Near Roccazzo, in open country a short way from Mazara del Vallo, archaeologists have recovered some of the oldest signs of human life in the Mazara area: flint scrapers, burins and blades from the Upper Palaeolithic. These are small, hand-worked tools, left by the hunters and gatherers who were active here thousands of years before the Phoenicians turned Mazara into a trading post on the sea.
What to see
Roccazzo is an archaeological site rather than a monument. It lies outside the built-up town, close to the hamlet of Borgata Costiera, and is known as an Eneolithic settlement — that is, from the Copper Age. What makes it matter are the finds recovered on the spot: Upper Palaeolithic flint tools — scrapers, burins and blades — along with other worked objects, which place this stretch of countryside among the earliest records of human life in the Mazara district. Do not expect temples or standing walls; the value here lies in the long sequence of occupation that the ground has yielded.
Our editors' tip
Come to Roccazzo in the right frame of mind: it rewards anyone drawn to prehistory and curious about where Mazara's very long story begins, not those after dramatic ruins. Before setting out towards Borgata Costiera, place it within the wider picture of the territory — from the Mesolithic settlements at Gorghi Tondi to the Neolithic rock-cut tombs — so that those few flint tools carry the weight they deserve.