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| “Bisanzio nella terra dei Nebrodi: S. Marco D’Alunzio” | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Project
“Socrates-Comenius” 2003/2004 Scientific Liceo “L.Piccolo” Capo D’Orlando,
Messina, Sicily “Byzantium
in the land of the Nebrodi: S. Marco D’Alunzio village” The
mysterious and fascinating name of Nebrodi Mountains, in the
North-Eastern part of Sicily, hides the lines of a complex historical
event which today testifies the presence of a rich heritage of works and
evidences which represent the real and alive voice of time and history,
“the concrete writing of the social, cultural and economic situations”.
One of the most enduring and undisputable influences is the Byzantine
influence, analysed and studied in particular in S. Marco D’Alunzio,
where the classes II B, II E and II D of the Scientific Liceo
“Lucio
Piccolo” of Capo D’Orlando went for a guided visit on the 11th
of November 2003, for what concerns the Comenius-Socrates Project “Byzantium
and the light of a disappeared world”. As
a little village situated on a rocky cone of the Nebrodi Mountains, S.
Marco D’Alunzio is a centre of the province of Messina. The actual
double name in itself expresses the different ages and the various
cultural influences operating on this place: “S. Marco” for the
Norman Middle Ages, “Alunzio” in the Greek-Roman antiquity. The
following considerations try to revaluate the trait d’union, the link
between the two denominations: the Byzantine Age. With
the Greek-Roman conquest, the village has the name of Alontion/
Haluntium: an evidence for this is the presence of a Greek inscription
on some Aluntine coins where we can read: TO MOUNIKIPION TWN ALONTINWN
(=
the
municipium,
free town of the Aluntine people). From
Alontion,
as a Greek colony, it is called
Haluntium
when it underwent the Roman influence. Later, we can find a continuous
decadence of the ancient “Alunzio” in the late ancient age, caused
above all by earthquakes and incursions of the Vandals against Sicily
from about 440 to 475 A.D. and of the Goths in 550 A.D. In the
North-Eastern part of Sicily, there are, however, some fortified places
as refuges for the refugees, up to the Byzantine conquest with the
general Belisarius in 535 A.D. Thus,
from the second half of the VIth century the Eastern Greek-Byzantine
Empire of Constantinople appears as the new political power after the
Goths. Some refugees from Syria and the Balcans increase the
re-Grecization of North-Eastern Sicily, above all after the
jurisdictional submission to the patriarcate of Constantinople during
the iconoclastic conflict of 730/750 A.D. Three centuries of relative
peace under the Byzantine government, with the reign of Michael II and
Teophilus, go to and end with the landing of the Arabs at Mazzara del
Vallo, in Sicily, in 827. The island of Sicily thus becomes scene of a
comparison between the Arabic-Islamic dimension and the
Byzantine-Christian dimension: the Byzantine Empire is in fact aware of
the political and military importance of Sicily, situated in the middle
of the Mediterranean sea; however, it is not able to oppose to the
invaders with all its power. Just
in the place of “S. Marco D’Alunzio”, the locality called
“Demenna”
in 901 resists the Arabic siege and invasion of seventeen days, then it
is evacuated until it regains importance in 965 with the Byzantine
re-conquest of Sicily and Calabria region. “Demenna”
thus replaces “Alunzio” as denomination of the above considered
locality towards the end of the VIth century. As a matter of fact, the
so called “Chronicle of Monemvasia” points out the relations between
the raids of the Avari population and the Slavic conquest of the
Balcanic peninsula towards the end of the VI century. The local Greek
population is obliged to withdraw or even migrate towards the sea and
towards the North-Eastern part of Sicily; also the inhabitants of the
famous town of Sparta ( called
“Lacedemone”)
in the Peloponneso are obliged to migrate: “Then also the inhabitants of Lacedemone abandoned their native land,
they sailed, some of them towards the island of Sicily, and even now
they remain there, in the place called Demenna
and, by preserving the dialect of the Lacedemoni, they changed their
name from Lacedemoni to Demenniti”
(Dujcev, pages 13-15) Thus,
the emigrants impose the toponym of their homeland against Aluntium
but in a lightly modified form: Lacedaimonia
or better (with neo-Greek Byzantine pronunciation)
Lacedemonia
becomes Demenna. In
1061 the Normans behave in the same way, depriving the Byzantine from
power, and in the choice of the name “S. Marco” they consciously
join to their first settlement in the region of Calabria ( in the South
of Italy) called “S. Marco Argentano” and conquered by Roberto the
Guiscardo. As pre-emptive measure, thus, the Norman secure both the
internal and the external control by building some fortifications which
were easily defensible by few men. The “Castrum
Sancti Marci” by which, during the first period they simply mean
the castle, now has the function of protection and defence en th cwra Demennwn
( in the territory of Demenna).
In a diploma of 1082, as a matter of fact, among the feudal estates
given by the Norman Count Ruggero of Altavilla to Roberto, bishop of
Troina, we can read: “in valle Deminae Castrum quod vocatur…”;
also in a second
diploma of April 3rd 1096, the same Count Ruggero, referring
to the donation of 1082 to the bishop Roberto, specifies:
“dedi
quoque apud Demennam castellum Alcariae cum tenimentis suis”. The
ancient Byzantine domination for the place thus becomes denomination of
the territory and the change is certainly due to the fact that the old
locality of
Demenna
will extend beyond the centre “Aluntium/ S. Marco” going
so far as to include hamlets located nearby. While the surrounding
territory still remains Greek-Byzantine for centuries, as for example,
the monastery of S. Philip of Fragalà or S. Philip of Demenna, the
village of S. Marco arises as a multicultural society in which Norman,
Arabs, Hebrews, Greek and Byzantine create a mosaic which indelibly
expands the nuances of its historical colours up to the present day. Prof.
Valentina Aglio & Prof. Franco Spaticchia (Liceo “Lucio
Piccolo”, Capo D’Orlando, Messina, Sicily) Bibliografia: 1)
MICHELE MANFREDI-GIGLIOTTI, Varie
Historiae Fragmenta, Mediasoft, Palermo, 2003. 2)
PASQUALE BISCUSO ( a cura di), Storia
dei Nebrodi, Pungitopo, Patti, 1991. 3)
EWALD KISLINGER, Monumenti
e testimonianze greco-bizantine di S.Marco D’Alunzio ( Me),
Edizioni del Rotari Club, S. Agata di Militello, 1995.
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