A head-spinning repository of artifacts from Sicily’s many inhabitants and invaders—Phoenicians, Greeks, Saracens, Romans—are set in the former convent of the Filippini. The most important treasures are metopes (temple friezes) from Selinunte —sumptuous detailed marbles depicting Perseus slaying Medusa, the Rape of Europa by Zeus, Actaeon being transformed into a stag, and other scenes that bring these myths vividly to life. Among the other artifacts—anchors from Punic warships and mirrors used by the Etruscans—is a rare Egyptian find: The Pietra di Palermo (Palermo Stone), a black stone slab dating from 2700 b.c. that is known as the Rosetta stone of Sicily. Discovered in Egypt in the 19th century, it was in transit for the British Museum in London when it was shuffled off to the corners of a Palermo dock. The hieroglyphics reveal the inscriber’s attention to detail: a list of pharaohs, details of the delivery of 40 shiploads of cedarwood to Snefru, and flood levels of the Nile.