11. Segesta and Erice (updated)

Saturday, Oct 19th.  Today we drove out of Palermo to visit Segesta and Erice.  Segesta was a city founded by the Elymean people but the population also included some Ionian Greeks.  The Elymeans had a mystical common origin with the Romans and were believed to be descendants of refugees from Troy.  There is nothing left of the city but there is a very well preserved Doric temple which was built in the late 5th century BC.  This is our first view of the temple as we approach the site.

This looks like a Greek temple but it really isn't as the Elymeans weren't Greek.  It has six columns across the front and 14 columns on each side and the base is 69 ft. by 184 ft.  It was apparently never finished as there is no evidence that it ever had a roof or naos which is the inner room of the temple.  Here is a photo of the front of the temple.

Like all temples of this type, it faced east.  Here is a view from the southwest.

And one from the north.

And to prove we were really there, here is Pat and I next to the temple.

Our next stop was the mountain top cite of Erice which sits at 2,500 ft.  Here is a photo as we approach Erice giving you some idea as to how far up it is.

And a photo looking down at the bay in front of the modern city of Trapani.

Here is the gate to the city.

Erice was founded by the Phoenicians, largely repopulated by the Greeks, mostly destroyed by the Carthaginians, conquered by the Saracens in 831 and then by the Normans in 1167.  The Real Cathedral (Royal Cathedral) was built in the 1300s.  Here is a photo of the Cathedral.

The Rose Widow over the entrance is supposedly original dating to the original construction.  Here is a photo of it.

As you would imagine, a city as old as this one and sitting on top of a mountain will have very narrow hilly streets and it does.  Here is a photo of the main street that we walked up and one of the side streets.

There are two castellos in Erice.  Pepoli Castello was built around 900 AD by the Saracens while they controlled the city.  This castello is the one to the left in the photo below.

The other is the Venus Castello built by the Normans around 1200 AD.  It is called the Venus Castello as it sits on top of the ruins of the ancient temple of Venus.  Here is a photo of this castello.

And this photo shows how these castles sit right on the edge of the mountain.

After visiting the castellos we walked back to the main piazza and had lunch in this restaurant right on the edge of the piazza.

After lunch we visited La Pasticceria Erice di Grammatico Maria.  This is a shop that specializes in marzipan.  As everyone should know marzipan is an Italian specialty dessert that is made from ground almonds and sugar and typically made to look like small fruit.  In Sicily, marzipan was developed by the nuns living in cloisters as a way to earn funds for the operation of the cloisters.  The cloisters are all mostly gone so it is now made in specialty pastry shops like this one run by Maria Grammatico.  Maria's life is a rags to riches story as she was orphaned as a child and went to live in the cloister.  While there she learned the techniques that the nuns used.  After leaving the cloister, she set up her own shop and is now world famous.  She gave a demonstration for us showing how marzipan is made and decorated.  Click on this image to see a video of her hard at work.

Here are examples of what marzipan looks like.

We then got to sample some marzipan as well as other pastries made with marzipan.

The green ball is Praline Al Pistacchio, the small white piece is Torrone, one in the fluted cup is Bocconcini and the last is Bellibrutti.  Don't ask me how to pronounce them but they were sure good to eat.  We got to wash them down with a sample of Marsala wine which is local to the area.

We then headed back into Palermo to get cleaned up and dressed as tonight we are having dinner with La Principessa di Raffadali in her 14th century Palazzo Raffadali.  In Sicily during the time of the Spanish rule, persons who merited recognition from the Spanish crown or had a lot of money were awarded titles that were then handed down through their families.  They were not members of the royal family but got to become part of the local aristocracy.  As it turns out, the Principessa is a very friendly 80 year old widow who was born in Rome and loves entertaining.  These aristocratic families no longer have their feudal lands to support them so they have to get jobs and work like everyone else.  In this case the heir to the title who is the son of the Principessa,  works for Verizon in northern Italy.  These dinners are a way to support the expense of maintaining the palazzo.  The Pricipessa gave us a tour of the palazzo and here are photos of some of the rooms we visited.







Dinner was cooked by the Principessa's in-house cook and served to us by her white gloved staff.  Excellent dinner and interesting palazzo.  She reminded me of my Sicilian grandmother from back when I was a young kid.