This is the beautiful beach of Cadiz, on the south coast of Spain. Cadiz is the oldest town in Europe.
Who would guess that near this beach used to stand the most important sanctuary in the Western Mediterranean?
Tradition said the god Hercules was buried there. Some of the most famous men of ancient history came as pilgrims to ask its oracle for advice:
Hannibal stopped in to consult the oracle before he set off across the Alps with his army.
Julius Caesar asked the oracle to interpret a dream he’d had that troubled him. (He raped his mother. “Not to worry,” said the oracle in perfect Greek. “That wasn’t your mother but the world. The dream means you will conquer the world.”)
Pliny was there, Polybius, Dio Cassio, many of the Roman emperors like Trajan. The Emperor Caracalla had the proconsul Aemilianus murdered for asking the Cadiz oracle who the next emperor would be.
The Temple received donations, legacies, and votive offerings from all over. Its treasury must have looked like Uncle Scrooge’s money-silo—gold all the way up to the top. Hannibal’s relative Magón was the first to loot it in 206 BC.
Bogud, the king of Mauritania, tried to loot in in 38 BC.
The unscrupulous Roman consul Varron did loot it; but Caesar had the treasure restored.
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