View of the Greek temple (500 B.C.) from the Norman Fortress at Segesta

For indeed your land devours its inhabitants, nor does it spare its people on grounds of age, nor defer to gender, nor consider their person, nor give any favor to their condition, or make any thought for their rank. Thirty seven souls entered Sicily with the lord Stephen, and all have been enveloped by death except for myself and Master Roger the Norman, a man of learning, industry and modesty .  .  . Sicily is unpleasant because of its air, and it is unpleasant through the evil of those who live there, so that it seems hateful to me, and almost uninhabitable. Distempers of the air render it abominable to me, as does the frequent scourge of poison through the frightful cruelty of which the naïve simplicity of our countrymen is there constantly endangered. Who, I ask, lives there in safety, where (apart from other trials) the mountains are always vomiting forth hellfire and throw out a sulphurous stink?  For here undoubtedly is the gate of hell.  Latin text

Peter of Blois, Letter to the Richard, bishop of Syracuse [Letter no. 46, PL 207.133-137 (ca. 1173)]  Translated by Graham A. Loud.  Peter of Blois had been brought to Sicily as an advisor of William I's wife, Margaret of Navarre.