Editing Segesta (section)

===Origins===
The origin and foundation of Segesta are extremely obscure. The tradition current among the Greeks and adopted by Thucydides,<ref name=Thuc1>{{Cite Thucydides|6.2}}</ref> ascribed its foundation to a band of [[Troy|Trojan]] settlers, fugitives from the destruction of their city; and this tradition was readily welcomed by the Romans, who in consequence claimed a kindred origin with the Segestans. Thucydides seems to have considered the [[Elymi|Elymians]] ({{langx|la|Elymi}}), a barbarian tribe in the neighborhood of [[Eryx (Sicily)|Eryx]] and Segesta, as descended from the Trojans in question; but another account represents the Elymi as a distinct people, already existing in this part of Sicily when the Trojans arrived there and founded the two cities. A different story seems also to have been current, according to which Segesta owed its origin to a band of [[Phocians]], who had been among the followers of [[Philoctetes]]; and, as usual, later writers sought to reconcile the two accounts.<ref>{{Cite Strabo|vi. p.272}}</ref><ref name=Thuc1/>

Another version of the Trojan story related in [[Virgil]]'s ''[[Aeneid]]'', which would seem to have been adopted by the inhabitants themselves, ascribed the foundation of the city jointly by the territorial king Egestus or Aegestus (the [[Acestes]] of Virgil), who was said to be the offspring of a [[Dardanus (city)|Dardanian]] damsel named Segesta by the river god [[Crinisus]], and by those of Aeneas' folk who wished to remain behind with Acestes to found the city of Acesta.<ref>[[Maurus Servius Honoratus|Serv.]] ''ad Aen.'' 1.550, 5.30.</ref> We are told also that the names of Simois and Scamander were given by the Trojan colonists to two small streams which flowed beneath the town,<ref>{{Cite Strabo|xiii. p.608.}}</ref> and the latter name is mentioned by [[Diodorus Siculus]] as one still in use at a much later period.<ref>{{Cite Diodorus|20.71.}}</ref>

The belief that the name of the city was originally Acesta or Egesta and changed to Segesta by the Romans to avoid its ill-omened meaning in Latin ({{lang|la|egestās}} means "poverty" or "lack")<ref>Lewis and Short Latin Dictionary.</ref> is disproved by coins which prove that considerably before the time of [[Thucydides]] it was called by the inhabitants themselves Segesta, though this form seems to have been softened by the Greeks of [[Magna Graecia]] into Egesta.<ref name=DGRG/>

The city was occupied by a people distinct from the [[Sicanians]], the native race of this part of Sicily, and on the other that it was not a Greek colony. Thucydides, in enumerating the allies of the [[Athenians]] at the time of the [[Peloponnesian War]], distinctly calls the Segestans barbarians.<ref>{{Cite Thucydides|7.57.}}</ref> At the same time they appear to have been, from a very early period, in close connection with the Greek cities of Sicily, and entering into relations both of hostility and alliance with the Hellenic states, wholly different from the other barbarians in the island. The early influence of Greek civilisation is shown also by their coins, which are inscribed with Greek characters, and bear the unquestionable impress of Greek art.