Val Demone

Old map of Sicily with the three valli; Val Demone delineated in red

Val Demone or Val di Demona (English: Province of Demona^[1]) is a historical and geographical region encompassing the north-eastern third of Sicily. Historically, it was one of the three valli of Sicily.

Val Demone was the last part of the island to be conquered by the Arabs in the 10th century. Christian refugees from other parts of Sicily congregated there, and the region remaine throughout in contact with the Byzantine provinces in southern Italy. Consequently it was the least Arabicized and Islamicized part of Sicily.^[2]

References

1. The Val in Sicilian and in Italian a grammatically masculine term, and it does not refer to a "Valley" as is usual in Italian geographical names, which are although always grammatically feminine, but to one of the Provinces or Governorates into which Sicily was administratively divided under the Arab rule and up until the 1812 administrative reform. The corresponding Arab term is Wāli, and the Sicilian Val is akin to the Arab Wilayah or the Turkish Vilayet, used as it would be a calque of the English term Shire
2. Metcalfe (2009), pp. 34–36, 40

Sources

• Metcalfe, Alex (2009), The Muslims of medieval Italy, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-2008-1