Ramacca

The town of Ramacca is sited inland at 266 meters above the sea level, on the first heights that rise to the west of the plain of Catania. Although inhabited since Greek times, the town of Ramacca only developed between 1710 and 1712.

Ramacca offers a few buildings of architectural interest. Next to the central town square is the Mother Church, dedicated to the Natività di Maria SS. It was built in 1700 with simple architectural lines of no particular style, decorated with stuccoes, a stone chip and concrete floor and a polychromatic marble altar. The church of the Immaculate Conception has a neo-classic façade and a single nave, decorated with stuccoes, altars and oil paintings. The apse was rebuilt in 1977 and still conserves the end niche with a wooden statue of Our Lady by an unknown artist, while there is an inlayed wooden tabernacle dating from the 1800s on the altar.

Adjoining the church of the Immaculate Conception is the 18th century Capuchin convent which hosts the Parish of S. Giuseppe. There is also an interesting archaeological Museum which displays finds from the explorations and excavations that have been carried out in the surrounding areas since the 1970s. There are numerous archaeological sites in the area, among which the Montagna zone, where the remains of the necropolis of an ancient Greek town have been brought to light, the Castellito zone, where there is a Roman villa with a splendid mosaic floor and the Torricella zone, site of a Bronze Age village and necropolis.

Large parts of this area are dedicated to the cultivation of artichokes and citrusfruits, in particular blood oranges.