The
words we choose to use have a huge power over our imagination. When I
hear words like “Greek islands” or “the Aegean” my mind
conjures up visions of beaches, olive trees and sunlight. Even though
my knowledge of ancient Greece and Rome is fairly weak, I still sense
the evocative and historical power of the ancient place names of the
Aegean region. Islands such as Lemnos and Samothrace contain relics
of a history which goes back thousands of years, and it is this very
ancient history itself which allows our imaginations to wander and
dream: myths of figures such as Hephaestus, the Greek god who was
cast out of Olympus and fell into water near the coast of Lemnos.
Jason and the argonauts also rested here, and were tempted to stay
there by the women who ruled the island at the time. Further back in
time the mists are even thicker and the legends more enigmatic: the
ancient Lemnians worshipped a duo of deities known as the Cabeiri,
subterranean figures whose history is obscure.
