The Diolkos

[Eleatic Guest]

Hello,

I am happy to announce that my WP article on The Diolkos has been rated as "Good article" in the category "Engineering and technology".

AFAIK, the section "Ancient sources" is the only printed or online list which includes ALL ancient references to the transfer of ships across the Isthmus of Corinth. Yeeaaah. 8)

PS: In case you have pics of the Diolkos to share, please let me know.

PPS: There is a petition to the apathetic Greek ministry of culture for saving this monument: Please sign here.

[Jona Lendering]

That's a great article, thanks Stefan!! And yes, I am envious () because I went searching the diolkos last August, but was unable to find it - actually, a bit because I was in a hurry to go to one of the Loutraki casinos... :wink: (Hey! I was on a holiday!)

[Eleatic Guest]

Many thanks, Jona. :-) )

On p.12 of "RAILWAYS IN THE GREEK AND ROMAN WORLD", you find a detailed map of the excavated parts of the trackway. They lie at the western end of the canal.

The best pic I found on the net showing the rutway character is here.

[size=75:1h3r7pqe]Btw in case someone wants to do his own research on the Diolkos, I can provide most of the quoted articles. [/size]

[Endre Fodstad]

I might be misremembering, but I seem to recall from my ancient history classes (or more likely the pub nights afterwards) back in the last millenium that there was a tradition or an account of some sort of religious rationale (a supposed prohibition by Poseidon or something) - besides the technical problems - for not building a canal across the Isthmus? Wouldn't that be an interesting detail for the article?

[Eleatic Guest]

Interesting. I haven't read about that.

In ancient times, there were some plans at cutting a canal through the Isthmus, but these were not implemented for various economic and technical reasons. Nero was the only one to tackle the project seriously and actually made some progress. I listed the most important ancient projects at: [url:2ewfd9z9]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corinth_Canal[/url]

[Eleatic Guest]

Interesting, there were at least two more ship trackways in antiquity besides the Diolkos at Corinth. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diolkos Other ship trackways