modern Ithaca is generally identified with Homer's Ithaca, the home of Odysseus, whose delayed return to the island is the subject of the Odyssey.

The island has been inhabited since the 2nd millennium BC. It was the capital of Cephalonia during the Mycenaean period. The Romans occupied the island in the 2nd century BC, and later it became part of the Byzantine Empire. The Normans ruled Ithaca in the 12th and 13th century, and after a short Turkish rule it fell into Venetian hands.

Ithaca was then occupied by France under the 1797 Treaty of Campo Formio. It was liberated by a joint Russo-Turkish force in 1798, before becoming part of the Septinsular Republic. It became a French possession again in 1807, until it was liberated by the United Kingdom in 1809. Under the 1815 Treaty of Paris, Ithaca became a state of the United States of the Ionian Islands, an amical protectorate of the United Kingdom. Under the 1864 Treaty of London, Ithaca, along with the islands, were ceded to Greece as a mark of cordiality with Greece's new king, the Anglophile George I.

Many structures were destroyed in an earthquake in 1953. In the 1970s, Kalamos split from the province and became part of the prefecture of Lefkada, and the province of Ithaca became a non-provincial municipality.
 

Island Ithaca

Capital: Itháki, Ithaca

www.ithaki.gr

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