The Corinth Canal

The Corinth Canal connects the Peloponnese with mainland Greece and the Sacronic Gulf with the Gulf of Corinth. This Canal was built during the 19th century, and since then, it has been a great help to connect and transport at both sides of the Corinth Isthmus. Before the canal existed, in ancient Greece, people would need to travel all around Peloponese in order to go from this spot to mainland Greece, a trip which would take them days.

Although the Corinth Canal was not built until the 19th century, it was planned by the Peloponnesians many centuries ago. Periander, who was known as The Tyrant of Corinth, had already started planning the Corinth Canal around the year 600 BC. Despite of planning a canal which would unite both sides of the isthmus, he could not do it due to the fact that there wasn’t enough technical tools and knowledge to complete the task.

After realizing he could not build the canal he had imagined, Periander created the Diolkos. The Diolkos would allow people to easily transport their ships from the Gulf of Corinth to the Saronic Gulf, or vice versa, becoming this way a perfect solution to a great problem. Since its creation, the Diolkos was used for centuries and has seen many ships being carried on wheels through its path.

The Diolkos was a great help to the problem of transporting ships from one side to the other, but it was not a perfect solution since large ships could not use it and it was very expensive to maintain it in proper conditions. During the times of Emperor Nero, the Corinth Canal started becoming a real goal rather than a dream. During this époque, a plan of how to build the canal was created, and everything was prepared for its construction, but Nero died before he was able to see his project come true.

It was not until the 19th century that the Corinth Canal became a reality when a French company started studying the project and began its construction. A while after this company had started building the canal, the project was taken by a Greek company, who completed its construction. Then, the Corinth Canal was finally created, with a length of more than 6300 meters, a depth of 8 meters, and a width of about 25 meters.

Map of the Corinth Canal in Greece