Tauromenion

Taormina's genesis and early history began with the Greeks who founded and named the town in 358 B.C.; travelling to Naxos and settling there had later extended their territory to Taormina.

Desired for its strategic position overlooking the sea and valley, it was seized by the Romans, and later fell into Byzantine hands. The Arabs, on their arrival, enriched the surrounding countryside, building an efficient irrigation system for crops, ensuring Taormina's desirability and verdant beauty.

During the Sicilian Struggle for freedom from the French, and the Sicilian Vespers uprising, Taormina gave its support to the Spanish Aragon family, who, once established in Sicily, rewarded the city richly. Various Spanish and Aragon ruling families funded the building of churches and great houses in the charming Gothic Romanesque style.

Taormina has proved a source of inspiration to novelists and writers throughout the centuries from Ovid to Goethe and D.H. Lawrence who, whilst in Taormina wrote "Lady Chatterley's Lover", and based various aspects of his novels on his experiences in the city. Goethe praised Taormina in his "Italian Journey", to such a degree that it became an integral part of the Grand Tour, upon which fashionable English gentlemen and intellectuals embarked for purposes of education and refinement in the 1800's.

Basking in its new found international popularity, Taormina expanded with the creation of numerous new hotels, many of which are still thriving, as Taormina's popularity has not waned.

Also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taormina

http://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI3211034/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timaeus_(historian)& http://www.argonauts-book.com/maps.html & http://ebooks.cambridge.org/ebook.jsf?bid=CBO9780511733246