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Sciacca is a common one of 40.868 inhabitants of the province of Agrigento. It is one citta of sea, tourist and thermal. Rich of monuments and churches, it is famous between the other for its historical carnival. The citizen of Sciacca finds itself on the coast of the Channel of Sicily between the foci of the river Platani and Belice, to approximately 65 meters above sea level: to east s' he raises the Saint Mount high Calogero 386 meters, to whose stratums gush, for a distance of approximately six kilometers, the famous thermal waters. He is situated to shape of amphitheater on the sea to noon of the Sicily, of forehead to the island of Pantelleria and Tunisi, to half road between the ruins of Selinunte, Eraclea Minoa, and Agrigento. According to the Savasta historian (the 1843) name of Sciacca was written with the letter X, that is Xacca derived from Xech, from the name saraceno Xech, that it is for Mrs. and Woman governor. Xechi was, moreover, calls from the Saraceni the governors to you of the public squares as Fazello (1498-1570 attests). According to other Xacca it derives from Xach that it wants to say Mercury (for a famous one tempio perhaps dedicated to this divinity), or Pomona (goddess of the abundance). Then in Latin Bag was written. Other explanations on its name gave the students to them Licata (1881) and Ciaccio (1900). Most recent, however, it must to Bag (1925), second which the Sciacca word is not other that participio feminine assets of the first coniugazione of the verbo sordo (Arabic) Saqqua that door the idea to separate, to divide, to cleave. The same author reports that Sciacca has been therefore called because sin from the beginning of the muslim dominion marked the border that separated two province or districts or contrade. The fact that Sciacca found nearly to half road between Mazara and Girgenti justifies, second the student, such designation from part of the conquering Africans. The same Michele Amari does not doubt on the Arabic origin of the name. The described thesis over has not found but confirmation from part of Giovanni Alessio (1938), second which the sopraccitata theory is valid for a course of water or one montuosa chain, but not for an inhabited center. Various students during the last few years think that its name drifts from the Arab 'Syac', that he means 'bath'; others give 'to the Saqquah', going back to the cult for the Syrian God 'Shai to the Quaaum'. - HISTORICAL SIGNALS - The origins The origins of Sciacca are ancient, probably to the time of the Sicani or the Fenici. In the WAYS to C., according to Tucidide, the inhabitants of Selinunte had constructed, like border of their territory, a castle that taken the name of Terme Selinuntine. The first testimonies that the territory of Sciacca was inhabited in the preistoria convalidate from the reperti of human skeletons and from some masi it carves to you, than probably they served in order to be based or to sleep. Some graphical signs, better visible in the period in which the Fazello lived, nearly have been cancelled, but recent studies of it have confirmed the existence. These most important ones mark them of remote civilization are find to you in the Cove Stew, on the summit of Monte Cronio, odierno saint Mount Calogero. It seems sure, therefore, than sin from the antichi times, the man has found in this mount the relief that gushed from its sources. According to the legend, the Baths to vapor (the so-called ones stufe of Saint Calogero) on Monte Cronio would have been implant to you from Labyrinth approximately thousand years before it were Christian. Costui, escaped from Clay for fear that Minosse slaughtered it, reached in Sicily where it came received from Cocalo, sicano king who lived in the city of Inico. Pleasing for the received hospitality, Labyrinth constructed for the king the Castle of Camico on a top of difficult access, in which the monarch guarded its treasures. Minosse, come to acquaintance of the Labyrinth hiding place, caught up the Sicily, in territory agrigentino, near the city that give the same one taken the name of Minoa. Endured after, it sended of the puttinges to Cocalo so that they delivered the fuggiasco to it. Cocalo accepted the proposal and invited Minosse to its castle, but while these it took a bath, it made it to suffocate from its daughters, being given back the corpse to its people and justifying the dead women of the king like if it had been caused the being slipped in the warm water. The ceramics found again in the coves of Monte Cronio, going back to the period of transition between the age of the stone and that one of the bronze, make to think that the city of Cocalo was placed in this situated one. According to it credits to you historical, the military shipment in Sicily di Minosse, concluded with its killing, finds its explanation in the attempt of the cretese king to conquer that city, therefore rich of thermal waters, place of sacred cult to Cocalo, supreme clergyman of the God of waters. Little are the sure historical news. The Saccensi - therefore they come calls the inhabitants to you of Sciacca - thinks that the ancient city was located in goes formed them from Monte Nadore and the Saint Mount Calogero, to approximately six kilometers from the odierna city. In this place remainders of foundations of great dimensions have come to the light. That would confirm the existence of the ancient city inhabited from sicane populations. The registrations fenicie, instead, would confirm the passage of the Fenici.
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