SYRACUSE, ARCHDIOCESE OF. - City and archdiocese of eastern Sicily. It has an area of 1,200 sq km and 224,000 inhabitants, almost all Catholics, distributed in 42 parishes, served by 124 diocesan priests and 60 religious; it has a seminary with all the courses, 12 male religious houses and 33 female (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 403). It is a metropolitan see with the suffragan dioceses of Noto, Caltagirone and Piazza Armerina; in 1950 the new diocese of Ragusa (v.) was united to it aeque principaliter.
I. HISTORY
Already inhabited by the Siculi, in 734 B.C. Archias of Corinth founded a colony there, occupying the islet of Ortygia. The city expanded rapidly and in turn founded the colonies of Acre, Casmenae and Camarina. The first oligarchic constitution was the cause of incessant struggles between the wealthy Greek landowning colonists and the poor native plebs. In an uprising the former were driven out; they turned to Gelon, tyrant of Gela, who succeeded in bringing them back into the city, of which he obtained power (490 B.C.). The victory at Himera over the Carthaginians (480 B.C.) gave S. dominion over eastern Sicily. After the tyrant Thrasybulus, brother of Gelon, was driven out in 466, a democratic regime was established, thanks to which S. extended its dominion over almost the whole island. This drew upon it the wrath and jealousy of Athens: which in 415 B.C. fitted out a powerful fleet that suffered a tremendous defeat (413 B.C.). The victory did not, however, serve to consolidate democracy, and disturbances were stirred up by the demagogue Diocles; Carthage took advantage of this, intervening in Sicily and destroying some cities. To avert the danger, Dionysius the Elder was appointed strategos with full powers (405 B.C.); under his government S. rose to its greatest grandeur, successfully fought the Carthaginians, the Siculi and the Italiotes, founding a vast empire from the Tyrrhenian to the Adriatic Sea. His son and successor, Dionysius the Younger, was unable to follow in his father's footsteps. In 344 Timoleon of Corinth was made master of the city. His government brought many benefits and consolidated the power of S. The Carthaginian power, ever looming over Sicily and already checked by Timoleon, was further weakened by Agathocles, who in 310 B.C. carried the war into Africa itself, but at his death (289 B.C.) disorder and tyranny regained the upper hand in the city, while Carthage took advantage of this to reconquer the positions it had lost. The intervention of Pyrrhus in Sicily, who was proclaimed king at S. in 278 B.C., was of ephemeral effect, because two years later the Epirote had to abandon the island. Hieron II succeeded in reorganizing the state by allying with Rome. But since the Syracusans had preferred the friendship of Carthage, the consul Claudius Marcellus attacked S. in 214 B.C., and after a two-year siege, despite the ingenious means of defense devised by Archimedes, he took and plundered it. Under Roman rule, although it remained the capital of the island and the seat first of the praetor and then of the proconsul, S. began to decline, especially during the servile wars, so much so that Augustus had to lead a colony there to repopulate it (21 B.C.).
In 535 it was occupied by Belisarius, who wrested it from the Goths and celebrated a splendid triumph there. The emperor Constans II made it his residence during the last five years of his life (663-68). Shortly afterward S. suffered the first incursion of the Muslims, who returned there several more times until in 878 they occupied it permanently. In 1038 it was briefly occupied by the Byzantine commander George Maniakes, who built the castle there, and in 1085 it was definitively liberated by the Normans and given as a county to Jordan, son of Roger I. At the beginning of the 13th century, after being successively occupied by Pisa and Genoa, it took an active part in the revolt of the Vespers and, having fallen under the dominion of the Aragonese, suffered the sad vicissitudes of the island.
II. CHRISTIANITY
When it was introduced there is unknown; St. Paul stayed there for three days in 61 (Acts 28:12), but it is not certain that a constituted Church or faithful already existed there. A writing of the 8th century affirms that the apostle Peter sent there from Antioch the first bishop Marcian, but the report is very uncertain; the Church of Syracuse was, however, certainly constituted in the 3rd century when the question of the "lapsi" arose (CSEL, 3, 2, p. 553) and as its underground cemeteries, which go back to that century and perhaps even to the preceding one, clearly attest. The first historically certain bishop is Chrestus, who in 314 took part in the Council of Arles (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., X, 5). In the Diocletianic persecution, however, at S. the martyr Lucia (v.) suffered; of the other martyrs who fell in the various persecutions the reports are uncertain or legendary. A catalogue of the bishops of Syracuse going back to the 1st century was published by C. Scobar in 1520, but it is no older than the 12th century and contains many inaccuracies: it omits some bishops who certainly existed, such as Siracosio, attested by inscriptions, and has many invented and duplicated names that greatly undermine its value. One must reach the end of the 5th century to encounter another certain bishop, Eulalius, founder of a monastery, who received St. Fulgentius of Ruspe (PL 65, 128) and took part in the Roman Council of 502 (MGH, Auct. antiq., XII, pp. 447, 451). At the end of the 6th century the bishop of S. was Maximian, formerly abbot of the monastery of St. Andrew in Rome when St. Gregory the Great was there; to him the Pontiff, who held him dear, wrote several letters, entrusted him with jurisdiction over all the Churches of Sicily for matters of lesser importance, and bitterly mourned his death (St. Gregory, Reg. Epist.: ed. P. Ewald - L. M. Hartmann, in MGH, Epist., I-II, see index). He was succeeded by John, archdeacon of the Church of Catania, also much esteemed by St. Gregory, who granted him the use of the pallium as already to his predecessor. In 640 the bishop was St. Zosimus, formerly abbot of a monastery of the city, and in 840 the famous Gregory Asbestas, implicated in the Photian schism. In the Dispositio attributed to the Byzantine emperor Leo the Wise (886-911) the bishop of Syracuse has metropolitan jurisdiction over all the bishops of Sicily, Malta and Lipari (G. S. Assemani, Italicae hist. script., III, Rome 1752, p. 495 ff.), but perhaps the privilege was older and went back to the time of the emperor Leo the Isaurian (717-741) who, as is known, transferred to the patriarch of Constantinople the jurisdiction over the Sicilian Churches. When the city was occupied by the Saracens (878) the bishop was Sophronius, who was taken prisoner to Palermo. The first bishop after the Norman occupation of the island was Roger, elected by Urban II (1093); he worked for the reconstruction of the diocese, which then had a great extent, embracing the whole south-eastern corner of Sicily, including also the territory of the ancient diocese of Lentini (Lanzoni, pp. 629-31). Pope Alexander III granted in perpetuity to the bishop of S. the use of the pallium and declared him immediately subject to the Holy See (1169), but Clement III in 1188 abolished the two privileges and declared S. a suffragan of Monreale. In 1317 the bishop Pietro Moncada restored the Cathedral; the Benedictine Tommaso da Catania celebrated the first Synod in 1388 and in 1393, while visiting the diocese, at Terranova (Gela), was taken prisoner in a Saracen raid and taken to Africa. The Syracusan Ruggero Bellomo built the episcopal palace and Paolo Santafede distinguished himself for charity and self-denial during the plague of 1455; Ludovico Platamone in 1529 received the Knights of Malta driven out of Rhodes. In 1543 the cult of St. Conrad, already approved for the diocese in 1515, was extended to all Sicily; in 1553 the bishop Girolamo Bologna promulgated the decrees of the Council of Trent, while his successor Giovanni Orosco introduced the Roman rite, abandoning the Gallican already in use since the time of the Normans, and in 1570 began the construction of the diocesan Seminary. The bishop Giovanni Torres enlarged the episcopal palace; in 1646 a famine devastated the city and in memory of the deliverance a procession in honor of St. Lucia was instituted which is still celebrated on the first Sunday of May. The terrible earthquake of 1693 completely destroyed 22 cities of the diocese and more or less damaged 12, killing 38,000 people; the bishop Annibale Termini attended to the reconstruction, beginning with the Cathedral and the Seminary, and spread the cult toward the Eucharist. The bishop Marini (d. 1730) began the construction of the facade of the Cathedral, which was completed under the bishop Testa and adorned with statues by Marabitti. The bishop Alagona (d. 1801) built the chapel of the Seminary and built the library, today transferred to the Seminary.
In 1816 the diocese was divided with the erection of that of Caltagirone, while to the canons of the Cathedral the use of the mitre and the cappa magna was granted; a new division occurred again in 1844 with the erection of the diocese of Noto; on this occasion S. was declared an archiepiscopal and metropolitan see. Among the last archbishops the Franciscan Benedetto la Vecchia (d. 1896) distinguished himself for holiness of life and doctrine. After the erection of the new diocese of Ragusa (1950) the archdiocese of Syracuse comprises the cities of Augusta, Buccheri, Buscemi, Canicattini, Carlentini, Cassaro, Ferla, Floridia, Francofonte, Lentini, Melilli, Palazzolo Acreide, Solarino, Sortino and the hamlets of Belvedere, Brucoli, Cassibile, Pedagaggi, Priolo, Rizzolo and Villasmundo.
III. MONUMENTS
Of the ancient Sicel civilization there remain, besides the important furnishings collected by Paolo Orsi in the city's Archaeological Museum, the famous necropolis of Pantalica, which dates from the 12th to the 8th century B.C., and that of Buscemi. More important are the Greek and Roman monuments, such as the temple of Apollo of the 6th century B.C., recently freed from the superstructures that encumbered it, the altar of Hieron, the Greek theater, the so-called ear of Dionysius, famous for its acoustics, the Euryalus Castle, the imposing latomiae transformed into luxuriant gardens, the amphitheater and the Roman gymnasium. The Cathedral, formerly the temple of Athena, of the 5th century B.C., adapted, according to a tradition, into a Christian temple by Bishop Zosimus in the 7th century, has a fine coffered ceiling of 1518, possesses a ciborium by Vanvitelli, a canvas by Antonello da Messina and some sculptures by Gaggini. Important are the churches of S. Pietro, Byzantine but remodeled in the 1300s, and the Norman ones of S. Niccolò (11th century), of S. Giovanni alle Catacombe (11th-12th century), of S. Tommaso (12th century), but remodeled later. The Norman basilica of S. Lucia al Sepolcro possesses a crucifix of 1200 and a stupendous canvas by Caravaggio depicting the Burial of the Syracusan Martyr; a fine portal of 1501 adorns the little church of the Madonna dei Miracoli. Among the secular or civil monuments worthy of note are: the Castle
Maniace, built in 1038 by the Byzantine commander of the same name and rebuilt by Frederick of Swabia, the Palazzo Bellomo of the 13th century, redone in the following one, with beautiful two-light and three-light windows, seat of the Medieval Museum and of a modest picture gallery with Byzantine monuments and works of the 14th and 15th centuries; the Palazzo Montalto of 1397 with Gothic-Catalan windows, the Palazzi Lanza, Abela and Interlandi of the 15th century, the Baroque Palazzo Municipale of 1635 and the Palazzo Beneventano of the 18th century. In Lentini a Byzantine Madonna is preserved in the former Cathedral, a reproduction of the Crucifixion by Tintoretto in the parish church of S. Luca, and two canvases of the 15th century in the parish church of the Most Holy Trinity, depicting the Nativity and St. Anthony of Padua. In Melilli the church of S. Sebastiano has fine frescoes by Olivio Sozzi (18th century); 18th-century churches exist in Augusta (Duomo), Palazzolo Acreide (S. Sebastiano, S. Paolo, Annunziata); in Buccheri a Magdalene by Antonello Gaggini is preserved.
IV. ILLUSTRIOUS FIGURES
Among the personalities of S. [Syracuse], the following should be remembered for their antiquity: Joseph the Hymnographer (8th century); St. Methodius, elected patriarch of Constantinople (843); St. Simeon the hermit, who died at Trier (1031), the first saint canonized by papal bull by Benedict IX (1041). In the 13th century, the notary Giacomo and Arrigo Testa, both from Lentini, poets of the Sicilian school at the court of Frederick II. In the 17th century, the Jesuit Ottavio Gaetani (d. 1620), diligent though not always faithful collector of the hagiographic glories of Sicily, and his brother Costantino (d. 1630), a Benedictine, philosopher, theologian and historian, friend of Card. Baronio and librarian of the Vatican Library; Vincenzo Mirabella (d. 1624), archaeologist, mathematician and historian who left a work on the monuments of S. [Syracuse], the fruit of patient and costly research; Mario Minniti (d. 1640), painter, a disciple of Caravaggio, by whom a beautiful St. Benedict is preserved; the Jesuit Ortensio Scammacca of Lentini (d. 1648), a prolific tragedian; Domenico Bottone of Lentini (d. 1696), an illustrious physician, author of the work Pyrologia topographica, which earned him a reputation as a scholar and scientist. In the 18th century, the founding of the two literary Academies of the Aretusei and the Anapei and the establishment of the Alagoniana Library gave a great impulse to culture in S. [Syracuse]; distinguished were Emanuele de Astorga (d. 1755) of Augusta, a renowned musician whose opera Dafni was successfully performed in Genoa in 1709; the architect Pompeo Picherali (d. 1746), who presided over the works of reconstruction of the city after the earthquake of 1693 with eclectic spirit and versatility; Saverio Landolina, man of letters and archaeologist, founder of the Archaeological Museum next to the Alagoniana Library; the priest Giuseppe Logoteta (d. 1809), historian, founder of the Giornale ecclesiastico di Sicilia and of a georgic-ecclesiastical Academy. In the 19th century, the priest Giuseppe Capodieci (d. 1828), sagacious and patient collector of the memories of his homeland, which he left in manuscript in 50 volumes, in addition to the published ones, in the Alagoniana Library; Tommaso Gargallo (d. 1843), an illustrious poet, classicist and historian; Alessandro Rizzo (d. 1867), an esteemed naturalist, founder of an Academy and of a scientific cabinet; Raffaele Politi (d. 1870), painter and archaeologist, illustrator of the monuments of Agrigento; Gaetano Italia Nicastro (d. 1896) of Palazzolo Acreide, fortunate researcher and illustrator of the archaeological monuments of his homeland; Gregorio Zappalà (d. 1908), sculptor, worked for Piazza Navona in Rome; G. Aurelio Costanzo (d. 1913) of Melilli, an illustrious poet, follower of Romanticism; Orso Mario Corbino (d. 1937), an illustrious physicist of Augusta.
V. CHRISTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY
The early Christian monuments of Syracuse are all located in Achradina, one of the five regions that made up the ancient Greek city; they constitute a grandiose complex for its vastness, architectural grandeur, and wealth of inscriptions and minor furnishings second only to Rome. Unfortunately, the many devastations, ancient and recent, have caused considerable damage and dispersed much precious material. Between large and small cemeteries, the Syracusan region possesses about a hundred underground hypogea; most date to the time of the Constantinian peace, but nuclei that certainly date to the 3rd century and even earlier are clearly traceable, especially in the major cemeteries.
The oldest is that of St. Lucia, so called from the martyr who was buried there. A small nucleus was already explored by Paolo Orsi in 1916-18; due to its architectural peculiarities, the scarcity of marble inscriptions, the narrowness of the corridors, and the archaism of the paintings in their motifs and technique, it certainly dates to the 3rd century. Other vast nuclei were discovered in 1942 and 1950, but have not yet been scientifically illustrated. The few paintings preserved there reproduce the well-known themes of the Good Shepherd, of Jonah, of Daniel in the lions' den, and of the Orant. Of singular importance is a Byzantine hypogeal oratory of the 8th-9th centuries with paintings among which are notable Sts. Marcian, Cosmas and Damian, Helena, and on the vault the martyrdom of the 40 martyrs of Sebaste.
The cemeteries of St. Maria di Gesù and Vigna Cassia, originally autonomous, today constitute a single vast complex; the first is formed by a double gallery in the shape of a cross flanked by loculi, while the second results from the fusion of about ten hypogea dug at different levels and then combined together. The architectural resemblances between these two cemeteries and that of St. Lucia are so evident as to leave no doubt about their chronology. The extreme northwestern section of that of Vigna Cassia dates to later times and is due to successive enlargements. Few inscriptions and paintings have been found there, among which those of the arcosolium of Marcia are important, but it must also be said that the two cemeteries have not been exhaustively explored.
The vastest, best known, and at the same time the most recent of the Syracusan underground cemeteries is that of St. John. Ample galleries with polysome arcosolia, vast cubicula with grandiose tombs truly give it an imposing appearance that justifies the enthusiastic wonder of the first explorers and visitors. Its excavation exploited an old Greek aqueduct and some cisterns transformed into cubicula. Paintings are scarce, among which stand out those of the arcosolium of Deodata and a Madonna, in the main gallery; in it was found the well-known sarcophagus of Adelfia from the 4th century of Roman origin. Rich
(Int. Exit)
SIRACUSA, ARCIDIOCESI di « Facade of the Cathedral, work of the 18th century by P. Picherali (1728-57).
instead it was the epigraphic harvest that yielded about 500 inscriptions (among which important is the one referring to the cult of St. Lucia), for the most part Greek. The cemetery was in use between the 4th and 6th centuries; shortly afterwards the ground above was also exploited. A little apart from S. Giovanni and independent of it is a hypogeum of the 4th century transformed into an oratory in the Byz-
Byzantine but which underwent transformations in later times. There a tradition, moreover a very recent one, has sought to identify the tomb of St. Marcian, the first bishop of the city.
A dense series of hypogea rises on the eastern rocky slope of the Acradina which extends from the small harbor as far as the Capuchin convent. Their exploration has yielded furnishings rather ambiguous as regards the Christianity of the users, who preserved Jewish or pagan traditions. The chronology of these hypogea can be fixed between the 4th and 5th centuries. Worthy of mention are then the sub dio necropolises of Grotticelli and of the Fusco.
In the suburb, to the north of S., important underground cemeteries are found at Manomozza and Riuzzo near Priolo, at Molinello near Augusta: all three present marked analogies with the oldest cemeteries of S., to whose chronology they must be connected. Traces of hypogea are found at Lentini, while more important are those of Floridia, Canicattini, Ferla and above all those of Palazzolo Acreide (Grotta di Senebardo, Intagliata, Intagliasella).
After Rome, S. is the city of Italy richest in inscriptions. They have been published in various journals and works as they came to light in the various explorations of the cemeteries; there is felt, however, the need for a scientifically modern Corpus that would gather them all; Father Ferrua S. J. has been working on it for several years, and he has already published excellent essays and preliminary studies. Of the minor arts, the collection of terracotta lamps is important, but even concerning them a comprehensive scientific work is still lacking.
The Byzantine period has then left monuments important for Syracusan archaeology, especially in the buildings of worship. Besides the already mentioned hypogeic oratories of St. Marcian and St. Lucy, worthy of mention are the church of St. Phocas near Priolo, that of the Zitone near Lentini, St. Teresa near S., St. Lucy of Mendola near Palazzolo; the troglodytic oratories of St. Mark near Palazzolo, St. Nicolicchio and St. Micidiario near Pantalica, St. Peter near Buscemi, etc. - See plates XLIV-XLV.
BIBL. - In the bibliography of Sicily (v.) naturally also applies to Syracuse. In particular, history: S. Privitera, Storia di S. ant. e moderna, 2 vols., Naples 1879; B. Lupus, Die Stadt Syrahus im Alterthum, Strasbourg 1887; F. H. Chase, Syracuse and its environs, 3 vols., New York 1924; L. Giuliano, Storia di S. ant., 3rd ed., Milan 1936. Christianity: R. Pirri, Sicilia sacra, I, Palermo 1733, pp. 598-600; Lanzoni, pp. 532-39; A. Amore, De primor-
diti relig. christ. in Sicilia, Rome 1945, pp. 17-43; L. Narciso, La personalità storica del veci. Siracuso, in Atti del I Congr. di arch. crist., ibid. 1952, pp. 217-23. Monuments: G. M. Capodieci, Antichi monum. di S., ibid. 1816; F. S. Cavallari - A. Holm, Topogr. archeol. di S., Palermo 1883; id., Append. alla topogr., Turin 1891. Christian archaeology: see also the archaeological bibliography of Syracuse, the most important is recalled: I. Carini, Iscriz. rinvenute nelle catac. di S., in Arch. stor. sicil., 1873, pp. 260-63, 505-523; 1874, pp. 508-14; 1875, pp. 121-25, 492-507; G. B. De Rossi, Arcosolio dipinto di singolare importanza, in Bull. di arch. crist., 3rd series, 2 (1787), pp. 149-59; V. Schultze, Die Katahomben von Syrahus, Vienna 1880; C. Cavallari, S. Giovanni fuori le mura di S. e i monum. annessi, in La Sicil. artist. e archeol., 1 (1887), pp. 21-24; G. Führer, Eine wichtige Grabstätte der Katahombe von S. Giovanni bei Syrahus, Munich 1896; id., Zur Grahschrift auf Deodata, ibid. 1896; G. Agnello, La basilica dei SS. Giovanni e Marziano in S., in Boll. d'arte del Min. pubbl. istruz., 9 (1929), pp. 3-24; C. Barrecca, Le catac. di S., 3rd ed., Rome 1934; the complete bibliography of Paolo Orsi, worthy illustrator of Christian Syracuse, in Paolo Orsi, Rome 1935; A. Ferrua, Note di epigraf. crist. siracus., in Arch. stor. per la Sicil., 4 (1938), pp. 19-37; id., Nuovi studi nelle catac. di S., in Riv. di arch. crist., 17 (1940), pp. 43-81; id., Epigraf. ticula pagana e crist., ibid., 18 (1941), pp. 151-243; id., Florilegio d'iscrizione paleocrist. di S., in Rendic. Pont. accad. rom. arch. crist., 22 (1948-47), pp. 227-230; G. Cultrera, Il Temeno delle Θεομογόριοι e la cripta di S. Marziano, ibid., 23 (1950), pp. 45-56; L. Bernabò-Brea, Ipogei pagani e crist. nella regione adiacente alle catac. di S. Gioe., in Not. degli scavi, 1947, p. 172 ff.; id., S., ibid., pp. 208-14; G. Agnello, L'oratorio ipogeico di Costelluccio, in Nuovo Didashaleion, 2 (1948), pp. 36-50; C. Amato, Di alcune iscriz. funerarie per bambini rinvenute recentem. nelle catac. siracus., in Pastor Bonus, 1 (1950), pp. 2-9; id., Le scoperte più recenti nelle catac. di S., ibid., pp. 13-23; G. Agnello, La chiesa paleocrist. di S. Pietro a S., in Arte crist., 38 (1951), pp. 25-30; id., La necropoli e la chiesa rupestre di Bibinello, in Atti del I Congr. naz. di arch. crist., Rome 1952, pp. 31-47; S. L. Agnello, Scavi e scoperte a S. Lucia di Mendola, ibid., pp. 49-58; L. Bonanno, Le catac. Banuisto e la sua suppellettile, ibid., pp. 93-100; C. Cecchelli, Sapiestia Dei. La figuraz. sapienziale del sarcofago di Adolfa, ibid., pp. 111-12; L. Puma, Contributo allo studio degli ipogei crist. minori di S., ibid., pp. 251-57. See also Wilpert, Sarcofagi, pl. 92, II, p. 102; pl. 93, I-II, p. 102.
Agostino Amore