Archaeology and nature: hyblean cultural landscape and territorial ...

Considered as "empty" spaces because lacking their primary function, they are instead usually "full" of
architectural artifacts of a certain local historical significance; rich in symbolic values, meanings, traditional
practices and informal uses [2]. These marginal realities actually possess a heritage of great interest: they
are a vital resource as their recovery would allow to not use more open areas; in addition, usually already
equipped with urbanization works, they are easily accessible and well connected to existing infrastructure
system. The return of these spaces to the city may therefore constitute an important opportunity to reshape
the urban fabric in which they are located, helping to mend the fragmented peripheral tissues, partly
compromised in recent decades by an uncontrolled urbanization [3].
In Sicily, currently in a state of "almost resigned standby" the landscape of sulfur mines, after having fed both
the economy of the region and the inspiration of its poets and writers is waiting - as most of the submerged
assets of this land - to be unearthed and, above all, valorized as a place of extraordinary individual and
collective memory.
2. The important role of mining industry in Sicily
The provinces of Enna, Agrigento and Caltanissetta are the most important and largest areas concerned by
the ancient production of sulfur in Sicily. If between the 19 th and 20 th centuries the parable of the practice of
sulfur extraction begins and ends, its history, however, has ancient origins and an evolution strongly linked to
the succession of rulers and the resulting political control in the island. Since the Bronze Age (2500 B.C.) an
intense activity in the field is, in fact, documented. It reaches its climax at the end of 18 th century when the
Sicilian sulfur cycle became fully part of the chemical European industry. The consequent need to recover
the sulfur in large quantities led, in 1808, under British protection, to the decision of government to give
Sicilian aristocracy, the permission for the subsoil exploitation. The opening of mines, begun at the time of
British occupation during the Napoleonic wars, then gave life in Sicily to a particular industrial revolution that
progressed in parallel to the contemporary English and French experiences [4]. The sulfur produced will be
requested from the European market, especially by those nations, as the basic element of the transformation
processes in the emerging chemical industry. Because of this, between 1830 and 1835, the number of
cantari (tons) exported, doubled rising from 380,000 to over 660,000. In 1835, the most of exported sulfur will
be directed in Great Britain (325,793) and France (262,774); the remaining amount will join other northern
European countries and the United States of America.
However, Sicilian mining was characterized by a high labor exploitation, especially among children: the socalled
carusi (as recorded in Pirandello's literature, for example, in Ciàula scopre la luna). Boys aged
between six and fourteen years for a few handfuls of money, were handed over by their parents to the
picconieri (pick-axe workers) to be used by them to bring to the surface the sulfur ere extracted. Numerous
were the laborers who preferred to leave the camps to work in the mines, even in inhuman conditions; the
exodus from agriculture was important and greatly influenced the fall in cereal production of large landed
estates. Although the establishment of a great "industrial proletariat" for those times (the first statistics, dating
back to 1860, show the presence of a job working in the mines of approximately 16,000 units) the
"exploitation" of sulfur was a mechanism in colonial style. The whole raw product was destined for foreign
market and mainly sold by foreign operators, mostly British, who also took care of credit aspects ensuring a
prepayment on delivery.
Such a race to low-cost production often led to overproduction crises which the Bourbon government, in
1835, tried to stem, by entering into a contract with the French company owned by the industrial Aycard and
Taix. Thus opening the way for the foreign capital to obtain concessions for the purchase and sale of
sulfurous Sicilians deposits. This agreement committed for ten years the company to purchase all sulfur
produced in Sicily at a set price. The production had to be contained within certain limits, but they ensured
the immediate payment of half of the sulfur delivered. In addition, the Taix & Aycard C. had promised to build
a local industry for the preparation of caustic soda and sulfuric acid, and to build sixteen miles of roads per
year [5]. In 1840, following the English dealers protests who accused the government of Naples having
specifically guaranteed a corner for France, the contract was terminated and with it the ambitious project of
creating a Sicilian chemical industry vanished.
In 1850, the discovery of oidium tuckeri, a fungus that causes powdery mildew of grape, the demand for
mineral increased, making Sicily a leader in the mining sector. A role that it held until the early 20 th century
and that was closely linked to the strong atmosphere of renewal that concerned Sicily after the unification of
Italy until the end of World War I and again between the 1920s and 1930s, especially in the transport and
development of regional rail [6]. Depending on the needs of the sulfur, the major mining centers of the island
were connected to the main Sicilian ports, then creating the so-called "sulfur-ways".
The crisis in the Sicilian sulfur industry began in the late 19 th century with the introduction of the Frasch
process, a method of mining deep-lying sulfur named after its inventor - used in U.S. mines with consequent
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