LEONTINI

ancient Greek town of southeastern Sicily, 22 miles northwest of Syracuse. Originally held by the Sicels (Siculi), its command of the fertile plain on the north made it an attractive site to the Chalcidians from Naxos, who colonized it in 729 BC. Early in the 5th century Hippocrates of Gela subjugated the city, and in 476, Hieron of Syracuse, having destroyed the towns of Catana and Naxos, relocated their inhabitants in Leontini. Twice the appeals of Leontini for aid led to unsuccessful Athenian expeditions into Sicily: in 427, following a Syracusan attack on the city, and in 415, when its democrats had been expelled by Syracuse-supported oligarchs. Marcus Claudius Marcellus stormed Leontini in 214 BC, as did the Muslims in AD 846847. It was almost totally ruined by the earthquake of 1693. The historian Polybius describes it as lying in a valley between two hills, each topped by an acropolis. Excavations in 1950 unearthed a Sicel hut village and the remains of the Castellaccio, a strongly fortified medieval castle, on the eastern acropolis. The modern town of Lentini, Sicily, a prosperous agricultural centre of over 20,000 inhabitants, lies somewhat to the northwest of the original site.