Island
Diabate
Gialesine, Korabalo and Marmoras
Listen to the story
Diabate marks the island the geographers Strabo and Ptolemy and the Roman writer Pliny knew simply as Dia, a rocky, well-watered island facing the middle of Crete's north coast, opposite Amnisos and Herakleion in the territory of Knossos. On the surviving map only scattered traces of the lettering can still be made out, and the island itself has vanished; the full name is preserved in an edition printed in 1598. Pliny places a town of the same name on the island. It was the original setting of the legend of Dionysos and Ariadne, and its many anchorages sheltered sailors.