Acate

Acate is a small inland town in Sicily's Ragusa province, perched around 199 metres on the edge of the Hyblaean plateau where the land drops toward the Dirillo river valley. Until 1938 it was called Biscari, and that older name is still bound up with its identity and its main landmark: the Castello dei Principi di Biscari, founded in 1494 and rebuilt over the 17th and 18th centuries into a princely residence, with a surviving late-medieval tower at its core. The town itself grew up around the castle in orderly, straight streets laid out by the ruling Paternò Castello family, lined with modest row houses and anchored by churches like the Matrice and San Vincenzo Martire.

This is working agricultural country, not a resort destination—vineyards, open fields, and the plastic greenhouses typical of southeastern Sicily dominate the landscape. The municipality does reach the sea at Marina di Acate, roughly 13 km away, a modest beach settlement with pale sand amid the greenhouse belt.

Visitors come less for polish than for authenticity: Holy Week processions, a Good Friday sacred representation, the San Vincenzo feast with its palio, and September's rural-heritage festival. It suits travelers interested in lesser-known Sicilian towns, local history, and unhurried countryside rather than curated tourism.