Antikythera

Antikythera lies midway between Kythira and Crete on one of the busiest shipping lanes of antiquity, which is why sponge divers working off its coast in 1900 found a first-century BC wreck loaded with bronze and marble statues, glassware, and a corroded lump of geared bronze now known as the Antikythera mechanism, an analogue computer that predicted eclipses and planetary positions and has no known parallel for over a thousand years afterwards. The finds are in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens; the island itself has around twenty permanent residents, two settlements, Potamos and Galaniana, a castle ruin, a lighthouse, and cliffs where Eleonora's falcons breed. Excavation of the wreck site continues periodically, and researchers pass through in summer. There is one guesthouse, limited supplies, and no bank.

History

The earliest known people, in the 5th or 4th millennium BC, were probably seasonal hunters drawn by migrating birds, and the island was settled and abandoned several times, with strong Cretan influence in the Bronze Age; in antiquity it was known as Aegilia. Between the 4th and 1st centuries BC Cilician pirates used it as a base until Pompey the Great destroyed them, and their fort still stands on a cliff in the north-east of the island (Wikipedia, Antikythera).

The landscape

• The wreck coast - the cliffs off which the famous cargo was found.
• The harbour at Potamos - the island's tiny settlement and dock.
• The falcon cliffs - breeding grounds for Eleonora's falcons in summer.
• The lighthouse and castle - the two structures that break the empty ridge.

When to go

Late spring and September, when boats run more reliably and the birds are present. Winter crossings are frequently cancelled and the island can be cut off for days.

What to expect

This is genuinely remote: a handful of residents, one place to stay, sparse food, no cash machine and ferries that answer to the weather rather than the timetable. There is nothing to see of the mechanism here. Visitors come for the emptiness and the birds.

Nearby

Kythira lies north; Crete is the next landfall to the south.

Key facts