considerable town, but not to be compared with what it came to be at a
later period. In comparison with the modern city of Turin, it was no
doubt always a small place. On the whole, you must not conceive such
military colonies to have been very large; the ancient Roman towns were
much smaller than those of modern times; we generally imagine them to
have been larger on account of the importance they have in history; but
on an average they were not larger than, for example, Bonn. A place of
the extent of Cologne, would have been a very considerable town in the
time of the Romans. After the decline of Rome under the emperors, Italy
had rather a numerous population, but in the age of Cicero and Augustus,
as I have already remarked, it was certainly far more thinly peopled
than at present. The population of the modern kingdom of Naples, north
of the Faro, is reported to be 6,000,000, while under Charles V. it is
said to have amounted to only 600,000. It is, indeed, said that, under
Charles V., families were counted and not persons; but admitting that the
number of persons was 2,000,000, which is the highest that can be made
out, still it is an undoubted fact, that in less than three centuries
the population has become more than trebled. I do not believe that, in
the reign of Augustus, the population was larger than under Charles V.
The astonishment with which Polybius and others mention the fact, that
previously to the Hannibalian war, Italy as far as the Cisalpine frontier
had 700,000 men capable of bearing arms, is too decisive to allow us to
suppose that the country was thickly peopled. Italy clearly reminds us
of the condition of Germany after the Thirty Years’ war, of which we
have descriptions in books of travel; and that state of Italy, as we see
from Lucan, continued until a late period. I have read a description of
Germany by an Italian who travelled in the country thirty years after the
war, and who saw the villages and buildings everywhere in ruins, and even
the towns were full of heaps of ruins and decaying houses.
The valley of Aosta, the country of the Salassians, is remarkable for its
gold-dust and gold-washings in the river Doria. Gold still exists there,
but little, for such veins often are entirely drained.
SICILIA.
In passing on to the islands, I shall first speak of Sicily, the queen of
the islands in the Mediterranean. It derives, like Italy and most other
countries, its name from its inhabitants, and Sicilia is the country of
the Siculi. I have already said that Itali and Siculi are the same name
in different dialects, and that accordingly both denote the same people.
The general tradition of antiquity is, that the Siculi migrated from
Italy into the island, and pushed the Sicani, its previous inhabitants,
into the western and southern parts. Those who go back to the mythical
ages, represent the island in the most ancient times as inhabited by
Gigantes, Cyclopes, and Laestrygones. It is a widely-spread opinion among
the ancients, that the Sicani belonged to the race of the Iberians. The
Sicani called themselves Autochthons, while, according to others, they
had come from Iberia, having been displaced by Ligurians; but such an
emigration, so far across the sea and by so many intermediate countries
as the Balearian islands and Sardinia, or, if you please, along the coast
of Africa, is incredible in the case of a people like the Iberians, who
never were great navigators. I believe that, in this account, we can keep
only to this one point, that, according to the conviction of those who
most thoroughly understand the circumstances, the Sicani belonged to the
Iberian race, even if we admit that the tradition about their emigration
is without foundation; and this is very possible. It is equally possible
that the story about the emigration of the Siculi from Italy is without
foundation; at least our authorities for it are not authentic. Another
question is, as to whether the Sicani and Siculi were everywhere
different people; the testimonies of the ancients must, of course, be
of the greatest weight to us in this matter. I am not one of those who
build history upon the mere names of nations, and am, therefore, not much
inclined to lay great stress upon the resemblance of the two names; but
Virgil uses Sicani and Siculi as synonymous, and this leads us to infer
that he probably had more ancient authors before him, who had done the
same. It is true also, that such a change of form is not unprecedented,
for _Aequus_, _Aequanus_, _Aequulus_, _Aequicus_, and _Aequiculus_, are
only derivatives from the same basis; and in like manner we might regard
_Sicanus_ and _Siculus_ as simple derivatives of the stem _Sicus_. I
should believe this to be quite correct, were it not that the ancients
speak so positively of the Iberian origin of the Sicani. I should, in
fact, reject this origin, were it not certain that Iberians existed in
Corsica, Sardinia, and the Balearian islands, and in ancient times, when
the Celts dwelt as far as the Sierra Morena, probably even on the coast
of Africa. The Basque language is foreign to all European languages known
to us; it belongs, as it were, to a different part of the world. But
however this may be, the two nations in Sicily were different from each
other, though we cannot say whether the difference was one of race or of
a less striking nature. The Siculi inhabited the north-eastern part of
the island, and the Sicani the southern and western.
At the time when the Phoenicians were in possession of the most important
islands of the Aegean, as Thasos and Cythera, and had settlements in
most of the Cyclades; they also occupied strong points on the coast of
Sicily; they were generally small places in little islands, headlands
and the like, not being intended as agricultural settlements, but as
factories. But they disappeared in consequence of the Greek colonies,
which commenced at an early period, and according to the traditions from
annals of which Thucydides probably made indirect use through Antiochus,
soon after the beginning of the Olympiads. The colonies came from two
of the Greek tribes, the Dorians and Chalcidians. In Italy, there was,
properly speaking, only one Doric city that was really great, whereas in
Sicily Doric cities preponderated both in number and greatness, witness
Syracuse, which Timaeus calls the largest Greek city, Agrigentum, which
was but little inferior to Syracuse, Gela, Selinus, and Camarina. Zancle
(afterwards Messana), Naxos, Leontini, Catana, and Himera, on the north
coast, were of Chalcidian origin. All the towns on the north-east, on
a line from Syracuse to Palermo, were Chalcidian, and those on the
south-west of it were Dorian. In speaking of the towns of Sicily, I shall
make some deviation from the general rule I have hitherto followed, and
enumerate them not in their natural succession, but according to their
magnitude.
Sicily, like most other countries which are surrounded by the sea on
two sides, presents the physical character of two different countries.
In Andalusia and Algarvia, the character of the animal and vegetable
world up to the mountains is African; and, in like manner, the southern
part of Sicily is completely African, and the palm-tree grows there
as beautifully as in Tunis and Tripoli; but the country north of cape
Heraeum is quite different.
If we except the south-western coast and the district about Leontini,
Sicily is altogether a mountainous country. Mount Aetna is the real
central knot of the island, and the highest mountains proceed from it in
a north-eastern direction as far as cape Pelorus just opposite to Italy.
The Heraean range likewise proceeds from Aetna in a western direction,
while another chain extends southwards. This last range is considerably
lower than the others, but still high enough to form the watershed
between the eastern and western coast. In the part between Palermo and
Messina, the mountains approach very close to the coast, so that often
two places situated on the coast are not connected by a road, just as is
the case in many parts of Liguria. Hence, during the wars of the Romans,
we never find that the northern coast formed their scene of operation,
which it is in all the wars on the south coast, for in this latter part
there are roads, and armies can move. But on the northern coast there
never was any communication either in the Punic wars or in those of the
middle ages and modern times. It is of importance to know this in order
to understand the history of the first Punic war.
AETNA is the highest mountain both of Italy and Sicily; it had only very
few eruptions in antiquity, but they were sometimes of a violence which
has never been equalled in modern times. According to Thucydides, the
third eruption, after the settlement of the Greeks in Sicily, occurred
in his own days, in the time of the Peloponnesian war. We need not,
however, scrupulously insist on this number, for it is possible that
all the eruptions were not recorded, and that there had been some at
a time when no annals were yet kept. The eruptions of which we know,
belong to Olympiads 70, 82,[60] and Olymp. 88, 3, or the sixth year
of the Peloponnesian war. The greatest subsequent eruption in ancient
times occurred after the death of Caesar. A still more terrible one
is recorded by the earliest Byzantine writers of the age of the Greek
emperor Anastasius or Zeno. During the eruption in the age of Caesar, the
ashes are said to have been thrown as far as Peloponnesus and Africa,
which is probably no exaggeration; but it seems scarcely possible that,
in the reign of Anastasius, the ashes should have been carried as far
as Constantinople, though it certainly is very difficult positively to
assert anything about these powers of nature.
ERYX (monte S. Giuliano), situated in an isolated position on the western
promontory, is a mountain of great historical interest. It is high, but a
tame mountain, and is celebrated for its temple of Venus Erycina; but it
has been immortalised in history by the defence of Hamilcar Barcas, who
was blockaded there by the Romans for years, and maintained himself in
spite of all difficulties: that defence is one of the greatest events in
military history.
Whether Sicily derived the name _Trinacria_ from its three promontories,
which seems to us very probable, or whether this is only apparent, and
the name arose from a Siculian town of a similar name (Trinacia or
Thrinacia), independently of the form of the island, is one of those
questions, concerning which it is best to confess that they cannot be
satisfactorily answered.
SYRACUSAE, at first probably SYRACUSA, was the greatest Greek city in
Sicily. The plural form of the name probably did not come into use until
the time when several towns were united in one great city; afterwards,
during the decline of the language, it was again called Syracusa. There
exists an abridgment of six books (from 21 to 26) of Diodorus Siculus,
which was no doubt made in Sicily itself, but at a late period, for it
already contains several modern Greek expressions, and among others,
also the form Syracusa. Those of the Byzantine writers who did not
want to write learnedly, likewise have the singular. It is well known
that Syracuse was a Corinthian colony led out by the Bacchiad Archias;
the first settlement was formed in the island of Ortygia (to which the
modern Siragossa also is confined), for the sake of safety against the
attacks of the inhabitants of the interior. It commenced its career
as a commercial place; and this first colony was small like all the
other Greek settlements, as, for example, Cyrene. The island in the
Doric dialect was called νᾶσος, and the Romans also retained this name
(_Nasos_), as we know from Cicero’s Verrine orations. A suburb of the
name of _Achradina_ (from ἀχράς, the wild pear-tree) arose on the main
land opposite the island. This suburb, which increased considerably, is
the Syracuse of the middle period, that is, under the first Gelo and the
first Hiero, until the time of the Peloponnesian war. Nasos then became
the Acra, but Achradina alone was fortified. By the side of this latter,
again two large suburbs arose, _Neapolis_ and _Tycha_; they seem to
have commenced at two different gates, and perhaps ran parallel to each
other, but were separated by a considerable intervening space. They, too,
became important towns, so that Syracuse was a tetrapolis. The last two
of these places which had not been fortified at all, or only feebly, were
surrounded by Dionysius with a wall which he constructed at a distance of
about three miles from the island. Above Syracuse there runs a range of
hills, and you may easily understand its situation, by comparing it with
the neighbourhood of Bonn, the plain extending between the Vorgebirge
and the Rhine: the city must be conceived to be situated in the plain
upon the Rhine, whence it gradually extends towards the Vorgebirge. These
hills, which, just like our Vorgebirge, bound the plain stretching to
the sea, were called _Epipolae_. They were from early times surmounted
by forts, the object of which was to protect the district in the petty
wars with the Siculians; during the Athenian war also they were very
dangerous on account of the great enlargement of the city. Dionysius
then fortified the city by building two mighty walls up the heights, so
as to enclose those forts which now became citadels. The whole of the
intermediate space between the walls, however, must not be imagined to
have been covered with buildings, for between Neapolis and Tycha there
were extensive tracts which can never have been built upon; the quarries
also could not be built over, as is clear from the whole surface of the
ground. But the circumference of the city was enormous.
The misfortunes of Syracuse are very painful: it was visited by such a
succession of devastations that we can hardly understand how it could
maintain itself: it must have possessed an unusual degree of vital power.
I believe that its happiest period was the reign of the last Hiero,
though the population may at that time already have been much smaller
than it had been in the earlier prosperous periods. In the Hannibalian
war, when the city was taken by the Romans, Neapolis and Tycha were
completely destroyed, and the alleged mildness of Marcellus was of no
avail, for the work of destruction was completed with barbarous fury. At
the capture of Achradina, Marcellus ordered to spare the lives of the
inhabitants, and not to carry away a free-born Syracusan into slavery.
This is always praised as an act of great humanity; but a new fragment in
the excerpts from Diodorus shows that this apparently humane order did
not prevent the complete pillage of the city: the Syracusans were robbed
of everything, and freedom alone was granted to them. But this gift
rendered their condition worse even than that of slaves, who received at
least some food from their masters, while the free men died of hunger, no
person supplying them with anything. Thus it happened that many a free
man gave himself out to be a slave in order to find a purchaser and food.
This is probably the most fearful occurrence in all ancient history.
After that time there existed in Neapolis and Tycha only a few isolated
buildings and temples, and the population disappeared; even in Achradina
only very few inhabitants appear to have remained, for in Cicero’s time
the real population was again confined to the island of Nasos; the same
appears to have been the condition of the city under the emperors, and
at present it is still the same. Under Augustus a Roman colony was
established there; still, however, the whole island of Sicily was so
essentially Greek, that under the emperors it was always regarded as a
part of Greece. Even at the time of the Norman conquest, in the eleventh
century of our era, Greek and Arabic were the only languages spoken there.
Although the Syracusans are not among those Greeks who excite our
sympathy for them in the highest degree, yet their history is one of
the most melancholy in ancient times. The whole of Greek history is
very saddening in its course, but none more so than that of Syracuse,
and if we seriously contemplate it, it is heartrending. The Syracusans
throughout show a lawlessness which rendered them incapable of governing
themselves; their only salvation was a mild usurper, as, for example,
the last Hiero; he was a mild and kindly man, although even he did
things which make us shudder; but this was natural in the case of Greek
usurpers. The history of Syracuse begins with an aristocratic form of
government, the first settlers ruling over a considerable territory, and
the ancient inhabitants having become serfs (κιλλικύριοι). Servitude
afterwards disappears, and a demos is formed, which is increased by new
settlers from all parts of Greece, and has to struggle with the lords of
the soil (γάμοροι). Gelo, one of these lords, put himself at the head of
the demos, and for the sake of appearances established a democracy, but
set himself up as tyrant. Under Hiero, Syracuse was extremely prosperous;
with him the tyrannis ceased and democracy was restored, but was found
wanting as soon as it was put to the test, and a struggle gradually
arose between the wealthy few and the multitude. During this struggle
there arose Dionysius I., an ambitious man, not a benefactor of the
people, though he was useful in several respects, for the people could
not do without a ruler. He was succeeded by his unworthy son, quite a
detestable person; it was now impossible to live without a usurper,
but it was equally impossible to endure him. The distressing condition
became worse in consequence of the unsuccessful undertaking of Dion,
respecting whom Plato was so singularly mistaken, and whom he regarded
in the light of his own ideal of what a man should be. Timoleon, a
really great man, expelled Dionysius by force, and restored happiness
and prosperity to the city for a period of twenty years. He ruled solely
by his personal authority, and the people, for once, were grateful to
him. After his death, fresh divisions arose, and Agathocles, a bold
but oriental miscreant of unprincipled impudence, usurped the supreme
power. Under his dominion of Syracuse became great and brilliant, but not
prosperous: it was fearfully ill used; it became a den of robbers, and
mercenaries of every description deluged the city with torrents of blood.
Long protracted, and devastating internal wars then followed, after which
came the more than fifty years’ reign of Hiero, during which Syracuse was
confined to a small territory. It often ruled over the whole island; but
the state of things was ever changing.
The population of Syracuse is estimated at 1,200,000 souls; and this
number is adopted in a great many books, but it is quite inconceivable.
The population of all Sicily at present amounts to from 1,600,000 to
1,700,000, and seventy or eighty years ago it was only 1,200,000.
How then is it possible, that Syracuse alone should have had such a
population of free men? Diodorus indeed speaks of thirty myriads, but
they must be understood as the numbers in the Roman census, that is,
as comprising not only the citizens of Syracuse, but including all the
inhabitants of the towns which stood to Syracuse in the relation of
isopolity. Hence we may assume that Syracuse itself, at the time of
its highest prosperity, contained within its walls at the most 200,000
inhabitants, including both free men and slaves, and I should be
surprised to find that it actually did amount to so much. You remember
that Thebes, when it was destroyed by Alexander, contained only 30,000
persons of every age, rank, and sex. The statements about the population
in antiquity are monstrously exaggerated; the numbers are not always
fictitious, but are founded upon misunderstandings.
AGRIGENTUM (Ἀκράγας, according to the common derivation of such names,
where ς is changed into _ntum_) was the second large city in Sicily.
Plans of it are found in books of travel, and in Graevius’ Thesaurus;
but nothing can be more erroneous than they are, for towns in the
neighbourhood are represented as parts of Agrigentum, which they never
were. It was a Rhodian colony, and was inferior in greatness to Syracuse
alone. The population is said to have amounted to 200,000 souls; but
the case is quite similar to that of Syracuse, as is clear from another
statement, which mentions only 20,000. Both numbers may be correct, if
we take the 20,000 as that of the real citizens, and the 200,000 as
comprising all the isopolites of Agrigentum. But notwithstanding all
this, the population of Sicily in ancient times was far larger than
it is at present; its numbers in the towns of the island change with
incredible rapidity. In the middle ages, Messina had 140,000 inhabitants;
at the end of the seventeenth century, the ill-usage of the Spaniards
reduced them to somewhat less than 100,000, and the plague brought them
down to 90,000; afterwards, by the systematic oppression, the object
of which was to crush Messina and to raise Palermo, they were reduced
to 40,000; and before the earthquake their number amounted only to
25,000; at present it is said to be 70,000. Such is the vitality in
those southern countries, and such are the changes in their population.
In the north, too, fluctuations occur, but not to the same extent as in
the south, where people have so few wants, and many can live in the open
air without a cover for their heads until some favourable opportunity
occurs. Immense ruins of Agrigentum still exist: it was situated on a
hill and was visible from the sea at a great distance, whence Virgil
says, _Arduus hic Acragas ostendit maxima longe moenia_. I have already
directed your attention to the fact that _moenia_ signifies “large
buildings in a city;” the walls of Agrigentum had nothing striking, and
parts of them ran in the valley, so that Virgil cannot have alluded to
them. The buildings of the city were not yet quite completed when they
were destroyed in the Carthaginian war; they were much larger than those
at Syracuse or any other of the Greek towns of Sicily. Before the war
in Olymp. 93, Agrigentum was the wealthiest city in the island; but
the stories of the riches of particular citizens, as, for example, of
Gellias, which Diodorus relates after Timaeus, are quite fabulous, for
Timaeus was credulous. In Olymp. 93, Agrigentum was taken and completely
destroyed by the Carthaginians; the town was defended in the most
unfortunate manner, or not defended at all: the Greek generals during
that war were so wretched and senseless, that the Agrigentines had enough
to do in trying to save themselves, leaving their city with all its
treasures a prey to the enemy. It was afterwards restored indeed, but the
new town was only a shadow of what it had been before. In consequence of
the treaties by which Selinus was ceded to the Carthaginians, Agrigentum
was re-united with the Greek part of Sicily, of which Syracuse, under
Dionysius and Timoleon, was the capital. Afterwards the character of the
wars between the Greeks and Carthaginians was no longer as destructive
as it had been before, for Carthage was satisfied with subduing and
ruling over the Greek towns. After the reign of Agathocles, Agrigentum
again fell into the hands of the Carthaginians. In the first Punic
war, it was taken by the Romans, and on that occasion one part of its
inhabitants made their escape, while others perished or were sold as
slaves. Towards the end of the Punic war, it was again implicated in
an insurrection against the Romans, in consequence of which it became
so desolate that the Romans, to prevent the complete extinction of the
place, established there colonists from other Sicilian towns. Agrigentum
is indeed mentioned in Cicero’s Verrine orations, but it is clear that it
was quite an insignificant town; under the Roman emperors it remained in
the same condition, and may have been of little more importance than the
modern Girgenti. The gigantic ruins of the ancient city are situated on
the plateau of the hill: the severest blow it ever received was that in
Olymp. 93, and subsequent earthquakes also contributed to its destruction.