Mount Etna Mount Etna Mount Etna, or Etna ( or ; or ; ), is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, in the Metropolitan City of Catania, between the cities of Messina and Catania. It lies above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is the highest active volcano in Europe outside the Caucasus. It is currently high, though this varies with summit eruptions. It is the highest peak in Italy south of the Alps. Etna covers an area of with a basal circumference of . This makes it by far the
Mount Etna largest of the three active volcanoes in Italy, being about two and a half times the height of the next largest, Mount Vesuvius. Only Mount Teide on Tenerife (Spain) surpasses it in the whole of the European–North-African region west of the Black Sea. In Greek Mythology, the deadly monster Typhon was trapped under this mountain by Zeus, the god of the sky and thunder and king of gods, and the forges of Hephaestus were said to also be located underneath it. Mount Etna is one of the world’s most active volcanoes and is in an almost constant state of activity.