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Marsala Punic

And Marsala Punic ship !

THE NAVAL STRONGHOLD PUNIC: MARSALA

After eight kilometers from Mozia, Marsala us almost completely hides its secrets.

And yet, was especially famous in antiquity for its port, determinants of both the Carthaginians, is, after, for the Romans. It was called Lilybaeum, lying on Cape Boeo, based on a small existing archaic settlement by the survivors of Mozia in 397 a. C.

It became the most important naval base and provided the Punic Sicily, sufficient to withstand the attacks of Dionysius, Timoleon, Pyrrhic, of Rome. The excavations and recent studies allow us to have a better idea of ​​its impregnable fortifications, mentioned by Polybius and Diodorus, reinforced on both sides of the promontory by a moat, whose traces, at times, occur during construction work.

Near Trapani port, remains a door flanked by two rectangular towers by imposing structure, cornerstones of the probable line of defense of the city. In the northern, at Cape Boeo, among the ruins of tanks and warehouses, we enter a big house with an atrium and a peristyle around which there are some rooms in a spa environment, dated to the third century. C, with rooms for sweat baths and traces of water systems.

Splendid mosaic floors of a naturalistic style, one of which represents four groups of wild animals attacking a deer; others are decorated with plant motifs and geometrical type of North African. An example of luxury that had to enjoy the city, passed to the Romans in 241, and since then a bridgehead for the conquest of Carthage and the invasion of Africa.

Among the many wrecks that buries the Mediterranean, the only previously known specimen of the Punic ship – partially recovered – can be seen at Baglio Anselmi: the rear and port side of a warship, of slender, in the hull of which can be seen painted letters of the Phoenician-Punic.

Of Roman (Second century. C.) is the funerary chamber recently discovered by accident in the city center. A staircase in the rock, three feet deep, the room (5 meters 5), trapezoidal, contains six graves dug along the sides. But what is striking is the explosion of life in a place of death.

A lively painted decoration on the walls runs: banquet scenes, Dance and music, winged figures and peacocks in a blaze of multicolored flowers, wreaths and garlands, according to the Roman funerary iconography that postponed the trip to the Elysian Fields of the Dead.

And the underground Crispia Sage: with an inscription indicating the name of the deceased which (uxori dulcissima) her husband tenderly, Julius Demetrius, dedicated the inscription.

taken from the brochure of the Province of Trapani