Sòlanto the marinara fraction on the homonymous promontory.

According to recent hypotheses supported by archaeological finds, the primitive Punic city of Solunto (in Semitic Kfr), dated from the 8th to the 5th century BC and remembered by the historian Thucydides, it was located near the promontory of Sòlanto. The toponym derives from the Greek sólos («ferro ferrous»). Following the invasion of Dionysius I of Syracuse, the town was destroyed and later, around 383 BC, the second city of Solunto was built on Monte Catalfano, of Hellenistic origin.

Caste of Solanto Santa Flavia

Today there are few traces of the Punic area due to the recent growth of buildings, such as a necropolis with chamber tombs (destroyed in April 1972 during construction works) near the Santa Flavia railway station, an industrial district with kilns, a probable tofet with remains of burnt bones and “entroned” stele and, at the locality of Olivella, a hypogeal burial with dromos. Among the ceramic materials found there are kylikes of Ionic production, aryballoi corinzi, an Etruscan kantharos of bucchero, Punic amphorae of Ramón 1.1.2.1 and Ramón 4.2.1.4. [4] The Punic coinage of the city essentially depicted the head of Heracles with a lion’s head cover (leontè) and a shrimp on the reverse.

The Caste

Solanto Castle, whose root of the name Solus comes from the Carthaginian word Selaim which stands for cliff, rises in a splendid position, in the middle between two bays, dominating, with its majestic architecture, the romantic gulf.

Caste of Solanto Santa Flavia

Built in the Norman period as a defensive bulwark of the adjacent tonnara, the Castle became a sudden fame for having been the refuge of Queen Bianca of Navarre, in her flight from Palermo, at night, to escape the desires of love and power of the count of Modica, Bernardo Cabrera. For its exceptional position, overlooking the sea, this place has always been the domain of great Sicilian aristocratic families such as Filangeri, Spadafora, Alliata, and in the past also a leisure residence for King Ferdinand IV of Bourbon and Queen Maria Carolina.
The small fortress came to the present owners, the Vanni princes of San Vincenzo around 1870. Already in the eighteenth century, a body of residence had been added to the tower, thus transforming the original fortified site into an elegant residence.
The construction of the castle has continued over the centuries, with overlapping styles that reflect the various epochs of belonging to the current structure.