ITALY
213
ITALY
populated by wars, anil the cultivation of the soil
having been interrupted, the stagnant waters overlaid
all. The Consul Cethegus, however, by new drainage,
made these lands healthy again, but the civil wars re-
duced them to a worse condition than the one from
which they were redeemed; and in the time of Augus-
tus, as Horace tells us, the Appian Way ran solitary
through that vast swamp. Augustus and his succes-
sors attempted to drain the tract once more; but the
barbarians destroyed every vestige of their work.
Popes Leo I, Sixtus II, Clement XIII, and especially
Pius VI, resumed the undertaking, and by means of
large canals restored it to agriculture; but once more
the region is unhealthy, and almost without inhabi-
tants. (6) Plains of Southern Italy. — The plains of
Southern Italy cover nearly four-tenths of its sur-
face, the regions which contain more of them being
Campania and Apulia. There are none in the Basili-
cata, and few in Calabria. On the Tyrrhenian Sea,
there are (a) the Campania Plain which extends
along the coast between the Garigliano and the Sarno
Rivers. Over it rise the volcanoes of the Campi Flegrei
and that of Vesuvius. This is the Campania Felix of
antiquity, a region of extraordinary beauty and of ex-
ceptional fertility due to the volcanic soil and to the
maritime climate, (b) The Plain of Pesto, or of the
Sele, which is much smaller than the first. It is situa-
ted at the movith of the Sele River, not far from where
stood Posidonia, or Pa?stum, the city of roses, famous
for its life of delights and delicacy, but already in
ruins at the beginning of the Roman Empire. Now
these places are marshy and unhealthy, (o) The
Plain of Santa Eufemia, situated at the end of the gulf
of the same name and traversed by the Amato River,
and the Plain of Gioja, traversed by the River Mesima.
They are small, marshy, and unhealthy plains in the
shape of amphitheatres, formed by the alluvial depos-
its of those two rivers. Looking towards the Ionian
Sea is the plain of Sibari. where once .stood, at the
mouth of the Crati River, the Greek city for which the
plain is named. It is of alluvial origin and nature, as
are the precetling two. Towards the Adriatic Sea the
plains of the coast of Apulia have their northern ter-
minal in the famous Tavoliere delle Puglie which is al-
most a steppe, treeless, monotonous, and sad, exposed
to the winds and traversed by a few streams that
change their channels. Formerly this plain was used
for winter pasturage, but, the soil being fertile, corn is
now grown. It is bounded by the Candellaro River,
the Apennines, the Ofanto River, and the Gulf of
Manfredonia. On the Salentine peninsula there is a
species of Tavoliere, contained between the Brindisi-
Oria railroad and a line drawn from Torre dell' Orso,
on the Adriatic Sea, to Nardo on the Ionian.
Volcanoes and Earthquakes. — As Italy is one of the most recently developed parts of the mainland and of the crust that has risen above the waters, it is subject to the phenomena that are due to that internal energy of the earth called volcanism, which is manifested in the various forms of volcanic activity, in earthquakes and in microseisms. The valley of the Po contains no active volcano, but the Berici Mountains and the Eu- ganean Hills that are rich in thermal springs (as at Abano) were, in remote times, two very active centres, as is shown by the great quantity of volcanic matter around them. In the peninsula of Italy and on the islands, volcanic activity is still very great, especially towards the Tyrrhenian coast. The Apennine zone that extends from the group of Mt. Amiata to Mt. Rocca- monfina is almost entirely covered by extinct volca- noes: the San Vincenzo hills, to the north of Campiglia, and the Sassofondino hills, to the west of Roccastrada, are of volcanic nature, as is also the great cone of Mt. Amiata, which is the highest volcanic elevation of the peninsula; to the east of the ,\miata rises the pic- turesque basaltic mass of Radicofani, and the Lakes of Bolsena (Vulsinio), Vico (Cimino), Bracciano
(Sabatino), and Albano (Latino) are merely the prin-
cipal craters of the many volcanoes that form the
Roman group. A great number of these volcanoes
began their activity under the sea which they filled
in with their products, creating in this way the
broken Campagna that consists chiefly of volcanic
materials. In the valley of the Tolero or Sacco,
near Frosinone, rise the Ernici volcanoes, of which
the chief summits are those of Posi, Ticchiena, Cal-
lano, and of San Giuliano; and to the south of the
plain through which the Volturno River flows stands
the group of extinct craters that constitute Mt. Roc-
camonfina. The volcanic group of Naples is the most
important one of them all, and the most famous, be-
cause it contains the oldest active volcano in Europe,
Am.^lfi (X Century)
namely Mt. Vesuvius (4000 feet). That ancient vol-
cano rises between the destroyed cities of Pompeii and
Herculaneum, at about six miles from Naples. Dio-
dorus Siculus, Vitruvius, Plutarch, and Strabo speak
of it as a volcano that had been extinct for centuries in
their day. In the year 79 of the Christian Era it suil-
denly became active again, burying in molten stone,
sand, and ashes the cities of Stabia, Hercvilaneum, and
Pompeii, and by its noxious vapours terminating the
life of Pliny the Elder. Between the years 79 and
1631 Vesuvius had a few eruptions: those of 20.3, 472,
512, 689, 91.3, 10.36, 1139, 1.500; but, on 16 December,
1631, the diameter of the crater was increased nearly
two miles, and nearly 72,000,000 cubic metres of lava
were ejected from it in a few hours, while there de-
scended from the summit devastating torrents of boil-
ing muc_l. Thereafter eruptions became more fre-
quent, the principal ones having occurred in 1737,
1794, 1S22, 18.58, 1861, 1862, 1868, 1872, and the last
in 1906; but flickering flames and smoke are almost
always emerging from the crater. The Campi Flegrei
to the west of Naples occupy a surface of nearly 60
sq. miles and consist of low craters that have been
partly filled in by the waters. Notable among these
are Mt. Montenuovo, which was developed in a single
night in September, 1530; and .Mt. Solfatara, from the
