Sicily is an autonomous region of Italy in Europe. Of all the regions of Italy, Sicily covers the largest surface area with 25,708 km² and currently has five million inhabitants. It is also the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea with several much smaller surrounding islands also considered part of Sicily.

Throughout much of its history, Sicily has been considered a crucial strategic location due in large part to its importance for Mediterranean trade routes. The area was highly regarded as part of Magna Graecia, with Cicero describing Siracusa as the greatest and most beautiful city in all of Ancient Greece.

Although today it is a region of Italy, it was once a country in its own, as the Kingdom of Sicily, ruled from Palermo. The Kingdom of Sicily oversaw southern Italy, Sicily, and Malta. It later became a part of the Two Sicilies under the Bourbons, when the rule was centered in Naples rather than Sicily. Since that time, the risorgimento has occurred and Sicily has been a fully fledged part of Italy.

Sicily is considered to be highly rich in its own unique culture, especially with regard to arts, cuisine, architecture and even language. The Sicilian economy is largely based on agriculture (famous for orange and lemon orchards).  This same rural countryside has attracted significant tourism in the modern age as its natural beauty is highly valued.

Sicily is also a treasure of important archeological and ancient sites such as the Necropolis of Pantalica.

Contents

1 History

1.1 Ancient Tribes

1.2 Greek and Roman Period

1.3 Early Middle Ages

1.4 Kingdom of Sicily

1.5 Italian Unification

1.6 World War II in Sicily

2 Geography

3 Transport

Unesco Contents

4 Unesco World Heritage Sites

4.1 Proclamation "Sicilian Puppet"

4.2 Agrigento: Temples Valley

4.3 Noto Valley: Baroque sites

4.4 Syracuse: Necropolis Pantalica

4.5 Isole Eolie-Aeolian Islands

Unesco Tentative Entry

4.2 Palermo & Monreale Cathedral

4.3 Taormina & Isola bella

4.4 Mothia Island & Lilibeo

Contents

5 Mafia History

5.1 General Information

5.2 The Real name: Cosa Nostra

5.3 History of Cosa Nostra-Mafia

5.4 Structure of Cosa Nostra

5.5 Ten Commandments

5.6 The modern Mafia in Italy

6 Culture

6.1 Food

6.2 Wine

6.3 Olive Oil

6.4 Sicilian Language

6.5 Mediterranean Diet

6.6 Sicilian-Americans

6.7 List of Sicilian Americans

Ancient tribes

The original inhabitants of Sicily were three defined groups of the Ancient peoples of Italy. The most prominent, and by far the earliest, of which was the Sicani, who, according to Thucydides arrived from the Iberian Peninsula (perhaps Catalonia). Important historical evidence has been discovered in the form of cave drawings by the Sicani, dating from the end of the Pleistocene Epoch, around 8000 BC.

The Elymians, thought to be from the Aegean, were the next tribe to migrate and join the Sicanians on Sicily. Although there is no evidence of any wars between the tribes, when the Elymians settled in the north-west corner of the island, the Sicanians moved to the eastern part of the island. In 1200 BC, the Sicels (from mainland Italy), thought to originally have been Ligures from Liguria, came to Sicily forcing the Sicanians to move back across Sicily settling in the middle of the island.

Greek and Roman period

Around 750 BC, the Greeks began to colonize Sicily, establishing many important settlements. The most important colony was Syracuse; other significant ones were Akragas, Gela, Himera, Selinunte, and Zancle. The native Sicani and Sicel peoples were easily absorbed into the Hellenic culture and the area became part of Magna Graecia along with the rest of Southern Italy (which the Greeks had also colonized).

Sicily was very fertile, and the introduction of olives and grape vines flourished, creating a great deal of profitable trading.  A significant part of Greek culture on the island was that of Greek religion and many temples were built across Sicily, such as the Valley of the Temples at Agrigento. Politics on the island were intertwined with that of Greece.  Syracuse became desired by the Athenians, who, during the Peloponnesian War, set out on the Sicilian Expedition. Syracuse gained Sparta and Corinth as allies and, as a result, the Athenian army and ships were destroyed with most of the survivors being sold into slavery.

While Greek Syracuse controlled much of Sicily, there were a few Carthaginian colonies in the far west part of the island. When the two cultures began to clash, the Sicilian Wars erupted. Greece began to make peace with the Roman Republic in 262 BC and the Romans sought to annex Sicily as its empire's first province. Rome intervened in the First Punic War, crushing Carthage so that by 242 BC Sicily had become the first Roman province outside of the Italian Peninsula. The Second Punic War, in which Archimedes was killed, involved Carthage trying to take Sicily from the Roman Empire. They failed and this time Rome was even more unrelenting in the annihilation of the invaders--in 210 BC, the Roman consul M. Valerian told the Roman Senate that "no Carthaginian remains in Sicily".

Sicily was of high importance for the Romans as it acted as the empire's granary.  It was divided into two quaestorships with Syracuse to the east and Lilybaeum to the west. Although under Augustus some attempt was made to introduce the Latin language to the island, Sicily was allowed to remain largely Greek in a cultural sense, rather than being subjected to complete Romanization. When Verres became governor of Sicily, the once prosperous and contented people went into despair due to his poor ruling.  In 70 BC, noted figure Cicero condemned the misgovernment of Verres in his oration In Verrem.

The religion of Christianity first appeared in Sicily between 200 AD and 313 AD when Constantine the Great finally lifted the prohibition and a significant number of Sicilians became martyrs, such as Agatha, Christina, Lucy, Euplius and many more. Christianity grew rapidly in Sicily during the next two centuries, the period of history where Sicily was a Roman province lasted for a total of about 700 years.

Early Middle Ages

As the Roman Empire was falling apart, a Germanic tribe known as the Vandals took Sicily in 440 AD under the rule of their king Geiseric. The Vandals had already invaded parts of Roman France and Spain, asserting themselves as an important power in western Europe. However, they soon lost these newly acquired possessions to another East Germanic tribe known as the Goths. The Ostrogothic conquest of Sicily (and Italy as a whole) under Theodoric the Great began in 488.  Even though the Goths were Germanic, Theodoric sought to revive Roman culture and government and allowed freedom of religion.

The Gothic War took place between the Ostrogoths and the Eastern Roman Empire, also known as the Byzantine Empire. Sicily was the first part of Italy to be conquered under general Belisarius who was commissioned by Eastern Emperor Justinian I.

Sicily was used as a base for the Byzantines to conquer the rest of Italy, with Naples, Rome, Milan and the Ostrogoth capital of Ravenna all falling within five years. However, a new Ostrogoth king Totila, battled his way down the Italian peninsula, plundering and conquering Sicily in 550. Totila, in turn, was defeated and killed in the Battle of Taginae by the Byzantine general Narses in 552.

Byzantine Emperor Constans II decided to move from the capital Constantinople to Syracuse in Sicily during 660.  The following year, he launched an assault from Sicily against the Lombard Duchy of Benevento, who then occupied most of Southern Italy. The rumors that the capital of the empire was to be moved to Syracuse, along with small raids, were probably responsible for the assassination of Constans in 668. His son, Constantine IV, succeeded him, and quickly suppressed a brief usurpation in Sicily by Mezezius. Contemporary accounts report that the Greek language was widely spoken on the island during this period.

In 826, Euphemius, the commander of the Byzantine fleet of Sicily, forced a nun to marry him. Emperor Michael II caught wind of the matter and ordered that general Constantine end the marriage and cut off Euphemius' nose. Euphemius fought back, killed Constantine and then occupied Syracuse.  He, in turn, was defeated and fled to North Africa. He offered rule of Sicily to Ziyadat Allah the Aghlabid Emir of Tunisia in return for a place as a general and safety.  An Islamic army of Arabs, Berbers, Spaniards, Cretans and Persians was disbanded. The conquest was a complicated tug-of-war hampered by considerable resistance and internal struggles.  It took over a century for Byzantine Sicily to be conquered. Syracuse held for a long time, Taormina fell in 902, and all of the island was eventually conquered by 965.  Throughout this reign, Byzantine Sicilians continued to revolt, especially in the east, and some of the lands were even re-occupied before being quashed.

Agricultural items such as oranges, lemons, pistachio and sugar cane were brought to Sicily, and the native Christians were allowed freedom of religion but had to pay an extra tax to their rulers. However, the Emirate of Sicily began to fragment as inner-dynasty related quarrels took place within the Muslim regime.  By the 11th century, mainland southern Italian powers were recruiting ferocious Norman merecenaries, who were Christian descendants of the Vikings.  It was the Normans, under Roger I, who freed Sicily from the Muslims. After claiming Apulia and Calabria, he occupied Messina with an army of 700 knights. In 1068, Roger Guiscard and his men defeated the Muslims at Misilmeri.  The most crucial battle, however, was the siege of Palermo, which led to Sicily's total domination under the Normans by 1091.

Kingdom of Sicily

Palermo remained the capital under the Normans. Roger's son, Roger II of Sicily, ultimately elevated the status of the island, along with his lands of Malta and Southern Italy, to a kingdom in 1130. During this period, the Kingdom of Sicily was prosperous and politically powerful, becoming one of the wealthiest states in all of Europe--even wealthier than England. Significant immigration from Northern Italy and Campania occured during this period and, linguistically, the island became Latinized.  Religiously, Sicily became entirely Roman Catholic while it had previously been mainly Eastern Orthodox Christian under the Byzantines.

After a century, the Norman Hauteville family dynasty died out, the last direct descendent and heir of Roger.  Constance married Emperor Henry VI which eventually led to the crown of Sicily being passed onto the Hohenstaufen Dynasty (Germanic peoples from Swabia). In 1266, conflict between the Hohenstaufen house and the Papacy led to Pope Innocent IV crowning Angevin Dynasty Duke Charles I as the king of both Sicily and Naples.

Strong opposition to the French rule due to mistreatment and taxation resulted in resistance from local peoples of Sicily, leading to an insurrection known as the War of the Sicilian Vespers in 1282, which eventually annihilated almost the entire French population on the island. During the war, the Sicilians turned to Peter III of the Kingdom of Aragon for support after being rejected by the Pope. Peter gained control of Sicily from the French (though the French retained control of the Kingdom of Naples). The wars continued until the peace of Caltabellotta in 1302, which recognized Frederick III as king of the Isle of Sicily, while Charles II was recognized as the king of Naples by Pope Boniface VIII. Sicily was ruled as an independent kingdom by relatives of the kings of Aragon until 1409 and then as part of the Crown of Aragon.

The Spanish Inquisition in 1492 led to Ferdinand I decreeing the explusion of every single Jew from Sicily. The island was hit by two very serious earthquakes in the east in 1542 and 1693. A few years before the second earthquake, the island was struck by a ferocious plague. There were revolts during the 17th century, but these were quelled with significant force (especially the revolts of Palermo and Messina). The Treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, resulted in Sicily's reassignment to the House of Savoy.  This period of rule lasted only seven years as it was swapped with the island of Sardinia by Emperor Charles VI of the Austrian Habsburg Dynasty.

While the Austrians were busy with the War of the Polish Succession, a Bourbon prince, Charles from Spain, was able to conquer Sicily and Naples. At first, Sicily was left as an independent kingdom, while the Bourbons ruled over both from Naples. However, the advent of Napoleon's First French Empire resulted in the capture of Naples at the Battle of Campo Tenese and Bonapartist Kings of Naples were instated. Ferdinand III the Bourbon was forced to retreat to Sicily (which he still controlled) with the help of British naval protection. Shortly thereafter, Sicily joined the Napoleonic Wars.  At the wars' end, Sicily and Naples formally joined as the Two Sicilies under the Bourbons. Major revolutionary movements occurred in 1820 and 1848 against the Bourbon government with Sicily seeking independence.  The 1848 revolution was successful and resulted in a sixteen month period of independence for Sicily, until the armed forces of the Bourbons regained control in May 1849.

Italian Unification

After the Expedition of the Thousand led by Giuseppe Garibaldi, Sicily became part of the Kingdom of Italy in 1860 as part of the risorgimento. The conquest started at Marsala and was finally completed with the Siege of Gaeta where the final Bourbons were expelled and Garibaldi announced his dictatorship in the name of Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia. An anti-Savoy revolt, pushing for Sicilian independence, erupted in 1866 in Palermo: this was quelled brutally by the Italians within just a week. The Sicilian (and the wider mezzogiorno) economy collapsed, leading to an unprecedented wave of emigration.  Organizations of workers and peasants known as the Fasci Siciliani, who were leftist and separatist groups, rebelled and caused the Italian government to impose martial law again in 1894.

The Mafia, a loose confederation of organized crimal networks, grew in influence in the late 19th century.  The Fascist regime was somewhat successful at suppressing them in the 1920s.  July 10, 1943, allies invaded Sicily during World War II.  This was one cause of the July 25 crisis (when Mussolini was ousted from power and King Victor Emmanuel III regained power).  Overall, the Allied victors were warmly embraced by the Sicilian population.  Italy became a Republic in 1946 and as part of the Constitution of Italy, Sicily was one of the five regions given special status as an autonomous region. Both the partial Italian land reform and special funding from the Italian government's Cassa per il Mezzogiorno (Fund for the South) from 1950 to 1984, helped the Sicilian economy improve.

Geography

Sicily is directly adjacent to the Italian region of Calabria, via the Strait of Messina to the east. The early Roman name for Sicily was Trinacria, alluding to its triangular shape.

Sicily has been noted for two millennia as a grain-producing territory. Citrons, oranges, lemons, olives, olive oil, almonds, and wine are among its other agricultural products.

The mines of the Enna and Caltanissetta district became a leading sulfur-producing area in the 19th century but have declined since the 1950s.

Sicily is divided into nine provinces; Agrigento, Caltanissetta, Catania, Enna, Messina, Palermo, Ragusa, Syracuse and Trapani. Also part of various Sicilian provinces are small surrounding islands, including the Aeolian Islands, the Aegadian Islands, Pantelleria, Ustica and the Pelagian Islands.

The island of Sicily is cut by several rivers, most of which flow through the central area and enter the sea at the south of the island. The Salso River flows through parts of Enna and Caltanissetta before entering the Mediterranean Sea at the port of Licata. To the east, the Alcantara in the province of Messina exits at Giardini-Naxos. The other two main rivers on the island, Belice and Platani, are to the south-west.

Sicily and its small surrounding islands are highly significant in the area of volcanology. Mount Etna is the only volcano on mainland Sicily located in the east.  At a height of 3,320 m (10,900 ft), it is the tallest active volcano in Europe and one of the most active in the world. In addition to Etna, there are several non-volcanic mountain ranges in Sicily: Sicani to the west, Eeri in the central era and Iblei in the south-east. Across northern Sicily, there are three other mountain ranges: Madonie, Nebrodi and Peloritani.

The Aeolian Islands to the north-east are volcanically significant with active Stromboli.  Dormant volcanos in the Tyrrhenian Sea include Vulcano, Vulcanello and Lipari.

Off the Southern coast of Sicily, the underwater water volcano Ferdinandea, which is part of the larger Empedocles, last erupted in 1831. It is located between the coast of Agrigento and the island of Pantelleria (which itself is a dormant volcano), on the Phlegraean Fields of the Strait of Sicily.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Proclamation 2001

"Opera dei Pupi, Sicilian Puppet Theatre"

Mainly based in Palermo and Catania, the Opera dei Pupi had its heyday in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. The puppeteers show great mastery in bringing characters of medieval chivalric epics alive. A few family-run theatres survive, thanks to safeguarding activities that started a century ago.

The Puppet Theatre, known as the Opera dei Pupi, emerged in Sicily at the beginning of the nineteenth century and was highly popular among the island’s working classes. The puppeteers told stories based on medieval chivalric literature and other sources, such as Italian poems of the Renaissance, the lives of saints, and tales of notorious bandits. The dialogues in these performances were largely improvised by the puppeteers. The two main Sicilian puppet schools in Palermo and Catania were distinguished principally by the size and shape of the puppets, the operating techniques, and the variety of colorful stage backdrops.

These theatres were often family-run businesses.  The carving, painting and construction of the puppets, renowned for their intense expressions, were carried out by craftspeople employing traditional methods. The puppeteers constantly worked to surpass each other with their shows, and they exerted great influence over their audience. In the past, these performances took place over several evenings and provided opportunities for social gatherings.

The economic and social upheavals caused by the extraordinary economic boom of the 1950s had a considerable effect on the tradition, threatening its very foundations. At that time, similar forms of theatre in other parts of Italy disappeared, some of them re-emerging some twenty years later. The Opera dei Pupi is the only example of an uninterrupted tradition of this kind of theatre. Thanks to current economic difficulties, puppeteers can no longer make a living from their art, prompting them to turn to more lucrative professions. Tourism has contributed to the degradation in the quality of performances, which were previously only for local audiences.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Agrigento (1997): Valley of the Temples

Founded as a Greek colony in the 6th century B.C., Agrigento became one of the leading cities in the Mediterranean world. Its supremacy and pride are demonstrated by the remains of the magnificent Doric temples that dominate the ancient town, much of which still lies intact under today's fields and orchards. Selected excavated areas shed light on the Hellenistic and Roman town and the burial practices of its early Christian inhabitants.

Justification for Inscription: The Committee decided to inscribe this site on the basis of criteria, considering that Agrigento was one of the greatest cities of the ancient Mediterranean world, and it is well preserved and exceptionally intact. Its great row of Doric temples is one of the most outstanding monuments of Greek art and culture.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Late Baroque Towns of the Val di Noto (South-Eastern Sicily)

The eight towns in south-eastern Sicily: Caltagirone, Militello Val di Catania, Catania, Modica, Noto, Palazzolo, Ragusa and Scicli, were all rebuilt after 1693 on or beside towns existing at the time of the earthquake which took place in that year. They represent a considerable collective undertaking, successfully carried out at a high level of architectural and artistic achievement. Keeping within the late Baroque style of the day, they also depict distinctive innovations in town planning and urban building.

Justification for Inscription: Criterion i This group of towns in south-eastern Sicily provides outstanding testimony to the exuberant genius of late Baroque art and architecture. Criterion ii The towns of the Val di Noto represent the culmination and final flowering of Baroque art in Europe. Criterion iv The exceptional quality of the late Baroque art and architecture in the Val di Noto lies in its geographical and chronological homogeneity, as well as its quantity, the result of the 1693 earthquake in this region. Criterion v The eight towns of south-eastern Sicily that make up this nomination, which are characteristic of the settlement pattern and urban form of this region, are permanently at risk from earthquakes and eruptions of Mount Etna.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Syracuse and the Rocky Necropolis of Pantalica

The site consists of two separate elements, containing outstanding vestiges dating back to Greek and Roman times: The Necropolis of Pantalica contains over 5,000 tombs cut into the rock near open stone quarries, most of them dating from the 13th to 7th centuries BC. Vestiges of the Byzantine era also remain in the area, notably the foundations of the Anaktoron (Prince’s Palace). The other part of the property, Ancient Syracuse, includes the nucleus of the city’s foundation as Ortygia by Greeks from Corinth in the 8th century BC. The site of the city, which Cicero described as ‘the greatest Greek city and the most beautiful of all’, retains vestiges such as the Temple of Athena (5th century BC, later transformed to serve as a cathedral), a Greek theatre, a Roman amphitheatre, a fort and more. Many remains bear witness to the troubled history of Sicily, from the Byzantines to the Bourbons, interspersed with the Arabo-Muslims, the Normans, Frederick II of the Hohenstaufen dynasty (1197–1250), the Aragons and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Historic Syracuse offers a unique testimony to the development of Mediterranean civilization over three millennia.

Justification for Inscription: The sites and monuments which form the Syracuse/Pantalica ensemble constitute a unique accumulation, through the ages and in the same space, of remarkable testimonies to Mediterranean cultures. The Syracuse/Pantalica ensemble offers, through its remarkable cultural diversity, an exceptional testimony to the development of civilisation over some three millennia. The group of monuments and archeological sites situated in Syracuse (between the nucleus of Ortygia and the vestiges located throughout the urban area) is the finest example of outstanding architectural creation spanning several cultural aspects (Greek, Roman and Baroque). Ancient Syracuse was directly linked to events, ideas and literary works of outstanding universal significance.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Isole Eolie (Aeolian Islands)

The Aeolian Islands provide an outstanding record of volcanic island-building and destruction, and ongoing volcanic phenomena. Studied since at least the 18th century, the islands have provided the science of vulcanology with examples of two types of eruption (Vulcanian and Strombolian) and thus have featured prominently in the education of geologists for more than 200 years. The site continues to enrich the field of vulcanology.

Justification for Inscription: The islands' volcanic landforms represent classic features in the continuing study of volcanology world-wide. With their scientific study from at least the 18th Century, the islands have provided two of the types of eruptions (Vulcanian and Strombolian) to vulcanology and geology textbooks and so have featured prominently in the education of all geoscientists for over 200 years. They continue to provide a rich field for volcanological studies of on-going geological processes in the development of landforms.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Properties submitted on the Tentative List: Palermo & Monreale

Description: The entire historic district of Palermo can be considered a unique and exceptionally important urban fabric, which has survived the long succession of various rules to which the island was subjected over the centuries and that have left extensive primary evidence.

"All-port" is the translation of the ancient name of the city, Panormus, which was founded by the Phoenicians in the eighth century BC, never conquered by the Greeks, but won by the Romans in 254 BC. The city was constituted by two fortified nuclei, the older Paleopolis and the Neapolis, which occupied a rocky headland bounded by two rivers - long since disappeared - that flowed into the sea in a deep and sheltered natural harbour.

Palermo underwent great expansion beneath Arab rule (ninth-eleventh centuries) that made the island's chief city and one of the leading trading centres of the Mediterranean. The image handed down by the Arab chroniclers is that of a mythical Oriental city, brimming with mosques, sumptuous palaces and crowded markets packed with precious goods, comparable in size and splendour to Cordoba and Cairo, and it is claimed that it counted over 300,000 inhabitants.

While extensive traces of the Arab city can still be seen in Palermo's urban fabric, which retains several Islamic urban features, little remains of the buildings constructed during that period, excepting the remains incorporated in the Norman architecture. Indeed, the Normans, who conquered the city in 1072 and made it an important trading hub between the Byzantine East, Muslim Africa and the Catholic Empire, skillfully merged different artistic trends and promoted an original architectural style, appropriately known as "Arab-Norman", in which domes and Moorish decorative motives are superimposed on the severity of basically Romanesque buildings.  The old Arab castle was extended and equipped with towers to become a fitting palace (Palazzo dei Normanni) for the new sovereigns, who also created a complex system of gardens on the plain beyond, as far as the hillsides, dotted with palaces, pavilions, fountains and fish pools, as testified by the Zisa, Cuba and Cubola. The city too became a great building site, with the purpose of consolidating the authority of the Crown and the episcopal see, particularly through the construction of religious buildings, such as San Giovanni degli Eremiti, Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio (the Martorana) and numerous other churches. The collaboration of Arab, Byzantine and Latin craftsmen allowed the flourishing of that extraordinary architectural synthesis which finds its highest expression in the Palatine Chapel and Monreale Cathedral. The monastic complex of Monreale, founded in 1174, was the citadel of Norman power in Sicily. The church was flanked by the royal palace, a building described by the chroniclers as "multa dignum admiratione", i.e. worthy of great admiration, and indeed no other king could boast anything similar. Each individual culture of the heterogeneous Norman kingdom left its trace there: the cathedral has a Norman plan and façade, Byzantine mosaics (over 6,000 square metres of them), Arab and Norman-style apsidal decorations, classical columns, and a cloister that combines Lombard, Islamic and French elements.

Although Palermo experienced a period of decadence under Angevin rule, the city once again benefited from ambitious building schemes and general urban reorganisation under Aragonese in a display of power by the dominant aristocracy, despite having lost the title of capital to Naples.

Palermo underwent another great transformation during the Baroque period, with a process of renovation that celebrated the glories of its ruling class in a burst of palaces, churches, monasteries and oratories. The creation of the square known as Piazza Quattro Canti dates to this period, following the intersection of Via Maqueda, and features corners richly adorned with fountains, decorative elements, windows, niches and statues, which form a spectacular architectural complex.

The city fell under Bourbon rule in 1734, finally becoming Italian in 1860

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Properties submitted on the Tentative List: Taormina & Isola Bella

Description: Taormina's fortune in all times is closely linked to its extraordinary location, lying on a narrow terrace above the sea formed by typical variously coloured calcareous rocks which ensured its fame in ancient times. Its coloured marbles can still to be found in monuments and private dwellings. Owing to its position, the town has always been considered as a natural fortress of great

strategic and political importance, as it allowed the control over the eastern coast of Sicily. As a proof of its important role as a fortified town, parts of the walls surrounding the ancient built-up area still remain.

At the beginning the site was inhabited by the Siculi, as attested by the remains of a necropolis. The foundation of the Greek polis is esteemed to date back to the year 358 B.C.; it was built by Andromacus, who gathered the survivors of the nearby Naxos, the first Greek colony in Sicily, up on the hill. The tyrant Jerone II used the town in his fight against the Italian Mamertini. The foundation of the various temples, whose remains are still included in the basements and parts of the walls of some Christian churches, as well as in the Ancient Theatre, dates back to the Greek epoch, when the town structure had been planned.

Under the Roman rule Taormina obtained privileges and it was  one of the three civitates federates of Sicily as mentioned by Cicero. The town expanded southwards, also due to the realization of the consular road Valeria, linking Messina and Syracuse. It was embellished by remarkable buildings: the small Odeon, the Gymnasium, the monumental tombs, the public bath, the Theatre in its present structure and the Naumachias, an important building of imperial epoch whose function is still uncertain, due to the lack of similar structures.

In the last decades of the 1^st century B.C.  the town got involved in the fight between Sestus Pompeus and Octavianus; the latter founded a military colony for strategic purposes.

Then Taormina became one of the Byzantines' favourite centres after the conquest of Sicily, and at the end of the 9^th century it became the capital of eastern Sicily after the Arabs' conquest of Syracuse. The town was the last stronghold to fall under the Arabs' rule. The latter caused so much damage that Taormina was brought back to the state of a fortified village and it had to change its name into Al-moetia.

In 1079 Roger d'Hauteville, conquered the town after a long siege; under the Norman rule Taormina thrived again and became a borough. Later it took part in the Sicilian  Vespers and in the struggles between Sicilian barons and the Aragonensis it took sides with the King of Aragon. During the Spanish rule, the town was chosen by some great families and this encouraged a remarkable building development.

Between the end of the 14^th and the half of the 15^th centuries several churches and buildings were erected, characterised by gothic elements mingled with Spanish ones; such buildings include the Badia Vecchia (1372), the similar Palace of St. Steven's Dukes, the Corvaja Palace, which was built on a pre-existent Arab tower and housed the first Sicilian Parliament.

Under the Spanish rule Taormina underwent a period of decadence. It still maintained its fame for being a locus refugi and so several convents and monasteries were established.

During the 18^th and the 19^th centuries its prestige grew and so Taormina became one of the most fascinating destinations for the foreign travellers of the Grand Tour, who were responsible for the diffusion of the special image of its historical and natural treasures.

In the second half of the 19^th century an Anglosaxon community settled in Taormina; they were responsible for the gardens and villas in the most charming spots of the town. The best example is the garden created by Florence Trevelyan, now public gardens, which includes eclectic pavilions of far-eastern inspiration, the "beehives", very peculiar for their architecture and variety of materials.

Isola Bella is linked to the town of Taormina by a system of bays; it is a typically Mediterranean spot, visited by men since prehistoric times, and it is characterised by a spontaneous vegetation mixed to numerous exotic plants introduced towards the end of the 19^th century. The islet  is crossed by various flights of steps, paths and small terraces and it represents, as a whole, a park of relevant naturalistic and cultural importance, whose for its flora and fauna, and has charmed visitors, artists and poets of all times.

UNESCO- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Properties submitted on the Tentative List: Mothia Island and Lilibeo

Description: Mothia was founded at the end of VII century B.C. on the island of San Pantaleo, situated at the centre of a large lagoon, known today as 'Stagnone', or big pond. Thanks to its location, particularly favourable to maritime trade, Mothia soon became one of the most prosperous Western Phoenician colonies. The more outstanding public works date back to the second half of VI century B.C., namely the fortifications, a submerged road that used to link the island to the mainland, near Birgi, the cothon (or drainage basin and harbour) and the main sanctuaries, in particular the tophet, where the burnt remains of offerings and sacrifices in honour of the god Baal Hammon were collected. Over one thousand carved steles where discovered here, undoubtedly the most significant evidence of Phoenician Punic sculpture. The ancient town’s industrial area features several omega-shaped furnaces, in every way similar to the more ancient pottery furnaces used in Phoenicia.
The more violent attacks of the Syracusan army took place not far from the Northern Gate with the town’s most imposing monuments, and ended in defeat and plunder in 397 B.C. The survivors of the ransacked town later gathered in the nearby Capo Lilibeo, where the Carthaginians built Lilibeo, a new town that developed into the most important military stronghold in Punic Sicily.
Lilibeo covers a large square area partly bordered by the sea; the sides facing the mainland were defended by a deep moat and strong towered ramparts. A vast necropolis ran along the north-east wall, beyond the moat. Thanks to its imposing fortifications and to the natural canal of dunes and cliffs that linked the harbour to the Stagnone making access difficult because of shallow waters, Lilibeo withstood the attacks of the Syracusan tyrant, Dionysius I, in 368 B.C. and then Pirrus, in 277 B.C. During the first Punic War, according to the historian Polibius, Lilibeo was the stronghold that allowed Carthaginians to maintain their dominion in Sicily. Despite years of siege and strict naval blockade, the town resisted Roman conquest and the Punic troops were evacuated only after the peace treaty that put an end to the war. Lilibeo prospered under Roman rule as a commercial port and also as seat of one of the two quaestores in charge of the administration of the whole of Sicily. Cicero held this position and spoke of Lilibeo as civitas splendidissima. The town’s economy further developed during the Roman Empire because of its strategic position along the commercial maritime routes from Northern Africa to Rome; the ruins of several luxurious private dwellings, with a wealth of thermal baths and polychrome mosaics, brought to light by during excavations in Lilibeo, date back to that period.
The site maintained its role as a crucial maritime port also under Arab and Norman rule: travellers of that period often referred to Lilibeo and described the town. In fact, it was during the years of the Arab domination that the was named Marsala, from the Arab Mars el Allah, or 'God's Harbour.

MAFIA: General Information

The Mafia (also known as Cosa Nostra) is a Sicilian criminal secret society which first developed in the mid-19th century in Sicily. An offshoot emerged on the East Coast of the United States and in Australia during the late 19th century following waves of Sicilian and Southern Italian emigration. In North America, the Mafia often refers to Italian organized crime in general, rather than just traditional Sicilian organized crime. According to historian Paolo Pezzino: "The Mafia is a kind of organized crime being active not only in several illegal fields, but also tending to exercise sovereignty functions – normally belonging to public authorities – over a specific territory.."

The Sicilian Cosa Nostra is a loose confederation of about one hundred Mafia groups, also called cosche or families, each of which claims sovereignty over a territory, usually a town or village or a neighborhood of a larger city, though without ever fully conquering and legitimizing its monopoly of violence. For many years, the power apparatuses of the single families were the sole ruling bodies within the two associations, and they have remained the real centers of power even after superordinate bodies were created in the Cosa Nostra beginning in the late 1950s

Some observers have seen "mafia" as a set of attributes deeply rooted in popular culture, as a "way of being", as illustrated in the definition by the Sicilian ethnographer, Giuseppe Pitrè, at the end of the 19th century: "Mafia is the consciousness of one's own worth, the exaggerated concept of individual force as the sole arbiter of every conflict, of every clash of interests or ideas."

Many Sicilians did not regard these men as criminals but as role models and protectors, given that the state appeared to offer no protection for the poor and weak. As late as the 1950s, the funeral epitaph of the legendary boss of Villalba, Calogero Vizzini, stated that "his 'mafia' was not criminal, but stood for respect of the law, defense of all rights, greatness of character. It was love." Here, "mafia" means something like pride, honour, or even social responsibility: an attitude, not an organization. Likewise, in 1925, the former Italian Prime Minister Vittorio Emanuele Orlando stated in the Italian senate that he was proud of being mafioso, because that word meant honourable, noble, generous.

The real name: Cosa Nostra

According to some mafiosi, the real name of the Mafia is "Cosa Nostra" ("Our thing"). Many have claimed, as did the Mafia turncoat Tommaso Buscetta, that the word "mafia" was a literary creation. Other Mafia defectors, such as Antonio Calderone and Salvatore Contorno, said the same thing. According to them, the real thing was "cosa nostra". To men of honour belonging to the organization, there is no need to name it. Mafiosi introduce known members to other known members as belonging to "cosa nostra" (our thing) or la stessa cosa (the same thing), meaning "he is the same thing, a mafioso, as you". Only the outside world needs a name to describe it, hence the capitalized form "Cosa Nostra".

Cosa Nostra was first used, in the early 1960s, in the United States by Joseph Valachi, a mafioso turned state witness, during the hearings of the McClellan Commission. At the time, it was understood as a proper name, fostered by the FBI and disseminated by the media. The designation gained wide popularity and almost replaced the term Mafia. The FBI even added an article to the term, calling it 'La Cosa Nostra'. In Italy the article 'la' is never used when the term refers to the Mafia.

Rituals of Sicilian Cosa Nostra

The orientation ritual in most families happens when a man becomes an associate, and then, a soldier. As described by Tommaso Buscetta to judge Giovanni Falcone, the neophyte is brought together with at least three "men of honor" of the family and the oldest member present warns him that "this House" is meant to protect the weak against the abuse of the powerful; he then pricks the finger of the initiate and spills his blood onto a sacred image, usually of a saint. The image is placed in the hand of the initiate and lit on fire. The neophyte must withstand the pain of the burning, passing the image from hand to hand, until the image has been consumed, while swearing to keep faith with the principles of "Cosa Nostra," solemnly swearing "may my flesh burn like this saint if I fail to keep my oath." Joseph Valachi was the first person to mention that in court.

The Sicilians also have a law of silence, called omertà; it forbids the common man, woman or child to cooperate at all with the police or the government, upon pain of death.

History of Sicilian Cosa Nostra

Origins: It has long been debated whether the mafia has medieval origins. Deceased pentito Tommaso Buscetta thought so, whilst modern scholars now believe otherwise. It is possible that the "original" mafia formed as a secret society sworn to protect the Sicilian population from the threat of Catalan marauders in the fifteenth century. However, there is very little historical evidence to suggest this. It is also feasible that the "Robin Hood" origins, which are closely intertwined with the Sicilian outlaw Salvatore Giuliano, were perpetuated by the earliest known mafiosi as a means of gaining goodwill and trust from the Sicilian people. This origin states that the Mafia is a means for righteous rebels to defend the people against oppression, Roman and Northern Italian control, and outside invasion.

After the Revolution of 1848 and the revolution of 1860, Sicily had fallen to complete disorder. The earliest mafiosi, at that time separate, small bands of outlaws, offered their guns in the revolt. Author John Dickie claims that the main reasons for this were the chance to burn police records and evidence, and to kill off police and pentiti in the chaos. However, once a new government was established in Rome and it became clear that the mafia would be unable to execute these actions, they began refining their methods and techniques over the latter half of the nineteenth century. Protecting the large lemon groves and estates of local nobility became a lucrative but dangerous business. Palermo was initially the main area of these activities, but the Sicilian mafia's dominance soon spread over all of western Sicily. In order to strengthen the bond between the disparate gangs and so ensure greater profits and a safer working environment, it is possible that the mafia as such was formed at this time in about the mid-19th century.

Mafia after the unification of Italy

From 1860, the year when the new unified Italian state first took over both Sicily and the Papal States, the Popes were hostile to the state. From 1870, the Pope declared himself besieged by the Italian state and strongly encouraged Catholics to refuse to cooperate with the state. Broadly speaking, in mainland Italy, this did not lead to violence. Sicily was strongly Catholic, but in a strongly tribal sense rather than in an intellectual and theological sense, and had a tradition of suspicion of outsiders. The friction between the Church and the state gave a great advantage to violent criminal bands in Sicily who could claim to peasants and townspeople that cooperating with the police (representing the new Italian state) was an anti-Catholic activity. It was in the two decades following the 1860 unification that the term Mafia came to the attention of the general public, although it was considered to be more of an attitude and value system than an organization.

The first mention in official law documentation of the 'mafia' came in the late 1800s, when a Dr. Galati was subject to threats of violence from a local mafioso, who was attempting to oust Galati from his own lemon grove in order to move himself in. Protection rackets, cattle rustling and bribery of state officials were the main sources of income and protection for the early mafia. Cosa Nostra also borrowed heavily from masonic oaths and rituals, such as the now famous initiation ceremony.

Fascist era

During the Fascist period in Italy, Cesare Mori, prefect of Palermo, used special powers granted to him to prosecute the Mafia, forcing many Mafiosi to flee abroad or risk being jailed. Many of the Mafiosi who escaped fled to the United States, among them Joseph Bonanno, nicknamed Joe Bananas, who came to dominate the U.S. branch of the Mafia. However, when Mori started to persecute the Mafiosi involved in the Fascist hierarchy, he was removed, and the Fascist authorities proclaimed that the Mafia had been defeated. Though the mafia was weakened, it had not been defeated as claimed. Despite his assault on their brethren, Mussolini had his admirers in the New York Mafia, notably Vito Genovese (although he was from Naples and not from Sicily).

The post-war revival

After Fascism, the Mafia did not become powerful in Italy again until after the country's surrender in World War II and the U.S. occupation. The United States used Italian connections of American Mafiosi during the invasion of Italy and Sicily in 1943. Lucky Luciano and other Mafiosi, who had been imprisoned during this time in the U.S., provided information for U.S. military intelligence and used Luciano's influence to ease the way for advancing troops. Furthermore, Luciano's control of the ports prevented sabotage by agents of the Axis powers.

Some say that the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, precursor to the CIA, deliberately allowed the mafia to recover its social and economic position as the "anti-State" in Sicily, and with the U.S.-mafia alliance forged in 1943, this became the true turning point of mafia history and the new foundation for its subsequent 60-year career. Others, such as the Palermitan historian Francesco Renda, have argued that there was no such alliance. Rather, the mafia exploited the chaos of post-fascist Sicily to reconquer its social base. The OSS indeed, in its 1944 "Report on the Problem of Mafia" by the agent W. E. Scotten, pointed to the signs of mafia resurgence and warned of its perils for social order and economic progress.

An alleged additional benefit (from the American perspective) was that many of the Sicilian-Italian Mafiosi were hard-line anti-communists. They were therefore seen as valuable allies by the anti-communist Americans, who allegedly used them to root out socialist and communist elements in the American shipping industry as well as wartime resistance movements and postwar local and regional governments in areas where the Mafia held sway.

According to drug trade expert Dr. Alfred W. McCoy, Luciano was permitted to run his crime network from his jail cell in exchange for his assistance. After the war, Luciano was rewarded by being released from prison and deported to Italy, where he was able to continue his criminal career unhindered. He went to Sicily in 1946 to continue his activities and according to McCoy's landmark 1972 book The Politics of Heroin in South-East Asia, Luciano went on to forge a crucial alliance with the Corsican Mafia, leading to the development of a vast international heroin trafficking network, initially supplied from Turkey and based in Marseille — the so-called "French Connection".

Later, when Turkey began to eliminate its opium production, he used his connections with the Corsicans to open a dialogue with expatriate Corsican mafiosi in South Vietnam. In collaboration with leading American mob bosses including Santo Trafficante Jr., Luciano and his successors took advantage of the chaotic conditions in Southeast Asia arising from the Vietnam War to establish an unassailable supply and distribution base in the "Golden Triangle", which was soon funneling huge amounts of Asian heroin into the United States, Australia and other countries.

Maxi Trial and war against the government

The Second Mafia War in the early 1980s was a large scale conflict within the Mafia that also led to the assassinations of several politicians, police chiefs and magistrates. Salvatore Riina and his Corleonesi faction ultimately prevailed in the war. The new generation of mafiosi placed more emphasis on "white-collar" criminal activity as opposed to more traditional racketeering enterprises. In reaction to these developments, the Italian press has come up with the phrase Cosa Nuova ("the new thing", a play on Cosa Nostra) to refer to the revamped organization.

The first major pentito (a captured mafioso who collaborated with the judicial system) was Tommaso Buscetta who had lost several allies in the war and began to talk to prosecutor Giovanni Falcone around 1983. This led to the Maxi Trial (1986-1987) which resulted in several hundred convictions of leading mafiosi. When the Italian Supreme Court confirmed the convictions in January 1992, Riina took revenge. The politician Salvatore Lima was killed in March 1992; he had long been suspected of being the main government connection of the Mafia (later confirmed by testimony of Buscetta), and the Mafia was clearly displeased with his services. Falcone and fellow anti-Mafia prosecutor Paolo Borsellino were killed a few months later. This led to a public outcry and a massive government crackdown, resulting in Riina's arrest in January 1993. More and more pentitos started to emerge. Many would pay a high price for their co-operation usually through the murder of relatives. For example, Cosa Nostra defector Francesco Marino Mannoia's, mother, aunt and sister were murdered.

Structure of the Sicilian Cosa Nostra

Known as the Honored Society among Mafiosi, the chain of command is organized in a pyramid similar to a modern corporate structure.

Traditional terminology

1. Capo di Tutti Capi (the "Boss of All Bosses", namely Matteo Messina Denaro for the Sicilian Mafia and Renato Gagliano for the Sacra Corona Unita)

2. Capo di Capi Re (a title of respect given to a senior or retired member, equivalent to being a member emeritus, literally, "King Boss of Bosses")

3. Capo Crimine ("Crime Boss", known as a Don - the head of a crime family)

4. Capo Bastone ("Club Head", known as the "Underboss" is second in command to the Capo Crimine)

5. Consigliere (an advisor)

6. Caporegime ("Regime head", a captain who commands a "crew" of around ten Sgarriste or "soldiers")

7. Sgarrista or Soldato ("Soldier", made members of the Mafia who serve primarily as foot soldiers)

8. Picciotto ("Little man", a low ranking member who serves as an "enforcer")

9. Giovane D'Onore (an associate member, usually someone not of Italian ancestry)

Italian Mafia structure

1. Capofamiglia - (Don)

2. Consigliere - (Counselor/Advisor)

3. Sotto Capo - (Underboss)

4. Capodecina - (Group Boss/Capo)

5. Uomini D'onore - ("Men of Honor")

Ten Commandments

In November 2007 Sicilian police reported to have found a list of "Ten Commandments" in the hideout of mafia boss Salvatore Lo Piccolo. Similar to the Biblical Ten Commandments, they are thought to be a guideline on how to be a good mobster. The commandments are as follows:

1. No-one can present himself directly to another of our friends. There must be a third person to do it.

2. Never look at the wives of friends

3. Never be seen with cops.

4. Don't go to pubs and clubs.

5. Always being available for Cosa Nostra is a duty - even if your wife's about to give birth.

6. Appointments must absolutely be respected.

7. Wives must be treated with respect.

8. When asked for any information, the answer must be the truth.

9. Money cannot be appropriated if it belongs to others or to other families.

10. People who can't be part of Cosa Nostra: anyone who has a close relative in the police, anyone with a two-timing relative in the family, anyone who behaves badly and doesn't hold to moral values.

The modern Mafia in Sicily-Italy

The main split in the Sicilian Mafia at present is between those bosses who have been convicted and are now imprisoned, chiefly Riina and capo di tutti capi Bernardo Provenzano, and those who are on the run, or who have not been indicted. The incarcerated bosses are currently subjected to harsh controls on their contact with the outside world, limiting their ability to run their operations from behind bars under the article 41 bis prison regime. Antonino Giuffrè – a close confidant of Provenzano, turned pentito shortly after his capture in 2002 – alleges that in 1993, Cosa Nostra had direct contact with representatives of Silvio Berlusconi who was then planning the birth of Forza Italia.

The deal that he says was alleged to have been made was a repeal of 41 bis, among other anti-Mafia laws in return for electoral deliverances in Sicily. Giuffrè's declarations have not been confirmed. The Italian Parliament, with the support of Forza Italia, extended the enforcement of 41 bis, which was to expire in 2002 but has been prolonged for another four years and extended to other crimes such as terrorism. However, according to one of Italy’s leading magazines, L'Espresso, 119 mafiosi – one-fifth of those incarcerated under the 41 bis regime – have been released on an individual basis. The human rights group Amnesty International has expressed concern that the 41-bis regime could in some circumstances amount to "cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment" for prisoners.

In addition to Salvatore Lima, mentioned above, the politician Giulio Andreotti and the High Court judge Corrado Carnevale have long been suspected of having ties to the Mafia.

By the late 1990s, the weakened Cosa Nostra had to yield most of the illegal drug trade to the 'Ndrangheta crime organization from Calabria. In 2006, the latter was estimated to control 80% of the cocaine import to Europe. The mafia also have a strong business in extortion big companies as well as smaller ones. It estimates that 7% of Italy's output is filtered off by organised crime. The Mafia has turned into one of Italy's biggest business enterprises with a turnover of more than US$120bn a year.

World War II in Sicily

Before the fight for North Africa ended, Roosevelt, Churchill, and their top military advisors met at Casablanca in January 1943 to examine the worldwide course of the war and decide on future strategy. In the Mediterranean theater, they called for the conquest of Sicily (Operation Husky) following a North African victory. The Allies recognized the island of Sicily, located just south of the Italian mainland, as a logical step on the road to Rome.

Lying between Tunisia and Sicily, Pantelleria and Lampedusa posed a threat to the invading forces. With their radio direction finder stations, troops on both islands could interfere with ship movements in the Sicilian straits, and a modern airfield on Pantelleria gave the enemy an interdiction capability. Capturing the bases would protect the invasion forces and allow the Allies to deploy fighters to protect ships and men during the first stage of Operation Husky. Reluctant to invade, Eisenhower decided to bomb the defenders into surrender.

In late May, NAAF and Allied naval forces began pounding Pantelleria. The airmen unleashed a torrent of bombs using an array of aircraft, including B-17s, B-25s, B-26s, P-38s, P-40s, A-36s, A-20s, and RAF Wellingtons. On June 11, a battered Italian garrison eagerly surrendered. Enemy forces on Lampedusa capitulated soon thereafter. 

Allied airmen then turned their full attention on Sicily. During the latter part of May, they bombed Sicilian and Sardinian airfields often and hard, and when Axis bombers pulled out for southern Italy, Allied airmen followed. In the last week of May, they struck heavy blows against Axis airfield complexes at Naples and Foggia. 

In an effort to block enemy reinforcement of Sicily, NAAF flew hundreds of medium- and heavy-bomber sorties during the latter half of June against depots, ports, and marshaling yards along Italy's western coast. As part of this effort, Messina, located on Sicily's northeast tip, was struck especially hard.

The Allied air forces also repeatedly hit airfields and landing grounds on Sicily, putting many of them out of service before the invasion. The Luftwaffe, however, still posed a threat. As Allied convoys approached Sicily on the night of July 9/10, enemy aircraft spread among bases in Sicily, Sardinia, Italy, and southern France still numbered in the hundreds. Although Allied air forces had nearly five thousand operational aircraft, they remained alert to possible attack.

The invasion plan called first for British and U.S. airborne assaults, the former by glider and the latter by parachute. The British began their operation on the evening of July 9 when 147 tow planes, each pulling a loaded glider, took off from Tunisia. The aircraft, nearly all C-47s from the AAF's Troop Carrier Command, carried the British I Airborne Division. Their mission focused on seizing a canal bridge south of the city of Syracuse on Sicily's east coast. Regrettably, strong winds, flak, and poor visibility caused most tow pilots to release their gliders in the wrong areas. Only twelve came down in the landing zone; at least forty-seven gliders crashed into the sea, drowning many of the troops aboard. But the British managed to engage the enemy at the canal bridge and captured it the next day.

The U.S. phase of the operation paralleled that of the British. More than two hundred C-47s carrying almost three thousand paratroopers of the 82d Airborne Division left Tunisia on the evening of July 9. Delayed because of high winds and a missed checkpoint over Malta, they approached Sicily in almost complete darkness to discover that fire and smoke from earlier Al lied bombing further obscured their drop zones. As a result, the paratroopers came down over a wide area. They carried out their mission, however, seizing and holding a strategic road junction east of Gela.

The Allies had decided to invade Sicily at its southeastern corner, with the U.S. Seventh Army under Lt. Gen. George Patton on the left and the British Eighth Army under Montgomery on the right. As dawn, July 10, approached, the amphibious phase of the operation began. At daylight, Allied airmen, including the recently arrived African-American troops of the 99th Fighter Squadron--popularly known as the "Tuskegee Airmen"--established defensive air patrols over the beaches and shipping. Night fall found Licata, Syracuse, and the airfield at Pachino in Allied hands. The next day, the U.S. Seventh Army held the beachhead against assaults by the German Hermann Goering and Italian Livorno Divisions, sustain ing more than two thousand casualties in the effort.

Patton decided to reinforce the beachhead with paratroopers from his North African reserves and he ordered a mission for the night of July II. Not everyone got the word, however. Nervous antiaircraft gunners in the Allied fleet and on shore mistook the arriving Allied transports for the enemy and opened fire with devastating effect. The gunners shot down twenty-three out of 144 aircraft, damaged thirty-seven more, and inflicted 10 percent casualties on the paratroop force. The surviving troopers joined the Seventh Army's fight to take the coastal plain and move into the hills beyond. 

On July 13, the American and British armies linked up and the critical assault phase was over. With the landings now secure, NAAF struck targets farther afield. Medium and heavy bombers attacked Messina on July 14, and B-17s and Wellingtons bombed Naples on July 14-15, damaging marshaling yards, rolling stock, and railroad tracks in both cities.

A week after the invasion, the U.S. Seventh Army raced north and west toward Palermo and the British Eighth Army moved against Catania. During these drives, AAF's XII Air Support Command helped the Americans, the RAF's Desert Air Force aided the British, and the Allied Tactical Bomber Force supported both armies. 

On July 22, the Americans liberated Palermo, a swift action that required little air support. But across the island, air power played a major role in fighting for Catania. Airmen flew hundreds of missions in the last ten days of July, bombing enemy communications centers, troop and gun concentrations, ammunition dumps, roads, and bridges.

On August 1, as the Sicilian campaign drew to a close, Libya-based B-24 Liberators of the Ninth Air Force struck Ploesti in the AAF's final heavy-bomber, low-level attack of the European war. A navigation error destroyed the daring plan's split-second timing, alerted Axis air defenses, and created confusion over the target; but despite very heavy losses, the crews grimly pressed  home their attacks from altitudes as low as one hundred feet. Bravery and heroism in the attack on Ploesti resulted in five awards of the Medal of Honor. The Germans, however, swiftly repaired the damage. 

As Allied troops approached Messina from the south and west in early August, enemy forces fled across the narrow straits to the Italian main land. To slow their withdrawal, Allied aircraft targeted every means of escape. A-36 dive-bombers struck merchant vessels, barges, freighters, and other small craft; medium and heavy bombers pounded supply points, marshaling yards, and beaches; and fighters attacked harbor shipping. In spite of these efforts, the resourceful Germans saved thousands of men and tons of equipment.

The campaign in Sicily successfully combined air, ground, and sea power in one of the largest amphibious landings of World War II. Al though a tough fight in torturous terrain followed, the eventual triumph secured Allied lines of communication in the Mediterranean, forced the Germans to transfer troops into southern France and the Balkans, and pro vided a springboard for the invasion of mainland Italy. 

Sicilian Language

Sicilian Language

Sicilian (u sicilianu, Italian: lingua siciliana, also known as Siculu) is a Romance language. Its dialects comprise the Italiano Meridionale-estremo language group, which are spoken on the island of Sicily and its satellite islands; Some assert that Sicilian represents the oldest Romance language derived from Vulgar Latin (Privitera, 2004), but this is not a widely-held view amongst linguists. For instance, Cipolla describes such a view as radical.

It is currently spoken by the majority of the inhabitants of Sicily and by immigrant populations around the world. The latter are to be found in the countries which attracted large numbers of Sicilian immigrants during the course of the past century or so, especially the United States, Canada, Australia and Argentina. In the past two or three decades, large numbers of Sicilians were also attracted to the industrial zones of northern Italy and indeed the rest of the European Union, especially Germany.

Sicilian is not recognized as an official language anywhere in the world, even within Italy. There is currently no central body, in Sicily or elsewhere, that regulates the language in any way. The autonomous regional parliament of Sicily has legislated to encourage the teaching of Sicilian at all schools, but inroads into the education system have been slow

Sicilian-Americans

Sicilian-Americans

Sicilian Americans are a subset of Italian Americans from Sicily or of Sicilian heritage, and number approximately 12 million. They are sometimes treated as a separate group due to cultural and historical differences between Sicily and the mainland.

The first Sicilians came to what is now the United States in the seventeenth century as explorers and missionaries. Sicilian immigration to the US then grew substantially in the period starting in the 1880s and in 1906 as many as a 100,000 Sicilians came to the US. By 1924, immigration restrictions had caused this to plummet. This period saw political and economic shifts in Sicily that made emigration desirable. A great portion of the Sicilian immigrants would settle in New York City, New Jersey, Chicago, Boston, New Orleans, San Diego and San Francisco.

Elements of Sicilian culture came with them such as theatre and music. Giovanni De Rosalia was a noted Sicilian American playwright in the early period and farce was popular in several Sicilian dominated theatres. In music Sicilian Americans would be linked, to some extent, to jazz. Many of the more popular cities for Sicilian immigrants, like New Orleans or Chicago, are pivotal in the history of jazz. In Chicago the predominately Sicilian neighborhood was called "Little Sicily" and in New Orleans it was "Little Palermo." One of the earliest, and among the most controversial, figures in jazz was Nick LaRocca who is of Sicilian heritage.

Sicilian-Americans immigrants faced stereotypes and discrimination, sometimes even from other Italians. Tensions between Italian regions had not been entirely resolved with unification and so Northern Italians had sayings that indicated Sicilians were untrustworthy and ethnically different. With northern Italians having blonde hair and blue eyes at a noticeably higher frequency than Sicilians, who, in general, tend to display darker features. A more persistent stereotype linked them to the mafia, and continues to perpetuate through films such as The Godfather that portray Sicilians in this light. As the mafia is of Sicilian origin, Sicilian Americans were stereotyped as mafia-linked to an even greater degree than Italian Americans in general. Even if unfair the rationalization for it was that the Mafia itself is traditionally stronger in Sicily than it is in the rest of Italy.

The Sicilian adjective mafiusu may derive from the Arabic mahyas, meaning "aggressive boasting, bragging", or marfud meaning "rejected". Roughly translated, it means "swagger", but can also be translated as "boldness, bravado". The Sicilian Mafia calls themselves Cosa Nostra (meaning "thing of ours"), based in Sicily.

Despite stereotypic pressures, Sicilian Americans have continued to thrive in the cultural climate of America, with many actors, directors, musicians, athletes, politicians, and intellectuals of notable prominence.

List of Sicilian Americans

List of Famous Sicilian Americans

Artists, writers, and musicians

• Henry Armetta, (Palermo, Sicily, July 4, 1888 - San Diego, California, October 21, 1945) was a movie character actor who appeared in at least 150 films, starting in silents as early as 1915 to a movie released in 1946, after his death. In 1938 he played in "Everybody Sing" with Judy Garland, Allan Jones, and Fanny Brice. In 1941, he was hilarious as the father of an Italian family shopping for beds in "The Big Store" with the Marx Brothers and Tony Martin. He appeared in at least 24 films in 1934 alone, sometimes uncredited.

• Armand Assante was born on October 4, 1949 in New York City, New York to an Sicilian father and an Irish mother. Assante is an accomplished character actor, with his big break coming in 1974 in "The Lords of Flatbush". His sometimes sinister look has made him a popular choice for movies and TV.

• Joseph Barbera, born Joseph Roland Barbera (March 24, 1911 – December 18, 2006), is an animator, cartoon artist, storyboard artist, director, producer and co-founder, together with William Hanna of Hanna-Barbera (now known as Cartoon Network Studios). The studio produced well-known cartoons such as The Huckleberry Hound Show, The Flintstones, The Jetsons, and Scooby-Doo.

• Sonny Bono, born Salvatore Phillip Bono (February 16, 1935 – January 5, 1998) was an American record producer, singer, actor and politician whose career spanned over three decades.

• Argentina Brunetti, (August 31, 1907 — December 20, 2005) was an actress and writer. She followed Mimi Aguglia, her famous mother's footsteps in the theater. She began her movie debut in the Frank Capra classic It's a Wonderful Life (1946), as Mrs. Martini. Throughout her varied career she has also written and performed in daily radio shows, became a member of the 'Hollywood Foreign Press Association', writing numerous articles on Hollywood personalities, authored books, written music and acted in over 57 television programs and 68 movies in which she mainly played multi-ethnic roles. She hosted a weekly web log on the Internet, called Argentina Brunetti's Hollywood Stories, which her son plans to continue running, and has written a biographical novel called In Sicilian Company.

• Frank Capra, (May 18, 1897 – September 3, 1991) was an American film director and a major creative force behind a number of highly popular films.Born Francesco Rosario Capra in Bisacquino, Sicily, Capra moved with his family to America in 1903, settling in Los Angeles, California.

• Richard S. Castellano, (September 4, 1933 – December 10, 1988). The actor became famous as Pete Clemenza in The Godfather.

• Gary Chester (October 27, 1924 - August 17, 1987) (born Cesario Gurciullo in Siracusa, Sicily-Italy) was one of the twentieth century's busiest studio drummers. Gary is counted as one of the greats when it comes to studio session drummers. His work appears on thousands of tracks, including hundreds of hit records from the '50s, '60s and '70s. He claimed to have logged some 15,000 studio sessions over three decades. He is on the short list of 20th Century Drummers' Hall of Fame.

• Iron Eyes Cody, (April 3, 1904 – January 4, 1999) was an actor born in Kaplan, Louisiana. He was born Espera DeCorti, the son of Sicilian immigrants Francesca Salpietra and Antonio DeCorti. He was not born a Native American, but he claimed to be part Cherokee and part Cree. Cody and his wife Bertha Parker adopted children that were Native American. Cody began his acting career at the age of 12 and continued to work until the time of his death. In 1996, the New Orleans Times-Picayune exposed his true heritage, but Cody denied it.

• Dan Cortese, (born September 14, 1967 near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an actor. Born in the Pittsburgh suburb of Sewickley, Pennsylvania, Cortese first came to prominence as host of MTV Sports from 1992 to 1993. He has had starring roles in the 1993 remake of Route 66, Traps, Melrose Place, The Single Guy, Veronica's Closet, and Ball & Chain.

• Alan Dale, (July 9, 1926-April 20, 2002) was a singer of traditional popular and rock'n'roll music. He was born Aldo Sigismondi in the Brooklyn borough of New York, New York. His father, Aristide Sigismondi, immigrated to the United States from Abruzzi, Italy in 1904 at the age of 21, and became a comedian in Italian language theater, with a radio program of his own. His mother, Agata "Kate" Sigismondi, was born in Messina, Sicily, and was 15 years younger than Aristide.

• Arturo Di Modica is a New York City artist, born in Sicily, best known for his sculpture Charging Bull (also known as the "Wall Street Bull"), which he installed without permission in front of the New York Stock Exchange in December 1989. The piece is now on loan to the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation who have placed it in nearby Bowling Green park. Di Modica now lives in New York City.

• Ben Gazzara, (born Biagio Anthony Gazzara on August 28, 1930, in New York City), is an actor in television and motion pictures. Born to Sicilian immigrants, Antonio Gazzara and Angela Consumano, Gazzara grew up on New York's tough Lower East Side. He found relief from his bleak surroundings in joining a theater company at a very young age. Years later, he said that the discovery of his love for acting saved him from the crime that was all around him during his teenage years.

• Lino Graglia is the Dalton Cross Professor of Law at the University of Texas specializing in antitrust litigation. He obtained a BA from the City College of New York in 1952, and an LLB from Columbia University in 1954. He worked in the United States Department of Justice during the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Graglia is an outspoken Catholic conservative of Sicilian background. He is a well known critic of affirmative action and racial quotas.

• Frankie Laine, born Frank Paul LoVecchio on March 30, 1913, is an influential American singer. Frankie's parents emigrated from Monreale, Sicily to Chicago's "Little Italy". At 17 he sang before a crowd of 5,000 at The Merry Garden Ballroom to such enthusiastic applause that he ended up performing five encores on his first night. But success as a singer was another 17 years away. Frankie Laine's 70-plus year career spanned most of the 20th century and has continued into the 21st. Laine was a key figure in the golden age of popular music, and remains, quite possibly the greatest singer of all time. On June 12, 1996, he was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 27th Annual Songwriters’ Hall of Fame awards ceremony at the New York Sheraton.

• Cyndi Lauper, (born June 22, 1953), Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper, better known as Cyndi Lauper, is a singer whose melodic voice and wild costumes have come to epitomize the 1980s, the decade in which she first came to fame. She was born in Queens, New York to Swiss German-American Fred Lauper and Sicilian Italian-American Catrine Dominique.

• Patti LuPone, (born April 21, 1949 in Northport, New York) is an American singer and actress of Sicilian descent. She is a graduate of Northport High School. An important player in contemporary American musical theater, she has performed on Broadway in works by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Stephen Sondheim and others. She won a Tony Award for Evita in 1980.

• Leo Martello, (1931-2000) was an author, lecturer, gay civil rights activist, and an early voice in the American Neopagan movement. He drew heavily on his Sicilian heritage, teaching the Strega Tradition which was named after the Italian word for Witch. As a founder of the Witches Anti-Defamation League (later the Alternative Religions Education Network) he was known for his lively and sometimes confrontational style. For example, in his books he tried to popularize the "Witches' Curse" which was "I wish you on yourself". He was profiled in Margot Adler's Drawing Down the Moon.

• Natalie Merchant, (born October 26, 1963 in Jamestown, New York, USA) is a versatile musician. Merchant co-founded and fronted the successful band 10,000 Maniacs in 1981, but left the band in 1993 for a solo career. Her father's original Italian name was Mercante but was americanized into Merchant. Her mother's side is Irish.

• Sal Mineo, born Salvatore Mineo, Jr. (January 10, 1939 - February 12, 1976) was an American actor and theater director, famous for his Academy Award-nominated performance opposite James Dean in the film Rebel Without a Cause.Mineo, born in The Bronx, New York City as the son of a Sicilian coffin maker, was enrolled by his mother in dancing and acting school at an early age.

• Al Pacino, born Alfredo James Pacino (born April 25, 1940 in The Bronx, New York, USA) is an American film actor. Pacino is the son of Salvatore Pacino (who was born in Italy) and Rose Gerard (the daughter of an Italian-born father and a New York-born mother of Italian descent). His parents divorced while Pacino was still a child. His grandparents originate from Corleone, Sicily.

• Louis Prima was born into a musical family of Sicilian descent in New Orleans. He studied violin for several years as a child. His older brother Leon Prima was a well regarded local bandleader. Prima was proud of his heritage, and made a point of letting the audience know at every performance that he was Italian-American and from New Orleans. His singing and playing showed that he absorbed many of the same influences as his fellow Crescent City musician, Louis Armstrong, particularly in his hoarse voice and scat singing.

• Mario Puzo, (October 15, 1920 – July 2, 1999) was an American author known for his fictional books about the Mafia. Puzo was born into a family of Sicilian immigrants living in the "Hell's Kitchen" neighborhood of New York City. Many of his books draw heavily on this Sicilian heritage.

• Leah Remini, (born June 15, 1970 in Brooklyn, New York) is an actress. She is best known for her role as Carrie Heffernan on the sitcom The King of Queens. Her father George Remini, owner of an asbestos company, originates from Sicily. Her mother Vicki Marshall, a high school principal, is Jewish.

• Pete Rugolo, (born December 25, 1915) is a Sicilian-born composer and arranger. He was born in Patti, Sicily, but his parents emigrated to the United States in 1920 and settled in Santa Rosa, California. He started his musical career playing the baritone, like his father, but he quickly branched out into other instruments, notably the French horn and the piano. He is most famous for his writing for the Stan Kenton Orchestra, although he led a long and successful career as a composer and arranger based in Los Angeles for many years. He has written for the Four Freshmen (for whom he was musical director) and many others.

• Martin Scorsese, (pronounced as Scor-SEH-see) (born November 17, 1942 in Queens, New York, USA) is a multi-Oscar nominated film director. Martin Scorsese came from a working class Italian-American family, hailing from the Sicilian town of Polizzi Generosa; his father Luciano Charles Scorsese (1912-1993) was a pants presser in New York's garment district. He struggled to earn enough money to attend university, but has shown enormous gratitude to his parents for helping him realize his dreams. His parents were the subject of Scorsese's documentary Italianamerican and made numerous cameo appearances in his films before their deaths. For years, his mother worked as the official caterer for all of Scorsese's films and his father helped in the wardrobe department.

• Gia Scala, born Giovanna Scoglio in Liverpool, England, to an aristocratic Sicilian father, Pietro Scoglio, and an Irish mother, Eileen Sullivan. Raised from infancy in Sicily, she moved to the United States at age fourteen where she studied and worked in New York City. She studied acting and in 1954 was signed to a contract by Universal Studios in Hollywood. She received wide recognition for her performance of "Anna" in the 1961 film, The Guns of Navarone. She ended her life with a drug overdose in 1972.Gia Scala is interred in the Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California.

• Anthony Scarpa, musician

• Vincent Schiavelli, (November 10, 1948 - December 26, 2005) is a noted character actor known for his work in film and on television. He was born into a Sicilian-American family in Brooklyn, New York. He studied acting through the Theater Program at New York University and began working on the stage in the 1960s. Having a respected Sicilian chef for a grandfather rubbed off on Vincent Schiavelli, as he is also the author of a number of cookbooks and food articles for magazines and newspapers. He received a James Beard Foundation Journalism Award in 2001 and has been nominated on a number of other occasions. He succumbed to lung cancer at age 57, passing away at his home in Polizzi Generosa, Italy, the town in Sicily where his grandfather emigrated from and which he wrote about in his 2002 book, Many Beautiful Things: Stories and Recipes from Polizzi Generosa.

• Frank Sinatra, born Francis Albert Sinatra (December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer who is considered one of the finest vocalists of all time, renowned for his impeccable phrasing and timing. Many critics place him alongside Bing Crosby, Elvis Presley, and The Beatles as the most important popular music figures of the 20th century. Sinatra launched a second career as a dramatic film actor, and became admired for a screen persona distinctly tougher than his smooth singing style. Sinatra also had a larger-than-life presence in the public eye, and as "The Chairman of the Board" became an American icon, known for his brash, sometimes swaggering attitude, as embodied by his signature song "My Way". He was born in Hoboken, New Jersey as the only child of a quiet Sicilian fireman father, Anthony Martin Sinatra (1894-1969). Anthony had emigrated to the United States in 1895. His mother, Natalie Della Gavarante (1896-1977), was a talented, tempestuous Ligurian, who worked as a part-time abortionist. She was known was "Dolly", and emigrated in 1897.

• Tony Sirico, (born July 29, 1942 in Brooklyn, New York) is an actor who is most famous for his role as Paulie Walnuts on the HBO TV series, The Sopranos. Prior to becoming an actor, Sirico spent some time in jail for holding up a number of night clubs in the late 1960s and early 1970s. While in prison, he became interested in acting from watching a theater group that came to perform. When he got out of jail, Sirico played gangsters in a number of films.

• Sylvester Stallone, born Sylvester Enzio Stallone (July 6, 1946 in New York City) is an American film actor, director, producer, and screenwriter. He is often referred to by his nickname, "Sly". He achieved his greatest successes in a number of action films, notably the Rocky and Rambo series. He was born to Frank Stallone Sr. (a beautician who was an immigrant from Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily) and Jacqueline "Jackie" Labofish, an American astrologer of 1/4 Russian Jewish descent.

• Tommy Tallarico, born Thomas V. Tallarico is an accomplished American video game music composer.

• Johnny Thunders, born John Anthony Genzale, Jr., was a rock and roll guitarist and singer, first with the New York Dolls, the proto-punk glam rockers of the early '70s. During the late '70s, he was a familiar figure on the New York punk scene, both with The Heartbreakers and as a solo artist. His guitar work was highly influential in punk rock music.

• Aida Turturro, is an actress who is most well-known for playing Janice Soprano, sister of New Jersey mob boss, Tony Soprano, on the HBO, TV series, The Sopranos, a role which netted her an Emmy Award nomination.

• John Turturro, is an American actor. He has appeared in over sixty movies, and is well known for his ability to effortlessly change both his demeanour and physique. Turturro was born in Brooklyn, New York to an Sicilian Catholic family. He completed his MFA at the Yale School of Drama. He worked as an extra in Raging Bull

• Steven Tyler, born Steven Victor Tallarico, frontman for legendary rock band Aerosmith.

• Frank Vincent, (born Frank Vincent Gattuso on 4 August 1939) is an Italian-American actor. He was born in North Adams, Massachusetts, but was raised in Jersey City, New Jersey. His father was also called Frank. His mother was Mary (nee Ricci). Frank has two brothers: Nick and Jimmy. Frank's father was one of six children, all born in the USA to Sicilian immigrants: Niccolo Gattuso and Francesca di Peri. He was spotted by Martin Scorsese in a low-budget gangster movie called Death Collector. Scorcese was impressed and hired Vincent to star in Raging Bull. Joe Pesci co-starred with Vincent in The Death Collector and the two were re-united in several other movies; another familiar co-star of Vincent is Robert De Niro.

• Emanuele Viscuso, (born December 24, 1952 in Palermo ), is the creator of the Sicilian Film Festival, a showcase of Sicilian directors and movies founded in Miami on 2006. Viscuso lives in Miami, in Milano and in Castelbuono, Sicily. Besides his work as president of this festival, Viscuso is a musician, a sculptor, a writer and a designer. His most famous piece is the 45 feet large sculpture "Wave-bridge on the imaginary" at the Milan Malpensa international airport. His design is mostly expressed with his world famous trompe l'oeil wall paper collection. Emanuele Viscuso has taken part to the Esperia* STS-120/10A Mission, lauched on October 23rd 2007 from the NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre, in Florida as delegate in Florida of Accademia Italiana della Cucina, a Cultural Institution of the Italian Republic. The City of Miami Beach, where he resides since November 2000, recognized his cultural involvement in the community with the "Key to the City" on October 17th 2007.

• Frank Zappa, born Frank Vincent Zappa was a composer, guitarist, singer and satirist. In his 33-year musical career, Zappa proved to be one of the most prolific musicians ever, releasing over 60 albums during his life. His father, Francis Zappa was born in Alcamo, Sicily. His mother Rose Marie Colimore was of half Italian, 1/4 Sicilian and 1/4 French descent.

Others

• Joe Causi is a famous disc jockey from New York. Coined the terms "Forget About it!" and "How you doing?" Host of Mix 102.7. Released a hit CD and a CD of classic dance songs.

• Lucky Luciano, considered to be the father of the American Mafia.

• Frank Lentini, born Francesco A. Lentini was born in Siracusa, Sicily into a large family. He was born with three longer legs, two sets of genitals and one rudimentary foot on his third leg. His primary legs also grew into different lengths. At the age of nine, Lentini moved to the United States and entered the sideshow business.

• Antonin Scalia (Sometimes known by the nickname "Nino") has been a U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice since 1986. He is widely considered the leading originalist voice on the Court and one of the most outspoken defenders of textualism. Antonin Scalia was born in Trenton, New Jersey to his mother, Catherine, and his father, S. Eugene. His mother was born in the United States; his father, a professor of romance languages, emigrated from Sicily at age 15. When Scalia was five years old, his family moved to Queens, New York City, New York, during which time his father worked at Brooklyn College.