Santa Maria di Licodia ( Sicilian: ''Santa Marìa di Licuddìa '') is a town and ''

comune The (; plural: ) is a local administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions ('' regioni'') and provinces (''province''). The can also ...

'' in the Metropolitan City of Catania, eastern

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

, southern

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

History

Santa Maria di Licodia occupies traditionally the site of the ancient ''Aetna'', a settlement founded by the colonists whom

Hiero I of Syracuse Hieron I ( el, Ἱέρων Α΄; usually Latinized Hiero) was the son of Deinomenes, the brother of Gelon and tyrant of Syracuse in Sicily from 478 to 467 BC. In succeeding Gelon, he conspired against a third brother, Polyzelos. Life During hi ...

had placed at Catania after their expulsion by the original inhabitants in 461 BC, which absorbed or incorporated an already existing

Sicel The Sicels (; la, Siculi; grc, Σικελοί ''Sikeloi'') were an Italic tribe who inhabited eastern Sicily during the Iron Age. Their neighbours to the west were the Sicani. The Sicels gave Sicily the name it has held since antiquity, b ...

town named Inessa.

Main sights

*''Chiesa Madre'' (Mother Church). Of the original medieval building, a bell tower has remained *Cherubim Fountain (1757) *''Casina del Cavaliere'', a Benedictine convent of medieval origin, outside the town. A large hoard of coins was found also outside Santa Maria di Licodia in 1891. In the nearby district of Civita is a large elliptical area, enclosed by a wall of masses of lava, which is about wide at the base and high. The ground is covered with fragments of tiles and pottery of the classical period, and it is probably a hastily built encampment of historic times rather than a primitive fortification, as there are no prehistoric traces.

Twin towns

* Rabat,

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

* Pisano Eteno, a ''

frazione A ''frazione'' (plural: ) is a type of subdivision of a ''comune'' (municipality) in Italy, often a small village or hamlet outside the main town. Most ''frazioni'' were created during the Fascist era (1922–1943) as a way to consolidate territ ...

'' of

Zafferana Etnea Zafferana Etnea (; scn, Zafarana ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Catania in the Italian region Sicily, located about southeast of Palermo and about north of Catania. The municipality of Zafferana Etnea contains th ...

* San Giuseppe di Ognina, Catania,

References

Municipalities of the Metropolitan City of Catania {{Sicily-geo-stub