Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/115

 «56 ^TBURIA. kills, many of them ragged, and attaining to a con- Biderable elevation, though hardly any can be said to astfnme the rank of moontains, with the exception of the lofty Monte Amiata^ which forms the centre of a volcanic group, in the very heart of the province, and rises to the height of 5794 feet above the level of the sea. There are, however, considerable level tracts of rich alluvial soil, the most important of which are those on the banks and at the mouth of the Amus; the valley of the Clanis, which connects the basin of that river with tbat of the Tiber; and a spacious tract along the coast, between the hills of the interior and the sea, now known as the Marem/ma, This last district is of very luirious width and irre- gular extent, owing to the manner in which the hills encroach upon it and throw out bold arms or detached masses quite down to the coast, of which the most CQOspicuoos are the prcHnontory of Populonium or JHombmOf and the Mons Argentarius. With these exceptions, the coast is for the most part low and flat, with extensive marshes in some parts, which lender the whole tract of the Mtxremma noted for its unheal thinesw, a character it seems to have already earned as early as the days of the younger Pliny, and which was sometimes unjustly extended to the ^ whole of Etraria. (Phn. £p. v. 6. § 2; Sidon. ApolL £p, I 5.) It is very difficult to group the ranges of monn- tains or hiUs, with which almost the whole of Etru- ria is occupied, into any system of geographical ar- langement The two great valleys ii the Amus and the Tiber, the one having a general direction from £. to W,, the other from N. to S., may be considered as forming the key to the geography of the country. Both these important streams rise in the oentnl range of the Apennines, at no very great distance from one anotha, and follow for some space a nearly parallel direction, until the Amus makes an abrupt turn near Arretium, and flows from thence towards the N W. till within a few miles of l^lorenoe, when it turns again, and pursues a oonrse nearly due W. from thence to the sea. From the point where the Amus thus suddenly turns off at Arretium, the re- narkable trough-like depression or valley of the Clanis (the VtU di Chiana) extends nearly S. as far as Clttsinm, from whence its waters find their way to tbe Tiber: thus separating the general mass of. the Etrurian hills from those on the W. bank of the Tiber. So level is this singular valley tbat its stagnant waters may be led off at pleasure either into the Amos on the N., or the Tiber on the S. [Clanis.] The portion of Etraria N. of the Araus is occu- pied principally by the offiihoots and ranges of the Apennines, the main chain of which forms its north- era boundary,. while it sends off towards the S. se- vtnil minor ranges or arms, some of them however of elevation little inferior to the central chain. Of these the most otmspicuous are the lofty and ragged group now called the Alpi Apuani^ which separates the valley of the Macra from that of the Ausar {Serckio);A second, of inferior elevation, which sepa- rates the basin of Lucca from that of Pisttfja^ and sends out its ramifications to the banks of tte Amus between Pisa and Florence; thirdly, the range which separates the basin of PUtofa and valley of the Ombrone from that of the Sieve ; fourthly, die much more lofty range, now called Prato Ma^fnOj which intervenes between the lower valley of the Araus and its source, and causes the great bend of that river aheady noticed; and, kstly, the ridge called Alpe ETBUBIA. detta Caiemyaj which separates the «pper vaOij «f the Araus from that of the Tiber. This last nage (which rises in its highest point to 4590 fieec) is continued by the great hills that extend at the back of Arretium and Cortona to the banks of the lake Thrasimene and Pernsia, and are thenoe proknged, though on a still diminishing scale, along the W. bank of the Tiber. Between Uiese snooeasive Twa^ieB and the Araus, and, in some cases, almost eocloaed by the mountains, lie several basins or valleys, af- fniiing a considerable extent of fertile plain, far the nibst part so perfectly level as to be subject to fre- quent inundations, and (in ancieat times especially) abounding in marehes and great pools or lakes of stagnant water. Such are, besides the plain at the mouth of the Araus and Ansar, the baun in which was situated the dty of Luca, the nearly similar valley of Pistoria, and that in which stands the catj of Fhrenoe, the modem capital of Tuscany. S. of the Araus, almost the whole bfeadth oC Etraria is occupied by a range of hills, or, more oor^ recUy speaking, by a broad tnct of hilly coontry, extending from the valley of the Clanis to the sea, and from the banks of the Araus to the month of the Umbrow The greater part of these hills, many of which rise to a hdght of not leas than 2000 feet,' and some even considerably exceed 3000, belong to the formation termed by gedqgists the Sob- apennine, and present comparatively essy dedivi- ties and gently sloping sides, forming a marked contrast to the bold abrapt forms of the oeBtcal Apennines. At the same time, they may all be con- sidered as dependent upon the same system; thoogh much broken and diversified, their ranges preserve a general parallelism to the direction of the central chain of the Apennines from N W. to SE. But aboot 40 miles S. of Siena there rises a range of a to- tally different character, and almost wholly isoiatftrl from the hills to the N. of it, — the volcanic group of which Monte Amiata already noticed is the centre, and the Monte LaJbro and Monte di Radi- copami form the two extremities; the general di- rection of this range is nearly from £. to W. A sh(»rt distance S. of this again (nearly on the present confines of Tuscany and the Papal States) com- mences the great volcanic tract which occupies almost the whole of Southera Etruria, and is di» rectly connected with tbat of Ladum and the Com* pagna di RonuL This district includes the extinct volcanic craters of the Logo di Boltena (Lacns Vol- siniensis), Laffo di Vico (Lacus Ciminus), and fdm di Bracciano (Lacns Sabatinns all of them now occopie^^y lAes, as well ss the smaller La^ di Mart^nano (Lacns Alsictinos) and the now dry basin of Baccano, None of t^ese volcanic foci ^ eraption have been in a state of activity within his- torical memory, though of very recent date in a geological senbe. Nor do any of the vdcauie hills of Southera Etruria rise to any considerable eleva- tion, like the Alban hilb of Latium ; but the ra^ge or tract of which the Mons Ciminus is the ceutre, forms a kind of hilly barrier extending, from E. to W., from the Tiber nearly to the sea-coast, which bounds the view of the Bonum Campagna, and was for a long time the limit of the Boman arms^ [Ci« MINUS Mons.] The low tract of the Maremma ahready noticed extends between the hills of the interior and the sea: it may be considered as commencing a little to the N. of the mouth of the Caecina, and extending from thence as liar as CentumceUae (CtPita JecdUa)| -<'•