The lava stone elephant and the cathedral of St Agatha
The heart of Catania is Piazza del Duomo, a baroque square designed by Giovanni Battista Vaccarini after the earthquake of 1693. In the centre stands the Fontana dell'Elefante, the symbol of the city: a Roman-era elephant carved in lava stone, called "u Liotru" by the Catanese, carrying an Egyptian obelisk on its back.
The cathedral of Sant'Agata, with a white marble façade by Vaccarini, holds the relics of the city's patron saint, Agatha, a young Catanese martyr of the third century, and the tomb of the composer Vincenzo Bellini, born in Catania. Every year from 3 to 5 February the feast of Sant'Agata, one of the largest religious festivals in the world, fills the streets with hundreds of thousands of devotees dressed in white.
Tip: from the square, the Fontana dell'Amenano lets you glimpse the underground river; the nearby Badia di Sant'Agata has a terrace on its dome with views over the city and Etna.
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