Geography

​On the side which forms the strait, the first city is Messene, then Tauromenium, Catana, and Syracuse. The cities between Catana and Syracuse, namely Naxos and Megara, have disappeared; there are the mouths of the rivers Symaethus and of all those flowing down from Aetna into well-sheltered harbors; here too is the promontory of Xiphonia. Ephorus says that these were the first Greek cities to be founded in Sicily, in the tenth generation after the Trojan War; for those before that time feared the piracies of the Tyrrhenians and the savagery of the barbarians in these parts, so that they did not even sail for trade. But Theocles the Athenian, having been carried by winds to Sicily, observed both the weakness of the people and the fertility of the land; on his return, though he could not persuade the Athenians, he took with him a large number of the Chalcidians in Euboea and some of the Ionians, and also some Dorians, most of whom were Megarians, and sailed. Thus, the Chalcidians founded Naxos, and the Dorians founded Megara, which was formerly called Hybla. These cities, then, no longer exist, but the name of Hybla remains because of the excellence of the Hyblaean honey.

​Of the cities that remain along the mentioned side, Messene lies in a gulf of Pelorias, which curves far toward the east and forms a kind of armpit. It is at a crossing distance of sixty stadia from Rhegium, and much less from the column. It is a foundation of the Messenians of the Peloponnese, from whom it changed its name, having been formerly called Zancle because of the crookedness of the places (for “zanclon” was the word for what is crooked), being previously a foundation of the Naxians near Catana. Later, the Mamertines, a tribe of Campanians, settled there. The Romans used it as a base for the Sicilian war against the Carthaginians, and after this, Sextus Pompeius assembled his fleet here when waging war against Augustus Caesar; and from here he also made his escape when he was expelled from the island. Charybdis is also shown a little before the city in the passage, an extraordinary depth into which the ebb-tides of the strait naturally draw vessels, which are turned upside down with spinning and a great whirlpool; and when they are swallowed up and shattered, the wreckage is swept away to the shore of Tauromenia, which they call Copria from this occurrence. The Mamertines gained such complete control over the Messenians that the city came under their power, and everyone calls them Mamertines rather than Messenians; and since the territory produces excellent wine, they do not call the wine Messenian but Mamertine, which rivals the best of the Italian wines. The city is well inhabited, but Catana even more so; for it has also received Roman settlers; but Tauromenium is less populated than either. Catana is also a foundation of the same Naxians, while Tauromenium is of the Zanclaeans at Hybla. Catana lost its original inhabitants when Hieron, the tyrant of the Syracusans, settled others there and called it Aetna instead of Catana. Pindar also calls him its founder when he says: “Understand what I say to you, O father who sharest the name of the holy sacred rites, founder of Aetna.” But after the death of Hieron, the Catanaeans returned, expelled the inhabitants, and dug up the tyrant’s tomb. The Aetnaeans, having withdrawn, settled in the mountainous part of Aetna called Innesa and called the place Aetna, which is eighty stadia distant from Catana, and they declared Hieron to be their founder. Aetna lies especially above Catana and shares most in the occurrences around the craters; for the lava streams are carried down closest to the territory of Catana, and the story of the pious sons, Amphinomus and Anapias, is celebrated there, who carried their parents on their shoulders and saved them when the disaster was approaching. When, as Poseidonius says, the active events around the mountain occur, the lands of the Catanaeans are covered with volcanic ash to a great depth. The ash, though causing trouble for a time, benefits the land in later times; for it makes it productive of good vines and excellent fruit, whereas the rest of the land is not equally productive of good wine. And they say that the roots which the ash-covered lands produce fatten the sheep to such an extent that they choke; therefore they draw blood from their ears every four or five days, just as we have said happens in Erytheia. The lava stream, changing into a solid state, petrifies the surface of the ground to a considerable depth, so that there is need of quarrying for those who wish to uncover the original surface. For when the rock has melted in the craters and then has been cast up, the liquid overflowing from the summit is a black mud flowing down the mountain; then, taking on solidity, it becomes millstone, retaining the same color which it had when flowing. And the ash of the burning stones is like that from wood; therefore, just as rue is nourished by wood ash, so the Aetnaean ash is likely to have some natural affinity to the vine.