Travel Guide Polizzi Generosa

Polizzi Generosa is about ten kilometres past Castellana Sicula. The village of Polizzi Generosa, with about 3,200 inhabitants, grew up around the castle built by Roger I in 1076, but it had been inhabited since the 4th century B.C. by Greek settlers who named it Polizzi. But it owes its compound name to an original anecdote. It only earned its nickname of "Generosa" in 1535. At that time, the Emperor Charles V, visiting the city, was welcomed with such pomp and generosity that he donated the baldachin that crowned his throne and officially attributed to its name the qualifier "generous". Along its streets, adorned with several palaces, we will stop mainly in the Chiesa Matrice to admire the triptych representing a Madonna and Child, which a particularly gifted Flemish stranger had the good idea to leave here. Afterwards, you can taste one of the "generous" hazelnut pastries that the area is very rich in and the famous Sfoglio Polizzano cake, a dessert invented in the 17th century by the Benedictine nuns of the Santa Margherita convent in Polizzi, which combines flavours with a mixture of tuma (a fresh sheep's cheese), cinnamon and chocolate. Not far away is Piano Battaglia, the ski resort of the Madonie (1,619 m), in the centre of the massif. It owes its name to a battle that took place in 1069 between Arabs and Normans.