Monte Bonifato (Mount Bonifato)

Mount Bonifato is located in the hinterland of Golfo di Castellammare, between the valley of Fiume Freddo (a river on the west) and Fiume Jato (a river on the east).
It shows quite steep faces on the south, while the declivity is more gradual in the northern part of the mountain, in proximity of Alcamo.
Until the first decades of the 19th century the mountain was covered with an oak wood of ilex and downy oak. In the thirties they began a massive reforestation prevalently with Aleppo's pine that is the prevailing essence nowadays. The access to the mount and the Nature Reserve is provided by a town street: Via per monte Bonifato. Along this road there is a large number of holiday houses, especially concentrated between the fourth and fifth hairpin bend from the valley floor, and it is illuminated for a large part of its course (with the exception of the last mile, before the entrance into the Reserve area).
From the peak you can admire a landscape with the mountains of Palermo on the east and the island of Marettimo in the west; on clearer days you can also see Ustica in the north and mount Cammarata in the south-east.

The stratigraphy of Mount Bonifato is quite complex as this mountain is made up of many layers of rock, dating back to geological periods. They have found, in particular, the following formations:

Formation Sciacca (Norian-Rhaetic)
Formation Inici (Hettangian-Sinemurian)
Formation Buccheri (Liassic superior-Tithonian inferior)
FormationLattimusa (Tithonian superior-Valanginian inferior)
Formation Hybla (Aptian–Albian)
Formation Amerillo (Cretaceous superior–Oligocene inferior)
Formation Bonifato (Oligocene superior)
Calcareniti of Corleone (Burdigalian–Langhiano)
Marls of San Cipirello (Langhiano superior-Tortonian inferior)
Colluvium(Holocene).
From the idrogeological point of view, there are a deep aquifer in correspondence with the Triassic limestones, a superficial one near the peak and secondary aquifers in correspondence with the layers of debris.

Between the mountain and Alcamo there is an imposing bank of travertine dating back to Pleistocene which has been exploited nearly all to get slabs for the building industry. However the quarries are also an important site for paleontology because they have found important fossils there.
In particular inside one of these quarries (now Geosite Travertino della Cava Cappuccini (Alcamo)), they have found remains (a natural cast of the brain, defences and molar teeth) of the dwarf elephant, Elephas falconeri, the spheric eggs and the fossilized armour of a big tortoise (Geochelone sp.). These last two fossil findings are kept at Museo paleontologico e geologico di Palermo "Gaetano Giorgio Gemmellaro". The site has also allowed to re-establish the correct "stratigraphy" of the Elephas in Sicily because, in a fracture of travertine filled with "paleosuolo" (then more recently than travertine itself), they have found the remains of a medium size elephant, the Elephas mnaidriensis, which had been wrongly considered the dwarf elephant's ancestor.
Inside Alcamo travertine they also discovered specimens of giant dormouse, Cervus elaphus e Sus scrofa, hosted at the Civic Museum of Prehistory "Torre di Lignì" in Trapani.
Alcamo travertine quarry, where they have found different remains of paleontological importance, has been menaced by a project for the construction o fan amphitheatre whose works were assigned in June 2014, and modified afterwards (in November 2014) so that this paleontological site will be partly protected.

Origins

In ancient times there was a fortified town on Mount Bonifato, in fact they have found different specimens.
With the passing of time, this town has passed different phases of population and depopulation and for a long time it was inhabited simultaneously with Alcamo (which stands at the foot of the mount), before its disappearing. In particular, it was inhabited since the last part of the Bronze Age, and Elyms, Romans and Byzantines settled there.
From the quotations by Licofron, we know that in ancient times this residential area was called Longuro. With the same name they also indicated the mount, which according to other suppositions was also called "Aereo" and "Longarico" (corresponding to the Latin name of Longuro).
The old town was defended by a wall on three sides and was composed by unicellular houses (that is having a single room).
Among the remains of the old town there is the “Funtanazza”, an ancient architectonic work which probably was a water reservoir; according to other people, it was, on the contrary, a thermal plant. The Funtanazza has a rectangular shape with pillars sustaining a barrel vault, similar to the moorish fountains on the northern coasts of Africa.

Medioeval period

It dates back to 1182 a document about land grants in which this residential area appears with the name "Bonifato" (or Bùnifat or Bonifacio), from the name of the Roman knight who became its owner.
In 1243, owing to an order given by Frederick II, after some cases of rebellion, there was an event of depopulation, but in 1333 it was repopulated under Frederick III’s rule. Since 1340 it was a possession of the baron Raimondo Peralta and later of Guarnieri Ventimiglia.
The son Enrico Ventimiglia succeeded Guarnieri Ventimiglia: he declared that he had the…