Marsala

Marsala is readily associated with its world-famous, richly colored eponymous fortified wine, and your main reason for stopping may be to visit some of the many wineries in the area and sample the product. But this quiet seaside town, together with the nearby island of Mozia, was also once the main Carthaginian base in Sicily: it was from here that Carthage fought for supremacy over the island against Greece and Rome, leaving behind intriguing archaeological sites. In 1773, a British merchant named John Woodhouse happened upon the town and discovered that the wine here, once fortified, was as good as the port long imported by the British from Portugal. Two other wine merchants, Whitaker and Ingham, rushed in, and by 1800 Marsala was exporting wine all over the British Empire. Later in the 19th century, Marsala played a significant role in the Risorgimento, the movement for Italian liberty. It was here that the swashbuckling national hero Giuseppe Garibaldi landed in 1860 with his thousand Redshirts to begin the campaign to oust the Bourbons from southern Italy.