Tag: temple
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Tour and Cook in Sicily
Live from Sicily! Last evening, I toured Valley of the Temples in Agrigento with the hiking group of wonderful Italians with whom I’ve spent the last two days. The 2500 year-old site, featuring the Temple of Concordia, pictured) continues to amaze me. I want it to amaze you too in September during Stirring Sicily, our…
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Sicily’s International Folk Music Festival
Now until March 10 is the annual Sagra del Mandorlo in Fiore (Almond Blossom Festival) in Agrigento. The festival is a 10-day extravaganza of events, the heart of which focus on folk music from around the world. I’ve yet to attend the festival that attracts everything from Mexican Mariachi bands to Japanese drummers. During this…
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Otherworldly In Agrigento, Sicily
Close your eyes and imagine yourself at the foot of the remains of an ancient Greek temple from the 5th century B.C.E., like the Temple of Castor and Pollux, pictured left. After learning about the thriving civilization that built Agrigento in the centuries before the common era from your archaeologist-guide, you’ll then savor a picnic…
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Google (and We) Know What’s Awe-Inspiring
In just a few days, the exclusive summit for Google Camp will take place in Sicily. Their annual milestone dinner will be held at the foot of this temple, Temple E (archeologists believe it was for the ancient Greek goddess Hera), at the Archeological Park of Selinunte. This Doric-style temple was completed between 490 and…
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At Selinunte, I Feel Ghosts
Yesterday, Tony, Dominic, and I visited the magnificent ancient city of Selinunte with our guide Gianluca. I’m always taken aback by this site because it’s expansive. It’s strewn with ruins of massive temples and abandoned homes. To me it possesses ghosts everywhere, who continue to protect it. Selinunte was a Greek city built on the…
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Temple E Is Electric
Today considered Europe’s largest archeological site, Selinunte was a Greek city built on the southwestern coast of Sicily by colonists from the eastern Sicilian Greek outpost of Megara Hyblea. Founded around 651 BC, it displayed its power by building massive temples dedicated to various gods, like this one pictured, Temple E, which scholars believe was…
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Agrigento: Blooming With Music and Dance
This year’s Sagra del Mandorlo in Fiore in Agrigento is ongoing (This photo, by my cousin Filippo Buttitta, was taken at the 2016 feast.). Folk dance and music groups from all over the world gather annually to share their cultural patrimony at the UNESCO site Valley of the Temples and throughout the city. Although I’ve…
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Southern Secret #5: Create Your Own Ritual
WRITTEN by GUEST BLOGGER, Danielle Oteri of Feast on History | Create your own ritual when you walk through these columns on our second day of Southern Secrets: Campania and Sicily’s Hidden Corners (June 29 – July 8, 2018). Built for what was then the Greek city of Poseidonia, this site became known as Paestum…
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Archeological Mysteries Brought to Life
In 1996, I backpacked throughout Europe by myself for two months, on a budget of just $50 a day. It was an exhilarating, remarkable journey: My Grand Tour. Being on a tight budget (so I could keep traveling until my last penny ran out!), I rarely had the luxury of a guide explaining to me…