Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography/Acesines 1.

​ACESINES (Ἀκεσίνης) a river of Sicily, which flows, into the sea to the south of Tanromeniun. Its name occurs only in Thucydides (iv. 25) on occasion of the attack made on Naxos by the Messenilis in B. C. 425: but it is evidently the same river which is called by Pliny (iii. 8) Asines, and by Vibios Sequester (p. 4) Asinius. Both these writers place it in the immediate neighbourhood of Tauromenium, and it can be no other than the river now called by the Arabic name of Cantara a considerable stream, which, after following throughout its course the northern boundary of Aetna, discharges itself into the sea immediately to the S. of Capo Schizò the site of the ancient Naxos. The Onobalas of Appian (B. C. v. 109) is probably only another name for the same river. Cluverius appears to be mistaken in regarding the Fiume Freddo as the Acesines: it is a very small stream, while the Cantara is one of the largest rivers in Sicily, and could hardly have been omitted by Pliny. (Cluver. Sicil. p. 93; Mannert, vol. ix. pt. ii. p. 284.) [ E. H. B. ]