Cavalli leggendari

Prologue

21 July, 356BC

On the day of Alexander the Great's birth, another event took place that had a profound impact on humanity. One of the Seven Wonders of the World, the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus (in modern-day Turkey) was burnt to the ground by a man named Herostratus. Under torture, he confessed that he had sought glory and fame at any cost, and had seen no other way of achieving this. He was brought before the courts, and before the people, who looked on him, filled with hatred and disgust.

But if the judges and the crowd had been less blinded by anger, they would have noticed the Sibyl, lit up in the surrounding darkness by the dying glow from the burning temple. The old woman's eyes rolled back and she began to convulse violently, crying out in a prophetic trance. A priest who had survived the blaze took her in his arms before she collapsed into a coma that was to last for several days. He later engraved the Sibyl’s words onto a copper tablet. She had spoken with what seemed to be the voice of the gods of Olympus:

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