The origin of the name Ithaka?

Of course, the true origin of the name of Ithaka, the fabled home of Odysseus may never be found. But we may try to retrieve the origin from the dark and uninviting past.

[Attika]

Our first logical step is to search in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. There we find that Ithaka derives from Ancient Greek Ἰθάκα (Itháka), which is the Doric form of Ἰθάκη (Ithákē). Searching further we find that the Doric form is of 'uncertain origin', but that the first element is possibly derived from a Phoenician word with the meaning of 'island'. That is not very helpful, because we can easily imagine that Ithaka could also have a Punic origin, where Y also means 'island'.

We may find an alternative etymology in Martin Bernal's 'Black Athena: Volume III: The Linguistic Evidence'. Bernal claims that Itháka (Ιθαkα), Attika (Αττιkα), and Ituke (Ἰτύκη) share the same syllabic structure: -th-k-. Itháka is obviously the island and town of Odysseus, but also an old town on the Euphrates: Qabr Abu al-'Atiq. Attika is the territory around Athens, while Utica was once a city near Carthage in what is now Tunisia.

The name of Utica, Wikipedia tells us helpfully, is derived from Phoenician ˁAtiq (ʿtq), cognate with Arabic ˁatiqah (عَتِيقَة) and Hebrew ˁatiq ('to pass', 'supercede'). These all mean 'old' and contrast the settlement with the later colony Carthage (qrt-ḥdšt), whose own name literally meant 'new town'. This is cognate with the name of the walled area within the modern city of Jerusalem: Ha'Ir Ha'Atiqah (הָעִיר הָעַתִּיקָה) meaning 'the old city'.

The existence of another Ithaka on the banks of the Euphrates strongly suggest that this toponym is Semitic in origin, but it is difficult to say whether it meant 'preeminent' or 'ancient'. The first interpretation is reinforced by Ithaka's early dominance over Cephallenia and Zakynthos. The latter interpretation could point in the direction of 'ancient' if there's any possibility that the name is derived from that of its inhabitants.

The same ambiguity holds for tracing the name of Attika, although the meaning of 'ancient' is more likely given the Athenian boasts of their antiquity and the region's standing out from the Dorian invasion.

So, the name of Ithaka may mean 'old', simply to state the ancient roots of their inhabitants.