Eurialos Castle

Tuesday was pretty boring, because we didn't have a site to visit. We had a morning lecture on the prehistoric pottery of Sicily and an evening lecture on digital archaeology. While they both were interesting, I much rather preferred to have been out exploring and sight-seeing. Anyway, yesterday was much better. We visited the Eurialos Castle, which is the only Greco-Roman castle that is left. It was built after the Athenian Expedition of 415-413 BC and lasted until the Romans took control of Syracuse (as well as Sicily) in 212 BC. The castle was heavily fortified with 3 trenches and a retractable drawbridge. It had numerous platforms where catapults, invented by Archimedes in the 3rd century BC, were held. There also was a system of galleries that allowed access underground from inside the castle to the outside. The castle was awesome, but it was an extremely hot day, so I was glad to get back to Ortigia. Last night I played a pick-up game of soccer and then went to see the premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, two days before anyone else in the states! It was dubbed over in Italian, though, but I knew the plot very well, and there were many action scenes, making it very easy to follow. It is my favorite so far, and I am so pumped to see the English version in a few weeks! Today was another boring day. I woke up real early to do my readings for a quiz today, since I stayed out late to see Harry Potter and didn't finish it earlier in the day. Then, we had a lecture on the prehistoric religion of Sicily. If you haven't guessed, my professor is an expert in prehistoric Sicily. While this topic is intriguing, I would much rather learn about Classical and Hellenistic Sicily. Anyway, the rest of the day was spent relaxing, doing errands online and watching the Godfather Part II.