These night images of molten lava from Mt. Etna during the eruption of 2001 were taken from a turn-out half way up the volcano near Monte Vetore. The red glow was beautiful and we were close enough to feel the radiant heat from mother nature’s pyrotechnic show.  

It was an awe inspiring moment as I contemplated the raw power of the earth and thought about how something so beautiful could also be devastating to life and property.

The first known non-indigenous people to settle in Sicily were the Sikels. Around BC 1400 these people migrated from the Italian mainland and coexisted peacefully with the Sicans. It was around the same time that the Elymi people also began to settle on the island.

Around BC 1000, the Phoenicians began to settle along the coasts of Sicily. They, too, peacefully coexisted with the Sicans, Sikels and Elymi. The earliest literary mention of Sicily’s history and its early inhabitants can be found in Homer’s The Odyssey – expressed as the land of the Cyclopes, the land of the Laestrygonians and the island of Aeolus.

Sicily’s history took a dramatic turn when the Greeks began to colonize the island, 300 years later.

Around BC 735, the Greeks established Naxos – between modern day Catania and Taormina – as an expansion of Magna Graecia (the Greek colonies in Southern Italy). It was the first Greek colony on the island. The Greeks also established Syracuse around the same time on the southeastern coast of the island. This colonization marked the birth of one of the most influential eras in Sicilian history. As the old Sicilian civilizations were virtually absorbed into Hellenistic culture, the Greeks quickly spread their empire throughout Sicily. During this era, they built the Valley of the Temples, located in Agrigento. Most of this temple complex still stands today and is regarded as one of the most impressive temple complexes outside of Greece.