Milazzo

Milazzo, in Sicily, is placed between the two gulfs, the Eponymous to the east and that of Patti, to the west, in a strategic place of north-eastern Sicily. Tourist destination and is the ideal point of departure for the Aeolian Islands, the Parco dei Nebrodi and Tindari. The name of the city appears to be tied to that of the river Mela that, until the second half of the Sixteenth Century, ended in the natural harbor and characterizes all the hydrology of alluvial plain at the foot of the Monti Peloritani. The origin of the idronimo is to be found in Akkadian “melu” or “milu”, with the meaning of “river that occasionally flows”.

The monumental heritage received, constituted by churches, convents and monasteries, and palaces, testifies to the formation of the implant of the primitive village between the XV and XVIII century. The increase in population, the growing urban development, the need to acquire new spaces, a relative safety due to the lessening of the attacks of the barbarians or pirates thanks to new defensive systems, the exercise of fishing activities and the seafaring in general, leads to the establishment of settlements and working places outside of the perimeter of the walled city.

On the road north – south and eastwards arise settlements outside the walls which give rise to the primitive ancient village of Milazzo. The offshoots of constituting borgo reach the slopes of marine Levante and Ponente due to the intensification of fishing activities while further south are concentrated in the port activities and commercial that perpetuate the millenary traditions of the population Milazzese. The equal of the Arabs in the work of the urbanization unconsciously are destroyed or covered or uncovered or partially remodulated interesting settlements of various eras.

The most important monument of the town is the castle of Frederick II: good national and European Union, extends over an area of over 7 hectares, constitutes a veritable citadel. The first fortifications are datable to the intervention romano-Byzantine, with a castrum. In 843 the arabs gave life to the first nucleus of today’s castle, on the ruins of the old dominations. Subsequently, the Normans and Swabians, added other structures, the Aragons it went along the defensive system, the Spaniards the encircled with a mighty walls.

Particularly interesting is a stylized drawing the lava stone in a corner of the medieval walls. Become fortified citadels, in 1860 was the last of the bourbon bastion before the conquest of Messina by part of the Thousand of Garibaldi.