Agathonisi 3.41

Agathonísi is a small Greek island and municipality located at the northernmost point of the Dodecanese in Greece. It is surrounded by many smaller islands and is home to two villages, both inland; Megálo Chorió, and Mikró Chorió . Between them is the small settlement of Agios Georgios, which forms the island's only harbor and consists of a few hotels and restaurants. The island is also locally known as Gaidaro, or by its ancient name Tragea.The highest point on the island is 209m above sea level. This peak is located close to Mikro Chorio. The island covers an area of 13.5km². It is made almost entirely of subcrystalline stratified limestones, and is covered with thorny macchia.In the late 1920s the island had 80 inhabitants, active in agriculture and sheep rearing. A census of the island in 1981 showed that it was populated by 133 people. In 1991, another census showed that the population had dropped to 112. By the 2001 census it had again risen to 158 residents, and in 2011 its population was 185, 168 of whom lived in Megálo Chorió, and only 17 in Mikró Chorió. The municipality of Agathonisi, which includes the uninhabited offshore islets of Gláros, Kounéli, Nerá, and Psathonísio, has a combined land area of 14.500km².NameIn ancient times, Agathonisi was known as Psetoussa . The ancient historian Thucydides also referred to it as Tragaia, while Strabo as Tragaiae and Plutarchus as Tragia. The island is known as Gaidaro in Italian and as Eşek Adası in Turkish.