An ancient Greek town of southeastern Sicily, 22 miles northwest of Syracuse. Originally held by the Sicels (Siculi), its command of the fertile plain on the north made it an attractive site to the Chalcidians from Naxos, who colonized it in 729 BC. Early in the 5th century Hippocrates of Gela subjugated the city, and in 476, Hieron of Syracuse, having destroyed the towns of Catana and Naxos, relocated their inhabitants in Leontini.Twice the appeals of Leontini for aid led to unsuccessful Athenian expeditions into Sicily: in 427, following a Syracusan attack on the city, and in 415, when its democrats had been expelled by Syracuse-supported oligarchs.
Marcus Claudius Marcellus stormed Leontini in 214 BC, as did the Muslims in AD 846847. It was almost totally ruined by the earthquake of 1693. (Encyclopędia Britannica Online.)
