The salt flats of Trapani and Marsala (This one pictured is in Nubia.) can trace their origins back to the Phoenicians who colonized and developed the area starting around 700 B.C. The Phoenicians, who soon after became known as Carthaginians because of their establishment of Carthage (i.e. modern-day Tunisia), were master mariners, fisherman, and traders. They took to the the northwestern coast of Sicily for strategic reasons: 1. the plentiful tuna that swam off the island’s shores and 2. the shallow marshes that enabled them to create salt in order to preserve all the tuna they caught.
