Aeolia (
Ancient Greek: 'Αἰολία), the island kingdom of
Aeolus, the ruler of the winds, visited by Odysseus in
Homer's Odyssey. In the Odyssey, Aeolus' Aeolia was purely mythical, a floating island surrounded by "a wall of unbreakable bronze" where the "cliffs run up shear".[1]
Homer does not say anything about where the island was located, but later writers came to associate Aeolia with one, or another, of the
Lipari Islands (also called the Aeolian Islands), north of eastern Sicily.[2] The Greek geographer
Strabo, reports that Strongyle (modern
Stromboli), one of the Lipari Islands, was said to be Aeolus' island.[3] Others associated the island of Lipara (modern
Lipari) with Aeolia.[4]
Hard, Robin, The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology", Psychology Press, 2004,
ISBN9780415186360.
Google Books.
Pausanias, Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918.
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.