My intent to document my trip to Italy has not turned out how I imagined. With the bustle of the trip, I didn’t take the time while I was there to sketch out what to write, which has made writing after the fact difficult. I’m going to write a few more brief posts of trip highlights, but then I will be moving on because I have another trip coming up that you won’t want to miss! The ancient Greeks founded the ancient city of Syracuse on the eastern shore of Sicily. We spent a day wandering around. The city has […]
Tag Archives: Sicily
Roman Villa
Maneuvering eastward in Sicily, we came to Villa Roman del Casale. It’s a large Roman Villa dating to the fourth century AD with thousands of square feet of mosaics. It’s basically a floor art gallery. That said, pictures serve better to explain. These are a small sampling of what’s in this palatial home.
The “Valley” of Temples
We crossed over from Malta to Sicily, moving from a small island to the largest in the Mediterranean. Now we’re in Roman territory! Actually, not quite. Yes, the Romans were here. They conquered the island during the First Punic War (a series of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage). However, before the Romans arrived, the Greeks were here, as we would see at other locales around the island. Our first stop was at Agrigento on the southern coast. There are a series of Greek temples built on a ridge, called the Valley of Temples today. (Whoever came up with […]