ARAGONA

Aragona lies near the Belvedere mount. It was founded in the beginning of the 17^th century at the behest of noble Baldassarre III Naselli, Count of Comiso, who named after his mother’s. Some year later, he would be proclaimed Prince of Aragon by King Philip IV. Until the early 1800s, the city belonged to the Nasellis.

Several of its buildings are worth-visiting: the Church of the Mercede and, attached, the former Convent of the Mercedari Fathers, the Palazzo Feudale, built between the 17^th and the 18^th century, the 1600’s Church of the Holy Rosary, the 1700’s Church of the Carmine, the Mother Church, dedicated to the Magi.

In the city environs are sites of naturalstic and archaeological interest: the vulcanelli (small volcanoes), along the Macalube district, a flat area made dry by natural gas coming from the small craters, only few centimetres in height; the remnants of a Roman villa in the Fontanazza district.