Do you want to know the ancient name of Agrigento? We’ll discover this and much more in today’s article. Agrigento was founded by Gela around the year 581 B.C., making it the youngest of all the Greek colonies established in Sicily during the period of major foundations. Tradition has preserved well the names of its two founders, Ariston and Pistilos, while the gods for whom the first temples were raised were Zeus and Athena.
The history of Agrigento begins with the tyranny of Phalaris, which arose a decade after the city’s founding, during the construction of the Temple of Zeus on the acropolis. Legend is tied to the name of Phalaris, and it is credible that he expanded Agrigento’s territories by subjugating the Sicanians of the interior.
One tradition even suggests that he was on the verge of taking control of the city of Himera, located on the northern coast of the island, whose territory connected well with that of Agrigento. The two cities were eventually united about seventy years later by Theron of the Emmenid family, who ruled beautiful Agrigento from around 488 to 473 B.C.
Himera was united with Agrigento only through the person of the tyrant, maintaining its total autonomy and right to mint coins. However, compared to Agrigento, it always remained secondary. On its coins, it added Agrigento’s emblem, a crab, to its own symbol, a rooster. Theron’s power inevitably attracted the attention of Carthage, which exerted its influence over the entire western part of the island.
Theron’s adversary, Thrasillus, supported by his son-in-law Anaxilas of Rhegium, and joined by Selinunte, sought Carthage’s aid. Thus, Carthage decided to wage war against Theron, primarily aiming to restore Thrasillus to power in Himera. Carthage’s forces were indeed formidable, but they suffered a truly memorable defeat, comparable to the Persians’ loss at Salamis.
Here’s what the ancient name of Agrigento was
Today, what we know about the city of Agrigento is that it has left us a wonderful series of coins. Initially, it minted didrachms and tetradrachms of silver, featuring an eagle on one side and a crab on the other. It remained absolutely faithful to these two types until around the year 420 B.C., when, under the influence of Syracuse’s coinage, it adopted the quadriga on the reverse of its tetradrachms, leaving the eagle on the obverse and even depicting two eagles devouring a kid.
The marvel of Agrigento’s coinage is undoubtedly the decadrachm, which is particularly rare despite a recent discovery. Additionally, Agrigento minted gold coins, although after the disaster of 406 B.C., its coinage became impoverished, continuing in bronze until the Roman era.
To get to the heart of the article, we can say that, in ancient times, the city of Agrigento had another name: Girgenti. It was only in the relatively recent year of 1927, by decree, that it changed from the old name of Girgenti to the current name of Agrigento, after the ancient Greco-Roman city that once stood there.
