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| Temple of Concordia at sunset |
The view from our hotel window in Agrigento was breathtaking, the gorgeous Greek Temple of Concordia. But, Agrigento has so much more in its Valley of the Temples, where we stayed in a beautifully renovated villa turned hotel. Dinner on the terrace under a nearly full moon showed us the magic of these ruins at night and made us eager for a tour yesterday with, happily, a terrific guide.
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| Concordia at night |
I think I'm finally getting Sicily's ancient history straight. Virtually all the temples were built by the Greeks during their two plus centuries in charge. The Carthaginians tended to destroy much of what the Greeks built, particularly by fire. The Romans sometimes rearranged the temples more to their liking, but kept them mostly intact, adding their markets, amphitheaters and homes around the temples. Norman conquerors turned a couple of still-standing temples into churches. Most of the destruction resulted from massive earthquakes that often rock this island.
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| Temple of Hercules |
The Temple of Concordia survived because the Normans built a church with its walls spanning the Greek columns, thereby giving the structure enough strength to withstand the later earthquakes. A later king hated what he saw and ordered the temple returned to its earlier condition, which still stands, with some help, today.
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| stone with cable channel |
We began our tour of the Valley of the Temples, as most tourists do, at the top, with the partially reconstructed Temple of Juno.
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tombs along the city wall
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Continuing down the ridge top (the valley is actually off to one side of the temple ridge and was where the citizens lived and farmed), the ancient city walls protect the site from invasion by sea. They are filled with catacombs, now empty of their occupants. Near the bottom of the ridge are temples that are just a jumble of collapsed columns and walls, perhaps to be partially rebuilt someday.
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| Greek statue waiting for new head |
Archaeologists found a couple of Greek statues. Our guide told us that the Greeks made "flexible" statues--the head and arms could be replaced each time the ruler changed, with the newcomers features in place of his predecessor.
The stones the Greeks used came from quarries several miles away in the limestone mountains above the valley. Slaves, of course, built the temples. One can only imagine how many died from exhaustion or horrific accident. It had to be thousands. Many of the stones have either holes in which large wood pins were inserted to carry or roll the stones. Others have channels that were used to hold cables that helped in the transport and lifting of the stones. The slaves used pulleys to lift the stones into place after they were cut perfectly to fit the stones below, beside and above them, with no mortar used at all.
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| mosaic of hapless elephant being taken to Sicily |
Leaving Agrigento, we visited the beautiful Villa Romano del Casale, with its incredibly mosaics. The villa may have been the home of a noble family. It was preserved because a huge landslide covered the entire area, entombing the villa in the process. Farmers found some remains of the villa when they were tilling the ground, which brought archaeologists in to excavate and preserve the building and mosaics.
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| children's chariot races |
It's quite a large villa, with a complete Roman bath, public rooms, many bedrooms and the family's quarters. Each room had a mosaic floor except for the basilica (meeting room), which is marble. We go a little more detail than we needed from our guide, but it was quite fascinating to see the scenes in mosaics of African animals being loaded onto ships for transport across the Mediterranean to Sicily, family gatherings and young women athletes.
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| women athletes in competition |
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