TYRA´CIA or TYRACI´NA(Τυρακῖναι, Steph. B: Eth. Tyraciensis, Plin.), a city of Sicily, of which very little is known. It is noticed by Stephanus as a small but flourishing city;and the Tyracienses are mentioned by Pliny among the municipal communities of the interior of Sicily. (Steph. B. s. v.;Plin. Nat. 3.8. s. 14.) It is doubtful whether the Tyracinus, princeps civitatis,mentioned by Cicero (Cic. Ver. 3.56) is a citizen of Tyracia or one of Helorus who bore the proper name of Tyracinus. In either case the name was probably derived from the city: but though the existence of this is clearly established, we are wholly without any clue to its position.
Several writers would identify the TRINACIA(Τρινακία) of Diodorus (Diod. 12.29), which that writer describes as having been one of the chief towns of the Siculi, until it was taken and destroyed by the Syracusans in B.C. 439, with the Tyracinae of Stephanus and Tyracia of Pliny. Both names being otherwise unknown, the readings are in both cases uncertain: but Diodorus seems to represent Trinacia as having been totally destroyed, which would sufficiently account for its not being again mentioned in history: and there is no other reason for assuming the two places to be identical. (Cluver. Sicil. p. 388; Holsten. Not. ad Steph. B. s. v.;Wesseling, ad Diod. l. c.
[E.H.B]