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Modern Description: From the Monastery of Aghios Nikolaos, the road continues to descend through uninterrupted pine forest to the southwest shore of the island at Kanákia bay (13.5 km) –a sandy cove with a small settlement and an offshore island in the bay. One of the most important, recent finds in Mycenaean archaeology has been made in this tranquil location. Archaeologists led by Yannis Lolos, excavating since 2006, believe that what they are unearthing may be the city and palace of the Aiacid dynasty, to which Ajax, son of Telamon, one of the most important of the Greek warriors mentioned in the Iliad, belonged.
The main area of excavation is along the ridge of the slope that rises to the south of the flat alluvial valley behind the shore. (On arrival at the waterfront, turn left and continue south along the shore; then turn left again into the pine trees before reaching the small harbour. The site is on the summit to your left as you walk inland to meet the path leading up.) The citadel and settlement, which grew into the island's principal urban centre, was continuously inhabited through the Middle and Late Bronze Age, but was then abandoned in the first half of the 12th century BC around the date that is generally ascribed to the siege of Troy. Looking across into the Peloponnese, with a protected harbour and a small fertile valley below, the city was well placed to play a leading role in the commerce of the Saronic Gulf. Finds made at the site bear witness to commercial links and contacts with other Aegean centres, Cyprus and even Egypt. The settlement conspicuously lacks the massive fortifications we find at Tiryns or Mycenae, but the buildings and the urban plan are created with a notably fortified aspect nonetheless – densely built and with substantial wall-foundations, and the bases of complex gates and towers. If this citadel was the home of Ajax, it is likely that he was the last king to live here: he never returned to it after leaving for Troy where, according to Sophocles, he died from his own hand. The city was abandoned shortly after. A cult to Ajax in historic times is attested on Salamis.
Wikidata ID: Q113003793
Trismegistos Geo: 37803

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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