Anactorium

Anactorium was an ancient Greek polis on the northwestern coast of Acarnania, positioned at the entrance to the Gulf of Ambracia. Founded around 630 BC as a Corinthian colony under Echiades, son of the tyrant Cypselus, it commanded harbors on both the Ambracian Gulf and the Ionian Sea — a configuration that underlines its role as a maritime trading hub. The historian Thucydides notes that settlers from Corcyra also participated in its founding, pointing to early political entanglements across northwestern Greece. Little stands above ground today; the site near Arta remains largely unexcavated and rewards primarily those with a specific interest in archaic Greek colonization and Acarnanian history.