1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Grammichele

GRAMMICHELE, a town of Sicily, in the province of Catania, 55 m. S.W. of it by rail and 31 m. direct. Pop. (1901) 15,075. It was built in 1693, after the destruction by an earthquake of the old town of Occhialà to the north; the latter, on account of the similarity of name, is generally identified with Echetla, a frontier city between Syracusan and Carthaginian territory in the time of Hiero II., which appears to have been originally a Sicel city in which Greek civilization prevailed from the 5th century onwards. To the east of Grammichele a cave shrine of Demeter, with fine votive terra-cottas, has been discovered.

See Mon. Lincei, vii. (1897), 201; Not. degli scavi (1902), 223.