Sicani

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Sicani

The Sicani (Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the historical stage in the development of the Greek language spanning across the Archaic Greece , Classical Greece , and Hellenistic civilization periods of ancient Greece and the classical antiquity....
S??a??? - Sikanoi) or Sicanians were one of three ancient people of Sicily

Sicily

Sicily is an Autonomous regions with special statute of Italy. Of all the regions of Italy, Sicily covers the largest land area at 25,708 km? and currently has just over five million inhabitants....
present at the time of Phoenician and Greek colonization.

Sicani are thought to be the oldest inhabitants of Sicily with a recorded name. The Greek historian Thucydides

Thucydides

Thucydides was a Greeks history and author of the History of the Peloponnesian War, which recounts the 5th century B.C. war between Sparta and Athens to the year 411 B.C....
claimed they immigrated from Iberia

Iberia

The name Iberia refers to three historical regions of the old world:* Iberian Peninsula, in Southwest Europe, location of modern-day Spain and Portugal...
, but his basis for saying this is unknown. The Elymians

Elymians

The Elymians were an ancient people who inhabited the western part of Sicily during the Bronze Age and Classical antiquity....
are thought to be the next recorded people to settle Sicily, perhaps from the Aegean

Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkans and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey respectively....
or Anatolia

Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
.

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Encyclopedia

The Sicani (Greek

Ancient Greek

Sicily

History

The Sicani are thought to be the oldest inhabitants of Sicily with a recorded name. The Greek historian Thucydides

Thucydides

Iberia

Elymians

Aegean Sea

Anatolia

Sicels

The Sicels were one of the three main tribes who, before the arrival of Colonies in antiquity, inhabited Sicily, according to the traditional ethnic division of Thucydides ....
were the next to arrive, from mainland Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia....
, perhaps Liguria

Ligures

The Ligures were an ancient people who gave their name to Liguria, which once stretched from Northern Italy into southern Gaul. According to Plutarch they called themselves Ambrones which means ?people of the water?....
, and settled in the east. Historical records start with the Phoenicians, who established colonies in the 11th century BCE, and especially with the Greeks, who founded the colony of Syracuse

Syracuse, Italy

Syracuse is a historic city in southern Italy, the Capital of the province of Syracuse. The city is noted for its rich Greek history, culture, amphitheatres, architecture and association to Archimedes, playing an important role in ancient times as one of the top powers of the Mediterranean world; it is over 2,700 years old....
, which eventually became the largest Greek city, in 734 BCE. Other Greek colonies were established around the island. The indigenous Sicilians were gradually absorbed by these colonizing peoples and finally disappeared as distinct peoples under Roman occupation.

Language

A few short inscriptions using the Greek alphabet

Greek alphabet

The Greek alphabet is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th century BC or early 8th century BCE....
have been found in the extinct Sicanian language. Except for names they have not been translated, and the language is unclassified

Unclassified language

Unclassified languages are languages whose genetic affiliation has not been established, mostly due to lack of reliable data. The question of the genetic affiliation of languages belongs to the domain of historical linguistics....
due to lack of data.