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History of
Agrigento
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Agrigento
is a great place to visit, not only for the tourist interested
in learning about Greek history and mythology. History is
preserved for all to see.
The city
was founded as Akragas ( named after the nearby river) around
582 BC by a group of colonists from Gela, who themselves were
the immediate descendants of Greeks from Rhodes and Crete.
The area
was however inhabited much earlier as a female skull, ?Girl
of Mandrascava", found near Cannatello, is half a million
years old.
A
Mesolithic village at Point Bianca, farther down the coast
toward Montechiaro Castle, dates from 6000 BC.
Akragas was
renamed Agrigentum by the Romans, Girgenti by the Saracens, and
finally named Agrigento in 1927.
Akragas flourished under Phalaris (570-554 BC), and developed
further under Theron (488-471 BC), whose troops participated in
the Battle of Himera in 480 BC, defeating the Carthaginians.
The city was destroyed several times during the Punic Wars,
suffering particularly extensive damage, but always rebuilt. The
Greek poet Pindar (518-438 BC) described Akragas as "the most
beautiful city of the mortals." Akragas' most famous citizen was
the philosopher and scientist Empedocles (490-430 BC).
After fall of
the Romans,
Agrigento's importance declined under the Byzantines and
Saracens. Captured by the Normans under the rule of Count Roger
I in 1087 it was established a Latin bishopric. It was during
the Norman rule that beautiful churches were constructed in and
around the city.
During the
Norman time, the city achieved political importance; its bishop
seat was restored and re-organized and new important buildings
such as the cathedral and other fortifications were erected
across the territory. Agrigento also grew economically much due
to important commercial relationships with North-African
countries.
A
demographic decrease was recorded in the following centuries
(14th-17th), the power held first by a few aristocratic families,
then the clergy. A new phase of social and economic prosperity
would come in the 18th century.
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