Enna Views

The sun has shone all day in Enna, fourth stop on our Sicily tour. Built on a rocky crag a little over 3000 feet above sea level, Enna is Sicily’s highest town and has views in every direction. On clear days, I am told, you can see the sea, Mount Etna etc, but unfortunately today was not one of them. The castle, whose origins go back to the first century BC, proved so impregnable that the Romans could only capture it by first passing through its sewers.

A person of note from Enna was a slave named Eunus, originally from Syria, but owned by a Greek in the second century BC. Eunus became the leader of a huge slave uprising which managed to capture the city. After crowning himself king, he set about building a state independent of Rome, minting his own coins (a coin bearing the name King Antiochus, the name that Eunus assumed, has recently been found). After holding out against Roman forces for several years, Eunus was captured, but died in captivity before punishment could be meted out.

Having eaten out again last night, we are cooking in tonight. We ate well again in Agricento, and inexpensively, the bill coming to 38 euros for one pasta dish (me) lamb chops and roast potatoes (Mark) two enormous glasses of very good house white and a bottle of fizzy water. On arriving, we were each given a glass of prosecco and when we asked for the bill, a glass each of Limoncello. On Tuesday evening we were both handed glasses of an almond-flavoured dessert wine at the end of our meal. I always like feeling you are getting something for nothing, but I know the cost is built in somehow.