Pantelleria

Pantelleria (Zip Code 91017) is 126 km. distant from Agrigento, 196 km. from Caltanissetta, 303 km. from Catania, 215 km. from Enna, 313 km. from Messina, 54 km. from Palermo, 262 km. from Ragusa, 343 km. from Siracusa, 53 km. from Trapani which province it belongs to.

The municipality has 7.468 inhabitants and an area of 8.302 hectares for a density of population of 90 inhabitants per square kilometre. Pantelleria rises on the seashore, on the average of 5 metres above sea-level.

The Town Hall is in piazza Municipio, tel. ++39 0923-695011 fax. ++39 0923-912900. E-mail address is: sindaco@comune.pantelleria.it.

Pantelleria is a volcanic island. Its waters are not drinkable but it is full of thermal springs. Among its agricultural products stand out passito (raisin wine), dried figs, capers, lentils and table grapes.

Pantelleria is the greatest satellite isle of Sicily, called Cossyra by the Greeks, colonized by the Phoenicians who gave it a port which became a port of call between Africa and Sicily.

It was contended by the Carthaginians and by the Romans during the Punic wars, then it was conquered by the Arabs who gave a new impulse to agriculture. During the World War II the island had an important function in controlling the Canal of Sicily and was continually bombed by allies.

Of particular importance are i Sesi, funerary monuments made of stone of the late Bronze Age and the Barbacane Castle, with a solid structure in black lavic stone of ancient origin but rebuilt in 1700.

The traditional residence of Pantelleria is the dammuso (of Arabian derivation) cube-shaped, made by squared stone called conci; the roof is a terrace that has some inflations in the centre with some very small openings.