Tag: siracusa

Postcard from Siracusa, Sicily: ‘Mailed’ before summer hell ignited

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The photos on these postcards should be time-stamped before delivery to your mailbox – our stay in Sicily was in late spring. Our travel schedule was designed to avoid the potential of encountering the same type of sizzling summer the island endured during 2022 – a high of 120 degrees in Siracusa.

So far this year, the temperature’s only hit a high of 117 degrees, but horrible wildfires have added to the island’s summertime blues. It’s no wonder that cacti and succulents are popular.

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Postcard from Siracusa, Sicily: Bellomo Palace and, for saint’s sake, always eat two of this dessert

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Above: A representation of the story of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden apples, Museo Regionale di Palazzzo Bellomo

A stark façade conveys the 12th-century origin of the Bellomo Palace. The interior spaces, however, reflect several centuries of architectural alterations, much like the centuries of regional Sicilian art housed within. Benedictine monks occupied the palace in the 18th century, merging it and an adjacent palazzo into one compound.

The Risorgimento, the ongoing unification of the Kingdom of Italy, represented a disaster for many Catholic religious orders. In Sicily, the government seized property and buildings, including this monastery in 1866. In 1940, the government repurposed the compound as a museum, with the 1866 confiscated religious art forming a major portion of its collection. The Bellomo underwent substantial renovation in 2004.

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Postcard from Siracusa, Sicily: Sturdy columns of Greek temple recycled by several religions

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Above: Façade of the Duomo di Siracusa, or Cattedrale della Nativita di Maria Santissima

The chapel where some of Santa Lucia’s relics, featured in a recent post, are housed in the Cathedral of the Nativity of Mary Most Holy. A statue of her reigns up high on its façade to the right of the Virgin to whom the church is dedicated. Up on the left is San Marciano of Siracusa with San Pietro and San Paolo flanking the entrance down below.

Over the past 2,000 years, the history of Saint Marcian of Syracuse has become somewhat muddied. One version is that he was a follower of Peter the Apostle, who dispatched him to Sicily to preach in the year 40. His conversion rate was so high that the ruling Romans deemed him dangerous, and he was put to death. San Marciano became known as the first bishop of the city and is the patron saint of the archdiocese.

The “new” façade of the cathedral dates from after the 1693 earthquake and reflects the style categorized as High Sicilian Baroque. But the rest of the building has much deeper roots. The site was occupied by a 5th-century BC temple of Athena, possibly constructed under Dionysius I. Thirty-six substantial columns surrounded the outer perimeter of the temple – columns so substantial they withstood the devastating earthquake and can still be viewed on the north side of exterior and within the cathedral itself.

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