It’s a mere “dot” on any map showing the southern Aegean, requiring a casual observer to turn their attention roughly midway between Santorini and Amorgos or between Ios and Anafi, yet the rock islet of Anydros has emerged in Greece as the “epicenter” of intense seismic activity over the past week.
With a land mass of a mere 120 hectares, the rocky, remote and inhospitable islet, also known locally as Amorgopoula, has no permanent inhabitants. It lies 10 nautical miles from Amorgos, to the northeast, where it belongs administratively, and 20 nautical miles northeast of internationally known Santorini.
According to media reports that surfaced in the wake of the privately owned isle’s fame this week, however, decades ago it temporarily hosted two minors deposited there by their parents, who resided on nearby Amorgos, in order to oversee the family’s sheep herd. Otherwise, the islet has remained without a human presence since 1860.
A fault just off Anydros is the source of a devastating 7.6 on the Richter scale earthquake in 1956 that nearly leveled Santorini, to the southwest.
The remote outcrop has been designated as a Corine habitat, with several plants endemic to the Cyclades islands, such as Allium luteolum, Fibigia lunarioides, Origanum calcaratum, Pimpinella pretenderis and Trigonella rechingeri. In terms of fauna, the islet hosts two rare species of reptiles, the Cyrtodactylus kotschyi and the Podarcis erhardii amorgensis.