Why go
The old name Katane and the city’s role in the struggles between Syracuse and Athens place Catania within Greek Sicily. Its early rulers and alliances changed, but the lasting visitor value is spatial: the ancient city lay beneath the centre now occupied by later streets and monuments.
The full story
Greek settlers founded Katane on Sicily’s east coast in the eighth century BC. Its position brought it into the politics of other Greek cities, especially Syracuse. In the fifth century BC, Hieron of Syracuse displaced the inhabitants and renamed the city Aitne. The earlier citizens later returned. During Athens’ expedition against Syracuse, Catania became an Athenian base, showing how a city on the eastern coast could matter far beyond its own walls. Control changed again in the conflicts that followed. Those episodes need not be memorised as a succession of rulers to make sense of a visit. They show that the site beneath modern Catania was already contested and connected to the wider Mediterranean. Later Roman and Baroque layers dominate what visitors can see now, so the Greek story works best as background for reading the centre as a place repeatedly occupied and rebuilt.
Useful to know
- Pair this background with central ancient remains; little of the Greek city is plainly visible above today’s streets.