The Romans in Sicily
Sicily, according to Cato, was "the nurse at whose breast the Roman people is fed". Sicily proved to be vital to Rome for a steady supply of grain.
In 264 Rome attacked the Carthaginian in what was to become the First Punic War (264-241 BC)
In 212 BC the last independent state Syracuse was defeated by the Romans
In the middle of the 5th century the Vandals started raiding the coastal towns of Sicily. About 50 years later they took control of the whole island. In 535 BC Sicily became part of the Byzantine empire.
Mosaic floor in Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina.
Sicily was the first Roman province, acquired after the First Punic War with Carthage in 241 BC. Initially, only the western part of the island was under Roman control, but after the defeat of the Kingdom of Siracusa in 212 BC during the Second Punic War, all of Sicily, along with Malta and nearby islands, became part of the Roman Republic. Sicily was crucial to Rome as a primary source of grain, leading to heavy extraction and the First and Second Servile Wars in the second century BC.
In the first century BC, the governor Verres became infamous for corruption, prosecuted by Cicero. During Rome's civil wars, Sicily was controlled by Sextus Pompey but fell to Augustus in 36 BC, who reorganized the island and established Roman colonies.
Under Roman rule, Sicily was a peaceful, agrarian province with thriving cities like Siracusa, Catania, Lilybaeum, and Panormus (Palermo). The island's main languages were Greek and Latin, though Punic, Hebrew, and other languages were spoken. Jewish and Christian communities developed, especially after AD 200.
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476, Sicily briefly came under Vandal control but returned to Roman rule under the Eastern Empire. It remained part of the Byzantine Empire until the 9th century.
Cicero on Sicily
“Of all foreign nations Sicily was the first who joined herself to the friendship and alliance of the Roman people. She was the first to be called a province; and the provinces are a great ornament to the empire. She was the first who taught our ancestors how glorious a thing it was to rule over foreign nations. She alone has displayed such good faith and such good will towards the Roman people, that the states of that island which have once come into our alliance have never revolted afterwards, but many of them, and those the most illustrious of them, have remained firm to our friendship for ever.”
Cicero, Marcus Tullius. Cicero: Against Verres in Latin + English (SPQR Study Guides Book 4) . Paul Hudson. Kindle Edition.
Siracusa
The Roman amphitheatre in Siracusa (140m by 119m). It was used by gladiator fights with wild beasts. The rectangular depression was probably for the machinery used in the spectacles.
Gladiatorial combat likely began as funeral rites during the Punic Wars (3rd century BC) and soon became central to Roman politics and entertainment. The games reached their height between the 1st century BC and 2nd century AD, featuring lavish spectacles. However, Christian disapproval and changing societal values led to the games’ decline in the 5th century.
The origins of gladiators and their games are debated. Nicolaus of Damascus (1st century BC) believed they were Etruscan, while Livy attributed their first appearance to the Campanians in 310 BC after a victory over the Samnites. Isidore of Seville (7th century AD) linked the word “lanista” (gladiator manager) and “Charon” (an arena official) to Etruscan roots.
Some modern scholars support a Campanian origin based on pictorial evidence, such as 4th-century BC Paestum frescoes showing fighters in funeral rites. Livy credits Rome’s first gladiator games in 264 BC to Decimus Junius Brutus, honoring his father. The games evolved through Rome’s conflicts with the Samnites, with the Samnite gladiator type becoming the most popular.
Gladiatorial games were extravagant tools for political self-promotion in Rome, offering free entertainment while bolstering the influence of their sponsors. Ambitious citizens might delay their munera (gladiator shows) until election season to win votes with lavish spectacles. Even those in power, like Sulla, famously broke sumptuary laws to host opulent games for his wife’s funeral.
Julius Caesar, during his aedileship in 65 BC, staged massive games with 320 gladiators in silver armor, despite immense personal debt. His lavish shows blurred the line between funerary rites and public entertainment, enhancing his popularity. Later, Augustus formalized the games as civic duties, imposing spending limits and restricting private munera. However, even emperors like Trajan, who used 10,000 gladiators and 11,000 animals to celebrate victories, saw costs spiral. Legislation to control spending, including by Marcus Aurelius, failed to curb the growing excesses of gladiatorial games.
The 3rd-century crisis strained the Roman Empire’s finances, making the obligatory gladiator games burdensome for magistrates, though emperors continued subsidizing them due to public demand. Christian writer Tertullian condemned the games, calling them spiritually harmful and a form of pagan sacrifice.
In 365, Emperor Valentinian I sought to limit expenses on gladiatorial games and prevent Christians from being sentenced to the arena. Theodosius I’s adoption of Nicene Christianity in 393 banned pagan festivals, and his successor, Honorius, officially ended the gladiator games in 399 and 404. Valentinian III reinforced the ban in 438. Interest in the games had already declined, though venationes (beast hunts) persisted. In the Byzantine Empire, theatrical shows and chariot races remained popular, with imperial support.
The earliest gladiator types were modeled after Rome's enemies: the Samnite, Thracian, and Gaul. As these enemies were absorbed into the empire, their gladiator names were changed—Samnite became the secutor and Gaul became the murmillo. Initially, gladiators of similar types fought one another, but by the late Republic, "fantasy" matchups emerged, pairing dissimilar fighters like the heavily armored secutor against the nimble, lightly-armored retiarius, armed with a net and trident.
Some gladiators fought from chariots or horseback, while others, like the cestus fighters from Greece, used lethal boxing gloves. The gladiator trade spanned the empire, fed by prisoners of war like Jewish captives after the Jewish Revolt. Training as a gladiator was seen as a chance for captured enemy soldiers to regain their honor through combat.
Gladiators also came from slaves condemned to the arena and paid volunteers (auctorati), who by the late Republic made up about half of all gladiators. For the poor and non-citizens, becoming a gladiator offered food, shelter, and a shot at wealth and fame. Gladiators kept their prize money and gifts; some, like Spiculus under Nero, gained wealth and property comparable to those of Roman generals.
The Best Gladiator Films
Gladiator (2000)
The Eagle (2011)
Ben-Hur (1959)
Spartacus (1960)
Centurion (2010)
Demetrius And The Gladiators (1954)
Barabbas (1961)
Halaesa
Statue of Ceres, in the Antiquarium at Halaesa on the north coast of Sicily, some 23 km from Cefalù. Ceres was the goddess of agriculture, grain crops, fertility and motherly relationships and patron of Sicily. Ceres, in Roman mythology, was equivalent to the Greek Demeter.
Pliny the Elder on Sicily in The Natural History
“But more celebrated than all is Sicily, called Sicania by Thucydides, and by many writers Trinacria or Trinacia, from its triangular appearance. According to Agrippa it is 6181 miles in circumference. In former times it was a continuation of the territory of Bruttium, but, in consequence of the overflowing of the sea, became severed from it; thus forming a strait of 15 miles in length, and a mile and a half in width in the vicinity of the Pillar of Rhegium. It was from this circumstance of the land being severed asunder that the Greeks gave the name of Rhegium to the town situate on the Italian shore.
In these Straits is the rock of Scylla, as also Charybdis, a whirlpool of the sea, both of them noted for their perils. Of this triangle, the promontory, which, as we have already mentioned, is called Pelorus, faces Scylla and juts out towards Italy, while Pachynum extends in the direction of Greece, Peloponnesus being at a distance from it of 440 miles, and Lilybæum, towards Africa, being distant 180 miles from the promontory of Mercury, and from that of Caralis in Sardinia 190. These promontories and sides are situate at the following distances from each other: by land it is 186 miles from Pelorus to Pachynum, from Pachynum to Lilybæum 200, and from Lilybæum to Pelorus 170.
In this island there are five colonies and sixty-three cities or states. Leaving Pelorus and facing the Ionian Sea, we have the town of Messana, whose inhabitants are also called Mamertini and enjoy the rights of Roman citizens; the promontory of Drepanum, the colony of Tauromenium, formerly called Naxos, the river Asines, and Mount Ætna, wondrous for the flames which it emits by night. Its crater is twenty stadia in circumference, and from it red-hot cinders are thrown as far as Tauromenium and Catina, the noise being heard even at Maroneum and the Gemellian Hills. We then come to the three rocks of the Cyclopes, the Port of Ulysses, the colony of Catina, and the rivers Symæthus and Terias; while more inland lie the Læstrygonian Plains.
To these rivers succeed the towns of Leontinum and Megaris, the river Pantagies, the colony of Syracuse, with the fountain of Arethusa, (the people in the Syracusan territory drink too of the fountains of Temenitis, Archidemia, Magæa, Cyane, and Milichie,) the port of Naustathmus, the river Elorus, and the promontory of Pachynum. This side of Sicily begins with the river Hirminius, then follow the town of Camarina, the river Gelas, and the town of Agragas, which our people have named Agrigentum. We next come to the colony of Thermæ, the rivers Achates, Mazara, and Hypsa; the town of Selinus, and then the Promontory of Lilybæum, which is succeeded by Drepana, Mount Eryx, the towns of Panhormus, Solus and Himera, with a river of the same name, Cephalœdis, Aluntium, Agathyrnum, the colony of Tyndaris, the town of Mylæ, and then Pelorus, the spot at which we began.
In the interior there are the following towns enjoying Latin privileges, those of the Centuripini, the Netini, and the Segestani; tributary towns are those of the Assorini, the Ætnenses, the Agyrini, the Acestæi, the Acrenses, the Bidini, the Cetarini, the Cacyrini, the Drepanitani, the Ergetini, the Echetlienses, the Erycini, the Entellini, the Enini, the Enguini, the Gelani, the Galatini, the Halesini, the Hennenses, the Hyblenses, the Herbitenses, the Herbessenses, the Herbulenses, the Halicyenses, the Hadranitani, the Imacarenses, the Ipanenses, the Ietenses, the Mytistratini, the Magellini, the Murgentini, the Mutycenses, the Menanini, the Naxii, the Noæi, the Petrini, the Paropini, the Phthinthienses, the Semellitani, the Scherini, the Selinuntii, the Symæthii, the Talarienses, the Tissinenses, the Triocalini, the Tyracinenses, and the Zanclæi, a Messenian colony on the Straits of Sicily. Towards Africa, its islands are Gaulos, Melita, 87 miles from Camerina, and 113 from Lilybæum, Cosyra, Hieronnesos, Cæne, Galata, Lopadusa, Æthusa, written by some Ægusa, Bucinna, Osteodes, distant from Soluntum 75 miles, and, opposite to Paropus, Ustica.
On this side of Sicily, facing the river Metaurus, at a distance of nearly 258 miles from Italy, are the seven islands called the Æolian, as also the Liparæan islands; by the Greeks they are called the Hephæstiades, and by our writers the Vulcanian Isles; they are called "Æolian" because in the Trojan times Æolus was king there.
Lipara, with a town whose inhabitants enjoy the rights of Roman citizens, is so called from Liparus, a former king who succeeded Æolus, it having been previously called Melogonis or Meligunis. It is 25 miles distant from Italy, and in circumference a little less. Between this island and Sicily we find another, the name of which was formerly Therasia, but now called Hiera, because it is sacred to Vulcan: it contains a hill which at night vomits forth flames. The third island is Strongyle, lying one mile to the east of Lipara, over which Æolus reigned as well; it differs only from Lipara in the superior brilliancy of its flames. From the smoke of this volcano it is said that some of the inhabitants are able to predict three days beforehand what winds are about to blow; hence arose the notion that the winds are governed by Æolus. The fourth of these islands is Didyme, smaller than Lipara, the fifth Ericusa, the sixth Phœnicusa, left to be a pasture-ground for the cattle of the neighbouring islands, and the last and smallest Euonymos. Thus much as to the first great Gulf of Europe.” (Pliny the Elder: The Natural History. John Bostock. 1855.)
Roman towns and settlements mentioned in The Natural History
Agragas = Agrigento
Camarina = Kamarina (archaeological site, not a modern town)
Catina = Catania
Cephalœdis = Cefalù
Cosyra = Pantelleria
Didyme = Salina (formerly called Didyme, one of the Aeolian Islands)
Drepana = Trapani
Ericusa = Alicudi (one of the Aeolian Islands)
Eryx = Erice
Euonymos = Panarea (assumed identification with the smallest inhabited Aeolian island)
Gaulos = Gozo (part of Malta)
Gelas = Gela
Himera = Himera (archaeological site, near today's Termini Imerese)
Leontinum = Lentini
Lipara = Lipari (main island of the Aeolian Islands)
Melita = Malta
Messana = Messina
Mylæ = Milazzo
Panhormus = Palermo
Pelorus = Capo Peloro (the northern tip of Sicily near Messina)
Phœnicusa = Filicudi
Selinus = Selinunte (archaeological park, near today's Castelvetrano)
Solus = Solunto (archaeological site near Santa Flavia)
Strongyle = Stromboli (one of the Aeolian Islands), known in popular culture for the film Stromboli (1950), directed by Roberto Rossellini and starring Ingrid Bergman.
Syracuse = Siracusa
Tauromenium = Taormina
Thermæ = Termini Imerese
Tyndaris = Tindari (archaeological site and church, near Patti)
Ustica = Ustica (name remains the same today)
Roman mosaics
Mosaic on pavement from the Roman period, 2nd century BC. Information from Parco Archeologico di Naxos: "The pavement combines polychrome (yellow, pink, red, grey and black) cut and polished pebbles and relatively large polygonal black and white tesserae; the central geometric panes features a diamond shape inside a large square on which there is a six petaled flower om a black background. Four darting dolphins occupy the triangular shaped corners. The technique and the style date from 2nd century BC with parallels in Athens, Delos and Eretria."
If you are interested in Roman mosaics, the fantastic museum at Villa Romana del Casale, near Piazza Armerina, is the place to go.
The half-naked lovers in Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina. The woman's hair is pulled up and she has a Junoesque stature with wide hips, which, according to Giuseppe di Giovanni, shows the Ancient Roman's taste in women at the time. It gave women status to be overweight since it was a way to show off the wealth of the family, the importance of the husband and the prosperity of his business. The man is carrying a basket of fruit.
The "Bikini Girls" playing with a coloured ball. They are taking part in an Olympic pentathlon competition. Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Cupids fishing. Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Mosaic floor in Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina.
Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Mosaic floor in Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina.
Mosaic decoration in the childrens' room. Villa Romana del Casale, Piazza Armerina
Mosaic floor from via Cappuccini, Taormina. AD C2.
Ancient Rome (3D animation)
Speakers: Dr. Bernard Frischer and Dr. Steven Zucker
Art
Hercules wrestling with Antaeus. Marble support for table-top. Greek, 200-100 BC. Found off the coast of Catania. Ashmolean Museum / Museo Civico 'Castello Ursino', Catania. The cartibulum was used in grand Roman villas to display the family's silver plate.
Part of the exhibition Storms, War & Shipwrecks - Treasures from the Sicilian Seas at the Ashmolean Museum, June-September 2016.
Fragment of a life-size bronze elephant statue, 3rd century BC. Height: 63 cm. On the foot, a patina is visible, caused by the touch of countless hands. This suggests that the bronze elephant must have stood in a public place. According to Rossella Giglio, the technical and decorative characteristics point to a Phoenician-Sicilian, northern-African or Iberian origin - or a workshop in Rome. The foot was found in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Tunisia on 3 July 1999 from the trawler Capitan Ciccio. (Sicily and the Sea, Allard Pierson Museum, 2015)
Detail of the bronze elephant foot found in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Tunisia on 3 July 1999.
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