Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 129, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 May 1916 — ISLAND WITH QUEER HISTORY [ARTICLE]

ISLAND WITH QUEER HISTORY

Cephalonia, in the lonian Sea, Has Many Masters in 2,000 Years. The occupation of Cephalonia by French and British forces, for strategic purposes, marked another cycle in the strange history of this little island in the lonian sea which has played the role of shuttlecock in international diplomacy for more than two thousand years, says a National Geographic society bulletin. With an area about three times as great as that of Martha’s Vineyard on the Massachusetts coast, Cephalonia is the largest of the seven lonian islands. The origin of its settlement is shrouded in the fascinating uncertainty of Homeric legend, but from the year of its surrender to the Romans, 189 B. C., its history has been marked by a succession of ownership which would bewilder the most astute Btudent of world politics. After the Roman emperor Hadrian made a gift of the island to Athens, Cephalonia, and the six other islands of the lonian group, became “free and Autonomous," but during the ascendancy of the Byzantine empire they •were subject to its power. The next change came Jn the (eleventh century. While William the •Conqueror was engaged in establishing himself firmly in the British isles, Another Norman, Robert Guiscard i('‘the Resourceful”), after conquering isouthern Italy, Bailed to the lonian sea and captured several of the islands, preparatory to overthrowing the Greek empire. This remarkable adventurer died on the island of Cephalonia while engaged in quelling a revolt, at a time when he seemed to have laid the foundations for a Norman ,empire similar to that which William established in England. Following Robert Guiscard’s invasion, Cephalonia passed in turn under

the suzerainty of the princes of Tarentum, the five "counts of Tocco, the republic of Venice, the ravaging corsairs of Greece and Naples, the Turks, the Spanish-Venetian allies, Venice *again, France, the Russo-Turkish allies, the French and the British. Great Britain finally relinquished its protector~ete and ceded the islands to Greece after the latter had allowed the Court of St. James to name a brother of the princess of Wales as king of the Hellenes in 1862. The chief city of Cephalonia is Argostoli, which has an excellent harbor and which is especially noted for its curious sea mills, operated by a current of sea water flowing through a chasm in the rocky shore. Across the bay from Argostoli is the rival port of Luxouri.

Cyclopean and Hellenic walls are still standing on the sites of the ancient cities of Cranii, Proni, and Samos, while a few miles beyond Argostoli there rises a relic of Venetian days, the strongly fortified castle of St. George. The Cephalonians, who are mentally alert and who are more purely Greek than the inhabitants of any of the other islands of the lonian group, have shown great ingenuity and industry in building terraces for the cultivation of the vine and olive: One of the chief products of the island is a peculiarly flavored currant which finds a ready market in Holland, Belgium and Germany. In addition to their agricultural pursuits, the Cephalonians are interested in shipbuilding, silk spinning, basket making and the manufacture of carpets. An odd lace, made of aloe fiber, is exported. Elato, also known as Monte Negro (Black Mountain), which is more than 6,006 feet high, gets its name from the dark pine forests which clothe its slopes.