On The Shoulders Of Giants (Neapolis Archaeological Site)

Member Name: michaelhudson

Product:	Neapolis Archaeological Site
Date:	20/10/03 (558 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Central location, The wonderful theatre

Disadvantages: Crowds, Crowds, Crowds

Syracuse was the New York of the ancient world, its grandiose monuments every inch as iconic to Plato, Archimedes and Cicero as lofty Art Deco skyscrapers, Macey's and the Statue of Liberty are to us. Modern Siracusa, having suffered the debilitating effects of colonial marginalization, aerial bombardment by both the Allies and the Luftwaffe, and a hotch-potch muddle of painted high rise concrete split by traffic clogged roads, retains all too few structures of this bygone age, the unsightly encroachment of post-war development checked only by the crumbling palazzos and tilting side streets of inner Ortigia and the wondrous remains preserved in the Parco Archeologico at Neapolis, one of the five distinct towns that made up the original settlement.

Wedged tightly between a municipal athletics track and private tennis courts, the road leading from Viale Teracati to the entrance is fenced by badly parked coaches and rounded gangs of elderly day-trippers, narrowing finally to a parting between two lines of souvenir stalls stacked with over colourful tea towels, shaped and branded lava rock, framed papyrus pictures, fake football tops, glossy pictorial history books and an assortment of shapeless plastic mountains topped by overhanging postcard strips. A bend in the road brings relative silence and the ticket office, where signs point left for the theatre and right for the Ear of Dionysius.

THE GREEK THEATRE

Entering the arena half way up, the first view is of a curving crumble of steps topped by a purple-flecked incline of patchy green and brown grass and fronted by an impenetrable green curtain behind a fragmentary stage. The 46 stone steps are cracked, rubbled and broken, yet they still retain a sense of order imbued by a wide horizontal aisle cutting across the mid-point of nine vertical wedges. At the top, behind the grass and continuing along the entire 140-metre diameter of the theatre, low set caves with faces full of pastry shape c
uts signifying an ancient cult of the dead close out the scene. A small waterfall, running off a branch of an ancient aqueduct, slides over moss covered rock, dissipating into thin chains of white bubble that float lazily on the disturbed pool of clear water. Tour groups are marched up the hill, holding cameras through a five-minute lecture in which they hear that Aeschylus and Epicarmo, who created the Greek comedy genre here, premiered new works in a theatre lauded by Plato and Aristotle, which held 15,000 spectators and dates from the 5th century B.C., making it the oldest Greek theatre entirely in stone. Politicians sat in the centre, nobles at the top, and neither paid anything for their tickets. Finally, the theatre was modified in the 2nd century B.C. and largely dismantled eighteen centuries later when the Spanish carted it off to be used in the construction of their fortifications in Ortigia. Lecture over, the tour groups are marched back down to their next checkpoint, leaving me alone against a back wall of limestone watching the harbour shining in the Sunday morning sun and the orange squeezer shaped modern church tussling with an improbably high rectangular building for the centre spot of the horizon. If I were able to edit out the workmen down below - busy hammering planks of wood over the ash grey steps in preparation for the forthcoming classical Greek theatre season - and the slow paced hum of an unseen generator, I would hardly know that a modern city existed hereabouts, sitting still in the breeze and the shade of millions.

THE EAR OF DIONYSIUS AND THE QUARRY OF PARADISE

Slipping down a shaded path of tightly overhanging, interwoven trees as fragrant as a Saturday afternoon in the Body Shop - medlars diluting prickly pears, blended with oranges and palms and a dash of lemon - I duck and weave my way along a meandering route of flowers and rock tunnels to the bottom of Paradise Gardens. To the right of a stop-start snake of tourist
s posing in front of its more conspicuous neighbour, the Rope-makers' Grotto cuts back from a sweeping entrance shaped like a pair of heavy theatre curtains parted at their base by a pair of giant, unseen hands. A strikingly smooth ceiling is supported by a broad column sharpened like a carnivore's tooth with its point embedded in a sodden floor of weeds and loose stone. Unfortunately entry to the cave itself is prohibited due to the danger of falling rocks, so you'll have to be content with either the view or the description.

Taking advantage of a lull between coach parties I slip into the Ear, which in truth looks more like an oriental eye, 23-metres high and varying in width between five and eleven metres, finally tapering to 30-centimetres or so at the very top. It's wonderfully eerie inside, pushing 65-metres back into the rock and engendering a sensation of being upside down in the gloomy hull of an upturned oil tanker permeated by the ghosts of more than 7,000 Athenians, survivors of a routed invasion fleet, who were imprisoned here in 415BC, forced to labour in the quarries, and then left to a slow death by the tyrant Dionysius. Carvaggio, a visitor some two millennia later, imagined him eavesdropping on his prisoners from far above, their voices carried upwards by the famous acoustics. It's one of those places that requires a few moments of silent contemplation before you can begin to appreciate just what is around you, but the constant stream of anodyne clappers, monotonous chanters and national anthem crooners manage to fill the odd moments of silence between shouts of "Forza Milan", wolf whistles and multi-lingual babble. I spend a few minutes devising hideous tortures for the faces behind the flashbulbs and then quietly leave.

Back at the street of plastic souvenirs, pause for a moment at the fence overlooking the Altar of Jeron (Heiron) II, a rectangular sacrificial altar almost 200 metres long and 23 met
res wide, comfortably the biggest structure of its kind in the whole of Magna Graecia. Built in the 3rd century BC to commemorate the end of the tyrants and the proclamation of the republic, more than 400 bulls were driven up ramps to be sacrificed in annual festivities, an extant pool in the middle of the rock reputedly served to clean up the subsequent mess. It requires a lot of imagination to fully appreciate anything other than the sheer size of it nowadays, however, especially as much of the stone work was removed by the Spanish for their city defences.

THE ROMAN AMPHITHEATRE

The entrance to the amphitheatre is in the middle of the souvenir stands, a metal gate on the right hand of the street opening to a small path lined with trees and benches. Though impressively large in size - behind only the Colosseum in Rome and the Arena of Verona at 140 x 119 metres - it is nowhere near as spectacular as its Greek counterpart. Elliptical and enclosed, the central arena is overgrown with wild yellow flowers and the surrounding stone steps are broken into patches by weeds and long, unkempt grass. Although visitors are restricted to the very top of the parapet the site has a number of interesting features to go with the wonderful charm – entirely encircled by huge trees it's as if you've stumbled upon a place lost for centuries, rough, eroded, and on the point of collapse except for two perfectly preserved red brick arches. The spirit of an entire island in microcosm.

DETAILS

Combined admission to the Quarries and the Greek and Roman Theatre is 4.5 euros. The lesser sights in the park - a church by the main entrance and views of the Necropolis of Grotticelle and the apocryphal Tomb of Archimedes - are free.
The park is open daily from 9am until two hours before sunset.

Remember to retain your ticket from the Greek Theatre for entrance to the Roman Amphitheatre.

A season of classical Greek theatre tak
es place annually at Neapolis from May to July. The outdoor performances begin at sunset and takets can be purchased onsite or from the tourist offices in town.

If you're intending to visit the Paolo Orsi Archaeological Museum (five minutes away in Viale Teocrito) and the Palazzo Bellomo Regional Art Gallery, it's worth buying a combined ticket for all three. There's a 30% discount on admission but it's only valid for two days.

The site is a twenty-minute walk from Ortigia (or just over five from the railway station) at the very top of the Corso Gelone. Numerous buses make the journey from the terminus in Piazza della Posta.

TOURIST INFORMATION

Aside from the small booth at the park entrance, the major tourist information centres are located in Via Maestranza (near Piazza Archimedes in Ortigia) and in Via San Sebastiano (on the other side of the park at the entrance to the Catacombs of San Giovanni, left of the roundabout in Viale Teocrito).

WEBSITES

www.regione.sicilia.it/TURISMO/Web_turismo/uk/ localita/SR/siracusa/homepage.ht ml

www.ortigiaonline.it

www.bestofsicily.com/siracusa.htm

www.apt-siracusa.it/uk/pag1.html

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