Kefalonia was one of the first places in Greece to be inhabited, as shown by fossil plants, animals, bones, etc. found in Fiskardo and tools dating back to 50,000 BC discovered in Skala and Same (Sami). According to the famous Kefalonian archaeologist and professor Spiros N. Marinatos (1901 - 1974), all the conditions were present in Kefalonia to make it inhabitable. At a time when trade was in its infancy, one of these conditions was that the motherland itself produced everything necessary for survival. Kefalonia was the breadbasket of the other Ionian islands. It also produced olive oil, wine and fruit. Its vast forests provided plenty of timber to build ships and develop trade. During Mycenean times and the age of Homer, the island undoubtedly derived a good part of its wealth from the forest of Ainos. Recent research has proved that the columns in the palace at Knossos were made of Cephalonian Fir! This in turn proves the existence of trade. Moreover, Kefalonia's geographical position made it a stepping-stone between East and West. The Kefalonian archaeologist and academic P. Kavadias stresses the similarity between the inhabitants of the colony of Fiskardo with peoples from neighbouring Epirus, the Peloponnese and southern Italy (Pelasgian tribes). From the pre-Mycenean and Mycenean tombs in Lakithra we may draw the conclusion that they were a bellicose people; anthropological examination of skulls has revealed that most of them had suffered repeated blows.

It is quite apparent that the whole island was inhabited by the middle of the 11th century BC (organised burial grounds). That was about the time that Cephalus and the name Cephalonia appeared. Around 1300 BC, Achaeans from Arcadia and Trifyllia in the westen Peloponnese began to found colonies farther afield, in Crete, Cyprus and even Sicily. The Achaeans were a people who formerly had lived in Minyan Orchomenus in Thessaly which according to Homer was the most important city in Mycenean Greece. Some of them wound up in Kefalonia, bringing Mycenean civilisation, gods and heroes along with them. Finds from their settlements, the most thriving of which were in Crane, testify to links with the Peloponnese. From the middle of the 11th century up to the middle of the 8th century BC nothing has been found. After that the evidence points to continuous human presence on the island.