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City (55.000 inhabitants), main town of the homonymous province, in the southeast sector of the island, not far from the southern coast, on two necks between the torrents Saint Anna and San Biagio, dominating the Valley Of The Temples.The economy of Agrigento bases himself on the collection, the transformation and the commerce of the hinterland agricultural products.
In big expansion it is the tourism, insured from his very precious Valley Of The Temples, considered by the Unesco as humanity's property.

Agrigento was in the past one of the most important towns of the Mediterranean.

His territory was lived since the Neolithic, but Akragas is remembered above all because corresponding to the ancient one, founded between 580 and 583 B.c. as Doric colony by the Rodii-Cretesi of Gela. Akragas shows, in ancient Greek, the hill, that is the acropolis, from which the valley is admired.

In 570 B.c. the despot Falaride wanted to supply it with walls and raised the first temples among which the Hercules (end of the VI century) temple.

The town was at the centre of coalitions and conflicts which involved Cartaginesi, Siracusani and Romans. Terone, that ruled ruled from 488 to 471 B.c. In 480 defeated the Cartaginesi at Himera. This victory was almost celebrated with the building contemporary of the series of the temples that today we could admire.

The lived was annihilated by the Cartaginesi in 406 B.c. to rise again in 340 B.c. with Timoleonte from Corinth.
Akragas was gained a first time in 262 by Romans; was regained by the Cartaginesi once more and definitively submitted from Romans in 210 B.c. which changed the name in Agrigentum.

The progressive decadence of Rome and expanding of the Christianity, determined the progressive depopulation
of the lived and the holy area of the Valley Of The Temples. The remained families preferred a position more repaired, therefore they went on a cliff. Anyway after centuries of stay, they underwent in 827 the conquest of Arabics, who called the town Gergent,
from which Girgenti, denomination which marked it until the XX century and precisely up to 1927.
The Normans kept it starting from 1087 and below of them Agrigento changed itself in an especially rich diocese. Precious testimony is that of the Arab geographer ldrisi who describes the town " between the most illustrious metropolises, animated from a continuos bustle of people, robust and high the fortress, charming the town which is of well ancient civilization and of universal reputation, Girgenti is one of the most impressive fortresses and country among the most excellent "; people run there from every part, here the ships are picked up,
they direct the brigades here. "his palaces exceed in height the ones of other towns and it is a true seduction for who admires them".

In the centuries XIII and XIV the Chiaramonte did the possible to build a new one and more powerful surrounded boundary walls and several monastery buildings and churches.

The town follows the destinies of Sicily. Under the Aragonesi (1302) the treaty of Caltabellotta is stipulated, a centre little being far. The town lives a long darkness period under the various rules. The "Moti rivoluzionari" of 1820 and of 1848 awake the civic consciences. After the unity of Italy, the principal town street's name will be Rome.

In 1943 it was struck from the bombardments and 1966 by a landslide which caused destructions and danger for the precious Valley Of The Temples.

The plant of the old town reflects the arrangement carried out by Arabics, pressed with tight and tangled streets and
small and narrow squares. Worthy civil and religious buildings of remarkable interest emerge in this texture. The pre-existent new town, developed it about to the core, is on the contrary, several airy and slender.