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63-596: The former slaves then moved to the eastern coast and took control of Catana and Tauromenium . Their exploit triggered several minor revolts in Italy and as far as Delos in the Aegean Sea . Eunus and Cleon were able to repel several Roman attempts to quell the rebellion until an army commanded by consul Publius Rupilius arrived in Sicily in 134 and besieged the cities controlled by the slaves. The revolt ended in 132 with

126-460: A hot-summer Mediterranean climate ( Köppen : Csa ). The city has hot summers, one of the hottest in the whole country of Italy. Temperatures of 40 °C (104 °F) are surpassed almost every year a couple of times. Winters are mild, with significant nighttime cooling. Precipitation is concentrated from October to March, leaving late spring and summer virtually dry. The city receives around 500 millimetres (20 inches) of rain per year, although

189-646: A basin or a bay" and "a bowl, a vessel or a trough", thanks to the city's distinctive topography. Around 900, when Catania was part of the emirate of Sicily , it was known in Arabic as Balad al-fīl ( بلد الفيل ) and Madīnat al-fīl ( مدينة الفيل ), respectively meaning "the Village (or Country) of the Elephant" and "the City of the Elephant". The Elephant likely referred to the ancient lava sculpture, now placed over

252-483: A body of Sicilian militia to quash the revolt but the slaves routed his army. They then defeated three other praetors in succession and occupied almost the whole island by the end of the year. In 134 the Roman Senate sent Flaccus , the consul for the year, to put an end to the revolt. However, his campaign, the details of which are few and obscure, seems to have ended without a conclusive result. A year later, in 133

315-545: A curse and a blessing. On the one hand, violent outbursts of the volcano throughout history have destroyed large parts of the city, while on the other hand the volcanic ashes yield fertile soil, especially suited for the growth of vines. (Strab. vi. p. 269) Two subterranean rivers run under the city; the Amenano, which surfaces at one single point south of Piazza Duomo, and the Longane (or Lognina). Catania experiences

378-403: A large fleet of warships at his base at Messana , with many slaves joining from the villas of patricians. After the victory of Augustus in 36 BC much of the vast farmland in Sicily was either ruined or left empty, and much of this land was taken and distributed to members of the legions which had fought there. Catania suffered severely from the ravages but was afterwards one of the cities raised to

441-467: A local center of learning. The philosopher and legislator Charondas (late 6th c. BC), born in Catania, putatively wrote program of laws used here and in other Chalcidic cities, both in Sicily and through Magna Graecia . suggesting a link between Catania and other cities during this time. The poets Ibycus and Stesichorus ( c.  630 –555 BC) lived in Catania. The latter putatively was buried in

504-460: A magnificent sepulchre outside one of the gates, therefore named Porta Stesichoreia . Xenophanes ( c.  570 -475 BC), one of the founders of the Eleatic school of philosophy, also spent the latter years of his life in the city. The first introduction of dancing to accompany the flute was also ascribed to Andron , a citizen of Catania. Catania appears to have remained independent until

567-642: A massive castle, Castello Ursino and also made Catania a royal city, ending the dominance of the bishops. Catania was one of the main centers of the Sicilian Vespers revolt (1282) against the House of Anjou and was the seat of the coronation of the new Aragonese king of Sicily, Peter I . The city remained a key Sicilian port during the War of the Sicilian Vespers . After a civil revolt in 1299,

630-577: A position of great prosperity under the Roman rule. Around 135 BC during the First Servile War , it was conquered by rebel slaves. One of the most serious eruptions of Mount Etna happened in 121 BC, when a great part of Catania was overwhelmed by streams of lava, and the hot ashes fell in such quantities in the city itself, as to break in the roofs of the houses. Catana was in consequence exempted, for 10 years, from its usual contributions to

693-563: A time (Plut. Dion. 58); and when Timoleon landed in Sicily in 344 BC Catania was subject to the despot Mamercus who at first joined the Corinthian leader, but afterwards abandoned this allegiance for that of the Carthaginians. As a consequence he was attacked and expelled by Timoleon in 338 BC. Catania was now restored to a fragile independence; changing sides during the wars starting in 311 BC of Agathocles of Syracuse with

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756-460: A wealthy and flourishing city; it retained its ancient municipal institutions, its chief magistrate bearing the title of Proagorus ; and appears to have been one of the principal ports of Sicily for the export of corn. In the Sicilian revolt from 44 BC Sextus Pompeius selected Sicily as his base and Catania gave in to Sextus' revolt and joined his forces. Sextus amassed a formidable army and

819-630: The Metropolitan City of Catania , which is the seventh-largest metropolitan area in Italy. The population of the city proper is 311,584, while the population of the Metropolitan City of Catania is 1,107,702. Catania was founded in the 8th century BC by Chalcidian Greeks in Magna Graecia . The city has weathered multiple geologic catastrophes: it was almost completely destroyed by a catastrophic earthquake in 1169 . A major eruption and lava flow from nearby Mount Etna nearly swamped

882-494: The Mezzogiorno , namely a heavy gap in industrial development and infrastructures, and the threat of the mafia . This notwithstanding, during the 1960s (and partly during the 1990s) Catania enjoyed development and a period of economic, social, and cultural success. In the first decade of the 21st century, Catania's economic and social development somewhat faltered and the city is again facing economic and social stagnation. This

945-557: The 1693 earthquake, and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site . The ancient indigenous population of Sicily, the Sicels , named their villages after geographical attributes of their location. The Siculian word katane means "grater, flaying knife, skinning place" or a "crude tool apt to pare". Other translations of the name are "harsh lands", "uneven ground", "sharp stones", or "rugged or rough soil". The latter etymologies are easily justifiable since, for many centuries following an eruption,

1008-663: The Carthaginians. When Pyrrhus landed in Sicily in 278 BC, Catania was the first to open its gates to him, and welcomed him with great splendor. During the First Punic War , Catania was one of the first cities of Sicily to submit to the Roman Republic after their first successes in 263 BC when it was taken by Valerius Messalla . A sundial was part of the booty which was placed in the Comitium in Rome. Since then

1071-461: The Italian average of 18.06 percent (minors) and 19.94 percent (pensioners). The average age of Catania residents is 41 compared to the Italian average of 42. In the five years between 2002 and 2007, the population of Catania declined by 3.35 percent, while Italy as a whole grew by 3.85 percent. The reason for this population decline in the comune di Catania is mainly due to a large segment of

1134-447: The Italian average of 9.45 births. As of 2006 , 98.03% of the population was Italian . The largest immigrant groups come from Sub-Saharan Africa : 0.69%, South Asia : 0.46%, and from other European countries (particularly from Ukraine and Poland ): 0.33%. There is currently a small community of Samaritans from Israel. Around 729 BC, the ancient village of Katane was occupied by Chalcidian Greek settlers from nearby Naxos along

1197-587: The Republic into a horrible den of misery, brigandage, atrocity and death. In 135 BC, the plantation slaves in Sicily finally rose in revolt, having as their head a certain Eunus of Syrian origin, who, as a conjurer and self-proclaimed prophet, had long foretold that he would be king. Recognizing his talents, his plantation master used to employ him as an entertainer at symposia , where he would perform sleight-of-hand magic tricks that included breathing fire. During

1260-559: The Roman state. The greater part of the broad tract of plain to the southwest of Catana (now called the Piana di Catania , a district of great fertility), appears to have belonged, in ancient times , to Leontini or Centuripa (modern Centuripe ), but that portion of it between Catana itself and the mouth of the Symaethus was annexed to Catana and must have furnished abundant supplies of grain. Cicero repeatedly mentions it as, in his time,

1323-570: The Triple Alliance.  After one year, Italy joined the Allied forces. Many promises made to secure Italy’s help during the war were not kept resulting in stability issues throughout the country leading to the adoption of fascist ideations. As the second World War began, the new regime opted to support Adolf Hitler, resulting in Catania and all the surrounding areas on Sicily being destroyed by Allied bombing. During World War II , Catania

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1386-411: The amount can vary greatly from year to year, from over 1,200 mm (47 in) to under 250 mm (9.8 in). During winter nights, lows can occasionally reach below freezing. Highs under 10 °C (50 °F) may happen during winter. Snow, due to the presence of Etna that protects the city from the northern winds, is an uncommon occurrence, but occasional snow flurries have been seen over

1449-475: The city became a civitas decumana i.e. was subject to the payment of a tenth of its agricultural income as a tax to Rome. The conqueror of Syracuse, Marcus Claudius Marcellus , built a gymnasium here. It appears to have continued afterwards to maintain its friendly relations with Rome and though it did not enjoy the advantages of a confederate city ( foederata civitas ), like its neighbours Tauromenium (modern Taormina ) and Messana (modern Messina ), it rose to

1512-471: The city has always been rebuilt within its black-lava landscape. Around 263 BC, the city was variously known as Catĭna ( Latin: [ˈkatɪna] ) and Catăna ( Latin: [ˈkatana] ; Ancient Greek : Κατάνη [katánɛː] ). The former has been primarily used for its supposed assonance with catina , the Latin feminization of the name catinus . Catinus has two meanings: "a gulf,

1575-462: The city in 1669 and it suffered severe devastation from the 1693 Sicily earthquake . During the 14th century, and into the Renaissance period, Catania was one of Italy's most important cultural, artistic and political centres. It was the site of Sicily's first university , founded in 1434. It has been the native or adopted home of some of Italy's most famous artists and writers, including

1638-413: The city of Catania. During the years 1923 and 1928, Catania endured two major eruptions of Mt. Etna. The 1923 eruption lasted twenty-nine days, from June 6 until June 29. A large lava flow occurred in the 1928 event and was the first to destroy a population center in over two hundred years. At the onset of World War 1, Italy was part of a defensive alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary referred to as

1701-567: The city was captured by an Angevin army, which occupied the city until the Angevins evacuated their holdings on Sicily in 1302. In the 14th century it gained importance as it was chosen by the Aragonese as a Parliament and Royal seat. Here, in 1347, it was signed the treaty of peace that ended the long War of the Vesper between Aragonese and Angevines. Catania lost its capital role when, in

1764-492: The city, sold its citizens as slaves, and repopulated the town with Campanian mercenaries. However, the Carthaginians would take possession of Catania under Himilco and Mago , after the nearby great naval Battle of Catana (397 BC) where they defeated Leptines of Syracuse , and in 396 BC forcing the local Campanian mercenaries to relocate to Aetna . Calippus , the assassin of Dion of Syracuse , held Catania for

1827-467: The coast. It became the Chalcidian colony of Katánē under a leader named Euarchos (Euarchus) and the native population was rapidly Hellenised . Thucydides states that it came into existence slightly later than Leontini (modern Lentini ), which he claims was five years after Syracuse , or 730 BC. The settlement's acropolis was on the hill of Monte Vergine, a defensible hill immediately west of

1890-544: The composers Vincenzo Bellini and Giovanni Pacini , and the writers Giovanni Verga , Luigi Capuana , Federico De Roberto and Nino Martoglio . Catania today is the industrial, logistical, and commercial centre of Sicily. Its airport, the Catania–Fontanarossa Airport , is the largest in Southern Italy. The central "old town" of Catania features exuberant late- baroque architecture , prompted after

1953-670: The conquered were sold into slavery, the slave-dealing of the Cretan and Cilician pirates whose activity was practically unchecked at this time, as well as the oppression of corrupt Roman provincial governors, who were known to organize man-hunts after lower-class country provincials (to be sold as slaves)—all contributed to a constant supply of new slaves at very cheap price, which made it more profitable for their masters to wear them out by unremitting labor, harshness, exposure and malnutrition, to be cheaply replaced, than to take proper care for their nourishment, health, and accommodation. Accordingly,

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2016-477: The conquest by the despot Hieron of Syracuse ; in 476 BC, he expelled all the original inhabitants of Catania and replaced them with his subjects from the town of Leontini – said to have numbered no less than 10,000, consisting partly of Syracusans and Peloponnesians . Hieron changed the city's name to Αἴτνη ( Aítnē , Aetna or Ætna, after the nearby Mount Etna , and proclaimed himself the Oekist or founder of

2079-409: The current city centre. The port of Catania appears to have been much frequented in ancient time and was the chief place of export for the corn of the rich neighbouring plains. Catania was associated with the ancient legend of Amphinomos and Anapias, who, on occasion of a great eruption of Etna, abandoned all their property and carried off their aged parents on their shoulders. The stream of lava itself

2142-609: The early 15th century, Sicily was turned into a member of the Crown of Aragon , and kept its autonomy and original privileges specially during the period from 1282 to 1410. In 1434 King Alfonso V founded here the Siciliae Studium Generale , the oldest university in the island. With the unification of Castile and Aragon (early 16th century ), Sicily became part of the Spanish Empire. It rebelled against

2205-856: The fall of Enna and Tauromenium. Following the final expulsion of the Carthaginians during the Second Punic War , there were great changes in land ownership in Sicily. Speculators from Italy rushed onto the island, buying up large tracts of land at low prices, or occupied estates which had belonged to Sicilians of the Carthaginian party. These were forfeited to Rome after the execution or flight of their owners. The newly arrived Roman Sicilians exploited their slaves more brutally than their predecessors. According to Diodorus Siculus , politically influential slave-owners, often Roman equites , did not provide enough food and clothing for their slaves. The Roman conquest of Macedonia , in which thousands of

2268-500: The foreign government in 1516 and 1647. In 1669 the city's surroundings suffered great material damage from the 1669 Etna eruption . The city itself was largely saved by its walls that diverted most of the lava into the port. Afterwards, in 1693 the city was nearly completely destroyed by a heavy 1693 Sicily earthquake and its aftershocks. The city was then rebuilt in the Baroque architecture that nowadays characterizes it. Catania

2331-590: The fountain in Piazza Duomo. The sculpture is most likely a prehistoric sculpture that was reforged during the Byzantine Era, prized as a protective talisman against enemies, both human, natural or geologic. Another Arab toponym was Qaṭāniyyah ( قطانية ), allegedly from the Arabic word for the " leguminous plants ". Pulses like lentils , beans, peas, broad beans , and lupins were chiefly cultivated in

2394-470: The help of traitors from within the slave army defending the town. All the prisoners taken when the town fell were first tortured and then thrown from a cliff. Next he marched on Enna, which had become the center of the entire revolt, where one of the slave leaders, Cleon, had taken refuge. Cleon in turn died of wounds sustained during a desperate sally out of the gates to try to break the Roman siege lines. Enna fell not long after, again helped by traitors inside

2457-516: The latter had forced an entrance, the Athenian leader Alcibiades made a famous speech in front of the assembly. Catania became an ally, and the headquarters of the Athenian army for the first year of the expedition, and a base of their subsequent operations against Syracuse. After the defeat of the Athenians, Catania was again threatened by Syracuse. In 403 BC, Dionysius I of Syracuse plundered

2520-517: The most famous was led by Spartacus . 18. Peter Green, "The First Sicilian Slave War", Past & Present, nr. 20 (1961): 10–29. Catania Catania ( / k ə ˈ t ɑː n i ə / , also UK : /- ˈ t eɪ n -/ , US : /- ˈ t æ n -/ ; Sicilian and Italian: [kaˈtaːnja] ) is the second-largest municipality in Sicily , after Palermo , both by area and by population. Despite its reputation as

2583-578: The name Aetna). The old Chalcidic citizens returned to the city in 461 BC. The period that followed appears to have been one of great prosperity for Catania, as well as for the Sicilian cities in general. In 415 BC, Catania became involved with the expedition to Sicily pursued by the Athenians to punish Syracuse. Initially the Catanaeans refused to allow the Athenians into their city, but after

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2646-469: The new city. For this he was celebrated by Pindar , and after his death he received heroic honours from the citizens of his new colony. A few years after the death of Hieron and the expulsion of Thrasybulus of Syracuse , the Syracusans combined with Ducetius , king of the Sicels , to expel the newly settled inhabitants of Catania, who went on to settle in the fortress of Inessa (to which they gave

2709-479: The new consul Lucius Calpurnius Piso was given the same task as Flaccus but this time the effort actually gave results. He recaptured Messana and put 8,000 surrendered slaves to death before laying siege to the important town of Tauromenium on the north-east coast, although he was unable to take it. The revolt was finally snuffed out in its entirety the following year by Publius Rupilius . He also laid siege to Tauromenium and captured it with relative ease thanks to

2772-440: The performance he kept up a patter—thought humorous by his listeners—saying that Sicilian society would experience a role-reversal, in which his aristocratic audience would be killed or enslaved, and he would become king. To those who gave him tips, Eunus promised that they would be spared once he came into his kingdom. During the revolt, he spared the lives of at least some of those individuals. The spark which would end up starting

2835-660: The period of the Roman Empire ; so that in the 4th century Ausonius in his Ordo Nobilium Urbium , notices Catania and Syracuse alone among the cities of Sicily. Catania was sacked by the Vandals of Gaiseric in 440–441. After a period under the Ostrogoths , it was reconquered in 535 by the Eastern Roman Empire , under which (aside from a short period in 550–555) it remained until the 9th century. It

2898-516: The plains around the city well before the arrival of Aghlabids . Afterwards, many Arabic agronomists developed these crops and the citrus orchards in the area around the city. The toponym Wādī Mūsá ( وادي موسى ), or "the Valley of Moses" (from the Arabic name of the Simeto River), was rarely used. As observed by Strabo , the location of Catania at the foot of Mount Etna has been both

2961-426: The plantation system which took shape in Sicily led to thousands of slaves dying every year of toil in the fields from dawn to dusk with chains around their legs, and being locked up in suffocating subterranean pits by night. For food, the slaves had to turn to banditry to survive. The Roman Senate failed to take measures to curb this dangerous tendency, which converted one of the most beautiful and fertile provinces of

3024-472: The population leaving the city centre to go to live in the uptown residential areas of the comuni of the Metropolitan area. As a result of this, while the population in the comune di Catania declines, the population of the hinterland comuni increases making the overall population of the Metropolitan area increase. The current birth rate of Catania is 10.07 births per 1,000 inhabitants compared to

3087-550: The population to flee to the countryside. After heavy fighting across eastern Sicily, Catania was eventually captured by the British 8th Army on 5 August 1943. After the conflict, and the constitution of the Italian Republic (1946), Catania attempted to catch up with the economic and social development of Italy's richer northern regions. The problems faced in Catania were emblematic of those faced by other towns in

3150-460: The recent years, especially in the hilly districts. More recently, light snowfalls occurred on 9 February 2015, 6 January 2017 and 5 January 2019, but the last heavy snowfall dates back to 17 December 1988. In January 2015, there were 315,601 people residing in Catania, of whom 47.2% were male and 52.8% were female. Minors (people under age 18) totalled 20.50 percent of the population compared to pensioners who number 18.87 percent. This compares with

3213-400: The revolt came when a group of slaves, who were suffering under the severe cruelty of their owner Damophilus, sought out Eunus for advice on what to do about their situation. Declaring that his prophecy was now to be fulfilled, Eunus organized about 400 slaves into a band and stormed the prominent city of Enna located in the interior of the island and the home of Damophilus. The unprepared town

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3276-594: The revolt quickly spread. Achaeus, a Greek slave, was named commander-in-chief by Eunus, who simultaneously proclaimed himself king Antiochus , of Syria. A group of 5,000 slaves on the south side of the island under Cleon rose up and captured Agrigentum , after which they joined Eunus and his forces. The numbers of the slave army swelled rapidly from 10,000 to 70,000 by the lowest number ( Livy and Orosius following him), or as many as 200,000 according to Diodorus Siculus , including men and women, possibly counting children as well. The Praetor Lucius Hypsaeus marched with

3339-513: The second city of the island, Catania is the largest Sicilian conurbation, and among the largest in Italy. It has important road and rail transport infrastructures, and hosts the main airport in Sicily (fifth-largest in Italy). The city is located on Sicily's east coast, facing the Ionian Sea at the base of the active volcano Mount Etna . It is the capital of the 58-municipality region known as

3402-609: The status of colony by Augustus which restored its prosperity through the settlement of veterans, so that in Strabo 's time it was one of the few cities in the island that was flourishing. Another revolt led by the gladiator Selurus in 35 BC created mayhem for a while. The Roman aqueduct of Catania was the longest in Roman Sicily at 24 kilometres (15 mi), starting from the springs of Santa Maria di Licodia. It retained its colonial rank, as well as its prosperity, throughout

3465-471: The suffering of her family's slaves, was spared by the mob and given an honorable escort which was to deliver her to the Roman garrison at Catana . Upon the capture of Enna , Eunus crowned himself king and subsequently took the name Antiochus, a name used by the Seleucids who ruled his homeland Syria, and he called his followers, who numbered in the tens of thousands, Syrians . After the capture of Enna,

3528-450: The walls. The remnants of the slave army on the rest of the island were quickly stamped out, with around 20,000 prisoners being crucified by Rupilius in retribution. As for Eunus, little is known about his actual participation in the war. Only his enemies left accounts of him, and they gave credit for his victories to his general Cleon. But Eunus must have been a man of considerable ability to have maintained his leadership position throughout

3591-468: The war and to have commanded the services of those said to have been his superiors. Eunus was captured after Tauromenium fell and was found hiding in a pit. He was taken to the city of Morgantina to await punishment, but he died of disease before he could be judged. The war lasted from 135 until 132 BC. It was the first of three large-scale slave revolts against the Roman Republic; the last and

3654-479: Was aggravated by the economic crisis left by the Forza Italia administration of mayor Scapagnini in 2008. Cleon (Roman rebel) Cleon (died 132 BC) was an enslaved Cilician who became a general in the slave rebellion led by Eunus during the First Servile War . He was killed in 132 BC in Sicily. Cleon was taken captive from Cilicia (modern-day Turkey) and enslaved by Romans in Sicily. He met

3717-407: Was captured and savagely sacked by the insurgents, who executed every inhabitant but the iron-forgers, who were chained to their smithies and put to manufacturing arms for their captors. Damophilus was butchered after being insultingly paraded through the local theater, abjectly begging for his life while his wife was tortured to death by her servants. Their daughter, who had once attempted to alleviate

3780-634: Was heavily bombed by the Allied air forces, owing to the presence of two of the main Axis airfields in Sicily ( Gerbini and Fontanarossa ) and for its strategically important port and marshalling yard . Altogether, the city suffered eighty-seven air raids. The heaviest took place in the spring and summer of 1943, before and during the Allied invasion of Sicily ; they caused heavy damage to the city (among others, twenty-eight churches and most historic palaces suffered damage), killed 750 inhabitants and prompted most of

3843-599: Was one of the vanguards of the movement for Sicilian autonomy in the early 19th century. In 1860 Giuseppe Garibaldi 's expedition of the Thousand conquered Sicily for Piedmont from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies . Since the following year Catania was part of the newly unified Italy , whose history it shares since then. The first half of the twentieth century was a cycle of repeated destruction and rebuilding for

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3906-597: Was said to have parted, and flowed aside so as not to harm them. Statues were erected to their honour, and the place of their burial was known as the Campus Piorum ; the Catanaeans even introduced the figures of the youths on their coins, and the legend became a favorite subject of allusion and declamation among the Latin poets , of whom the younger Lucilius and Claudian have dwelt upon it at considerable length. The Greek polis of Catania appears to have been

3969-532: Was the seat of the Byzantine governor of the island. Catania was under an Islamic emirate for two centuries, after which it fell to the Normans of Roger I of Sicily . Subsequently, the city was ruled by a bishop-count (1072). In 1194–1197 the city was sacked by German soldiers during after the conquest of the island by emperor Henry VI . In 1232 it rebelled to the former's son, Frederick II , who later built

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