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Aci Castello
Aci Castello ( scn, Jaci Casteḍḍu) is a ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Catania in Sicily, Italy. The city is located north of Catania on the Mediterranean coast. The primary economic sectors are agriculture and industry (in Catania). The city is neighbored by Aci Catena, Acireale, Catania, San Gregorio di Catania and Valverde. History The town of Aci Castello developed around the castle, which was built in 1076 by the Normans upon the foundations of a 7th-century Byzantine fortification. In 1169, Aci Castello started to expand after an eruption of Mount Etna made the towns in its vicinity uninhabitable. The castle later became the property of the bishops of Catania. In 1296, Roger of Lauria, admiral of the Aragonese fleet during the War of the Sicilian Vespers, was granted the fief of Aci and its castle as a reward for his faithful service to King Frederick III of Sicily. When relations between the two men soured and di Lauria transferred his loyalties to the Angev ...
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Castello Normanno (Aci Castello)
The ''Castello Normanno'' ("Norman Castle"), or alternatively the ''Castello di Aci'' ("Castle of Aci"; scn, Casteddu di Iaci), is a castle in Aci Castello in the Metropolitan City of Catania in Sicily, southern Italy. The castle is situated on a rocky outcrop jutting out into the sea. Its precise date of construction is uncertain, but it was important to the development of its region during the Middle Ages. During the War of the Sicilian Vespers, it was subject to Roger of Lauria. It was besieged more than once, and was briefly controlled by the Spanish. It is currently a museum. History The town of Aci Castello developed around the castle, which was built in 1076 by the Normans upon the foundations of a 7th-century Byzantine fortification. In 1169, Aci Castello started to expand after an eruption of Mount Etna made the towns in its vicinity uninhabitable. The castle later became the property of the Bishops of Catania. In 1296, Roger of Lauria, admiral of the Aragonese fleet ...
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Valverde, Catania
Valverde ( Sicilian: ''Bedduvirdi'') is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Catania in the Italian region Sicily, located about southeast of Palermo and about northeast of Catania. Valverde borders the following municipalities: Aci Bonaccorsi, Aci Castello, Aci Catena, Aci Sant'Antonio, San Giovanni la Punta, San Gregorio di Catania San Gregorio di Catania ( Sicilian: ''San Grigoriu'') is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Catania in the Italian region Sicily, located about southeast of Palermo and about northeast of Catania. San Gregorio di Catania .... References External links Official website Cities and towns in Sicily {{Sicily-geo-stub ...
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Palermo
Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The city is noted for its history, culture, architecture and gastronomy, playing an important role throughout much of its existence; it is over 2,700 years old. Palermo is in the northwest of the island of Sicily, by the Gulf of Palermo in the Tyrrhenian Sea. The city was founded in 734 BC by the Phoenicians as ("flower"). Palermo then became a possession of Carthage. Two ancient Greeks, Greek ancient Greek colonization, colonies were established, known collectively as ; the Carthaginians used this name on their coins after the 5th centuryBC. As , the town became part of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire, Empire for over a thousand years. From 831 to 1072 the city was under History of Islam in southern Italy, Arab ru ...
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Blasco II De Alagona
Blasco II d'Alagona (died 23 October 1355), called the Younger, was a very influential nobleman in fourteenth century Sicily. He was probably born in Sicily, of an Aragonese family. He succeeded his uncle Blasco I. The family originated in Alagón. Blasco was very close to the ruling house, also of Aragonese origin, and received many favours from them. The Alagona family was the most powerful in Catania at first and then eastern and eventually, under Blasco II, all of Sicily. In 1320, Frederick II of Sicily ceded the Castle of Aci, expropriated from Margherita, descendant of the Admiral Roger of Lauria, to Blasco. In 1326, Blasco defended the city of Palermo from the Angevins. While there, Beltrando del Balzo pillaged Aci. During the reign of Peter II, Blasco was the Grand Justiciar of the realm. Giovanni of Randazzo, brother of Peter, appointed him regent for his nephew, the young King Louis. As regent, Blasco was opposed by Matteo Palizzi, lord of Tripi and Saponara ...
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Frederick III Of Sicily
Frederick II (or III) (13 December 1272 – 25 June 1337) was the regent of the Kingdom of Sicily from 1291 until 1295 and subsequently King of Sicily from 1295 until his death. He was the third son of Peter III of Aragon and served in the War of the Sicilian Vespers on behalf of his father and brothers, Alfonso ΙΙΙ and James ΙΙ. He was confirmed as king by the Peace of Caltabellotta in 1302. His reign saw important constitutional reforms: the ''Constitutiones regales'', ''Capitula alia'', and ''Ordinationes generales''. Name Although the second Frederick of Sicily, he chose to call himself "Frederick III" (being one of the rare medieval monarchs who actually used a regnal number) – presumably because only some fifty years before, his well-known and remembered great-grandfather had ruled Sicily and also used an official ordinal: ''Fridericus secundus, imperator etc.''. Thus, ''Fridericus tertius'' was better in line with the precedent of his ancestor's ordin ...
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War Of The Sicilian Vespers
The War of the Sicilian Vespers or just War of the Vespers was a conflict that started with the insurrection of the Sicilian Vespers against Charles of Anjou in 1282 and ended in 1302 with the Peace of Caltabellotta. It was fought in Sicily, Catalonia (the Aragonese Crusade) and elsewhere in the western Mediterranean between the kings of Aragon on one side against the Angevin Charles of Anjou, his son Charles II, the kings of France, and the Papacy on the other side. The war resulted in the division of the old Kingdom of Sicily; at Caltabellotta, Charles II was confirmed as king of Sicily's peninsular territories ("Kingdom of Sicily on the other side of the Strait", that is, Naples), while Frederick III was confirmed as king of the island territories ("Kingdom of Sicily across the Strait", that is, Trinacria). Background Sicily had been part of a Kingdom of Sicily, which also encompassed the southern Italian peninsula, since the early 12th century, when Roger II of Sicily ...
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Roger Of Lauria
Roger of Lauria (''c''. 1245 – 17 January 1305) was a Neapolitan admiral in Aragonese service, who was the commander of the fleet of the Crown of Aragon during the War of the Sicilian Vespers. He was probably the most successful and talented naval tactician of the Middle Ages. He is known as Ruggero or Ruggiero di Lauria in Italian and Roger de Llúria in Catalan language, Catalan. Biography Roger of Lauria was born at Lauria or Scalea in what is now southern Italy, the son of Richard of Lauria, Great Justiciar of the Kingdom of Sicily, and Bella d'Amichi, Donna Bella, a nurse of Constance of Sicily, Queen of Aragon, Constance of Sicily. His father had served under King Manfred of Sicily, a Hohenstaufen; when the last member of that family, Conradin of Swabia, was beheaded at Naples in 1268, he took refuge with other Guelphs and Ghibellines, Ghibelline exiles at Barcelona, part of the Crown of Aragón with his mother. Later King Peter III of Aragon, who had married Constan ...
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Mount Etna
Mount Etna, or simply Etna ( it, Etna or ; scn, Muncibbeḍḍu or ; la, Aetna; grc, Αἴτνα and ), is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, in the Metropolitan City of Catania, between the cities of Messina and Catania. It lies above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is one of the tallest active volcanoes in Europe, and the tallest peak in Italy south of the Alps with a current height (July 2021) of , though this varies with summit eruptions. Over a six-month period in 2021, Etna erupted so much volcanic material that its height increased by approximately , and the southeastern crater is now the tallest part of the volcano. Etna covers an area of with a basal circumference of . This makes it by far the largest of the three active volcanoes in Italy, being about two and a half times the height of the next largest, Mount Vesuvius. Only Mount Teide on Tenerife in the Canary Islands surpasses it in ...
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Byzantine
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire remained the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe. The terms "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" were coined after the end of the realm; its citizens continued to refer to their empire as the Roman Empire, and to themselves as Romans—a term which Greeks continued to use for themselves into Ottoman times. Although the Roman state continued and its traditions were maintained, modern historians prefer to differentiate the Byzantine Empire from Ancient Rome a ...
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Italo-Normans
The Italo-Normans ( it, Italo-Normanni), or Siculo-Normans (''Siculo-Normanni'') when referring to Sicily and Southern Italy, are the Italian-born descendants of the first Norman conquerors to travel to southern Italy in the first half of the eleventh century. While maintaining much of their distinctly Norman piety and customs of war, they were shaped by the diversity of southern Italy, by the cultures and customs of the Greeks, Lombards, and Arabs in Sicily. History Normans first arrived in Italy as pilgrims, probably on their way to or returning from either Rome or Jerusalem, or from visiting the shrine at Monte Gargano, during the late tenth and early eleventh centuries. In 1017, the Lombard lords in Apulia recruited their assistance against the dwindling power of the Byzantine Catapanate of Italy. They soon established vassal states of their own and began to expand their conquests until they were encroaching on the Lombard principalities of Benevento and Capua, Saracen- ...
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San Gregorio Di Catania
San Gregorio di Catania ( Sicilian: ''San Grigoriu'') is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Catania in the Italian region Sicily, located about southeast of Palermo and about northeast of Catania. San Gregorio di Catania borders the following municipalities: Aci Castello, Catania, San Giovanni la Punta, Tremestieri Etneo, Valverde. History The early 19th century saw the abolition of feudalism and barony. At that time the "Giurati" or "Jury" was replaced with the "Decurionato", a group ten men elected by common people and approved by the king. After Italian unification, in 1860, the "Decurionato" was also abolished and replaced by a modern administrative system. The only exception was during the fascist period when the mayor was replaced by a "Podestà". San Gregorio took its name from its patron saint, Pope Gregory I Pope Gregory I ( la, Gregorius I; – 12 March 604), commonly known as Saint Gregory the Great, was the bishop of Rome from 3 Sep ...
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