Provincial capital as well as the seat of important commercial activities, the city is especially famous for its truly magnificent archeological treasures which are known throughout the world. It Iies on a rough broken upland dose to the south coast of Sicily, high over the Valley of the Temples. Founded as Akragas by settlers from GeIa in 581 B.C., under its tyrant Tiro it rose to power in the Sth century BO. and, with Syra-cuse, defeated the Carthaginians at Himera in 480 8.0. Most of the temples that enriched the city, to such an extent that Pindarus defined it “the most beautiful of those inhabited by mortals”, belong to this period. Destroyed by Carthage and rebuilt by Timoleon, the city was conquered by the Romans in the 3rd century BO. and named Agrigentum, remaining highly important. It began to decline under Byzantium and continued to do so with the Arabs who took it in 827 and called it Girgenti. From the l4th century onwards its fortunes were those of Sicily. Agrigento is divided into two areas: the modern city and the Valley of the Temples, part of the city’s ancient history, where our visit will start.

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