The Cumaean Sibyl

Three Roman roads connected Puteoli with Naples, Capua, and Cumae. They are still bordered with ruined temples and columbaria, from which objects of great interest have been taken to the Naples Museum. Along the road to Cumae some of the ancient pavement can still be seen, with marks of the chariot wheels, and along this road St. Paul travelled on his way to Rome. Cumae is the most ancient of the Greek settlements in Italy (about 1050 B. C.). It became a city of vast wealth, and exercised great influence in the civilization of the country. This is proven by the fact that all the Italian alphabets were founded upon the Cumaean. After many vicissitudes, the city was destroyed by the citizens of Naples in the thirteenth century, having become a stronghold for pirates and robbers. Cumae was the place of exile of Tarquin the Proud, who died there, 509 B. C. It was from the Cumaean Sibyl that Tarquin the Proud purchased three of the nine Sibylline books, which the Romans preserved as their most precious relics, for many centuries, in the Capitol. And it was this Sibyl who prophesied the fall of Rome, and whom Michael Angelo painted as one of the Four Sibyls on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Scipio Africanus died at Cumae 184 B. C. But it is Virgil who gives to the ruins of Cumae their charm. At the beginning of the Sixth Book of the AEneid, Virgil describes Cumae as the place where Aeneas had his first interview with the Sibyl Deiphobe, who was the priestess of the Temple of Apollo, erected by Daedalus on the "Arx," or Acropolis, from whose caverns she pronounced her oracles. The Grotto of the Sibyl is said to be the cavern through which she led Aeneas to sacrifice to the god of the infernal regions. Midway in this grotto (which leads through the hill to Baiae) is the approach to a small chamber called the "Entrance to the Infernal Regions;" and as Dante, in his "Inferno," follows Virgil, one looks to see the inscription, "Who enters here leaves hope behind." Among the ruined tombs which line the road to Cumae is one marked "The tomb of the Sibyl."