Ionian Islands

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Ionian Islands , chain of islands (1991 pop. 193,734), c.890 sq mi (2,310 sq km), W Greece, in the Ionian Sea, along the coasts of Epirus and the Peloponnesus. The group is made up of Kérkira , Paxoí , Lefkás , Kefallinía , Itháki , Zákinthos , Kíthira , and numerous islets. Largely mountainous, the islands reach their highest point at Mt. Ainos (c.5,340 ft/1,630 m) on Kefallinía. Fruits, grains, timber, olives, wine, and cotton are produced, and sheep, goats, and hogs are raised. Industries include fishing, shipping, and tourism. The islands had no unified history until the 10th cent. AD, when they were made a province of the Byzantine Empire. Venice took the islands in the 14th and 15th cent. and held them until 1797, when the Treaty of Campo Formio, which ended the Venetian republic, gave the islands to France. In 1799 they were seized by a Russo-Turkish fleet and were constituted a republic under Russian protection. In 1807, by the Treaty of Tilsit, Russia returned the islands to France. From 1809 to 1814 the British navy occupied all the islands except Kérkira. In 1815 the Ionian Islands, known as the "United States of the Ionian Islands," were placed under British protection. The British ceded the islands to Greece in 1864 after considerable popular agitation on the islands. A series of earthquakes in 1953 caused extensive damage.

Ionian Islands. Six of these Greek possessions, Corfu, Paxos, Leucas, Ithaca, Cephalonia, and Zante, are situated off the western coast of Greece. The seventh, Cerigo, is off the southern coast of the Peloponnese. They were occupied by the Italians after the Balkan campaign and the garrisons of the largest ones—Corfu, Leucas, Cephalonia, and Zante—were all overwhelmed by the Germans after the Italian armistice in September 1943. On Cephalonia the Italians resisted strongly until they ran out of ammunition. More than a thousand were killed in the battle and subsequently thousands more were shot out of hand.

Ionian Islands (Iónioi Nísoi), Greece A geographic region of Greece often called Eftanisa or Heptanesos ‘Seven Islands’, there being seven principal islands. They may be named after Io, virgin priestess of Hera, who, according to Greek mythology, was continually on the move to avoid the attentions of Zeus; on one of her journeys she passed up the Adriatic Sea past the islands. According to tradition, Io also gave her name to the Ionian Sea.

Ionian a member of an ancient Hellenic people inhabiting Attica, parts of western Asia Minor, and the Aegean islands in pre-classical times. They were apparently displaced from some areas by the Dorians in the 11th or 12th century bc but retained their settlements in Attica, especially Athens, where they were responsible for some of the greatest achievements of classical Greece. They also colonized the islands that became known as the Ionian Islands.

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