Sicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the 20 regions of Italy. It is one of the five Italian autonomous regions and is officially referred to as Regione Siciliana. It has 5 million inhabitants.
Calabria, known in antiquity as Bruttium, is a region in Southern Italy.
Apulia is a region of Italy, located in the southern peninsular section of the country, bordering the Adriatic Sea to the east, the Ionian Sea to the southeast, and the Strait of Otranto and Gulf of Taranto to the south. The region comprises 19,345 square kilometers (7,469 sq mi), and its population is about four million.
Reggio di Calabria, commonly known as Reggio Calabria(listen) or simply Reggio in Southern Italy, is the largest city and the most populated comune of Calabria, Southern Italy. It is the capital of the Metropolitan City of Reggio Calabria and the seat of the Regional Council of Calabria.
Marsala is an Italian town located in the Province of Trapani in the westernmost part of Sicily. Marsala is the most populated town in its province and the fifth in Sicily.
Mazara del Vallo is a town and comune in the province of Trapani, southwestern Sicily, Italy. It lies mainly on the left bank at the mouth of the Mazaro river.
Basilicata, also known by its ancient name Lucania, is an administrative region in Southern Italy, bordering on Campania to the west, Apulia (Puglia) to the north and east, and Calabria to the south. It has two coastlines: a 30-km stretch on the Tyrrhenian Sea between Campania and Calabria, and a longer coastline along the Gulf of Taranto between Calabria and Apulia. The region can be thought of as the "instep" of Italy, with Calabria functioning as the "toe" and Apulia the "heel".
Vitaliano Brancati was an Italian novelist, dramatist, poet and screenwriter.
Southern Italy or Mezzogiorno is a macroregion of Italy meant to broadly denote the southern half of the Italian state.
Trapani is a province in the autonomous island region of Sicily, southern Italy. Following the suppression of the Sicilian provinces, it was replaced in 2015 by the Free municipal consortium of Trapani. Its capital is the city of Trapani. It has an area of 2,469.62 square kilometres (953.53 sq mi) and a total population of 433,826 (2017). There are 24 comunes in the province.
The Province of Syracuse is a province in the autonomous island region of Sicily in Italy. Following the suppression of the Sicilian provinces, it was replaced in 2015 by the Free municipal consortium of Syracuse. Its capital is the city of Syracuse, a town established by Greek colonists arriving from Corinth in the 8th century BC. It has an area of 2,109 square kilometres (814 sq mi) and a total population of 403,985 (2016). Syracuse has 8% of the Sicilian population and 8.2% of Sicily's area.
Acireale is a coastal city and comune in the north-east of the Metropolitan City of Catania, Sicily, southern Italy, at the foot of Mount Etna, on the coast facing the Ionian Sea. It is home to numerous churches, including the Neo-Gothic St. Peter's Basilica, St. Sebastian's Basilica in the Sicilian Baroque style, and the 17th century Acireale Cathedral, and a seminary, for the training of priests. Acireale is also noted for its art and paintings: the oldest academy in Sicily, the "Accademia dei Dafnici e degli Zelanti", is located here.
Porto Empedocle is a town and comune in Italy on the coast of the Strait of Sicily, administratively part of the province of Agrigento. It is the namesake of Empedocles, a Greek pre-Socratic philosopher and a citizen of the city of Agrigentum, in his day a Greek colony in Sicily. The primary industries of Porto Empedocle are agriculture, fishing, ironworking, pharmaceuticals and rock salt refining.
Pachino is a town and comune in the Province of Syracuse, Sicily (Italy). The name derives from the Latin word bacchus, which is the Roman god of wine, and the word vinum, which means wine in Latin; originally the town was named Bachino which eventually was changed to Pachino when, in Sicily, Italian became the official spoken and written language.
San Fratello, formerly San Filadelfo, is a comune (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Messina in the Italian region Sicily, located about 110 kilometres (68 mi) east of Palermo and about 90 kilometres (56 mi) west of Messina. San Fratello borders the following municipalities: Acquedolci, Alcara li Fusi, Caronia, Cesarò, Militello Rosmarino, Sant'Agata di Militello.
Portopalo di Capo Passero is a comune (municipality) in the Province of Syracuse, Sicily (Italy). The southernmost commune of the island of Sicily, it is about 220 kilometres (140 mi) southeast of Palermo and about 45 kilometres (28 mi) southwest of Syracuse. As of February 2017, it had a population of 3,916 and an area of 14.9 square kilometres (5.8 sq mi). The nearest city is Pachino with a population of nearly 10,000. Portopalo belonged to the municipality of Pachino until 1975 when it became an autonomous municipality itself. Portopalo is widely considered to have some of the best fishing that the Mediterranean area has to offer because of its location, connection of the Ionian and Mediterranean Seas and its temperate climate, which provides average temperatures between 14° and 25 °C.
The history of Islam in Sicily and Southern Italy began with the first Arab settlement in Sicily, at Mazara, which was captured in 827. The subsequent rule of Sicily and Malta started in the 10th century. Islamic rule over all Sicily began in 902, and the Emirate of Sicily lasted from 831 until 1061. Though Sicily was the primary Muslim stronghold in Italy, some temporary footholds, the most substantial of which was the port city of Bari, were established on the mainland peninsula, especially in mainland Southern Italy, though Muslim raids, mainly those of Muhammad I Abu 'l-Abbas, reached as far north as Naples, Rome and the northern region of Piedmont. The Muslim raids were part of a larger struggle for power in Italy and Europe, with Christian Byzantine, Frankish, Norman and local Italian forces also competing for control. Muslims were sometimes sought as allies by various Christian factions against other factions.
The Pomodoro di Pachino is an IGP/PGI for tomatoes from the southeast coast of Sicily, Italy, which has been granted IGP protection by EU since 2003.
Castelluccio culture is an archaeological feature dating to Ancient Bronze Age of the prehistoric civilization of Sicily, originally identified by Paolo Orsi on the basis of a particular ceramic style, in the homonymous village, between Noto and Siracusa.
