Lipari
From Freepedia
Lipari (Roman Lipara, ancient Greek Meligunis) is the biggest of the Aeolian Islands, in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the north coast of Sicily, and also the island's main town. It has approximately 11,000 inhabitants and during the tourist season (May-September) its population reaches up to 200,000.
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Geography
Lipari is the largest of a chain of seven islands in a volcanic archipelago that straddles the gap between Vesuvius and Etna. The island has a total surface area of 37.6 km², and is 24 nautical miles from Sicily. Besides the main town, most of the year-round population resides in one of the four main villages: Pianoconte is almost due west across the island, Quattropani in the northwest, Acquacalda along the northern coast, and Canneto is on the eastern shore north of Lipari town.
Geology
It is generally accepted that the island was created by a succession of four volcanic movements, the most important of which was the third one, presumably lasting from 20,000 BCE to 13,000 BCE. A further important phenomenon should have happened around 9,000 BCE (C14 exams by Keller). The last recorded eruptions occurred in the fifth century CE when the airborne pumice covered Roman villages on the island. The volcanos are considered inactive, though steaming fumaroles may still be seen. As a result of the volcanic origins, the island is covered with pumice and obsidian. Pumice mining has become a large industry on Lipari, and the pale pumice from Lipari is shipped internationally.
Ancient History
Its position has made the harbor of Lipari strategic. In neolithic times Lipari was, with Sardinia, one of the few centers of the commerce of obsidian, a hard black volcanic glass prized by neolithic peoples for the sharp cutting edge it could produce. Lipari's history is rich in incidents and is witnessed by the recent retrievals of several necropolis and other archaeological treasures. Man seems to have inhabited the island already in 5,000 BCE, though a local legend gives the eponymous name "Liparus" to the leader of a people coming from Campania. Its continuous occupation may have been interrupted violently when the late 9th century Ausonian civilisation site was burned and apparently not rebuilt. Many household objects have been retrieved from the charred stratum.
Colonists from Cnidia under Pentathlos arrived at Lipara in 580 BCE and settled on the site of the village now known as Castello or la Cittade. The colony successfully fought the Etruscans for control of the Tyrrhenian. Allied with Syracuse at the time of the fateful intervention of Athens in the west in 427, Lipara withstood the assault of Athenians and their allies. Carthaginian forces succeeded in holding the site briefly during their struggles with Dionysios I, tyrant of Syracuse, in 394, but once they were gone the polis entered a three-way alliance which included Dionysios' new colony at Tyndaris. Lipara prospered, but in 304 Agathokles took the town by treachery and is said to have lost pillage from it in a storm at sea. Many objects recovered from wrecks of antiquity are now in the Aeolian Museum at Lipari. Lipara became a Carthaginian naval base during the first Punic War, but fell to Roman forces in 252-251, and again to Agrippa in Octavian's campaign against Pompey. Under the Roman Empire, it was a place of retreat, baths (the hydrothermic waters are still used as a spa) and exile.
History from the Middle Ages to the Present Day
The loss of Roman protection (and Byzantine force) in the Early Middle Ages led to Arabic pirates raiding across the Mediterranean, which decimated the local population, and the island was eventually abandoned. The Normans conquered the Arabs throughout Sicily between 1060 and 1090 CE, and repopulated the island once their rule was secure.
Though still plagued by pirate raids, the island was continually populated from this point onward. Rule of the island was passed from the Normans to the Hohenstaufen Kings, followed by the Angevins, and then the Aragonese, until Carlos I, the Aragonese King became the Spanish King, and then quickly was crowned Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. In 1544, Ariadeno Barbarossa ransacked Lipari and deported the entire population. Charles V then had his Spanish subjects repopulate the island and build the massive city walls atop the walls of the ancient Greek acropolis in 1556.
The walls created a mighty fortress which still stands today. The acropolis, high above the main town, was a safe haven for the populace in the event of a raid. While these walls protected the main town, it was not safe to live on the rest of the island until Mediterranean piracy was largely eradicated, which did not truly end until the 19th century.
During Fascism, Lipari Island was a destination for the confinement of members of the political opposition: among them, Emilio Lussu, Carlo Rosselli, Giuseppe Ghetti.
An interesting Museum has recently been created to collect a relevant part of local archaeological retrievals; its disparate sections relating to the human history of the entire Aeolian Islands from prehistoric to classical times, also cover vulcanology, marine history, and the paleontology of the western Mediterranean.
- References
Ezio Giunta, dir. (2005). Lipari. Estateolie 2005*The Essential Guide (English version of Tourist Guidebook): 2-61.
External links
- The Aeolian Museum
- Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites
- Aeolian Island tourism website (in Italian).
