Adriatic Oddity
The story of Odysseus lies at the base of European literature and it is one of the oldest myths ever. The return of this legendary Greek hero from Troy to his home on Ithaca took 10 years which in fact makes him probably the slowest traveller of all times. Mainly all historians that studied and interpreted the myth in the course of centuries have placed his adventures in the Mediterranean, around the Sicily, and very few dared to take into equation the Adriatic sea which at the era was not very well known, if not even avoided, (possibly for the reputation of its wild inhabitants). But if we accept what Homer wrote had really happened, if Troy was seiged for 10 years and then conquerred and raided by Greeks, if Odysseus set out on a voyage „bigger than life“, and if we truly immerse ourselves into Homer’s description of sailing which undoubtely shows he knew about the winds and currents that scattered Odysseus and his crew around then we can come up with a more than slightly different point of view. Among those rare few Mohicans who claim Odysseus explored Central and South Dalmatia instead, is Jasen Boko, writer of both plays and travel literature, dedicated traveller himself who published a book on the matter, a book based on his personal revelations closely following Homer’s clues found on the pages of his epic poem. To summarise, Boko widened a path to a theory saying that one of the most famous travellers ever, sailed for almost 10 years around not the Mediterranean but the Adriatic sea, and since we happen to share the passion for a possibility of impossible, odd, or maybe just simply true, our decision was to sail there and see for ourselves, first time in this perspective, the locations described by Homer situated right here in our neighbourhood.
Sailboat would take us to places already familiar, armed with nothing but a small heap of books, camera, enough red wine to steer up our imagination, and one thing Odysseus and his sailors didn’t have – weather forecast. Having studied the lines from the poem we would compare them to real cliffs, bays and distances between…try to establish the beaches and shores where Odysseus landed, discover palaces within whose walls he was welcome, break through Scylla and Charibdis against the south wind, hear the Sirens, meet Calipso in her cave…
Have we found anything while chasing the legend?
Many centuries have passed since the war and not even the glorious city of Troy has to offer something special in terms of the architectural remains. To say the truth the same goes for most of legendary locations, but after our almost ghost-hunting like experience we realized that if the Troyan war happened, and if Odysseus ever existed and had adventure sailing, a big share of it happened in the Adriatic. There are several reasons for that. One is the way winds usually blow and given that, Odysseus and his sailors on the way home from Troy to Ithaca couldn’t have really ended anywhere else but in the Adriatic. Other thing is that old interpretations of the epic place for example Lotophags on a Tunisian island of Djerba, while according to Homer they live on land. Laestrygonians live in a coastal city with steep cliffs at the mouth of a river and „the old school theory“, (widely accepted and rarely questioned) puts them in a town with no either river or steep cliffs?! On the other hand in our aproach there is a town neatly fitting the Homer’s description. And so on…
So, the answer is yes and we would now like to share it in form of multi-day trip designed by following ancient epic poem, a more recent travel novel and burning desire to discover new about old.
Odyssey started his journey back in Troy and yours will start in central Dalmatia; exact spot will depend on the airport of your arrival.
First stop was Heraklea that hosted lethargic Lotus-Eaters, one of very few peaceful peoples Odysseus encountered in the Adriatic…
Then off to find a cave where mythical giant Polyphemus, more known as Cyclop captured Greek hero and some of his crew to make them his lunch…
After very hazardous self-rescue the fleet of Odysseus and his companions went to the open sea island of Aeolus – god of winds, and got favourable wind to get back home to Ithaca and almost arrived, but we know that almost doesn’t count, so upon surviving a big storm they landed back to Aeolus’ island but confronted this time with the God’s fury they had to flee…
Having passed through storms in the open sea for days this time they decided to get to land and sail along it in order to avoid unpredictible conditions of the ocean. They rowed for 7 days only to reach „the steep city of Telepil“ where the most hostile tribe of canniballistic Laestrygonians made a fatal trap and out of twelve ships only one with the Odysseus onboard escaped the slaughter and maniacally sailed/rowed on to a new episode…
Aeaea, the island of a witch-godess Circe was the next stop and could have been last too, but cunning Odysseus managed to outwitt, (and charm), Circe who had turned his crew into pigs, with a kind of magic and a sword which pleased her enough to undo the black magic excercised on his people and that gave way to a romance. Not that he seemed to be in a big hurry to return to his wife Penelope or simply homesick but still after a year or so it was time to leave…
Sirenes or Mermaids? – the next temptation he was ready for and ordered the crew to tie him to the mast so he wouldn’t be lured by the Sirens’ irressistible call to sail closer to them and eventually hit the underwater rocks and sink down…
No time to rest because Scylla and Charybdis, the deadly narrow straight, was waiting in a hugh winds…to be or not to be…they crossed the passage, not without a cost though – they lost six men and exhausted proceeded to…
Thrinacia – island where Helios – sun god had its cattle that, (according to Circe’s word of advice), were not to be eaten. But after a month of first recovery and then perhaps idleness while waiting for wind to lessen its force, Odysseus’ people got hungry, ignored the warning, made sure their captain was asleep and treated themselves with the meat of sacred cows and after six days sailed away home…at least that’s what they believed…in the meantime Helios complaints to supreme God – Zeus who strikes the ship with a thunder and sinks it…
The last man standing, or better to say, floating is, of course, Odysseus holding onto the mast. The sea carries him again through the deadly straight, and finally after days on the verge of life and death on sea, waves wash him out on the shore of Ogygia. It is here where the voyage is on hold for seven years. But he doesn’t spend his days alone, nymph Calypso welcomes him in her cave and he can not resist her…
Anyway, seven years passed and Calypso in the end helped her lover build the raft that would take him out of the Croatian territorial waters and back to Ithaca where his dear wife Penelope was still waiting…
