Lake Avernus

Descrizione:

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Lake Avernus is a volcanic lake in the town of Pozzuoli, located precisely between the district of Lucrino and the archaeological site of Cumae, in the metropolitan city of Naples.

The name Avernus comes from the Greek άορνος (without birds), and indeed story goes that this absence was caused by the particular gases, lethal to birds, exhaled from the lake According to Greek and Roman religions, it was an entrance to the Netherworld, kingdom of the God Pluto: for this reason, the Roman underworld (the Greek Hades), was also called Avernus, and not by chance Christian mythology recognizes this place as the earthly adobe of Lucifer, the angel who fell from Heaven. Lake Avernus lies inside an extinct crater, formed 4.000 years ago.

Indeed, the poet Virgilio as well, in the sixth book of his Aeneid, places close to this place the mystical entrance to the underworld, where the hero Aeneas must venture into (scrupea, tuta lacu nigro nemorumque tenebris, VI, 238). Lake Avernus is, after Lake Fusaro, the second largest lake in the Phlegraean Field.

During the nineteenth century, it was object of study, particularly for the optical phenomenon Fata Morgana.