“He who has not seen the so-called Cyclopean cities of Latium…those marvels of early art, which overpower the mind with their grandeur, bewilder it with amazement, or excite it to active speculations as to their antiquity, the race which erected them, and the state of society which demanded fortifications so stupendous on sites so inaccessible as they in general occupy; — he who has not beheld those sublime trophies of early Italian civilization — the bastion and round tower of Norba — the gates of Segni and Arpino — the citadel of Alatri — the many terraces of Cora — the covered way of Praeneste, and the colossal works of the same masonry in the mountains of Latium, Sabina, and Samnium, will be astonished at the first view of the walls of Cosa. Nay, he who is no stranger to this style of masonry, will be surprised to see it on this spot, so remote from the district which seems its peculiar locality. He will behold in these walls immense blocks of stone, irregular polygons in form, not bound together with cement, yet fitted with so admirable nicety, that the joints are mere lines, into which he might often in vain attempt to insert a penknife: the surface smooth as a billiard-table; and the whole resembling, at a little distance, a freshly plastered wall, scratched over with strange diagrams.”
George Dennis, The Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria, London, 1848
Cyclopean-Ruins-San-Felice-Circeo
The Saracena Gate, a Cyclopean masterpiece. Massive stones fitted together using the polygonal technique, long before the Romans and the Etruscans.
“Ages before the Romans existed, the fair land of Italy was inhabited by nations who have left indestructible monuments as the only records of their history. Those wonderful cities of early Italy which have been termed Cyclopean, are thickly scattered throughout certain districts, and are often perched like eagles’ nests, on the very crests of mountains, at such an elevation as to strike amazement into the traveler who now visits them, and to bewilder him with speculations as to the state of society which could have driven men to such scarcely accessible spots for habitation, and to entrench themselves therein with such stupendous fortifications.”
Louisa Caroline Tuthill, History of Architecture, (1848)
These ancient Cyclopean ruins are not in Italy, but in neighboring Greece (Tiryns)
(I've chosen to leave out any reference to Atlantis and Giants, thus the blog headline is truncated.)
