{"id":40134,"date":"2022-02-14T15:13:56","date_gmt":"2022-02-14T13:13:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/paxoi-and-antipaxoi\/"},"modified":"2022-02-14T15:13:57","modified_gmt":"2022-02-14T13:13:57","slug":"paxoi-and-antipaxoi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/paxoi-and-antipaxoi\/","title":{"rendered":"Paxo\u00ed and Ant\u00edpaxoi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n\n
\"Paxoí\"
G\u00e1ios, Paxo\u00ed, from NW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n

The name \u201cPaxo\u00ed\u201d<\/strong> derives from the ancient Phoenician word \u201cPaks\u201d which means trapeze. The name probably came from the fact that Paxo\u00ed has a roughly flat shape (no high mountains or sudden peaks) and therefore reminds of the geometrical shape of trapeze.<\/p>\n\n

In all the ancient maps and books, the name \u201cPaxo\u00ed\u201d was used for both islands, Paxo\u00ed and Ant\u00edpaxoi.<\/p>\n\n

According to mythology<\/strong>, Paxo\u00ed was once a part of K\u00e9rkyra (Corfu). However, the god Poseidon separated the two islands with his trident, because he wanted the nereid (nymph) Amfitr\u00edti to live away from everybody, in a beautiful land.<\/p>\n\n

The first inhabitants of the island<\/strong> were the Phoenicians, but it is not known to date when their colonization began. It is estimated to be between the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC, as that was the time the Phoenician civilization peaked in the eastern Mediterranean.<\/p>\n\n

The island of Paxo\u00ed is mentioned in several historic books, because of two famous sea battles that took place in the waters surrounding the island. The first sea battle<\/strong> was the conflict between Corinth and K\u00e9rkyra in 432 BC, just one year before the Peloponnesian War began (in actuality, that sea battle was the spark to start the Peloponnesian War \u2013 see more in the section of Corfu\u2019s history).<\/p>\n\n

The second sea battle<\/strong> took place in 229 BC, between the Kerkyrians and the Illyrians, the latter led by Queen T\u00e9fta. The Illyrians were excellent pirates, exercising their skills for centuries, and as a result their naval tactics were superior. They won the Kerkyrians at sea, sank their flagship and scattered their allies. That sea battle served also as a spark to the Romans, who for the first time interfered with the affairs of the Hellenes, defeated the Illyrians, reduced them to a small state and then started conquering the Hellenic states.<\/p>\n\n

Paxo\u00ed went under the Roman rule<\/strong> first, just like the rest of the Ionian islands. In the Byzantine years, the island was part of the Cephalonian military prefecture. At that time, several conquering parties were attempting \u2013 and briefly succeeding \u2013 to occupy Paxo\u00ed which, at large, followed the historic course of Corfu.<\/p>\n\n

In 1386 AD, Paxo\u00ed and the rest of the Ionian islands fell to the might of the Venetians<\/strong>, who treated the people well and built 2 castles on the island in order to defend from hostiles, one on top of the island of \u00c1gios Nik\u00f3laos (the islet in front of G\u00e1ios, the capital of Paxo\u00ed) and the other in L\u00e1kka. These castles defended the people of Paxo\u00ed well, up until the Turkish admiral Barbarossa came, in 1537.<\/p>\n\n

During the Turkish rule<\/strong>, the people of Paxo\u00ed led a wretched life, as the Turks did what they did to all the islands they occupied: slaughter the men, sell the women and children to the slave markets and the young ones took for upbringing Gen\u00edtsaroi (an Ottoman tactic in which they stole small children and turn them into muslim soldiers devoted to the sultan, in special camps).<\/p>\n\n

After the Turkish plundering and desolation, only few inhabitants remained on the island. Unfortunately, in 1571, the Ottomans led by admiral Loutsal\u00ed Pasha<\/strong>, plundered the island again and slaughtered everybody. After that, Paxo\u00ed remained uninhabited up until 1759, when Kerkyrians with Io\u00e1nni Vo\u00falgari as their leader came to populate the island again. Some years later, in 1797, the island was occupied by the French.<\/p>\n\n

For the years 1800 \u2013 1807, Paxo\u00ed passed to the Russians<\/strong> and actually had 7 years of democracy! (the first Hellenic territory to have a democracy before the Hellenic Wars of Independence).<\/p>\n\n

The French occupy the island once more, only to lose it to the English a few years later (1814). A few years later again, just before the beginning of the Wars of Independence, England offers the Paxo\u00ed island to Ali Pasha of Ipirus.<\/p>\n\n

Paxo\u00ed united with Hellas<\/strong> together with the rest of the Ionian islands, in 1864.<\/p>\n\n

G\u00e1ios: <\/strong>It\u2019s the capital of the island and a natural harbour, as the small island of \u00c1gios Nik\u00f3laos is situated very close to the land, creating a natural channel of 40 \u2013 120m width. On the islet of \u00c1gios Nik\u00f3laos lie the ruins of one of the 2 castles of Paxo\u00ed, built by the Venetians. G\u00e1ios is a wonderful city, built amphithetrically around the sea channel<\/p>\n\n

Ypapant\u00ed cave: <\/strong>A cave on the western coasts of the island, with its mouth to the sea (accessible only by boat). It is said that the heroic Hellenic submarine Papanikol\u00eds used to hide here, during the 2nd World War.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The name \u201cPaxo\u00ed\u201d derives from the ancient Phoenician word \u201cPaks\u201d which means trapeze. The name probably came from the fact that Paxo\u00ed has a roughly flat shape (no high mountains or sudden peaks) and therefore reminds of the geometrical shape of trapeze. In all the ancient maps and books, the name \u201cPaxo\u00ed\u201d was used for…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40132,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[668],"tags":[822,452,821],"class_list":["post-40134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-paxi-isl-antipaxi-isl","tag-antipaxoi","tag-history","tag-paxoi","category-668","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40134"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40135,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40134\/revisions\/40135"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleray.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}