Syracuse (25, 26/9)

One of the dipper-like funerary pots

What a surprise the night brought! It was raining when we woke this morning, and it looked like it was going to continue for some time. Towards lunchtime it cleared enough for us to venture out to the Museo Archeological Paolo Orsini. Named after an eminent archeologist who did a huge amount of work particularly in the Syracuse area, it was very extensive and actually touched on the geology of Sicily which helped to explain both some of the landscapes, some of the agriculture, and some of the reasons why Greek and Roman remains are found where they are.  However rooms full of pot sherds are beginning to be a little too common for us.  What is on display is a minute example of what is is storage, so they must have warehouses full of the stuff in every city and town in Sicily.  It is the sort of stuff an expert could make stories out of, but for amateurs who are grasping for the big picture, it is a little too much detail.  However we have found that the emphasis varies from museum to museum, and there always seems to be something that we learn in each one. In this case, there were a whole lot of pots with a large straight hand on them like a dipper except that the handle part was not curved and was triangular in shape.  Seeing that the pottery was found as grave goods, we speculated that they were like tombstones and indicated something about the person who had been cremated.  They also had a great collection of huge storage jars leaving us to speculate again just how they were made and fired so evenly.  It rained again whilst we were in the museum, and it was still trying to when we left.

Syracuse's amphitheatre

We decided to ignore the rain, however, and when a patch of blue sky appeared so we ventured out to the Area Archeologica Neapolis, to check out the theatre and associated Greek and Roman structures, or what is left of them. The first structure was the roman amphitheatre. One side of this is reasonably complete, with the seating, and the corridors under these, still visible. The seating and much of the infrastructure on the other side has been robbed away. Once again, the eternal gripe - no written information, only those black and white grids that you photograph with your phone, and then listen to. We didn't have the app, and there were very few people actually using them. 

Got any bulls to sacrifice?

Close to the amphitheatre was the Alter of Heiron II, a massive structure (198 x 23m) on which animal sacrifices were made. It was dedicated to Zeus and up to 400 bulls would be sacrificed at any one time.  It looked like most of it was directly shaped out of the bedrock and could have also been used as the seating for sporting games carried out on the larger flat area just adjacent.

It would have been great to see a show in the theatre

We then progressed to the theatre which was the largest we have seen. It has to be as it is known to be the largest theatre built in the ancient world with the capacity to hold 15,000 people in 67 rows of seats. It is approximately 138m wide, and the seating is divided into ten wedges. Each row was given a letter, a tradition still followed today in our theatres. Originally built in the 470 BC, it was enlarged in 212 BC, then its capacity was reduced by the Romans to create a larger stage. All the tiers of seats were carved into the limestone unlike some of the others we have seen where some of the seating has had to be built up. Unfortunately much of the stonework of the stage buildings was removed in 1520-31 by Emperor Charles V to build the walls around Ortygia, down on the coast. Many Greek plays celebrated their opening night here, and apparently Greek comedy was born on the stage of the Syracuse theatre. Now, every summer the theatre is used for a program of classical theatre, not all Greek or Roman!. We saw some advertising for Aida to be held there, but it was in August - too late.
The area around these structures is honey-combed with the quarries the Greeks used to extract millions of cubic metres of stone for their buildings. These caves, or latomie, have had a number of used over the centuries - prisons, catacombs, churches - and a couple of them are huge. We weren't able to get into the necropolis area where Archimedes is reputed to have been buried (he was a local boy), although I think we had a better view of them from the B&B's sitting room window. 

One of the cave temples near the theatre

We headed for Ortygia (the island just off Syracuse and connected to it by a couple of very short bridges.  We had tried to go the night before but without a map and no signposts we had taken a wrong turn.  The place was quite a tourist area with plenty going on. We settled on dining outside in the Piazza Duomo, sitting opposite the cathedral. The Piazza is surrounded by lovely baroque buildings, many of which seem to have been restored, well cleaned at least. It was a very pleasant place to have dinner. I had seafood spaghetti (delicious) and Allan had rigatone with pistachio, both using local ingredients. We had the local wine, but it didn't measure up to previous vintages we have drunk. As has become our custom, it was gelati for dessert, eaten as we strolled back up the hill to our room.

No we're not in France - snails at the market

Using the web we found a laundromat down near the bridges to Ortygia, and for less than the cost of doing it ourselves elsewhere, we just left it with the guy in charge the next day and we were to return in an hour and a half to collect it. While waiting we wandered along the eastern waterfront for a bit, then found the market with a wonderful array of fresh produce. We didn't buy anything because we couldn't keep anything cool in the car, and we already had grapes in the fridge back in our room. After retrieving our washing, (all neatly folded) and leaving it in the car.

Cheeses made up to look like pigs.
We forgot to find out if they were from pigs milk!

We went off to find the Papyrus Museum, which was down on the far end of Ortygia. It was small but very neatly laid out, and covered all aspects of papyrus making. The Egyptians never described how they made their papyrus, and no one has been able to produce it in modern times to the perfection they achieved. Its quality dropped once the Egyptians were invaded by Alexander the Great. Papyrus was a profitable Egyptian export, but in the damper European climate it tended to grow mould and deteriorate rapidly. Interestingly enough, the Vatican insisted that all its papal bulls be written on it up until 1022. Vellum and parchment had always been around, and when the Arabs introduced paper it spelt the demise in Europe for papyrus. Syracuse once had a papyrus industry but it also failed eventually. There was an attempt to revive it in the 18th century, but it was not successful, partly because they were unable to reproduce the quality of the Egyptian papyrus, and what they did produce wasn't smooth and was very brown. The papyrus plant still grows along the banks of the Ciane River in Syracuse, hence the existence of the museum here, although it is apparently rare in Egypt now.

Papyrus growing in Syracuse

We had just left the museum when we then came across some New Zealanders we'd already chatted to in Caltagirone and Ragusa! This time we exchanged names and email addresses and had quite a long chat before parting company. We may yet see them in Rome. They leave a day earlier than us, but they have given us the name of the hotel they are staying in, seeing as how we haven't booked one yet.
From here we went to the Galleria di Palazzo Bellomo, thinking that we already had tickets for entry, but were mistaken. It was an and/or ticket and we used up our two of three options yesterday. Because we were there we decided we would go through anyway, and felt ripped off when they asked for €8 entry fee. We should have just walked out, particularly as it wasn't very big and it was mostly of religious artworks which we had seen plenty of. 
Back on Ortygia that night for dinner (we are getting very used to eating very late like the locals) we could here a guitarist playing in the piazza. It was a pity he wasn't there last night. It would have been very pleasant sitting eating dinner, and listening to someone of his calibre, but we wanted to spread our largesse around a bit so didn't go back to last night's venue. We settled for a restaurant which was in the courtyard of one of the palazzos in a street leading up to the square. I had the seafood spaghetti again and Allan had linguine with pesto, both excellent. We decided to buy a gelati for dessert and go and listen to the guitarist whilst we ate it. Unfortunately he was taking a break, so we had to put up with other buskers not of the same calibre until it was his turn again. It was wonderful, and we have never seen a busker so appreciated by a casual audience like his, both in their applause and donations!