This city, situated at the foot of Mount Etna, was founded by a colony
from Chalcis, seven hundred and fifty-three years before the Christian
era; and soon after the settlement of Syracuse. There have not been
wanting some, however, to assert that ancient Catanea was one of the
oldest cities in the world.
It fell into the hands of the Romans, and became the residence of a
prætor.
It was then adorned with sumptuous buildings of all kinds. It was
destroyed, however, by Pompey; and restored by Augustus with greater
magnificence. It was large and opulent. Being so contiguous to Mount
Etna, it is rendered remarkable for the fatal overthrows to which it
has been subjected by the eruptions of that mountain; in some of which
it has been known to discharge a stream of lava four miles broad and
fifty feet deep, and advancing at the rate of seven miles in a day.
The number of eruptions from the page of history are 81.
From the time of Thucydides (B.C. 481) 3
In the year B.C. 1
In A.D. 44 1
A.D. 252 1
During the 12th century 2
13th 1
14th 2
15th 4
16th 4
17th 22
18th 32
Since the commencement of the 19th cent. 8
--81 total.
In 1693 Catanea was entirely destroyed by an earthquake, so that hardly
one stone remained upon another. It began on the 9th January, and on the
11th the earth opened in several places. Almost in a moment 11,000
persons, who had fled to the cathedral for shelter, perished by its
fall; the canon, with the ministers at the altar, and about one hundred
persons, being all that escaped. The undulations of this shock were
felt, it is said, in Germany, France, and even in England. Fifty-four
towns of some magnitude were, more or less, sufferers by this
earthquake, and the total loss of human life, it is supposed, amounted
to nearly one hundred thousand.
"The present town," says Malte Brun, "is well built. Its fine edifices
are so many proofs, not of its prosperity, but of its misfortunes; for,
in Catanea, houses never become old; they give way either to lava or
volcanic shocks. It is to the earthquakes of 1693 and 1783 that it owes
its magnificence; almost wholly destroyed, it was rebuilt with greater
regularity. Most of its edifices, however, have been injured by the
shocks in 1819."
A great many antiquities are contained in the Biscari Museum, which was
founded by a wealthy noble of the same name, who spent his fortune in
exploring or digging for antiquities in the territory of Catanea. The
ancient theatre and amphitheatre, the old walls, baths, and temples,
were buried under several layers of lava and alluvial deposits, that
were removed by the same individual; lastly, the town is indebted to him
for several ancient statues.
"There are many remains of antiquity," says Mr. Brydone, "but most of
them are in a very ruinous state. One of the most remarkable is an
elephant of lava, with an obelisk of Egyptian granite on his back. There
are also considerable remains of a great theatre, besides that belonging
to the prince of Biscaris, a large bath, almost entire; the ruins of a
great aqueduct eighteen miles long; the ruins of several temples, one of
Ceres; another of Vulcan. The church, called Bocca di Fuoco, was
likewise a temple. But the most entire of all is a small rotunda, which,
as well as the rotunda at Rome, and some others to be met with in Italy,
demonstrates that form to be the most durable of any."
There is also a well at the foot of the old walls, where the lava, after
running along the parapet, and and then falling forwards, produced a
very complete and lofty arch over the spring.
Through the care, and at the expense of prince Biscaris, many other
monuments of ancient splendour and magnificence have been recovered by
digging down to the ancient town, which, on account of the numerous
torrents of lava that have flowed out of Mount Etna for the last
thousand years, is now to be sought for in dark caverns many feet below
the present surface of the earth.
Mr. Swinburne states, that he descended into baths, sepulchres, an
amphitheatre, and a theatre, all very much injured by the various
catastrophes that have befallen them. He found, too, that these
buildings were erected not on the solid ground and with brick or stone,
but on old beds of lava, and with square pieces of the same substance,
which, in no instance, appears to have been fused by the contact of new
lavas: the sciarra or stones of old lava having constantly proved as
strong a barrier against the flowing torrent of fire as any other stone
could have been, though some authors have been of opinion, that the hot
matter would melt the whole mass, and incorporate itself with it.
There was a temple at Catanea, dedicated to Ceres, in which none but
women were permitted to appear[186].