Ichana (

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

: ), was an ancient city of

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

, which, according to

Stephanus of Byzantium Stephanus or Stephen of Byzantium (; , ''Stéphanos Byzántios''; centuryAD) was a Byzantine grammarian and the author of an important geographical dictionary entitled ''Ethnica'' (). Only meagre fragments of the dictionary survive, but the epit ...

, held out for a long time against the arms of the Syracusans, whence he derives its name (from the verb , a form equivalent to ), but gives us no indication of the period to which this statement refers. The "Ichanenses" (people of Ichana), however, are mentioned by Pliny (iii. 8. s. 14) among the stipendiary towns of the interior of Sicily, though, according to some scholars, the true reading is "Ipanenses" (people of Hippana, another ancient town in Sicily). In either case we have no clue to the position of the city, and it is a mere random conjecture of Cluverius to give the name of Ichana to the ruins of a city which still remain at a place called Vendicari, ''

comune A (; : , ) is an administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions () and provinces (). The can also have the City status in Italy, titl ...

'' of

Noto Noto (; ) is a city and in the Province of Syracuse, Sicily, Italy. It is southwest of the city of Syracuse at the foot of the Iblean Mountains. It lends its name to the surrounding area Val di Noto. In 2002 Noto and its church were decl ...

, a few miles north of Cape Pachynum (modern

Capo Passero Capo Passero or Cape Passaro (; Greek: ; Latin: Pachynus or Pachynum) is a celebrated promontory of Sicily, forming the extreme southeastern point of the whole island, and one of the three promontories which were supposed to have given to it the ...

at the southeast corner of the island), and which were identified by

Tommaso Fazello Tommaso Fazello (Neo-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 Sicu ...

as those of Imachara.

References

* {{coord missing, Italy Ancient cities in Sicily Lost ancient cities and towns Former populated places in Italy