Monte Adranone
ancient Italian city and archaeological site
Monte Adranone is a mountain rising 900 metres above sea level in the north of the comune of Sambuca di Sicilia, in the Province of Agrigento.
At the summit of the mountain are the remains of an ancient city, possibly Adranon, and one of the more important archaeological sites of Magna Graecia in Sicily.
The city is distinct from the Adranon in eastern Sicily and is possibly mentioned by Diodorus Siculus in his account of the First Punic War. Its identification was proposed by Klüver and taken up by Holm in consideration of essential toponymic data (the site dominates the crags of a hilly district called Adragna) and now is supported by archaeological data from the systematic excavations that unambiguously demonstrated a general and violent destruction of the city around the middle of the 3rd century BC with sporadic presence, perhaps of garrisons, during the Second Punic War.
The site
The ancient city was settled at the beginning of the 5th century BC and was undoubtedly a Selinunte colony, lying between the Hellenized Sican area and the Punic Elymian area, with a decisive pre-eminence of the Punic component from the beginning of the 4th century. The imposing ruins indicate the strategic importance of the site which dominated the road that connected Selinunte with Akragas. It may have been the cornerstone of the defense system built by the Carthaginians. It was destroyed during the 3rd century BC according to archaeological excavations.
Regular excavations started in 1968 since when annual systematic campaigns have brought to light the necropolis, the mighty walls and vast sectors of the city and suburban area.
The city extended over an almost triangular undulating territory culminating in the NE with the sacred area of the acropolis and sloping down to terraces towards the SW in the direction of the deep saddle that distinguishes the two hills on which the entire inhabited area develops and which perhaps coincided with a fundamental road axis of the city itself.
The public source identifies “Monte Adranone” as ancient Italian city and archaeological site. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Monte, Adranone and ancient.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Monte Adranone”, the useful work is to connect “ancient Italian city and archaeological site” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3861168. VIAF identifies the subject as 315137662. The Library of Congress control number is sh97007719. Authority coordinates are 37.684, 13.140. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1968.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Monte Adranone” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.