Mount Etna is located in the northeast of the Italian island of Sicily. Locals call him "Mongibello", which means "Mountain of the Mountains". Etna really amazes with its size, especially when you look at it from the sea. Actually, this is not even one mountain, but a whole mountain range. Its area is 120 square kilometers, and the circumference of Etna is two hundred kilometers. During the eruption in 1964, the volcano grew by another fifty meters, and now its height is equal to 3323 meters. The massif has 270 craters, and lava spills out from cracks one kilometer deep.
Etna also takes precedence in the number of eruptions known to man. This unusual volcano caused many troubles to the Sicilians. Its central upper crater is filled with a huge layer of rocks. Until now, he did not have enough energy to blow up this plug, so the next eruptions occur from many side craters and holes, which are also called "parasitic cones." Moreover, some of these cones are so significant that in other areas they could pass for an independent volcano.
The whole area adjacent to Etna is well settled and densely populated. At its wide foot, especially in its southern side, since antiquity there have been villages, each of which has a population of several hundred inhabitants. The villages were scattered on the richest slopes, the fertility of which is never depleted by volcanic ash. This fertile ash from almost continuously operating craters is carried by the wind to the fields. And outside the Etna massif, most of Sicily is a kind of desert. Here, it seems, there is no culture that would not grow on local plantations. Artichokes, peaches, olives, grapes, pomegranates, apple trees, figs, cherries, bananas, corn, date palms, sugarcane, tomatoes, tobacco, plums, peppers, thyme, rosemary, oranges, lemons, chestnuts, pistachios, peanuts, walnuts, hazelnuts.
Both poor houses and the dwellings of wealthy people in cities, towns and villages are being built to this day (despite the dominance of concrete) from dark volcanic stones, sometimes covered with brick-red or pink plaster.
The fact that Etna is insidious and dangerous was known long before the Nativity of the Savior - from the works of Greek and Roman writers. Ancient writings mention the eruption of Etna in 1500 BC. e. To the ancient Greek poet Pindar, the activity of the Etna volcano was represented by the fiery breath of Typhon - a hundred-headed monster thrown by Zeus into the underworld. In addition, there are a great many myths with the help of which the local people try to explain the atrocities of their colossus. The flames so often erupted by the volcano reminded of who in the pantheon of the Olympian gods rules over fire and metals. Hephaestus served in the blacksmiths of the Olympian gods, and his forge was located just under Etna. Hephaestus was lame and ugly, so his wife Aphrodite often gave him grief. No wonderthat he became one of the most gloomy and irritable gods on Olympus.
True, other poets assured that not God himself lives in the gloomy caves, but his henchmen - the Cyclops, who forge lightning for Zeus in the bowels of the mountain.
And there are also legends that in the depths of Etna the captive titan Typhon is rebelling against the formidable Zeus, or the Cyclops Polyphemus throws fragments of rocks into the sea after the sailing Odysseus.
But people with a materialistic outlook wanted to understand many of the processes taking place in nature, to reveal some of its secrets. Such was, for example, the ancient Greek philosopher Empedocles, who lived almost five hundred years before our era. He was not satisfied with the legends and myths associated with Etna, and he became the first person who became interested in the volcano scientifically.
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Empedocles was the first to single out four elements - fire, air, water and earth - that is, everything that we observe simultaneously, looking from the top of Etna. Already in his declining years, he decided to go to Etna to observe her life. No matter how dissuaded his friends, relatives and students, he climbed onto the crater of Etna, made a home for himself there and lived on the volcano for several years. According to legend, Empedocles died on Etna, in Etna and for the sake of Etna. They say he stood for a long time at the very edge of the crater, trying to penetrate with his philosophical thought into the depths of the volcano. But the volcano remained indifferent to the thoughts and concerns of the scientist, and then Empedocles allegedly threw himself into its crater. "Then the volcano burst into flames and threw out his sandals."
Unlike ancient authors, medieval poets and scientists, Etna left deeply indifferent. None of them saw her, nor did they want to see her. Many of the medieval scientists did not even really know about the existence of Etna: not a single manuscript of those times mentioned the Sicilian volcano … Until 1669, when Etna raged in earnest and a lava flow wiped out twelve villages and the entire western part of Catania.
In early March, local residents saw a thick, black cloud creeping from the top of Mount Etna - a mixture of smoke and ash. Flame burst through it, visible from afar. The earth trembled and such deafening underground explosions were heard that even people accustomed to such phenomena were frightened. The churches opened their doors, and residents of the surrounding cities poured into them together with the Catanians.
On March 8, a solemn divine service has just ended in the cathedral. The priests and their assistants cleared away the church utensils, while the parishioners slowly reached for the exit. Suddenly, a whirlwind of such force flew in that the church reeled so that it seemed that it was about to collapse. It seemed to the people, thrown into fear, that even the air was on fire. It was filled with such a thick dust that it was impossible to see anything two steps away. The clear day turned into pitch darkness, as if a total eclipse had come.
Little by little, during the day, everything calmed down, and people were relieved to see that the air did not burn at all: just the setting sun, hanging over the horizon, made the ash clouds glow. Everyone hid in their homes. At night, an underground shock of such monstrous force was heard again that it shook the town of Nicolosi. Its inhabitants poured out into the streets in horror, fearing to be buried alive under the rubble of their homes. They did not want to return to their homes for anything and somehow settled in the straw huts.
Soon the ground not only shook again, but simply began to shake. This time houses began to collapse, trees fell, whole blocks fell off the rocks. How many of the inhabitants of Nicolosi, hoping to while away the night before dawn on the street, found their death that day? Nobody counted them. The eruption of Etna was only gaining strength and soon raged with such fury that everyone forgot about the dead in the first hours.
The lavas did not pour from the top, but broke through at the very foot of the volcano. A few days later, a church procession was organized to Etna: everyone prayed to the Almighty for grace and mercy. The procession was already returning to the town when she was met by a living hell - a new earthquake destroyed everything. Hot stones flew out of two dozen craters in a cloud of fire and smoke. In horror and powerlessness, the inhabitants of Nicolosi and the surrounding villages watched as the fiery vents opened. The setting sun illuminated the picture of the real end of the world.
Lava continued to erupt in the following days. The stream inexorably swept away everything in its path. He completely destroyed the rich village of Montpelier, as before that the villages of Malpasso, Gzarida and others were buried under a multi-meter layer of lava. There was hell all around, but after a few days it turned out that the worst was coming: the lava flows aimed at Catania. Fifteen days after the eruption began, the towns that had miraculously survived were destroyed by a new earthquake. At the same time, huge clouds of black-gray-orange smoke rose from the top of Mount Etna. No, it did not open a new mouth of the volcano - it collapsed and disappeared in the depths of the top of Mount Etna.
Lava flows had completely disfigured the entire neighborhood before, and now people did not recognize the usual outlines of Etna itself. However, it seemed that the avalanche was not going to stop. By mid-April, when the eruption had lasted more than a month, the first lava flows had crept to Catania. Its walls, ten to twelve meters high, were made of large and strong blocks and could withstand the onslaught of streams, as they were carefully fitted. All places where lava could break into the city, in particular the city gates, were carefully caulked.
One of the streams rounded the city and came out to the place where the ships were moored. The sight of the confluence of incandescent lava with sea waves simultaneously shook and enchanted: being pushed forward by monstrous forces, the lava crawled even under water …
There were daredevils who, armed with picks and crowbars, hammers and hoes, tried to make a gap in the already hardened crust so that the still liquid lava would flow out from the inside and deviate to the side. In some places, this was done, but this man-made stream, which went in a different direction, began to threaten the town of Paterno, which had not been touched until that time. In horror, the inhabitants of Paterno sounded the alarm and began to beat the Catanians, who, in an effort to save their city, put Paterno at risk. The battle was clearly unequal: five hundred angry men from Paterno and nearby villages against a hundred people exhausted by a long struggle with fiery lava. The Catanians were put to flight, and they soon saw the main stream again rushed to their city and made a gap fifty meters wide. Until the last minute everyone hoped to survive, everyone dreamedso that it is his home that remains unharmed. When people realized that it was time to leave, it was already too late to save anything. With a terrifying roar, houses began to collapse one after another, and the inexorable stream carried away their debris.
Only in the month of July - after three months of unprecedented riot - the volcano calmed down.
… Since the time of the Christian chronology, there have been 150 powerful eruptions of Etna. And they occur, as a rule, during the seeming calm of the volcano. Therefore, people do not even listen to weather forecasts, but they are alarmed when Etna does not smoke for a suspiciously long time. Every Sicilian has a different explanation for how they endure life on Etna. For example, one of them: “Why do the Eskimos stay at the North Pole, where it is so cold? Because they were born there and do not even think about the reasons that keep them here. And we - it just so happened - were born on a volcano. Etna doesn't want to be anywhere else, and we don't. This is probably what is called patriotism. The narrator falls silent, and the passers-by who have surrounded him nod approvingly and probingly look up: is their restless mountain still in place?
It rises, elegantly illuminated by the sun and coquettishly crowned with cumulus clouds perched on its top. And below Etna, at its foot, a chapel was built in memory of the victims of the volcano and as a warning to future generations.
N. A. Ionina, M. N. Kubeev