A city of geometrical streets and substantial buildings, very little pre-1693, the date of the most disastrous earthquake. Some churches are ostentatiously impressive (San Nicolò is Sicily’s largest) but short on art. The opera theatre, Teatro Bellini, is named for Catania’s famous citizen and any evening in the Bellini gardens, on the hour, you will see the rock groups, children and political orators stop and listen to a few bars of a Bellini aria – Casta diva, perhaps – played over loudspeakers. The Bellini Museum has manuscript scores of the operas and some fascinating biographical material on this supreme bel canto composer who lived hard and died young.

The main street, Via Etnea, runs dead-straight to the foot of the volcano. The best excursions start from Catania – one in the small hours, seeing the glow of fires on the slopes and reaching the summit at sunrise.

For railway enthusiasts: Catania is also the terminus for the Circumetnea narrow-gauge railway, which encompasses Etna at a respectful distance. It navigates a troubled landscape among villages as sombre and jumbled as the basalt and lava-blocks around them.

The city has quality shops, well-kept gardens and a go-ahead atmosphere. The centre, Piazza del Duomo, is adorned with an absurd fountain, an Egyptian obelisk on top of an elephant carved out of lava, surmounting classical sculptures. Its designer was the monk Vaccarini, an amateur architect who reconstructed most of Catania after the 1693 earthquake and otherwise made a decent job of it.