January 11, 2007	Thursday	Zilhaj 20, 1427

LONDON, Jan10: An amateur historian produced evidence on Tuesday to back his claim to have found the island-homeland of Homer’s legendary Greek king, Odysseus. Scholars have argued for centuries over the whereabouts of Ithaca, the lost kingdom of the hero of the Trojan war. But Robert Bittlestone, a management consultant from Kingston-on-Thames, Surrey, and two professors of classics and geology have suggested the location is not the Greek island of Ithaki, but Paliki — a peninsula of Kefalonia.If true, it would be the greatest classical discovery since Heinrich Schliemann found the site of Troy in Turkey in the 1870s, and would establish Odysseus as a figure from history as opposed to a figment of Homer’s imagination.

In Homer’s epic poem, it takes Odysseus 10 years to return home after the war.

Ithaca is described as low-lying and furthest to the west of the group of islands off western Greece.

Modern Ithaki, cited by proud islanders as the home of Odysseus, is the most easterly of the island group.

According to a report published in the daily Telegraph on Wednesday Mr Bittlestone developed an interest in the mystery four years ago after a family holiday.

He was struck by how Homer’s description of ancient Ithaca did not match the location of Ithaki, and began analysing the literary, geological and archaeological evidence.

He enlisted the help of Prof James Diggle, a classicist at Cambridge University, and Prof John Underhill, a geologist from the University of Edinburgh, and together they developed the theory that Paliki was Odysseus’s homeland.

The trio published Odysseus Unbound — The Search for Homer’s Ithaca last year and suggested that a 300foot-wide channel between Paliki and Kefalonia had been filled in by rock falls and landslides. On Tuesday, they presented new geological evidence to Channel 4 news. Mr Bittlestone said: Unlike many historical speculations, our answer to the age-old mystery of Ithaca’s location makes a prediction that can be tested by geological techniques.

The results of the latest tests are very encouraging. The new evidence has dramatically improved the probability that Homer was speaking the truth and that the location is the one we propose. Last October, a 400-foot-borehole was dug at the southern end of the four-mile isthmus between Kefalonia and Paliki. While to the east and west there are solid limestone bedrocks, the drill went 48 feet below sea level and found no such bedrock.

Analysis of samples from the borehole identified fossilised phytoplankton, which live in the upper layers of oceans.

The researchers interpret their presence as evidence of the high-speed displacement of water from the channel during a massive rock fall.

Seismic movements over 3,000 years are known to have led to the landmass of the peninsula being raised.

Surveys of surrounding sea depths identified a 92-foot-deep underwater valley that lines up precisely with the proposed exit of the former water channel between Kefalonia and Paliki.

Satellite images revealed the existence of ancient roads that had been were cut off in a way consistent with a there having been rock falls and landslides.

Prof Underhill said: Within the borehole, we found considerable landslip and rock fall material of a very young geological age, which is consistent with the theory that there was a channel in this location.

The team hopes to raise the funds required to produce a 3D map of the subsurface along the whole valley, and eventually, if the findings are positive, to carry out excavations to search for Odysseus’s city and palace.