|
Assorus (Sicily)
Assorus or Assoros ( grc, Ἄσσωρος), or Asserus or Asseros (Ἄσσηρος), also known as Assorium or Assorion (Ἀσσώριον), was a city of the interior of ancient Sicily, situated about half way between Agyrium and Enna. It was a city of the Siculi, and appears never to have received a Greek colony. In 396 BCE it is mentioned by Diodorus as the only Siculian town which remained faithful to Dionysius of Syracuse, at the time of the great Carthaginian expedition under Himilco. In consequence, we find Dionysius, after the defeat of the Carthaginians, concluding a treaty of alliance with the Assorini, and leaving them in possession of their independence. At this time it would seem to have been a place of some importance; but no subsequent mention of it occurs in ancient writers until the days of Cicero, in whose time it appears to have been but a small town, though retaining its municipal independence, and possessing a territory fertile in corn. It suffered severely ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Sicily
The history of Sicily has been influenced by numerous ethnic groups. It has seen Sicily controlled by external powers – Phoenician and Carthaginian, Greek, Roman, Vandal and Ostrogoth, Byzantine Greek, Aghlabid, Fatimid, Kalbid, Norman, Aragonese and Spanish – but also experiencing important periods of independence, as under the indigenous Sicanians, Elymians and Sicels, and later as the Emirate of Sicily, County of Sicily, and Kingdom of Sicily. The Kingdom was founded in 1130 by Roger II, belonging to the Siculo-Norman family of Hauteville. During this period, Sicily was prosperous and politically powerful, becoming one of the wealthiest states in all of Europe. As a result of the dynastic succession, then, the Kingdom passed into the hands of the Hohenstaufen. At the end of the 13th century, with the War of the Sicilian Vespers between the crowns of Anjou and Aragon, the island passed to the latter. In the following centuries the Kingdom entered into the personal union wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Verres
Gaius Verres (c. 120–43 BC) was a Roman magistrate, notorious for his misgovernment of Sicily. His extortion of local farmers and plundering of temples led to his prosecution by Cicero, whose accusations were so devastating that his defence advocate could only recommend that Verres should leave the country. Cicero's prosecution speeches were later published as the ''Verrine Orations''. Biography Gaius Verres was born around 114 B.C. Public career During Sulla's civil war (83–82 BC), Verres deserted the government faction of Marius and Carbo and went over to Sulla. Sulla made him a present of land at Beneventum and secured him against punishment for embezzlement. In 80 BC Verres served on the staff of Gnaeus Cornelius Dolabella, governor of Cilicia. According to Cicero, the governor and his subordinate both ruthlessly plundered the province. In 78 BC Dolabella had to stand trial at Rome accused of extortion and was found guilty with the evidence of Verres, who had secu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archaeological Sites In Sicily
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscapes. Archaeology can be considered both a social science and a branch of the humanities. It is usually considered an independent academic discipline, but may also be classified as part of anthropology (in North America – the four-field approach), history or geography. Archaeologists study human prehistory and history, from the development of the first stone tools at Lomekwi in East Africa 3.3 million years ago up until recent decades. Archaeology is distinct from palaeontology, which is the study of fossil remains. Archaeology is particularly important for learning about prehistoric societies, for which, by definition, there are no written records. Prehistory includes over 99% of the human past, from the Paleolithic until the advent of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dittaino
The Dittaino (Greek: ; Latin: Chrysas) is a river of central Sicily which rises in the Heraean Mountains, not far from the modern towns of Gangi and Enna. It is long. After flowing through the territory of Assorus, where its tutelary divinity was worshipped with peculiar honors during the Greek civilization, and afterwards through that of Agyrium, it joins the Simeto in the plain of Catania Catania (, , Sicilian and ) is the second largest municipality in Sicily, after Palermo. Despite its reputation as the second city of the island, Catania is the largest Sicilian conurbation, among the largest in Italy, as evidenced also by ..., about from its mouth. Hydronym The modern name is the Sicilian version of Arab vocable ''Wādī al-tīn'', namely "The River of Sandstone". References * Rivers of Italy Rivers of Sicily Rivers of the Province of Enna Rivers of the Province of Catania {{Italy-river-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tommaso Fazello
Tommaso Fazello (New Latin ''Fazellus'', 1498 – 8 April 1570) was an Italian Dominican friar, historian and antiquarian. He is known as the father of Sicilian history. He is the author of the first printed history of Sicily: ''De Rebus Siculis Decades Duae'', published in Palermo in 1558 in Latin. He was born in Sciacca, Sicily and died in Palermo, Sicily. He rediscovered the ruins of the ancient Sicilian towns of Akrai (modern Palazzolo Acreide), Selinus (modern Selinunte) and Heraclea Minoa. He also rediscovered the Temple of Olympian Zeus at Akragas (modern Agrigento). In 1555, he taught at the Convent of San Domenico, Palermo, which later became the University of Palermo The University of Palermo ( it, Università degli Studi di Palermo) is a university located in Palermo, Italy, and founded in 1806. It is organized in 12 Faculties. History The University of Palermo was officially founded in 1806, although its .... Biography Born at Sciacca in Sicily, Fazell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Assoro
Assoro ( scn, Àsaru, la, Assorus, el, Assoros) is a ''comune'' in the Province of Enna, Sicily, southern Italy. The town-site of Assoro occupies the site of ancient Assorus. The fight to take the heights of Assoro during WWII figured prominently in Farley Mowat Farley McGill Mowat, (May 12, 1921 – May 6, 2014) was a Canadian writer and environmentalist. His works were translated into 52 languages, and he sold more than 17 million books. He achieved fame with the publication of his books on the Can ...’s account of his wartime service, ''And No Birds Sang''. Among the main sights in the town is the 12th-century Basilica di San Leone. References Municipalities of the Province of Enna {{Sicily-geo-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterranean Sea in Europe, North Africa, and Western Asia, and was ruled by emperors. From the accession of Caesar Augustus as the first Roman emperor to the military anarchy of the 3rd century, it was a Principate with Italia as the metropole of its provinces and the city of Rome as its sole capital. The Empire was later ruled by multiple emperors who shared control over the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire. The city of Rome remained the nominal capital of both parts until AD 476 when the imperial insignia were sent to Constantinople following the capture of the Western capital of Ravenna by the Germanic barbarians. The adoption of Christianity as the state church of the Roman Empire in AD 380 and the fall of the Western ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importance to later Byzantine, Islamic, and Western European science. The first is the astronomical treatise now known as the '' Almagest'', although it was originally entitled the ''Mathēmatikē Syntaxis'' or ''Mathematical Treatise'', and later known as ''The Greatest Treatise''. The second is the ''Geography'', which is a thorough discussion on maps and the geographic knowledge of the Greco-Roman world. The third is the astrological treatise in which he attempted to adapt horoscopic astrology to the Aristotelian natural philosophy of his day. This is sometimes known as the ''Apotelesmatika'' (lit. "On the Effects") but more commonly known as the '' Tetrábiblos'', from the Koine Greek meaning "Four Books", or by its Latin equivalent ''Quadrip ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pliny The Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ''Naturalis Historia'' (''Natural History''), which became an editorial model for encyclopedias. He spent most of his spare time studying, writing, and investigating natural and geographic phenomena in the field. His nephew, Pliny the Younger, wrote of him in a letter to the historian Tacitus: Among Pliny's greatest works was the twenty-volume work ''Bella Germaniae'' ("The History of the German Wars"), which is no longer extant. ''Bella Germaniae'', which began where Aufidius Bassus' ''Libri Belli Germanici'' ("The War with the Germans") left off, was used as a source by other prominent Roman historians, including Plutarch, Tacitus and Suetonius. Tacitus—who many scholars agree had never travelled in Germania—used ''Bella Germani ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the establishment of the Roman Empire. His extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy and politics, and he is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and served as consul in 63 BC. His influence on the Latin language was immense. He wrote more than three-quarters of extant Latin literature that is known to have existed in his lifetime, and it has been said that subsequent prose was either a reaction against or a return to his style, not only in Latin but in European languages up to the 19th century. Cicero introduced into Latin the arguments of the chief schools of Hellenistic philosophy and created a Latin philosophical vocabulary ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Agyrium (Sicily)
Agira (; Sicilian: ''Aggira'', grc, Ἀγύριον) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Enna, Sicily (southern Italy). It is located in the mid-valley of the River Salso, from Enna. Until 1861 it was called San Filippo d'Argiriò, in honour of its saint Philip of Agira. The modern city overlies the ancient one of which few traces remain. History Agira stands on the site of the ancient Sicel city of ''Agyrion'' ( grc, Ἀγύριον - Agyrion), or ''Agyrium'', and ''Agyrina'', On the top of the mountain where the castle stands, excavations have brought to light buildings dated between the sixth and fourth centuries BC with the presence of polychrome plaster and remains of the mint for coins. Diodorus Siculus was born here and credits Heracles with the foundation of '' sacred precincts'' of Iolaus and of Geryon, and the creation of a nearby lake. In the mid-fifth century, Agyrium was the first Sicilian city to mint bronze coinage in the Greek fashion. In the 4th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Himilco
Himilco was a Carthaginian navigator and explorer who lived during the late 6th or early 5th century BC, a period of time where Carthage held significant sway over its neighboring regions. Himilco is the first known explorer from the Mediterranean Sea to reach the northwestern shores of Europe. His lost account of his adventures is quoted by Roman writers. The oldest reference to Himilco's voyage is a brief mention in '' Natural History'' (2.169a) by the Roman scholar Pliny the Elder. Himilco was quoted three times by Rufius Festus Avienius, who wrote '' Ora Maritima'', a poetical account of the geography in the 4th century AD. Little is known of Himilco himself. Himilco sailed north along the Atlantic coast from the Iberian Peninsula to the British Isles. He traveled to northwestern France, as well as the territory of the Oestrimini tribe living in Portugal, likely in order to trade for tin (to be used for making bronze) and other precious metals. Records of the voyages of Hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
.jpg "Click for more on -> Archaeological Sites In Sicily")
