Greek Texts & Translations

city from them. The inhabitants generally are rather called Mamertini than Messenians. The district abounds in wine, which we do not call Messenian, but Mamertinian: it vies with the best produced in Italy. ^note The city is well peopled, but Catana is more populous, which has been colonized by the Romans. ^note Tauromenium is less populous than either. Catana was founded by people from Naxos, and Tauromenium by the Zanclaens of Hybla, ^note but Catana was deprived of its original inhabitants when Hiero, the tyrant of Syracuse, introduced others, and called it by the name of Aetna instead of Catana. It is of this that Pindar says he was the founder, when he sings, Thou understandest what I say, O father, that bearest the same name with the splendid holy sacrifices, thou founder of Aetna. ^note

But on the death of Hiero, ^note the Catanaeans returned and expelled the new inhabitants, and demolished the mausoleum of the tyrant. The Aetnaeans, compelled to retire, ^note established themselves on a hilly district of Aetna, called Innesa, ^note and called the place Aetna. It is distant from Catana about 80 stadia. They still acknowledged Hiero as their founder.

Aetna lies the highest of any part of Catana, and participates the most in the inconveniences occasioned by the mouths of the volcano, for the streams of lava flowing down in Catanaea ^note pass through it first. It was here that Amphinomus