What was Odysseus's home island?

Ithaca is Odysseus’s home island. In Homer’s Odyssey he’s repeatedly called “Odysseus of Ithaca,” the king who struggles for ten years after Troy to return there, where his wife Penelope and son Telemachus wait while suitors overrun his palace. The epic’s climax is his return and restoration of order in Ithaca. Context: Scholars debate the exact location of Homeric Ithaca, but tradition places it among the Ionian Islands. The other options connect to different myths or stops: Sicily is where the Cyclops dwells; Corfu is often linked to the Phaeacians who ferry him home; Crete belongs to King Minos’s legends. Memory tip: Odyssey = odos (journey) to Ithaca—think “Ody-SEE-us home in I-tha-ca.”