The island's past recalls Odyssey and his nymph Calypso, the apostle Paul, the poet Opian, the Roman Emperor Augustus, the German military leader Odoakar and his "comes domesticorum" Pierius, the ancient Illyrians, the Croatian-Slavic inhabitation of the island and their battles with the Roman army, the Dubrovnik nobles who ruled over the island, as did the Abbots of St. Mary and later, the Venetian knights, the fall of the Dubrovnik Republic, the arrival of Napoleon's army and the English war ships...