La villa romana di Cava Cinque Porte e gli insediamenti rurali in località Cavadonna di Sopra (Siracusa): nuove considerazioni alla luce dei dati archivistici e topografici

Abstract

This contribution reconsiders the information that can be deduced from what is already known in the bibliography about the Roman villa of Cava Cinque Porte in the territory of Noto (Syracuse) and several other rural settlements in the vicinity of Cavadonna di Sopra in light of the scant bibliographical
information and evidence drawn from unpublished documents in the archives of the Direzione Generale Antichità e Belle Arti (Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero della Cultura). This extensive district on the eastern edge of the Hyblaean Plateau, corresponds with the catchment basin fed by the Cavadonna river and boasts optimal conditions for human settlement, namely fertile
land, abundant spring water and raw materials, and a strategic, defensible position on the road between Syracuse and Acrae. It has been an area of
significant human settlement in south-eastern Sicily since prehistoric times.

KEYWORDS: Cava Cinque Porte, Cavadonna, Noto, Roman imperial villa, thermae, Francesco Saverio Cavallari, Giuseppe Fiorelli.