The
1783 Calabrian earthquakes were a sequence of five strong
earthquakes that hit the region of
Calabria in southern
Italy (then part of the
Kingdom of Naples), the first two of which produced significant
tsunamis. The
epicenters form a clear alignment extending nearly 100 km from the
Straits of Messina to about 18 km SSW of
Catanzaro. The epicenter of the first earthquake occurred in the plain of
Palmi. The earthquakes occurred over a period of nearly two months, all with estimated magnitudes of 5.9 or greater. Estimates of the total number of deaths lie in the range 32,000 to 50,000.