AKKA: Dwarf of Syracuse

Sicily in the days when there was keen rivalry between Syracuse and the newer city of Alexandria in Egypt. Akka was the king's dwarf, but he hated his deformity, and built his hopes on fulfilling a superstition expressed by his foster mother in Alexandria, and he virtually kidnaps twin children on a boat bound for that city, so as to use his mother's sorcery to gain his normal size. An unusual story against a convincing picture of the period.