Even the subject of earthquakes proved soporific.
Impossible to find oneself at Catanzaro without thinking of earthquakes; I wonder that the good people of Coltrone did not include this among deterrents whereby they sought to prejudice me against the mountain town.

Over and over again Catanzaro has been shaken to its foundations.

The worst calamity recorded was towards the end of the eighteenth century, when scarce a house remained standing, and many thousands of the people perished.

This explains a peculiarity in the aspect of the place, noticeable as soon as one begins to walk about; it is like a town either half built or half destroyed, one knows not which; everywhere one comes upon ragged walls, tottering houses, yet there is no appearance of antiquity.

One ancient building, a castle built by Robert Guiscard when he captured Catanzaro in the eleventh century, remained until of late years, its Norman solidity defying earthquakes; but this has been pulled down, deliberately got rid of for the sake of widening a road.