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Modern Description: Foúrni is an archipelago of several islands south of the channel that separates Ikaría from Samos, of which only the two largest—Foúrni and Thýmaina—are properly inhabited. Strabo had rightly called Ikaría ‘alimenos', or ‘harbourless': but Foúrni, its neighbour, is the very opposite. Its several islands protect one another from the winds, and their coasts are so heavily indented that there is any number of natural harbours. These coastal waters have always been remarkably rich in fish, and the island's economy is based almost solely on its fishing-fleet. Its plentiful catches (predominantly lobster and red mullet) are shipped to Piraeus. The land, however, is in no way as rich as the water, having been almost entirely deforested over a century ago by charcoal burners, leaving a sharp profile of hills and a largely bare shoreline at the sea. The modern name, Foúrni, meaning ‘the furnaces' probably derives from this large-scale charcoal production.
In Antiquity the island's name was Korsiai, and its fame rested on the quality of its superb marble. One of the best preserved ancient marble quarries in the Aegean is in Petrokopió Bay, where many well-formed architectural elements in pure white marble still lie discarded by the shore awaiting a delivery journey that never materialised. The quality of the stone, remarkably free of veins and faults, was so good both for building and for sculpture that it was widely used on Ikaría and Samos, and at Ephesus in Asia Minor, as well as further afield.
The modern Chora of Foúrni is pleasingly grouped in a theatre-shaped ring of hills, and occupies a small fertile plain watered by the confluence of several seasonal torrents. One corner of the square is dominated by a massive (lidless) ancient carved sarcophagus of the Roman period (1st century AD), of local marble, which was found on the edge of the town in the area of the Roman cemetery. On the sarcophagus's north side the inscribed epitaph is visible of ‘Epameinon, son of Telon and Philte', who died at the age of 25. The inside shows clearly the chisel and running-drill marks left from the hollowing out of the block, instructive of the methods used by the stone-cutters.
Wikidata ID: Q16523376
Trismegistos Geo: 34105

Info: McGilchrist's Greek Islands

(From McGilchrist’s Greek Islands, © Nigel McGilchrist 2010, excerpted with his gracious permission. Click for the books)

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