The earliest evidence of human activity dates to the Neolithic, where it appears visitors to the island would arrive temporarily in order to extract obsidian for dispersion elsewhere in the central Mediterranean. The earliest permanent settlement would not begin until the Bronze Age, with the primary site, Mursia, being the only settlement known from the period. The iconic Sesi, megalithic multi-burial structures, would be built during this period as well. The original population of Pantelleria did not come from Sicily, but were of
Iberian or Ibero-
Ligurian ancestry. After a considerable interval, during which the island probably remained uninhabited, the
Carthaginians took possession of it, no doubt owing to its importance as a station on the way to Sicily. This probably occurred around the beginning of the 7th centuryBC. Their
acropolis was the twin hill of San Marco and Santa Teresa, south of the present town of Pantelleria. The town has considerable remains of walls made of rectangular blocks of masonry and also of a number of cisterns.
Punic tombs have been discovered, and the votive terra-cottas of a small sanctuary of the Punic period were found near the north coast. The
Romans occupied the island as the
Fasti Triumphales record in 255BC, lost it again the next year, and recovered it in 217BC. It struck
bronze coins, originally with a
Punic inscription but changing to
Latin by the 1st centuryBC. Under the
empire, it served as a place of banishment for prominent persons and members of the imperial family. The town enjoyed
municipal rights. In 700AD,
Arabs conquered the island. In 1123,
Roger II of Sicily took the island, and in 1311 an
Aragonese fleet under the command of
Lluís de Requesens won a considerable victory here. Requesens's family became princes of Pantelleria until 1553, when a
Turkish fleet commanded by
Dragut sacked the island. A naval battle took place near the island in July 1586 when an armed English
merchant fleet of five ships managed to
repel an attack by eleven
Spanish and Maltese galleys. A
Siculo-Arabic dialect similar to
Maltese was the vernacular of the island until the late 18th century, when the
Romance Sicilian superseded it. The modern Sicilian language in Pantelleria contains many
Arabic loanwords, and most of the island's place names are of
Semitic origin. During the
Napoleonic Wars, the British considered the possibility of taking over Pantelleria (together with
Lampedusa and
Linosa) so as to be able to supply
Malta, but a royal commission stated in an 1812 report that there would be considerable difficulties in this venture. Pantelleria's capture was regarded as crucial to
Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily in 1943 as planes based on Pantelleria could readily reach Sicily. In
Operation Corkscrew the Allies bombarded Pantelleria heavily from air and sea in the days before the invasion. The garrison surrendered as the landing troops approached. Pantelleria then became a vital base for Allied aircraft during the assault on Sicily.
Archaeological sites A Middle
Bronze Age village was on the west coast, southeast of the harbour, with a rampart of small blocks of
lava, about high, wide at the base and at the top, upon the undefended eastern side. Remains of huts were found there, with pottery, tools of
obsidian, and other artifacts. These objects are in the museum at
Syracuse. To the southeast, in the district known as the Cunelie, are many tombs, known as
sesi. They are similar in character to the
nuraghe of
Sardinia, though of smaller size, and consist of round or elliptical towers with sepulchral chambers in them, built of rough blocks of lava. Fifty-seven of them can still be traced. The largest is an ellipse of about , but most of the
sesi have a diameter of only . The identical character of the pottery found in the
sesi with that found in the prehistoric village proves that the former are the tombs of the inhabitants of the latter.
Monuments and other buildings The island has scattered typical one-level buildings called
dammuso of unknown but probably remote origins. A
dammuso is a
dry stone building with thick walls that usually appear black due to the extensive use of
volcanic rock. They have characteristic domes on top painted white to avoid overheating. The domes collect rainwater that is directed to a large tank (usually below the building) or to the nearby soil for use in the dry season. Most of the other constructions were destroyed during the
Second World War. One notable exception is the castle
Barbacane, a renaissance building formed by an irregularly quadrangular plan with internal court joined to a squared base tower. == Geology ==