MYTHS AND LEGENDS RELATED TO THE BEAUTIFUL ISLAND OF SICILY

Sicily is a land rich in colors, scents, and flavors, but also in many myths and legends that make its places even more evocative. Cyclops, Greek gods, and nymphs are the protagonists of tales handed down for centuries in the Sicilian region.
Among the legends full of passion, there is certainly the legend of the Moor’s heads.
Those who have already had the pleasure of making a trip to Sicily cannot fail to have noticed the ceramic vases in the Moor’s shape, one of the representative symbols of the island.
Legend has it that during the Arab domination in 1100, in Palermo, in the Kalsa district, lived a young girl who often took care of the plants on her balcony. One day, a Moor (an Arab) passed in front of her house. Seeing her, the Moor fell madly in love with her and declared his love for her.
She was very impressed and immediately returned the feeling. One day, the girl discovered that the Moor would have to return to the East where his wife and children were waiting for him. Feeling betrayed and humiliated, blinded by anger and jealousy, she cut off the head of the Moor during the night. With this, she made a vase in which she planted a basil plant and put it on display on the balcony. The basil (from the Greek Basilikos), a royal plant but also representative of love and passion, grew lush and fragrant. The neighbors, amazed by the beauty of the vase, wanted to imitate it, so they began to make terracotta vases in the shape of the Moor’s head.


On the other hand, Syracuse is linked to the legend of the Arethusa fountain.
On the island of Ortigia, adjacent to the beautiful city of Syracuse, there is the Arethusa fountain, a place made even more fascinating by its extremely romantic history.
The legend tells of the Greek nymph Arethusa, known throughout Greece for her beauty and raised by the goddess of hunting and maidens, Artemis. One day, after a hunting trip in the woods with Artemis, Arethusa decided to take off her clothes and take a bath to cool off in a clear stream: the river Alpheus that flowed in Olympia (in the Peloponnese). Suddenly, Arethusa heard a noise, became frightened, and quickly came out of the water. She started running when a voice invited her to stop. The voice came from Alpheus, the deity of the waterway. Enraptured by her beauty, Alpheus assumed a human form and began to chase and bother her, so Arethusa asked Artemis for help. The goddess, to save her, transformed her into a source of fresh water, making her sink underground, and guided her to re-emerge on the island of Ortigia, in Syracuse. Alpheus, in love with Arethusa to the point of wanting to reach her, asked for help from his father Oceanus, who opened the waters of the Ionian Sea, allowing him to reach Sicily. Arethusa, amazed by so much love and insistence, yielded to the flattery of Alpheus. Artemis, to seal their love, dug a cave under the source, to mix for eternity the waters of Arethusa with those of Alpheus.