Editing Magna Graecia (section)

==History==
[[File:Reggio calabria mura greche lungomare.jpg|thumb|Remains of the ancient Greek city of Rhegium (now [[Reggio Calabria]]) along the seafront of Reggio Calabria]]
[[File:Bronzi di riace, V secolo ac. 01.jpg|thumb|''[[Riace Bronzes]]'' exhibited in the [[National Museum of Magna Graecia]] in Reggio Calabria]]
[[File:Reggio calabria museo nazionale dioscuri da locri statua destra.jpg|thumb|Right statue from the [[Dioscuri]] group from [[Locri]] exhibited in the [[National Museum of Magna Graecia]] in Reggio Calabria]]

===Greek colonisation===

According to [[Strabo]]'s ''[[Geographica]]'', the colonisation of Magna Graecia had already begun by the time of the [[Trojan War]] and lasted for several centuries.<ref name="Strabo">{{cite book|author=Strabo|title=Geographica|chapter=I, Section I|url=http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/citequery3.pl?dbname=GreekFeb2011&query=Str.%201.1.3|language=el|volume=VI|access-date=5 February 2020|archive-date=22 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200522133218/http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/citequery3.pl?dbname=GreekFeb2011&query=Str.%201.1.3|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Greeks began to settle in southern Italy in the 8th century BC.<ref name="CerchiaiJannelli2004">{{cite book |author1=Luca Cerchiai |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fH32nSiCue0C |title=The Greek Cities of Magna Graecia and Sicily |author2=Lorena Jannelli |author3=Fausto Longo |publisher=Getty Publications |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-89236-751-1 |pages=7}}</ref> Their first great migratory wave was by the [[Euboea]]ns aimed at the Gulf of Naples ([[Pithecusae]], [[Cumae]]) and the Strait of Messina ([[Zancle]], [[Rhegium]]).<ref>STEFANIA DE VIDO 'Capitani coraggiosi'. Gli Eubei nel Mediterraneo C. Bearzot, F. Landucci, in Tra il mare e il continente: l'isola d'Eubea (2013) ISBN 978-88-343-2634-3</ref> Pithecusae on the island of [[Ischia]] is considered the oldest Greek settlement in Italy, and Cumae their first colony on the mainland of Italy.

The second wave was of the [[Achaea]]ns who concentrated initially on the Ionian coast ([[Metapontum|Metapontion]], [[Poseidonia]], [[Sybaris]], [[Crotone|Kroton]]),<ref>Strabo 6.1.12</ref><ref>Herodotus 8.47</ref> shortly before 720{{nbsp}}BC.<ref name="magna grecia">{{cite web|url=https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/magna-grecia_(Enciclopedia-Italiana)/|title=MAGNA GRECIA|access-date=7 July 2023|language=it}}</ref> At an unknown date between the 8th and 6th centuries BC the Athenians, of Ionian lineage, founded [[Scylletium]] (near today's [[Catanzaro]]).<ref>Strabo, ''[[Geographica]]'', 6.1.10</ref>

With colonisation, [[Greek culture]] was exported to Italy with its dialects of the [[Ancient Greek language]], its religious rites, and its traditions of the independent ''[[polis]]''. An original [[Hellenic civilization]] soon developed, and later interacted with the native [[Italic languages|Italic]] civilisations. The most important cultural transplant was the [[Chalcis|Chalcidean]]/[[Cumaean alphabet|Cumaean]] variety of the [[Greek alphabet]], which was adopted by the [[Etruscans]]; the [[Old Italic alphabet]] subsequently evolved into the [[Latin alphabet]], which became the most widely used alphabet in the world.

====Secondary colonisation====

Over time, due to overpopulation and other political and commercial reasons, the new cities expanded their presence in Italy by founding other Greek cities; effectively expanding the Greek civilisation to the whole territory known today as Magna Graecia.<ref name="magna grecia"/>

Remains of some of these Greek colonies can be seen today such as those of Neapolis ('new city', now [[Naples]]), Syracusae ([[Syracuse, Italy|Syracuse]]), Akragas ([[Agrigento]]), Taras ([[Taranto]]) and Rhegion ([[Reggio Calabria]]).

An intense colonisation program was undertaken by [[Syracuse, Sicily|Syracuse]],<ref>{{Cite book|first=Lorenzo|last=Braccesi|title=Grecità adriatica. Un capitolo della colonizzazione greca in Occidente|year=1979|publisher=Pàtron|edition=2nd|page=450|isbn=978-88-555-0935-0|language=it}}</ref> at the time of the tyranny of [[Dionysius I of Syracuse]], around 387–385 BC. This phenomenon affected the entire [[Adriatic Sea|Adriatic]] coast, and in particular led to the foundation in Italy of Ancon (now [[Ancona]]) and [[Adria]]; in the [[Dalmatia]]n coast he saw the foundation of Issa (current [[Vis (town)|Vis]]), Pharus ([[Stari Grad, Croatia|Stari Grad]]), Dimus ([[Hvar (town)|Hvar]]); Lissus (now [[Lezhë]]) was founded on the [[Albania]]n coast. Issa in turn then founded Tragurium (now [[Trogir]]), Corcyra Melaina (now [[Korčula]]) and Epetium (now [[Stobreč]], a suburb of [[Split, Croatia|Split]]).

Rhegium (now [[Reggio Calabria]]) founded Pyxus ([[Policastro Bussentino]]) in [[Lucania]]; [[Locri]] founded Medma ([[Rosarno]]), [[Polistena|Polyxena]] and Hipponium ([[Vibo Valentia]]) in present-day Calabria; Sybaris (now [[Sibari]]) revitalised the indigenous centres of [[Laüs]] and Scydrus in Calabria and founded Poseidonia ([[Paestum]]), in Campania; Kroton (now [[Crotone]]) founded [[Terina (ancient city)|Terina]] and participated in the foundation of [[Caulonia (ancient city)|Caulonia]] (near [[Monasterace]] marina) in Calabria; Messana (now [[Messina]]), in collaboration with Rhegium, founded Metaurus ([[Gioia Tauro]]); Taras together with [[Thurii]] founded Heracleia ([[Policoro]]) in Lucania in 434 BC, and also [[Gallipoli, Apulia|Callipolis]] ('beautiful city').<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/gallipoli_%28Enciclopedia-Italiana%29/|title=Gallipoli|access-date=21 July 2023|language=it}}</ref>

===Expansion and conflict===
{{See also|History of Greek Sicily|Calabria}}

At the beginning of the 6th century BC, all the main cities of Magna Graecia on the Ionian Sea had achieved a high economic and cultural development, which shifted their interests towards expansion of their territory by waging war on neighbouring cities. The 6th century was therefore characterised by great clashes between the colonies. Some of the clashes that established the new balance and the new relationships of force were the [[Battle of the Sagra]] river (the clash between Locri Epizefiri and Kroton), the destruction of [[Siris, Magna Graecia|Siris]] (by Sybaris and Metapontum), and the clash between Kroton and Sybaris (which ended with the destruction of the latter).<ref>Arte seconda - la colonizzazione e il periodo Greco, capitolo III, Il VI secolo e lo scontro con Crotone, Battaglia Della Sagra, https://www.locriantica.it/storia/per_greco3.htm</ref>

As with all the events of this period precise dates are unknown, but the destruction of Sybaris may have occurred around 510 BC, while the two other clashes are placed around 580-560 BC, with the destruction of Siris before the [[Battle of the Sagra]].

===Roman Era===
{{See also|Roman expansion in Italy|Sicilia (Roman province)}}
[[File:Roman conquest of Italy.PNG|right|thumb|[[Roman expansion in Italy]] from 500 BC to 218 BC]]
[[File:Second Punic war (cropped).png|thumb|Italian cities and tribes who allied with Hannibal, c. 213 BC (blue)]]

The first Greek city to be absorbed into the [[Roman Republic]] was Neàpolis in 327{{nbsp}}BC.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.73366|quote=Roman Republic Neapolis in 327{{nbsp}}BC.|title=A Short History of the Roman Republic|last=Heitland|first=William Emerton|date=1911|publisher=The University Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.73366/page/n6 72]|language=en}}</ref>

At the beginning of the 3rd century, Rome was a great power but had not yet entered into conflict with most of Magna Graecia, which had been allies of the Samnites. However, the needs of the Roman populace determined their need for territorial expansion towards the south.<ref>Musti, Domenico (1990). "La spinta verso il Sud: espansione romana e rapporti "internazionali"". Storia di Roma. Vol. I. P 536. Turin: Einaudi. ISBN 978-88-06-11741-2</ref> As the Greek cities of southern Italy came under threat from the [[Bruttii]] and [[Lucanians]] from the end of the 4th century BC, they asked for help from Rome, which exploited this opportunity by sending military garrisons in the 280s BC.<ref>DMITRIEV, S. (2017). The Status of Greek Cities in Roman Reception and Adaptation. Hermes, 145(2), 195–209. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26650396</ref>

Following Rome's victory over [[Taranto|Taras]] after the [[Pyrrhic War]] in 272{{nbsp}}BC, most of the cities of southern Italy were linked to Rome with pacts and treaties (''foedera'') which sanctioned a sort of indirect control.<ref>Lane Fox, Robin (2005). The Classical World. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-102141-1. P 307</ref>

[[Sicilia (Roman province)|Sicily]] was conquered by Rome during the [[First Punic War]]. Only Syracuse remained independent until 212 because its king [[Hiero II of Syracuse|Hiero II]] was a devoted ally of the Romans. His grandson [[Hieronymus of Syracuse|Hieronymus]] however allied with [[Hannibal]], which prompted the Romans to [[Siege of Syracuse (213–212 BC)|besiege the city]], which fell in 212{{nbsp}}BC.

After the second Punic War, Rome pursued an unprecedented program of reorganisation in the rest of Magna Graecia, where many of the cities were annexed to the [[Roman Republic]] in 205{{nbsp}}BC, as a consequence of their defection to Hannibal.<ref name="archeologiaviva"/> Roman colonies (''civium romanorum'') were the main element of the new territorial control plan starting from the ''[[lex Atinia]]'' of 197{{nbsp}}BC. In 194{{nbsp}}BC, garrisons of 300 Roman veterans were implanted in [[Volturnum]], [[Liternum]], [[Puteoli]], [[Salernum]] and [[Buxentum]], and to [[Sipontum]] on the Adriatic. This model was replicated in the territory of the Brettii; 194{{nbsp}}BC saw the foundation of the Roman colonies of [[Crotone|Kroton]] and [[Tempsa]], followed by the Latin colonies of [[Copia (ancient city)|Copia]] (193{{nbsp}}BC) and Valentia (192{{nbsp}}BC).<ref>Giuseppe Celsi, La colonia romana di Croto e la statio di Lacenium, Gruppo Archeologico Krotoniate (GAK) https://www.gruppoarcheologicokr.it/la-colonia-romana-di-croto/</ref>

The social, linguistic and administrative changes arising from the Roman conquest only took root in this region by the 1st century AD, while Greek culture remained strong and was actively cultivated as shown by epigraphic evidence.<ref>Kathryn Lomas, Aspects of the Relationship between Rome and the Greek Cities of Southern Italy and Campania during the Republic and Early Empire, Thesis L3473, Newcastle University, 1989 http://theses.ncl.ac.uk/jspui/handle/10443/744</ref>

===Middle Ages===
[[File:Colonne Doriche.JPG|thumb|right|[[Doric columns]] from the Temple of Poseidon in Taras (now [[Taranto]]); legacy of its Greek origins]]

During the [[Early Middle Ages]], following the disastrous [[Gothic War (535–552)|Gothic War]], new waves of [[Byzantine Greeks|Byzantine Christian Greeks]] fleeing the [[Slavic migrations to Southeastern Europe|Slavic invasion]] of [[Peloponnese]] settled in Calabria, further strengthened the Hellenic element in the region.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Slavs and nomadic populations in Greece|url=https://www2.rgzm.de/foreigners/cfm/themen/309/309_uk.cfm?Language=uk|access-date=19 June 2021|website=www2.rgzm.de|archive-date=24 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210624201538/https://www2.rgzm.de/foreigners/cfm/themen/309/309_uk.cfm?Language=uk|url-status=dead}}</ref> The iconoclast emperor [[Leo III the Isaurian|Leo III]] appropriated lands that had been granted to the Papacy in southern Italy and the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire continued to govern the area in the form of the [[Catapanate of Italy]] (965 -1071) through the Middle Ages, well after northern Italy fell to the Lombards.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Brown |first1=T. S. |year=1979 |title=The Church of Ravenna and the Imperial Administration in the Seventh Century |journal=The English Historical Review |volume= 94|issue= 370|pages=5 |jstor=567155}}</ref>

At the time of the [[Italo-Normans|Normans]]' late medieval conquest of southern Italy and Sicily (in the late 12th century), the [[Salento]] peninsula (the "heel" of Italy), up to one-third of Sicily (concentrated in the [[Val Demone]]), and much of Calabria and Lucania were still largely Greek-speaking. Some regions of southern Italy experienced demographic shifts as Greeks began to migrate northwards in significant numbers from regions further south; one such region was [[Cilento]], which came to have a Greek-speaking majority.<ref>{{cite book |author= Loud, G. A. |title=The Latin Church in Norman Italy |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2007 |page=494 |isbn=978-0-521-25551-6 |quote=At the end of the twelfth century{{nbsp}}... While in Apulia Greeks were in a majority – and indeed present in any numbers at all – only in the Salento peninsula in the extreme south, at the time of the conquest they had an overwhelming preponderance in Lucania and central and southern Calabria, as well as comprising anything up to a third of the population of Sicily, concentrated especially in the north-east of the island, the Val Demone.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author= Oldfield, Paul |title= Sanctity and Pilgrimage in Medieval Southern Italy, 1000–1200|publisher= Cambridge University Press |year=2014 |pages=13 |isbn= 978-1-107-00028-5 |quote=However, the Byzantine revival of the tenth century generated a concomitant process Hellenization, while Muslim raids in southern Calabria, and instability in Sicily, may also have displaced Greek Christians further north on the mainland. Consequently, zones in northern Calabria, Lucania and central Apulia which were reintegrated into Byzantine control also experienced demographic shifts and the increasing establishment of immigrant Greek communities. These zones also acted as springboards for Greek migration further north, into regions such as the Cilento and areas around Salerno, which had never been under Byzantine control.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author= Kleinhenz, Christopher |title= Medieval Italy: an encyclopedia, Volume 1|publisher=Routledge |year=2004 |pages=444–445 |isbn=978-0-415-93930-0 |quote=In Lucania (northern Calabria, Basilicata, and southernmost portion of today's Campania){{nbsp}}... From the late ninth century into the eleventh, Greek-speaking populations and Byzantine temporal power advanced, in stages but by no means always in tandem, out of southern Calabria and the lower Salentine peninsula across Lucania and through much of Apulia as well. By the early eleventh century, Greek settlement had radiated northward and had reached the interior of the Cilento, deep in Salernitan territory. Parts of the central and northwestern Salento, recovered early, [and] came to have a Greek majority through immigration, as did parts of Lucania.}}</ref> At this time the language had evolved into medieval Greek, also known as [[Byzantine Greek]], and its speakers were known as [[Byzantine Greeks]]. The resultant fusion of local Byzantine Greek culture with Norman and Arab culture (from the Arab occupation of Sicily) gave rise to [[Norman-Arab-Byzantine culture]] in Sicily.

<gallery mode="packed" heights="120">
File:Paestum BW 2013-05-17 15-01-57.jpg|[[Second Temple of Hera (Paestum)|Greek temples]] of [[Paestum]], [[Campania]]
File:Reggio calabria museo nazionale mosaico da kaulon.jpg|Mosaic from [[Caulonia (ancient city)|Caulonia]], [[Calabria]], [[National Museum of Magna Graecia]]
File:Tavole-palatine - Hera temple.jpg|[[Ancient Greek temple|Temple of]] [[Hera]] in [[Metaponto]], [[Basilicata]]
File:Agrigent BW 2012-10-07 12-24-45.JPG|The [[Temple of Hera, Agrigento|Temple "D"]], [[Valle dei Templi]], [[Agrigento]], [[Sicily]]
File:Milo of Croton Dumont Louvre MR1839.jpg|[[Milo of Croton]]
File:Archytas of Taras.jpg|[[Archytas|Archytas of Taras]]
File:Tarentum.jpg|5th-century BC Greek coins of Taras (now [[Taranto]]) with the eponym [[Taras (mythology)|Taras]] hero riding a dolphin
File:2547 - Milano - Museo archeologico - Piatto apulo - Foto di Giovanni Dall'Orto - 1 feb 2014.jpg|The goddess [[Nike (mythology)|Nike]] riding on a two-horse [[chariot]], [[Apulia]]n [[patera]] (tray), 4th century BC, [[Archaeological Museum, Milan|Archaeological Museum of Milan]]
File:Head-Kantharos of a Female Faun or Io (?) LACMA 50.8.25.jpg|Head-[[Kantharos]] of a female faun or [[Io (mythology)|Io]], [[red-figure pottery]], 375–350 BC, [[Los Angeles County Museum of Art]]
</gallery>