Nissoria is a small inland hill town in the province of Enna, set in central Sicily near the Salso River, between Agira, Assoro and Leonforte. Its present centre stands on a plateau above fertile countryside, with surrounding hills that keep its character closely tied to farming, rural work and local community life.
The town’s identity is unusually double. Its earliest origin is traced to the Byzantine casale of Nysura, founded in the 6th century in contrada Torre; the name is linked to the Greek *Sunorì*, meaning “closeness” or “proximity”. After later Arab and Norman phases, the modern settlement was created in the 18th century when inhabitants moved from the Torre valley to the plateau of today’s town.
This layered beginning gives Nissoria the feel of a place “born twice”: partly a memory of a Byzantine rural settlement, partly an 18th-century Sicilian agricultural town with a later feudal connection to the Moncada family. Its distinctiveness lies in that relationship between old valley origins, planned plateau settlement and enduring contadina identity.
Patron Saint:
Saint Joseph (San Giuseppe) – 19 March
Nearest Airport:
Catania (Fontanarossa) – (57 km, 00:53)
Neighboring Cities:
