What to see in Scicli, itinerary including the main monuments and places of interest in the Baroque city, including the Chiafura Caves, the Church of San Matteo and the Castle.
Tourist information
City of the province of Ragusa in Sicily, Scicli extends over the coastal strip about 5 km from the sea.
Its territory includes the coastal towns of Donnalucata, Playa Grande, Cava d’Aliga, Arizza and Sampieri, with Punta Pisciotto.
Scicli is one of the cities of the Val di Noto, rebuilt in Baroque style after the disastrous earthquake of 1693, included in the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The origins of the city of Scicli most likely date back to the Sicilian period, dating back over three thousand years ago, while there are testimonies of the human presence in the area dating back to the period from the third millennium BC. to the fifteenth century BC.
The topographical structure of Scicli is configured between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with a gradual passage from the hill to the plain, which includes the old city, located on the hill of San Matteo, and the part located at the confluence of the valleys of San Bartolomeo, called the "Quarries" of Santa Maria La Nova and the Fiumara of Modica.
A characteristic of the territory of Scicli is the presence of karst caves, of which an excellent example are the caves of Chiafura, located on the side of the hill of San Matteo, reachable through paths with stairways, flanked by dry stone walls.
Until the sixties of the last century, the caves were inhabited by poor families.
What see
At the top of the hill, where the ruins of the old Castle of the three cantons are located, stands the magnificent Church of San Matteo, which can also be admired from the central Piazza Italia, where the typical eighteenth-century buildings overlook, and the Mother Church of the Madonna delle Milizie, dating back to the first half of the eighteenth century and built in Baroque style.
In the same square there is also the fifteenth century Church of San Bartolomeo.
This church was the only one to resist the earthquake of 1693, even if the current prospect dates back to the nineteenth century.
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In one of the oldest quarters of the city there is the Church of Santa Maria la Nova, of very ancient origins, whose neoclassical facade is a reconstruction completed in 1816.
The beautiful churches of San Giovanni Evangelista, Santa Teresa, Church and Convent of Carmime and San Michele Arcangelo, as well as the Palaces, Beneventaro, Fava, Spadaro and the suggestive via Mormino Penna stand out.
