Giardini Naxos

Giardini Naxos (Naxos Gardens)

Giardini Naxos nestles in a small bay, ringed and protected by small hills.

Giardini Naxos, the First Greek Colony

The first Greek colony in Sicily, it is a very large archaelogical site incorporating a museum. Few landscapes embrace the typical beauty of Sicily better than Giardini Naxos, the very cradle of ancient Mediterranean civilizations, a forward-looking tourist resort in the panorama of hospitality that is southern Italy.

In its current location in Giardini Naxos, at Cape Schisò, in 734 BC, what has long been considered the first Greek settlement in Sicily was founded.  Recent studies claim it was Zancle in 756 BC that was actually the first Greek outpost in Sicily. The new colony was given the name of Naxos like the same named island in the Aegean Sea. Although quite modest in size, it nevertheless enjoyed symbolic importance since an altar in honor of Apollo Archegetes was built there. It was a departure point for Greek ambassadors on their way back to their homeland.

The elegant silhouette of Giardini Naxos seems a pearl set in the stride of the bay of the same name. To view it at night is to see a charming fairy-tale place, with a thousand flickering torches, mixed with the silvery reflections of lanterns on the sea. In the distance you can see the Strait and the Calabrian coast, on the Ionian sea. On the horizon you have the majestic Mount Etna and the green hills gliding down to the sea. Closer, Castelmola, Mount Venere, Mount Taurus and the Greco-Roman theater beckon.

Today Giardini Naxos is, together with the adjacent Taormina and Letojanni, one of the most popular beach resorts in eastern Sicily.