[2143] Among these were many followers of Pythagoras, also Theagenes, Hippys, Lycus surnamed Butera, and Glaucus, who were historians; Ibycus, Cleomenes, and Lycus the adoptive father of Lycophron, who were poets; Clearchus and Pythagoras, who were sculptors.
[2144] The Rhegians firmly opposed the designs of this tyrant; and when, under pretence of courting their alliance, he sought a consort from their city, they replied with independent feeling that he might have their hangman’s daughter. (See Diodorus Siculus, xiv. 44.) Had the other states of Magna Grecia displayed the same energy, the ambitious views of this artful prince might have been frustrated; but after the defeat of their forces on the Elleporus, now Callipari, they succumbed, and Rhegium, after a gallant defence which lasted nearly a year, was compelled to yield, about the year 398 B. C.The insulting tyrant sentenced the heroic Phyton, who had commanded the town, to a cruel death, and removed the few inhabitants that remained to Sicily.
[2145] B. C.360.
[2146] B. C.280.
[2147] B. C. 91.
[2148] The defeat of Sextus Pompeius is referred to the year 36 B. C., but there is no precise date mentioned for the establishment of the veteran soldiers in Rhegium, which probably took place about the year 31 B. C.
[2149] Pliny computes the distance from Rhegium to Cape Leucopetra at 12 miles; there is probably some error in the text, as there is no cape which corresponds with the distance of 50 stadia from Rhegium. A note in the French translation proposes to read 100 instead of 50 stadia. Topographers are not agreed in fixing the situation of the celebrated Leucopetra. D’Anville places it at Capo Pittaro, Grimaldi at the Punta della Saetta, and Cluverius, Holstenius, and Cellarius at the Capo dell’Armi. This latter opinion seems more compatible with the statement of Pliny, and is also more generally accredited.
[2150] The Herculeum Promontorium is known in modern geography as Capo Spartivento.
[2151] The Promontorium Iapygium, or Sallentinum, as it was sometimes called, formed a remarkable feature in the figure of Italy, while the art of navigation was in its infancy. It was a conspicuous landmark to mariners bound from the ports of Greece to Sicily. The fleets of Athens, after having circumnavigated the Peloponnesus, usually made for Corcyra, whence they steered straight across to the promontory, and then coasted along the south of Italy. It seems from Thucydides (vi. 44) that there was a haven here which afforded a shelter to vessels in tempestuous weather.
[2152] Now Capo di Bruzzano.