Now summer residential zone for its chilly air and its scented summer nights, Avola Antica keeps ruins of the previous Abola, totally destroyed by the 1693 nature disaster. The site of the ancient city is dominated on its top by a mid-XIX century villa, once a two towered castle, from which was visible the whole coast from Cassibile to Capo Passero. Around the castrum, on the steep slopes, where built several homes and many churches. Severa spiral staircases and old cisterns carved into the rock along the hairpin-bends are pretty interesting. Several graves indicate habitation of the area since prehistory. Controversial is the matter concerning its descendent from the Ancient Iblae as classic historiography claimed. In the V century Stefano Bizantino referred to Abola, whose coins showed an ox and, on the other side, a bunch of grapes. The town, after being part of the royal property, became baronage peerage in 1361. From 1542 to 1812 was Pignatelli Cortés marquisate.

(source: Avola, la città esagonale)