Article Index
Salina
The History
All Pages

Secoud only to Lipari in size, the island of Salina appears enigmatic to anyone who sees it for the first time from a distance. Almost proud of this aura of mystery that Nature chose to give her, the "Green Island" appears a very different colour from the sea, i.e. a metal-grey colour.

Situated in the heart of the Aeolian archipelago, Salina seems to be fomed by two distinct islands: actually there are two very big volcanoes, which in antiquity caused the island to be called Didyme, "twinned" or "doubled", in that it evoked the his breasts of a goddess. The island was known by this name to many erudites of the past (including Thucydides, Pausanias and Strabo), who mentioned it several times in their writings. The present-day name dates from a more recent period and is due to the Romans, who gave the island this name because of the enormous quantity of salt extracted above all in the pool of brackish water situated in the area called Lingua.

The two volcanoes mentioned are called Monte Fossa delle Felci (962 metres - the highest peak in the Aeolian Islands} and Monte Porri (860 metres). They are part of that group of six volcanoes that still make up the Island. The two "breasts" are the biggest volcanoes on the island; they are also the "youngest": It seems that they were formed in a more recent epoch.

Anyone going to Salina must realise that they will spend a period of their life far from the fashionable life. Salina is different. If the term "civilisation" means getting away from pure Humanity then consider Salina a wild island! On this island there is still that is rich and in some respects also primordial, the authentic patrimony of a territory that is never monotonous but always varied. Equally varied are the vicissitudes that accompany the populations of the island, multiform like the territory they inhabit. The beauty of Salina is also this: alongside landscapes and sunsets that many had come to believe were lost, there are multiform and complex social substrates. Who can say that differentiation of life and thought is not Richness?