Arhcaeological Museum of Syracuse

Today, we visited the Archaeological Museum of Syracuse, which is the largest archaeological museum on the island of Sicily. It housed many exhibits dating from the prehistoric to the Roman times. The first section housed the skeleton of extinct midget elephants. In the middle of the skull is a huge whole, which some scholars believe could be responsible for the development of the myth of the Cyclopes. The prehistoric section showed various different types of pottery and other household utilities. Of the Greek artifacts, my favorite were some of the ornately decorated red-figure and black-figure vases, a relief of Medusa from the Temple of Athena, a statue of Priapus (the god of male genitalia), and the gigantic bust of Asklepius. Pictures apparently were forbidden, but I made it through a majority of the museum before I ran into guards. Thus, I was able to take several without detection. We have a quiz tomorrow, so this evening I will catch up on my reading assignments.