San Leone (river)

The San Leone is a river in the Province of Agrigento, Sicily, Italy. Its main stream is 26 kilometres (16 mi) long, and it has a drainage basin of 206 square kilometres (80 sq mi).^[1] Its source is in the commune of Santa Elisabetta and it discharges into the Mediterranean Sea in San Leone, a frazione of the city of Agrigento. It has various names along its course: at its source it is called Akragas, further downstream Drago, then Sant'Anna (the ancient Hypsas)^[2] and the final 3 km until its mouth San Leone. Its largest tributary is the San Biagio (also: San Benedetto).^[1] In the 19th century it was known as Fiume di Girgenti.^[3]

San Leone
Location in Sicily
Location
Country	Italy
Region	Sicily
Physical characteristics
Mouth	Mediterranean Sea
• location	San Leone
• coordinates	37.2644°N 13.5777°E / 37.2644; 13.5777
Length	26 km2 (10 sq mi)
Basin size	206 km2 (80 sq mi)

The Sant'Anna (or Drago) to the west, and the San Biagio to the east, join to form the Fiume San Leone south of the ancient site of Agrigento

Notes

1. Bacino Idrografico del Fiume San Leone ed Area Intermedia compresa fra i Bacini del F. San Leone e del F. Naro (067), Regione Siciliana, p. 89
2. Polybius is the only author who mentions the Agrigentine Hypsas by name, and he states distinctly that it was the river flowing at the foot of the hill of Agrigentum on the W. and SW. See Polybius, Histories, tr. by W. R. Paton (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1922–1927), IV : Fragments of Books 9-15 (1925), 9.27.
3. Edward Herbert Bunbury, ‘Agrigentum’, in Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, ed. by William Smith (London: Walton and Maberly; John Murray, 1854).