The history and philosophy of earthquakes from the remotest to the present times: collected from the best writers on the subject. With a particular account of the phaenomena of the great one of November 1st 1755, in various parts of the globe / By a Member of the Royal Academy of Berlin [i.e. John Bevis].

Date:
1757
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The history and philosophy of earthquakes from the remotest to the present times: collected from the best writers on the subject. With a particular account of the phaenomena of the great one of November 1st 1755, in various parts of the globe / By a Member of the Royal Academy of Berlin [i.e. John Bevis]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    18/368 (page 8)
    On the firft of September, when other letters came away. An Italian letter of Antonio Bulifon, to the captain general of the kingdom of Sicily, Contains a narrative of an earthquake at Naples on Whitjun Eve, June the 5th, 1688, fo powerful that it ftiook even the foundations of that city. The houfes at firft feemed to be lifted up, and then inftantly were rocked backwards and forwards with incon¬ ceivable violence, and to that degree, that in fome towns the bells rang of the ml elves •, that particularly belonging to the clock of St. Angelo, was throws a full palm out of its gudgeon. What greatly augmented the confirmation was a horrible rumbling all the while, as if the world were turn- ing upfiide down. In the month of June 1690 news arrived from the ifiand of St. Chrijlopher in Americay and likewife from Charles Fowny of feveral ftone houfes being overfet by an earthquake, and then fwallow’d up*, in fome places, of the earth rifing up in large hills, and of the finking of trees into chafrns 7 or 8 feet wide in others. The Jefuits College, and all other free ftone buildings in St. Chrijlophers were razed to the ground. Letters from Naples and Rome of the 3d and 7th of February 1693, brought advice of the ruin of the cities of Catanea, Agofta, and Syracufe^ in Sicily; alfo of Reggioy and feveral other places in Calabria; and that as to the reft of Sicily, near one half was overturned, above 100000 fouls being loft under the ruins of no lefs than 27 great towns. That at Agofta, Faorminoy Syracufe and Catanea, there are fcarce any marks of the walls and fortifications to be feen, in which jaft city alone, at leaf!: 18000 perfons perifhed ; and