DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.846#0077
74 I lonrbi lion's Travels in Sicily, in 1819.
an extraordinary length, that the antiquaries did not hesitate to
pronounce it to be that of the celebrated Lygdamis of Syracuse,
a man of gigantic stature and wonderful strength, the con-
queror at all the games of the discus, in wrestling, and at the
cesltts, the first who won the prize at the latter game, and who,
according to Pausanias, had never known thirst, or perspired.
This most curious monument underwent the fate of many
others ; it was overturned, then transported to another place ;
then, injury added to injury, and insult to insult, it was at
last made into a simple architrave, and the tomb of poor
Lygdamis now forms the exterior ornament of a church.
Environs of' Syracuse.
Nature, strange and whimsical nature, was certainly in a
good humour when she conceived the country round the port
of Syracuse. Those that have seen it have seen her rarest work,
and the most cheerful and beautiful things her hand has ever
thrown on the earth!
Journey to the Sources of the Anapus.
At a miie beyond Ortygia, on the other side of the great
port, on a tongue of land which, at first, curved like a semi-
circle, stretches afterwards in a straight line as far as the pro-
montory of Plemmyrium,and considerably beyond the temple of
Jupiter Olympius, there is a promontory which presents one of
the most beautiful pictures in the world, enclosed in no less
beautiful a frame—a little corner of the earth, which has
escaped the common ruin—a retreat favoured by heaven,
which has snatched it from the destroying fury of time and
man, for the admiration of posterity. It is there that the
Anapus, imprudently quitting its narrow but safe bed, its hum-
ble and modest but fresh and verdant banks, and still more
imprudently trusting itself to the precipitate perfidy of a rude
shore—it is there the peaceable and humble Anapus soon dis-
covers its error, and is swallowed up in the green and agitated
waves of the Ionian sea. Here, closing his eyes to the length
of the route and the perils of the enterprise, let the reader, if
he thinks proper, accompany me in my bark, and proceed
with me to the sources of the Anapus.
The little boat which bore me skimmed in a moment over
the basin of the great port, and in a moment I passed from a
frightful desert into Eden; the instant we touched the shores, I
sprung to land as if I feared so fair a scene would escape me.
In vain Ortygia and its port, Neapolis and its ruins, invited
my eyes to the places which I had quitted. On the left, the
ruins of the Temple of J upiter Olympius raised their proud
an extraordinary length, that the antiquaries did not hesitate to
pronounce it to be that of the celebrated Lygdamis of Syracuse,
a man of gigantic stature and wonderful strength, the con-
queror at all the games of the discus, in wrestling, and at the
cesltts, the first who won the prize at the latter game, and who,
according to Pausanias, had never known thirst, or perspired.
This most curious monument underwent the fate of many
others ; it was overturned, then transported to another place ;
then, injury added to injury, and insult to insult, it was at
last made into a simple architrave, and the tomb of poor
Lygdamis now forms the exterior ornament of a church.
Environs of' Syracuse.
Nature, strange and whimsical nature, was certainly in a
good humour when she conceived the country round the port
of Syracuse. Those that have seen it have seen her rarest work,
and the most cheerful and beautiful things her hand has ever
thrown on the earth!
Journey to the Sources of the Anapus.
At a miie beyond Ortygia, on the other side of the great
port, on a tongue of land which, at first, curved like a semi-
circle, stretches afterwards in a straight line as far as the pro-
montory of Plemmyrium,and considerably beyond the temple of
Jupiter Olympius, there is a promontory which presents one of
the most beautiful pictures in the world, enclosed in no less
beautiful a frame—a little corner of the earth, which has
escaped the common ruin—a retreat favoured by heaven,
which has snatched it from the destroying fury of time and
man, for the admiration of posterity. It is there that the
Anapus, imprudently quitting its narrow but safe bed, its hum-
ble and modest but fresh and verdant banks, and still more
imprudently trusting itself to the precipitate perfidy of a rude
shore—it is there the peaceable and humble Anapus soon dis-
covers its error, and is swallowed up in the green and agitated
waves of the Ionian sea. Here, closing his eyes to the length
of the route and the perils of the enterprise, let the reader, if
he thinks proper, accompany me in my bark, and proceed
with me to the sources of the Anapus.
The little boat which bore me skimmed in a moment over
the basin of the great port, and in a moment I passed from a
frightful desert into Eden; the instant we touched the shores, I
sprung to land as if I feared so fair a scene would escape me.
In vain Ortygia and its port, Neapolis and its ruins, invited
my eyes to the places which I had quitted. On the left, the
ruins of the Temple of J upiter Olympius raised their proud