The soldiers, masters of the beautiful and
wealthy city, divided among them the riches and goods of the citizens
according as to each one the lot fell; they levelled to the ground the
magnificent buildings, public or private, sacred or profane, all that
were proudest for amplitude, construction, and ornament; and that not
even the ruins of ancient splendour should remain, all that had survived
they gave to the flames."
This city, which the Saracens destroyed, is the one the Taorminians
cherish as the culmination of their past. In the Greek, the Roman, and
the early Christian ages it had flourished, as both its ruins and its
history attest, and much must have yet survived from those times; while
its station as the only Christian stronghold in the island would
naturally have attracted wealth hither for safety. In this first sack of
the Saracens, the ancient city must have perished, but the destruction
could hardly have been so thorough as is represented, since some of the
churches themselves, in their present state, show Byzantine workmanship.
There remains one bloody and characteristic episode to Ibrahim's
victory.
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