The Strongest Ancient Greek Castle

Uriales Castle, high above the city of Syracuse in Sicily, was arguably the most impressive fortification anywhere in the ancient Greek world. The castle was constructed by the great tyrant Dionysius I to protect Syracuse from Carthaginian attack. It was the literal and figurative high point of the 18 miles of fortifications that the tyrant built on the plateau above Syracuse. It was protected on this side by three lines of ditches. This is the second ditch, hacked, as you can see, into the native limestone. On the far side are the remains of an outwork, now mostly tumbled into the ditch. Beyond looms the keep. The city of Syracuse, ancient and modern, is ahead of us, off toward the sea. Immediately in front of the keep was the colossal third ditch, which we're now peering into. This ditch was connected by a series of tunnels with every other part of the castle. Here we have the piers of the drawbridge. We'll take a closer look at all this from below. We're now inside the third ditch. This was the heart of the fortress, the central hub to which all their parts were connected, mostly by tunnels. As you can see off to our right, these tunnels were at different levels, some at the level of the ditch, others below. The ditch is littered with blocks that have fallen from the walls above. To our left is a subterranean gallery, which we'll explore shortly. It parallels the full length of this moat. And right ahead are the three piers that supported the drawbridge of the central keep. One more look down a deep tunnel, and now into that subterranean gallery. Quite a few tunnels opened off this gallery, and most are unfortunately now closed to visitors. But one at the far end is still open, so hang tight. There's nothing quite so tantalizing as a barrier, is there? But I'll be good for YouTube. Just a peek. Ahead is the entrance to a tunnel that issues in a moat along the side of one of the main keep walls. We won't go quite that far. Just enough to give you a sense of the scale, which is pretty mind-boggling. Nice and cool down here. Ahead, a tantalizing pool of light. Not the end of the tunnel, believe it or not, but far enough for us. And with this haunting view, we'll return to the keep. On this side, the keep was defended by five immense towers, each about 40 feet high and surmounted by catapults. Let's go inside. Walking up now between two of the towers. As you can see, all were made from large blocks of local stone, probably cut from the ditches. Now emerging into the central courtyard of the keep and turning back toward the inner faces of the towers. Although rubble fills most of the courtyard, we can still see the chambers that lined it on this side. These were likely some combination of barracks and storerooms, perhaps kitchens for the soldiers stationed here. From this vantage point, we have a good view over the keep and toward the outer courtyard, which connected it with the walls of Dionysius. We're now at the far end of the keep's courtyard, turning to go through this gate. This was a sort of outer courtyard, a large area that contained the keep's cisterns, which are right ahead of us. Looking down into the cisterns and now turning to exit the keep. All the sounds of a Mediterranean summer. The walls, as you can see, are about 20 feet thick. One last look at the walls of Dionysius and along this path rutted by ancient carts toward the greatest Greek fortification ever built.