ERICE

(124 km) Erice, previously a sacred city for the Elimi, was the site of a temple dedicated to the goddess of fertility, Astarte, according to the beliefs of the Phoenicians. The Greeks resumed the cult of the goddess identifying her in Aphrodite as well as the Romans in Venus Ericina. It enjoys an exceptionally isolated position which has allowed it to preserve its medieval appearance with its narrow stone-paved streets, steep hills, picturesque houses,

the flowery courtyards in the Arab way and the incomparable beauty of the landscape. The most important monument of Erice is the fourteenth-century Mother Church of 1314, flanked by a mighty bell tower with graceful mullioned windows and crowned with merlons. Opposite the Town Hall is the fifteenth-century former church of S. Domenico which houses one of the offices of the Ettore Majorana Center for Scientific Culture, directed by the well-known physicist Antonino Zichichi,

where every year an international conference is held for the study and research on scientific topics of particular importance.