train, which brought us back to Catania at eight o'clock. Our first
visit there was to the "divine artificer," who found eight punctures
impartially distributed over my two tires. We thus learned to know the
cactus in a new light. Hereafter we avoided even a dry piece of it
lying in the road as cavalry would avoid caltrops. We took advantage
of the necessary delay to visit the most interesting monument of Greek
Catania, the theatre, covered by lava, on which rest the houses of the
modern city. Enough underground excavation has been done to enable one
to realize the appearance of the place when Alcibiades here harangued
the Catanians to bring them over to the Athenian alliance, and had
such drastic force lent to his lisping oratory by a body of Athenian
hoplites, who, coming from their camp outside the city, broke down
a weak spot in the wall and entered the city before he got to his
peroration.
Again it was about noon when we mounted with intention to ride to
Lentini, somewhat over a third of the way to Syracuse, across a level
plain, and then take a train across the hill-country to within ten
miles of Syracuse, there to resume our ride. For an hour or more we
were passing through the famous "Campi Læstrygonii," which Cicero calls
"_uberrima pars Siciliæ_," now known as the plain of Catania, the most
extensive plain in Sicily. Then we crossed the Symæthos, and soon
began a gentle climb, with the sun almost in the zenith. Now and then
a turn in the road, or if not that, a look over the shoulder, gave us
a fine view of Ætna, which kept increasing in majesty as we receded
from it. I was thankful that we had not climbed it. That would have in
some measure vulgarized it. A geologist might do it in the line of his
profession. But one who wishes to keep the Ætna of Æschylus and Pindar
may do better to gaze with awe from the hill of Syracuse, as _they_
did, upon this Greek Sinai. I do not want to overpower a mountain like
that. I want it to overpower me. One may doubt whether Coleridge would
or could have written his hymn to Mont Blanc if he had "conquered" it,
as tourists express it.
Just as the train for Syracuse was coming in we reached Lentini
station, and this time the sea that "washes away all human ills" was
not available. We here made a resolve to do our work in the future
when the sun was nearer the horizon. There was nothing of interest
for us to investigate in the city of Gorgias, the sophist and orator,
whose silver tongue, combined with a bold and transparent trick of the
Segestans, duped the Athenians, who thought themselves the wisest of
men, into the Sicilian expedition. We were accordingly glad to speed
along to Priolo, a station between the ruins of Megara and the flat
peninsula, Thapsos. Just beyond the latter, having ridden long enough
to get up steam, we washed away our ills for that day with the hill of
Syracuse looking down upon us, and then as renewed men passed, when the
sun was approaching the horizon, over that historic hill, and looked
down on the historic harbor and on little Ortygia, large enough to hold
the modern city as it held the first Corinthian colony. What a tide of
associations rush over one at this sight! In a sense we were at our
goal. Had we closed our journey with that nightfall we should at least
have read our Thucydides for the future with different eyes.
In an exaltation of spirit we came to the Casa Politi, almost at
the point of Ortygia, looking out upon the sea, where we found a
German host and hostess. After our strenuous and partially successful
wrestling with Italian, which had generally ended by our falling back
on the member who had taken Italian at Harvard to straighten out for us
the tangled web of the dialogue, how welcome it was when we asked the
question, "_Haben Sie vielleicht gutes Bier?_" to get straight from the
shoulder the honest answer, "_Jawohl, gewiss_," and the more tangible
answer of three foaming mugs from a cool cellar. We had lived in the
spirit a good deal that day, enjoying the beauty of Taormina, Ætna,
and Syracuse, and holding converse with Alcibiades and Gorgias and
Thucydides. Now we hobnobbed with Gambrinus, and enjoyed "the warmest
welcome in an inn."
I have never had more full and exhilarating days than those four
days in Syracuse, days full of revelation, recollection, reverie,
or, to put it more prosaically, days devoted to study in history and
topography. The ruins of Syracuse are not to the casual observer very
imposing. One might almost say of them, "_periere etiamque ruinæ_."
But even these ruins have great interest for the archæologist. There
is, for example, an old temple near the northern end of Ortygia, for
the most part embedded in the buildings of the modern city, yet with
its east end cleared and showing several entire columns with a part
of the architrave upon them. And what a surprise here awaits one who
thinks of a Doric temple as built on a stereotyped plan! Instead of
the thirteen columns on the long sides which one is apt to look for
as going with a six-column front, here are eighteen or nineteen, it
is not yet quite certain which. The columns stand less than their
diameter apart, and the abaci are so broad that they nearly touch. So
small is the intercolumnar space that archæologists incline to the
belief that in this one Doric temple there were triglyphs only over
the columns, and not also between them as in all other known cases.
Everything about this temple stamps it as the oldest in Sicily. An
inscription on the top step, in very archaic letters, much worn and
difficult to read, contains the name of Apollo in the ancient form,
Ἀπέλονι. The inscription may, of course, be later than the temple; but
it is in itself old enough to warrant the supposition that the temple
was erected soon after the first Corinthian colonists established
themselves in the island. While the inscription makes it reasonably
certain that the temple belonged to Apollo, the god under whose guiding
hand all these Dorians went out into these western seas, tradition,
with strange perversity, has given it the name of "Temple of Diana."
But it is all in the family. Whether tradition has also erred in naming
the temple on the highest part of the island, into which the cathedral
has been so immured that the old temple columns protrude on each
side of the church, the "Temple of Minerva," is a question to which
archæologists have not yet returned a unanimous answer. Indications
point rather to Zeus. This temple owes its preservation, such as it
is, to this immuring of the cathedral in it. In fact, the temple is
nearly all present, although one might almost pass it by in the daytime
without seeing it. Another temple ruin on the edge of the plateau,
which begins about two miles south of the city, across the Anapos, one
might also easily overlook in a casual survey, because it consists only
of two columns without capitals, and a broad extent of the foundations
from which the accumulated earth has been only partially removed. This
was the famous temple of Olympian Zeus, built probably in the days of
Hiero I., soon after the Persian war, but on the site of a temple still
more venerable. One seeks a reason for the location of this holy place
at such a distance from the city. Holm, the German historian of Sicily,
argues with some plausibility that this was no mere suburb of Syracuse,
but the original Syracuse itself. In the first place, the list of the
citizens of Syracuse was kept here down at least to the time of the
Athenian invasion. In the second place, tradition, which, when rightly
consulted, tells so much, says that Archias, the founder of Syracuse,
had two daughters, Ortygia and Syracusa, which may point to two
co-ordinate settlements, Ortygia and Syracuse; the latter, which was on
this temple plateau, being subsequently merged in the former, but, as
sometimes happens in such cases, giving its name to the combined result.
Besides these temple ruins there are many more foundations that tell a
more or less interesting story. Then there are remains of the ancient
city that can never be ruined: for instance, the great stone quarries,
pits over a hundred feet deep and acres broad, in some of which the
Athenian prisoners were penned up to waste away under the gaze of the
pitiless captors; the Greek theatre, cut out of the solid rock; the
great altar of Hiero II., six hundred feet long and about half as
broad, also of solid rock. Then there is the mighty Hexapylon, which
closed the fortifications of Dionysius at the northwest at the point
where they challenged attack from the land side. With its sally-ports
and rock-hewn passages, some capacious enough to quarter regiments
of cavalary, showing holes cut in the projecting corners of rock,
through which the hitch-reins of the horses were wont to be passed,
and its great magazines, it stands a lasting memorial to the energy
of a tyrant. But while this fortress is practically indestructible, an
impregnable fortress is a dream incapable of realization. Marcellus and
his stout Romans came in through these fortifications, not entirely, it
is true, by their own might, but by the aid of traitors, against whom
no walls are proof.
One of the stone quarries, the Latomia del Paradiso, has an added
interest from its association with the tyrant who made himself hated
as well as feared, while Gelon was only feared without being hated.
An inner recess of the quarry is called the "Ear of Dionysius," and
tradition says that at the inner end of this recess either he or his
creatures sat and listened to the murmurs that the people uttered
against him, and that these murmurs were requited with swift and fatal
punishment. Certain it is that a whisper in this cave produces a
wonderful resonance, and a pistol-shot is like the roar of a cannon;
but that people who had anything to say against the butcher should come
up within ear-shot of him to utter it is not very likely. Historians
are not quite sure that the connection of Dionysius with this recess is
altogether mythical, but that he shaped it with the fell purpose above
mentioned is not to be thought of, as the whole quarry is older than
his time, and was probably, with the Latomia dei Cappuccini, a prison
for the Athenians.
[Illustration: STONE QUARRY AT SYRACUSE CALLED LATOMIA DEI CAPPUCCINI]
No object is more frequently mentioned in connection with Syracuse than
Arethusa, the nymph changed into a fountain when pursued across the
sea by the river Alpheius. The water of this fountain, much praised in
antiquity, has in recent times become brackish by the letting in of
salt water through earthquakes. But what it has lost in real excellence
it has gained in stylish appearance. For the sake of its ancient
renown, washerwomen have recently been excluded from it, a fine wall
put about it, and papyrus plants added to make it look picturesque.
Enveloped in a more natural beauty lies the rival fountain, Kyane,
the source of the southern branch of the Anapos some distance south
of the Olympieum. The nymph Kyane was turned into a fountain by Pluto
because she told Demeter of the rape of Persephone. We gave half a day
to Kyane, and had ourselves pushed up a stream lined with reeds and
papyrus, the latter a reminder of Saracen occupation, to this spring,
from which the stream comes forth with a rush. It is difficult to
decide which is more beautiful, the clear, deep, broad spring or the
stream through which one approaches it. The whole journey is like an
excursion into fairy-land, the outside world being shut out by the
reeds and papyrus.
But if the monuments of Syracuse are on the whole comparatively
unimpressive, what a history is crowded into the less than three
centuries between Gelon, the second founder of the city, in that he
made it great, and Marcellus. This history is far from being a mere
record of slaughter, and sieges, and sack of cities. The time of Hiero
I. is memorable for the appearance at Syracuse, in familiar if not
always friendly converse, of Pindar, Simonides, Bacchylides, Æschylus,
Epicharmos and Xenophanes. One must not think of the poetry of this
Hieronian circle as exotic because most of the poets were transplanted:
to the Greek poets any place in the Greek world where they were
appreciated and cared for was home. Anacreon sang as well and as
naturally at Samos and Athens as at his native Teos; Simonides's muse
was apparently equally happy in Athens, Thessaly, and Sicily; and even
the Theban eagle suffered no relaxation of his wings at the Syracusan
court; nay, he appears to have made his loftiest flights there. Over
one-third of his epinicion odes are for Sicilian victors. Of the Titan
Æschylus alone of that company one may suspect that, although he did
not always get on well at home, yet the sojourn so far from Eleusis and
Marathon found him homesick and heartsick. It is only rarely in the
world's history that such a lot of stars gather around a court. It is a
good deal that Syracuse was again visited by the muses in the time of
Hiero II., when Theocritus took up his abode there.
The afternoon before we left Syracuse we got a reminder that its
greatness did not all pass away with the Roman occupation. The enormous
catacombs from Christian times speak of new and better days. But what
stirs one more is one particular spot in the crypt of St. Marcian, a
church partly made out of a temple of Bacchus. Here, in front of an
old altar, a block of stone is pointed out as the stone on which St.
Paul stood when he preached at Syracuse. One gets impatiently sceptical
about traces of the saints in Italy; but why not accept the report
that in his three days' stay at Syracuse, recorded in the Acts of the
Apostles, St. Paul preached here? What is more fitting than that, by
the very altar of the god of revelry, the great apostle should speak
as he spoke at Athens? At any rate, I add this spot to Appii Forum and
Tres Tabernæ as a place where I trod in the footsteps of a man beside
whom Gelon, Pyrrhus, and Hannibal were pygmies.
II
On the journey from Syracuse to Girgenti by rail through the heart of
Sicily the most interesting point is Castrogiovanni, the ancient Enna,
called the navel of Sicily, a height from which one sees mountains
diverging in every direction, a real _Knotenpunkt_. The railroad
affords a view of Enna only from some distance as it plunges into a
long tunnel under the ridge joining this height to another almost as
high, on which stands Calascibetta. The surroundings of the old Sikel
town, Enna, which, being early colonized by Syracuse, became a lasting
monument of Greek domination over the Sikel, were probably much more
beautiful in ancient times. On these rather bare heights there was once
such luxuriant growth of woods and flowers that hunting-dogs lost the
scent of the game. In this flower-garden the Sicilian legend placed the
rape of Persephone.
As the train approached Girgenti it passed through the great sulphur
region of the world. Here thousands of boys, many of them under ten
years of age, carry the sulphur up to the surface. These boys are bound
over by their parents to the overseers of the mines for the sum of two
hundred francs, more or less, which they are expected to work off. But
it takes years to do it, and many die before they succeed. The parents
spend the purchase money and the children live on in despair. Our
informant, a German-American, who had come over to study the sulphur
industry, and who was not a sentimentalist, said that the sight of
these boys going up and down the ladders with tears rolling down their
cheeks had made him join in their sighs and carry a heavy heart all the
way to Palermo.
The case of Girgenti is that of Syracuse reversed. Its history is not
so very important, but its ruins are impressive. Even at Himera, where
Theron and Akragas stood by Gelon and Syracuse, it was in a second
rôle. On that occasion, when the larger part of the Carthaginian
prisoners fell to Akragas, apparently because they strayed into
Akragantine territory after the battle, some of the citizens are
said to have got five hundred slaves apiece. From this time Akragas
gave itself up to the amassing of wealth. As a consequence it became
the least martial and most luxurious of Greek cities, showing, like
Corinth, that a Dorian city, when once given over to pleasure, could
outdo the Ionians in that direction. While Syracuse battled with
Athens, Akragas remained neutral. About the only form of strenuous
activity to which it arose was athletics; and even then a victory was
made an occasion for a display of wealth. When Exænetos won in the
stadion at Olympia, three hundred span of milk-white horses accompanied
him into the city.
The luxury of Akragas took on a peculiarly showy and almost gross type.
The men loaded themselves with gold ornaments. They erected tombs to
horses which had won Olympic victories and to other favorite animals. A
typical Akragantine was Gellias, who used to have slaves stand at his
door and invite every passing stranger to come in; and once, when five
hundred knights from Gela made a visit to Akragas in the winter, he
took them all in, entertained them, and gave each of them a new chiton
and himation. That the means of entertainment did not fail him is shown
by the statement that he had three hundred rock-hewn wine-barrels,
holding each a hundred amphoræ, and a big vat holding a thousand
amphoræ, out of which these were filled; and this was _private_
hospitality.
One could hardly expect moderation when such bountiful provision for
carousal was at hand. Athenæus tells a story showing how well the young
men lived up to their privileges. Some of these, drinking themselves
dizzy at a banquet, declared that the house rocked like a ship, and, as
if to avert impending shipwreck, began to lighten ship by pitching the
furniture out of the windows, to the danger, and then to the hilarious
delight, of the passers-by. But as a crowd and some disorder resulted,
the generals went to the house to investigate the matter. The young
bloods were equal to the emergency. They accosted the graybeards as
Tritons, thanked them for deliverance from the storm, and vowed to
sacrifice to them so soon as they had got over their sea-sickness and
fright. The old men, being carried away with the humor of the thing,
entered into the spirit of the joke, and that house was ever after
known as "the ship."
Such a joke might have been played in a good many other towns, but
the following bit of gossip, if not true, is _ben trovato_, and has a
peculiarly Akragantine flavor. It is related that at the fatal siege
of the city by the Carthaginians, when all was at stake, a law was
passed restricting the guards when at their posts to one under-mattress
and one over-mattress, one blanket, and two pillows. If these things
were done in a green tree, what was done in a dry? Empedocles, the
most eminent citizen of Akragas, said of his fellow-citizens that they
indulged in high living as if they were going to die to-morrow, but
built as if they were going to live forever. The first half of this
statement we have to judge by gossip, which, as it is very bulky and
all to the same point, may well make us believe that when there is so
much smoke there must be some fire. For the corroboration of the latter
half, go to Girgenti and _circumspice_.
* * * * *
What a moment was that when, toward the end of the afternoon, after
toiling up from the station on the north side of Girgenti to the city
itself, which occupied the site of the acropolis of Akragas, we looked
down on the plateau sloping southward toward the sea, and dotted with
the famous ruins long known to us by photographs. About a mile below
us, in the direction of the ruins, was the Hôtel des Temples, which we
had been told in Syracuse was to close for the summer the day before.
But as "the Greeks got into Troy by trying," we thought we would try to
get into this hotel, and be near our goal. At the door a boy declared
that the house was closed; but at our request he said he would call the
padrone. In ten minutes there appeared in riding clothes, and leading a
horse, the most charming landlord of Sicily, with a bewitching smile
and the manners of a gentleman. He said that, although his house was
closed and his cook gone, he had not the heart to send us back up into
the city. We could have, he said, eight or nine beds apiece, and, as
he had a hunting comrade with him for the night, he could give us some
soup and meat.
More than satisfied to have established a base of operations, without
a delay of five minutes we were at the Concordia Temple, the most
perfectly preserved Greek temple, unless we except perhaps the Theseum.
Having an hour and a half of daylight, we used it in getting a first
view of nearly everything on the plateau, and then returned to what we
supposed was to be a frugal meal. But the dinner was an Akragantine
feast, the best of the whole journey, with the possible exception of
the next one at the same table. We wondered what sort of a dinner the
regular cook would have produced if this was done by a novice; and when
the padrone made apologies for his dinner, we searched his smiling face
for traces of sarcasm.
The next day we enjoyed in detail what we had already enjoyed in the
lump, that row of temples lined up along the southern edge of the
plateau which here ends in a rocky precipice. These temples when
new, with the city of half a million inhabitants behind it, and the
acropolis above it with still more temples, must have been a very
effective sight to one coming up from the sea five miles away.
[Illustration: SO-CALLED CONCORDIA TEMPLE AT GIRGENTI]
Although the material of the temples is a friable yellow sandstone,
quarried near by, we must not in reconstructing our picture think of
them as yellow temples. They doubtless had stucco and paint enough to
hide this core. The stone is so porous that it is not surprising to
find the columns on the south side--_i.e._, the side most exposed to
the sirocco--badly eaten away. The whole line dates from the fifth
century, and was doubtless planned and begun by Theron, who had armies
of slaves from Himera.
What Greek name the Concordia Temple had is unknown. Holm suspects
that it is the temple of Demeter, although the substructure under a
church farther up the hill has generally been assigned to her. It owes
its excellent preservation to the fact that in the Middle Ages it was
turned into a church of St. Gregory of the turnips, whoever he was,
when the cella walls were perforated with a series of arches on each
side, to let in the light.
The next best preserved is the temple of Hera Lacinia, in the most
commanding situation of all, having the precipice, which is here higher
and more abrupt, on its east front, as well as on its south side. It
is also considerably the highest of the line. Its present name is
surely wrong. It is quite likely to have been a temple of Poseidon,
a divinity held in honor at Akragas, a horse-rearing as well as a
maritime city. The temple of Herakles is more interesting than either
of these, although only one column stands upright; the rest lie as they
were thrown down by an earthquake, in such good order that it would be
easy to set them up again; and the result would be much more important
than Cavalari's so-called temple of Castor and Pollux, which, being a
corner of a temple put together out of two different temples, should be
properly called "Cavalari's folly." The temple of Herakles is rightly
named. It was identified as being at the sacred gate and near the
agora. It is much larger than the two temples already described, and
shows, like them, traces of a great conflagration which reddened the
yellow stone in places. Its ground plan is very clear but peculiar, and
so extremely interesting. Sicily is the place of all others to study
the construction of the Greek temple.