Daily Junction.mobi portal<p>One of the most significant debates in unravelling the geography of The Odyssey has been to pinpoint where Ithaca really was.</p>
<p>For a long time, scholars have argued <a href="https://www.the-tls.com/regular-features/mary-beard-a-dons-life/where-was-odysseus-ithaca-blog-post">that it must be the island of Ithaki</a> in the Ionian sea. The problem is that Ithaki is mountainous, while Homer’s Ithaca is “low-lying”.</p>
<p>Researchers from Cambridge and Aberdeen <a href="https://antigonejournal.com/2026/07/in-search-of-ithaca/">have recently proposed</a> that Ithaca was never described as an island in Homer’s description. Instead, they suggest he describes it as land or country that is part of a bigger island.</p>
<p>This would suggest that Paliki, lying on the western coast of Kefalonia, is a better candidate. Geo-scientific investigations and archaeological excavations have uncovered that Paliki was a significant bronze age site, and hence a plausible location. </p>
<p>The locations from Odysseus’s journey might map on to real-world locations, or they might be purely myth. Either way, the inter-relationship of these locations tell us a story of a yearning for home and search for belonging. It also throws light on how the ancient writers saw our world as filled with mystery and dangers. </p>
<p>The geography of The Odyssey is a lens through which to understand the vulnerabilities and fears of men in the ancient Greek world. Maps of Odysseus’s journey might not be real, but then all maps lie.</p>
<p>Maps are only a story we tell ourselves – a journey into the unknown, far beyond the boundaries of our imagination. In The Odyssey, Homer was not only mapping the world, but building a world.</p>
<p><em>This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something, The Conversation UK may earn a commission.</em><!-- Below is The Conversation's page counter tag. Please DO NOT REMOVE. --><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/287312/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" /><!-- End of code. If you don't see any code above, please get new code from the Advanced tab after you click the republish button. The page counter does not collect any personal data. More info: https://theconversation.com/republishing-guidelines --></p>
<p><span><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/pragya-agarwal-1395996">Pragya Agarwal</a>, Visiting Professor of Social Inequities and Injustice, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/loughborough-university-1336">Loughborough University</a></em></span></p>
<p>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-we-map-the-odyssey-how-ancient-geographers-and-modern-researchers-have-traced-odysseuss-travels-287312">original article</a>.</p> </div>