Augusta is a town and comune in the province of Syracuse, located on the eastern coast of Sicily. The city is one of the main harbours in Italy, especially for oil refineries (ExxonMobil and others as part of the complex Augusta-Priolo) which are in its vicinity. The city is situated 35 km north of Syracuse and faces the Ionian Sea.
The old town is an island, made in the 16th century by cutting an isthmus and is connected to the mainland by two bridges. One bridge was built recently (Viaduct Frederick II of Swabia) and the other built when the city was founded and is called the Spanish Gate. Augusta is home to two ports.
Founded 27 centuries ago, Megara Hyblaea is one of the oldest Greek colonies of Sicily. It was destroyed by its rival Syracuse, was raised from its ruins, then taken by the Romans together with Syracuse during the Second Punic War. It remains an archaeological site, a testimony of the organization of a Greek colony of the Archaic period. Upon the ruins of one of its suburbs, Xiphonia, the city of Augusta was founded in 1232 by Emperor Frederick II. After the Angevin domination, it became part of Aragonese Sicily and, from 1362, it was a fief of Guglielmo Raimondo II Moncada. It returned to be a royal possession (under Spain) in 1560, and was extensively fortified to counter Turkish pirates.
In 1675 its harbour was the site of a naval battle between the Dutch-Spanish and the French fleets. The town suffered a major earthquake and tsunami in 1693. During World War II, Augusta was invaded on July 13, 1943 by the Eighth Army of the Allied troops led by the British General Montgomery. The city houses a great number of churches, the Convent of the Domenican Fathers, and the Castello Svevo (Hohenstaufen Castle, built c. 1232). The castle has a square plan of a 62-metre (203 ft) side length, with eight towers.
