Schisò Castle

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Coordinates: 37°49′25″N15°16′19″E / 37.823574°N 15.271838°E / 37.823574; 15.271838 Schisò Castle (in Italian Castello di Schisò) is a 16th-century fortress on Cape Schisò in Giardini Naxos, Sicily, Italy.

Geographic coordinate system Coordinate system

A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position and two or three of the numbers represent a horizontal position; alternatively, a geographic position may be expressed in a combined three-dimensional Cartesian vector. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation. To specify a location on a plane requires a map projection.

Giardini Naxos Comune in Sicily, Italy

Giardini Naxos is a comune in the Metropolitan City of Messina on the island of Sicily in southern Italy. It is situated on the coast of the Ionian Sea on a bay which lies between Cape Taormina and Cape Schisò. Since the 1970s it has become a seaside-resort.

Sicily Island in the Mediterranean and region of Italy

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, in Southern Italy along with surrounding minor islands, officially referred to as Regione Siciliana.

Contents

Schiso Castle. The observation tower was added in the 16th century when the castle was rebuilt from an earlier, medieval structure Schiso Castle.jpg
Schisò Castle. The observation tower was added in the 16th century when the castle was rebuilt from an earlier, medieval structure

History

Schisò Castle, which overlooks the bay of Giardini Naxos, was originally constructed in the 13th and 14th centuries. It was rebuilt in the 16th century, with a military observation tower added which served to patrol Cape Schisò and the bay against raids by Barbary pirates who were led by the Turkish corsair Barbarossa Kheir-ed-Din to plunder the many small coastal fishing villages on the coast south of Port Schisò. [1] Within the castle was a sugarcane processing unit as the production of this crop was a lucrative activity in 16th-century Sicily. [1]

Barbary pirates

The Barbary pirates, sometimes called Barbary corsairs or Ottoman corsairs, were Ottoman and Maghrebi pirates and privateers who operated from North Africa, based primarily in the ports of Salé, Rabat, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli. This area was known in Europe as the Barbary Coast, a term derived from the name of its ethnically Berber inhabitants. Their predation extended throughout the Mediterranean, south along West Africa's Atlantic seaboard and into the North Atlantic as far north as Iceland, but they primarily operated in the western Mediterranean. In addition to seizing merchant ships, they engaged in Razzias, raids on European coastal towns and villages, mainly in Italy, France, Spain, and Portugal, but also in the British Isles, the Netherlands, and as far away as Iceland. The main purpose of their attacks was to capture Christian slaves for the Ottoman slave trade as well as the general Arab slavery market in North Africa and the Middle East.

Turkish people or the Turks, also known as Anatolian Turks, are a Turkic ethnic group and nation living mainly in Turkey and speaking Turkish, the most widely spoken Turkic language. They are the largest ethnic group in Turkey, as well as by far the largest ethnic group among the speakers of Turkic languages. Ethnic Turkish minorities exist in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire. In addition, a Turkish diaspora has been established with modern migration, particularly in Western Europe.

Hayreddin Barbarossa Ottoman admiral

Hayreddin Barbarossa, or Barbaros Kheireddin Pasha, born Khizr or Khidr, was an Ottoman admiral of the fleet who was born on the island of Lesbos and died in Constantinople, the Ottoman capital. Barbarossa's naval victories secured Ottoman dominance over the Mediterranean during the mid 16th century, from the Battle of Preveza in 1538 until the Battle of Lepanto in 1571.

It is built upon a small hill formed by lava rock, and its name Schisò is derived from the Arabic word Al Qusus which means bust or chest. [1] It was renovated in the late 19th century, with the addition of balconies which line the facade. Its first owner in the 16th century was Don Cesare Statella, a nobleman from the city of Catania. Subsequent owners included the aristocratic De Spuches family, Giovanni Conti, Lombardo Alonco, and in the early 20th century the castle passed to the family of Paladino who continue to own it up to the present day.

Arabic Central Semitic language

Arabical-ʻarabiyyah[alʕaraˈbijːa](listen) or ʻarabī[ˈʕarabiː](listen) or Arabic pronunciation: [ʕaraˈbij]) is a Central Semitic language that first emerged in Iron Age northwestern Arabia and is now the lingua franca of the Arab world. It is named after the Arabs, a term initially used to describe peoples living from Mesopotamia in the east to the Anti-Lebanon mountains in the west, in northwestern Arabia, and in the Sinai Peninsula. Arabic is classified as a macrolanguage comprising 30 modern varieties, including its standard form, Modern Standard Arabic, which is derived from Classical Arabic.

Catania Comune in Sicily, Italy

Catania is the second largest city of Sicily after Palermo located on the east coast facing the Ionian Sea. It is the capital of the Metropolitan City of Catania, one of the ten biggest cities in Italy, and the seventh largest metropolitan area in Italy. The population of the city proper is 320,000 while the population of the city's metropolitan area, Metropolitan City of Catania, stood at 1,116,168 inhabitants.

A full view of Schiso Castle. Schiso.JPG
A full view of Schisò Castle.

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References

  1. 1 2 3 http://www.comune.giardini-naxos.me.it


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