NAXOS  , the earliest

Greek colony in Sicily, was founded by Theocles from Chalcis in 735 B.C., on the E. coast, S. of Tauromenium (mod . Taormina), in a low-lying situation just N. of the mouth of the river Alcantara, where the castle of Schiso now stands . The adoption of the name of Naxos, the island in the Aegean Sea, seems to indicate that there were Naxians among its founders . Within a few years it became strong enough to found Leontini and Catana . Naxos was the warmest ally of Athens in the Sicilian expedition . In 403 B.C. it was destroyed by Dionysius and handed over to the Sicels, but was never rebuilt . Its place was supplied in 358 by Tauromenium . Scanty traces of its walls are to be seen, of irregular blocks of lava, especially on the south, parallel to the river (E . A . Freeman, Inst. of Sic. i . 323) . Without the city stood the altar of Apollo Archegetes, at which all sacred embassies that left Sicily sacrificed before their departure (Thuc. vi .

3) .