Greece,The Sea and the Islands
The Sea and the Greek Islands
It is the sea which determines the islands, and the thing which distinguishes one island or group of islands from another is the quality of the sea. Scientists may find it difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between one stretch of salt water and another. The travel¬ler knows better, and so does the sailor. The North Sea has an entirely different character from the Caribbean. The Mediterranean, in tem¬perament at any rate, is only a distant relation of the Red Sea or the English Channel.
Even scientifically the Mediterranean has points of difference from the others, for it loses by evaporation two-thirds more than it receives from the rivers which drain into it. This loss is replaced by a steady inflow of water from the Atlantic through the Straits of Gibraltar. The effect of steady evaporation on this almost landlocked sea is that the Mediterranean has a higher salt content than most other seas in the world. The swimmer in the waters round the Greek islands soon appreciates this. The sea is buoyant. It lifts him up as confi¬dently as did the dolphin which carried Arion on its back in safety to Taenarus, or as some say to the island of Lesbos.
The Ionian and the Aegean are very different seas. If the Ionian is female, the Aegean is male. One is soft, enveloped often with that gauze-like haze which hangs so frequently over the Italian landscape. The other is clear and precise. The Aegean engenders an air in which sentimentality and woolly thinking are impossible. The Greeks, with that curious accuracy of theirs which seems to have been as much the result of intuition as of deliberate thought, ’sexed’ these two seas by calling one of them after Io, priestess of Hera, who came here to escape the anger of her mistress for having an affair with Zeus, and the other after King Aegeus of Athens. The names have stayed un¬changed over the centuries, and so have their separate qualities.
The Ionian is the central basin of the Mediterranean, and is bounded on the west by Sicily and the toe of Italy, on the east by Greece. In a few places it is as deep as two thousand fathoms. In classical times its importance lay in the fact that the trade routes between the mainland and the new colonies in Sicily and southern Italy ran across it. From Corfu vessels had an open sea crossing of little more than sixty miles to the heel of Italy. Following the coast-
The Greek Islands
line of the Gulf of Taranto they came to the rich colonies of Sybaris and Croton, and then to the straits of Messina. Syracuse lay only a little southward down the coast of Sicily.
The character of a sea is determined by its winds and weather, just as these again determine the character of its islands and islanders. In the Ionian two winds predominate, the Sirocco and the Gregale, or the Bora as it is known in Corfu. The Sirocco which blows from the south is a warm, even a hot, wind which originates in north Africa. By the time it reaches the islands it has often picked up a high humidity which restrains physical activity, deadens thought and exac¬erbates the nerves. Fortunately it is not as virulent on this western coast of Greece as in Malta or Sicily. In Sicily indeed it is said that at one time, if the Sirocco had blown for over ten days, all charges of inexplicable violence and passion were dismissed. Such crimes were considered not to lie within the doer’s rational cognizance but to owe their origin solely to the south wind.
The Sirocco blows mostly in spring and autumn, but its counter¬part the Gregale is a winter wind. Springing off the mainland moun¬tains, the cold air rushes down to take the place of the warmer air rising off the Ionian. The Gregale is the most dangerous wind in this part of the Mediterranean, though its full effects are fortunately not felt in the Greek islands. It is on the far side of the sea, on the eastern coasts of Sicily, Malta and Gozo, that the full fetch and thunder of these winter gales is felt. This was St Paul’s tempestuous wind called Euroclydon, which drove his ship helplessly across from Crete to ground in the Maltese bay that bears his name.
In winter the small-boat sailors and fishermen of the Ionian do not venture far, for apart from the principal winds heavy squalls often descend off their mountainous islands. But in spring and summer the sea round this western coast of Greece is often calm and practically windless for days on end. It is now that the offshore fishermen bring in the excellent fish which make eating a pleasure in these islands. Apart from the magnificent lobsters of Corfu, usually the clawless Mediterranean variety {astakos in Greek), the Ionian is rich in mullet, tunny, ray, swordfish, octopus and squid, as well as many others whose names only the locals know.
The Aegean, the island-studded sea of the Greek archipelago, is entered either round Cape Matapan, the ancient Taenarus which con¬tained the entrance to the Underworld, or more often nowadays through the rocky slit of the Corinth canal- Since most cruise ships come first to Athens through the canal, giving travellers their first
The Sea and the Islands
introduction to the Aegean world, a few words about it will not be out of place. The emperor Nero, when he visited Greece in AD 66, saw what an advantage to commerce a canal would be, and ordered work to begin on one. His death two years later, as well as the technical difficulties encountered, prevented any further attempts to unite the Aegean with the Ionian by way of the Gulf of Corinth. In classical limes ships wishing to cross the isthmus of Corinth, avoiding the long and stormy route round Cape Matapan, could be hauled over the narrow neck of land on rollers. Traces of the tracks used for this purpose have been found, and the position of Corinth astride the isthmus gave it a maritime importance and ultimately a prosperity to rival that of Athens.
It was not until nearly two thousand years after Nero’s death that Ihc Corinth canal was opened in 1893. It is a little over three miles long and sixty-nine feet wide at the base, affording passage for ships of up to twenty-two feet in draught. It took twelve years to complete, and by the time it was opened it was not deep enough for the greatly increased tonnage of the merchant ships then being built. Neverthe¬less for the yachtsmen bound from one coast of Greece to the other I he Corinth canal serves a very useful purpose, and the saving in distance is considerable for vessels bound from western Greece for ports in the Aegean and the Black Sea. From Sicily, western Italy and the south of France it is of little use.
At the far end one emerges into the Aegean. The tragic death of Aegeus, father of Theseus, is permanently recorded by the name of the sea. Theseus, triumphant after his conquest of the Minotaur, had left Ariadne behind him on Naxos and was hastening for the shores of Attica and his father’s kingdom of Athens. Unfortunately he forgot his promise to hoist the white sail which should have announced his safe return, leaving instead the dark sail which told that the king’s son had perished in the Labyrinth of Knossos. Seeing a dark-tanned sail (such as Greek fishing boats still carry) on his son’s ship, Aegeus was overwhelmed by grief; he threw himself into the sea from a high rock and was drowned.
The sea to which he gave his name is an arm of the Mediterranean thrust between Asia Minor and Greece - the sea which cradled west-cm civilization and the arts of navigation. It must never be forgotten that the Aegean was the birthplace of Greek seamanship, and hence, directly or indirectly, of almost all western maritime enterprise dur¬ing the past two thousand years. Out of the Aegean has also come a word that is now part of the English language, ‘archipelago’. This has
The Greek Islands
come to mean any large group of islands, but originally it meant the sea which contained the Aegean islands. The word itself is found nowhere in ancient or mediaeval Greek. Pelagos is the poetic Greek word for sea, but whether the prefix archi- means ‘chief or ‘main’, or is a corruption of Aegei, has not been finally resolved.
The character of this sea is formed principally by two factors: its geographic position and its climate. Geographically it is the sea which divides Europe from Asia, and yet at the same time - because the islands lie like stepping-stones across it - it is not so much a moat between one world and another as a bridge. The closeness of island to island meant that in the infancy of ship-building and navigation man was able, during the clement seasons of the year, to maintain communications across a watery world. Scudding between the rocky islands, traders were able to exchange the goods of one civilization for those of another. Because a ship is hardly ever out of sight of land for more than a few hours, it was possible for these early navigators to bring their cargoes safe to port without compass, chart or sextant.
The climate has played an equally important part in the develop¬ment of Aegean civilization. Apart from the proximity of island to island, the weather conditions were favourable for primitive naviga¬tion. The Etesian winds, as the Admiralty Pilot calls them, blow from a northerly direction over this sea for most of the summer months. Without these prevailing winds it is hardly an exaggeration to say that Greek culture would never have spread so widely as to embrace not only the whole mainland but also the coast of Asia Minor. The name derives from the Greek etos, meaning ‘year’, because they can be relied on to blow regularly every year.
Flowing down from Bulgaria, Turkey, and beyond them from Russia, prompted by the hot air rising over the Mediterranean, they carry on southwards all the way to Egypt. It was upon these regular seasonal winds that the Greeks of antiquity based their sailing prac¬tices and their navigation. Their ships were hauled ashore in the autumn and were not launched again until the start of the ‘prodroms’ (or ‘forerunners’) - the variable winds of spring which herald the return of the Etesians. It was with the Etesians astern that Mycenaean merchants could sail from Argos or other ports in the northern Aegean down to Crete, while from Crete the sailors whose trading had enriched Knossos and Phaistos could run down to Egypt and the Nile delta. Usually a cargo would be taken down during the height of the summer season, and another brought back during the following spring before the Etesians had set in.
The Sea and the Islands
However one travels through the Aegean it is impossible to ignore this summer wind. Even the most unobservant landsman cannot help remarking on the extraordinary clarity of the sky, which is unlike any other sky in the world. It is here that one sees at once the difference between the Ionian and the Aegean seas - a difference which is reflected in their respective islands. Even in midsummer there is a briskness in the Aegean air. The blue of the sky is sharp, and broomed by the wind. The softness, the hint of trailing mist over the sea or in the upper reaches of the sky, which is to be found in the Ionian, is absent from the Aegean.
In particular, during July and August the winds which the modern Greeks call meltemi begin to blow every day at dawn, reach their maximum about noon, usually dropping off at sunset. The word may derive from the Venetian bel tempo, and it is their cool invigorating rush which dissipates the bugbear of so many Mediterranean lands -the noonday lassitude and the high humidity which curb thought and action alike. At midday in an Aegean island one can stand on a rocky peak or sit in a quayside taverna and feel, in a shade-heat of ninety degrees, the stimulating wind which brings freshness to sultry places.
Equally, the meltemi can be a source of frustration and even of danger for the unwary. When they are at their noonday height, move¬ment on foot can be difficult and it is as well to look for sheltered places to walk or sit. When at anchor in a north-facing bay it is wise to get under way early in the morning, or to make sure you have enough cable out to stop you dragging in the coming blasts.
Unlike the Ionian, the Aegean is not generally speaking a deep sea. Only in a few places, notably just north of Crete, does it attain a depth of more than a thousand fathoms. The islands which raise their craggy shoulders out of the sea are remnants of a land mass connect¬ing Europe with Asia Minor. They are peaks of old hills, or the summits of mountain ranges long submerged, and a glance at a map shows how they splay out from Greece or Turkey to follow the lines of the main ranges on either side of the dividing sea. Because it is predominantly shallow, the Aegean can be a very treacherous area, and a dangerous breaking sea can quickly be kicked up on the rocks and shallows round the islands. It is not difficult to understand why the ancient Greeks called a halt to maritime activity during the winter months.
Of the many creatures which share these seas with man, the por¬poise or dolphin is the most engaging, playing constantly around the bow waves of ships. They rise close alongside to breathe - that half
snorting sigh - and then dive and tumble in the disturbed water. Squeezed along by the water pressure in front of the bows, they will stay there effortlessly just as long as it suits them. Then with a quick flurry they will all be gone. In calm spring weather one of the loveliest sights in the Aegean is the wheeling, planing and banking of a pair of shearwaters, the sharp tips of their wings almost touching the water as they turn and dip. Above all, the Aegean is a clean sea, except where conglomerations of mankind pollute it, and the fathoms-deep sea-bed can be as clear as if seen through glass.
The sea is Greece. Where the first images of other European
countries that come to mind may be rural or urban - the Loire or the
Champs Elysees, the Lake District or Hyde Park Corner, the image of
Greece is the sea. Even the inland shepherd knows it is there, and
never far out of sight. From mountain or moorland he can see the
shining inlets where the sea marches into the land, or look across a
deep blue strait to his nearest island neighbours. Yet Greece is not a
romantic land such as the poetry of Keats may suggest. It is a harsher,
stronger and more brilliant world, especially in the islands, where the
atmosphere - even in Corfu or Rhodes — is never sugared but always
astringent.