The historians' history of the world in twenty-five volumes, volume 03

by Unknown

The oldest colonial foundations of this time were like those unorganised expeditions which once poured out upon the islands and the shores of Asia Minor. Such were the settlements of the Achæans and Locrians in southern Italy. As the Greeks, however, were continually being forced out to more distant coasts, their colonisation had to take on a different character. The navigation of the islandless sea in the west, or even the journey to Libya and the stormy Pontus, necessitated a degree of seamanship greater than that possessed by the inhabitants of the agricultural coast districts of the Grecian peninsula, from among whom the settlers of the lands across the sea had until then gone forth. Hence Africa, Bœotia, and Argolis ceased to take an independent part in the colonisation movement. In their place arose cities, hardly or not at all mentioned by Homer, which by their advantageous location had come to be centres of navigation; Chalcis and Eretria on the Euripus, the strait which furnishes the most convenient connection between southern Greece and Thessaly; Megara and Corinth on the isthmus, where the two seas which wash the shores of Greece come within a few miles of each other; Rhodes, Lesbos, and other islands of the Ægean Sea; finally the Ionian coast towns, especially Miletus. Not that all the colonists, who went out from here to seek new homes on distant shores were actually at home in these cities. On the contrary, these cities were only gathering places whither streamed the emigrants from the surrounding regions—all those who found no chance to advance in their old homes or who were driven abroad by love of adventure or by dissatisfaction with political conditions. But the cities, from which the colonising expeditions went out, organised the undertaking; they provided leaders and ships and their institutions served as models for the colonies.

Once founded, however, the colonies were, as a rule, wholly independent of the mother-city. The relation between them was like that between a father and his grown son in Grecian law. The citizen of the mother-city was always respected in the colony; and the colony, on the other hand, could always count on finding support with the mother-city in case of a difficult crisis. That the colony, moreover, remained in especially active intercourse with its mother-city lay in the nature of this colonial relationship; and in the course of time the colonies became the surest supports for the commerce of the mother-city and the best markets for the productions of its industrial activity.

In consequence the recollection of this relationship was kept alive for a long time. But the circumstances which gave rise to the foundation of all the colonies earlier than the sixth century, remain veiled in the darkness of tradition. Historical records were as yet far removed from this period, and the dates of foundations which have been handed down to us are based wholly upon calculations according to generations or upon suppositions of even less value. Such accounts can at the most give us only approximate clews and must in each single instance be compared with other traditions. Only so much is certain that in the first half of the seventh century the settlement of the southern coast of Thrace was in full progress and the Hellenes had already established themselves upon the gulf of Tarentum.

No other field offered the Grecian colonists such favourable conditions as the coasts of Italy and Sicily, beyond the Ionic Sea. Situated in the same latitude as the mother-land, these countries have a climate very similar to that of Greece.

Intercourse between the two shores existed at an early date. Fragments of vases in the Mycenæan style have been found in Messapia, and the pre-Hellenic necropolis in eastern Sicily shows traces of a civilisation which is partially under Mycenæan influence. It even appears that in pre-historic times immigrations from the Balkan peninsula into Italy already took place by way of Otranto. At least it is related that the Chones once dwelt on the western coast of the gulf of Tarentum; and the similarity of names between these people and the Epirot Chaones, the inhabitants of the region about the Acroceraunian promontory, can hardly be accidental. Perhaps this is connected with the fact that the Italici designate the Hellenes as Græci, since the Græci are said to have been an Epirot tribe, which in historic times had wholly disappeared.

Be that as it may, the Hellenes had at all events taken possession of the eastern coast of the present Calabria, during the course of the eighth, or at latest at the beginning of the seventh century. The new settlers called themselves Achæans and thought they were descended from the Achæans in the Peloponnesus. As a matter of fact their dialect is closely related to the Argolian. The Chones of Italy have since disappeared from history, and have probably been merged into one people with the Achæans.

The new home was called Italia, after a branch of the original population which disappeared at an early date, and this name was gradually extended over the whole peninsula clear to the Alps. The land offered a boundless field for Hellenic activity, and the realisation of that fact found expression in the name Greater Hellas, which arose in the colonial territory across the Ionian Sea in about the sixth century, in contrast to the crowded condition of the too thickly populated mother-land. This may have been hyperbole, but it was in a sense justified by the brilliant development of the Achæan settlements. The coasts of the gulf of Tarentum became covered with a circle of flourishing cities. In the north at the mouth of the Bradanus was Metapontum, which bore on its armour the speaking device of an ear of corn; then came Siris in the fruitful plain at the mouth of the river of the same name, which, to the poet Archilochus appeared an ideal place for a colony; further south where Crathis empties into the sea, was Sybaris, whose wealth and luxury soon became proverbial. In close rivalry with Sybaris stood Croton, situated near the promontory of Lacinium, on the top of which the new settlers founded the temple of Hera, the queen of heaven, which became the chief sanctuary for the Greeks of Italy. One column of the building is still standing, a signal for ships, and can be seen from afar over the blue waters of the Ionian Sea. Finally, far to the south at Cape Stilo was Caulonia, the last of the Achæan settlements.

The Achæans soon penetrated also into the interior and through the narrow peninsula to the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea. Sybaris founded here the colonies of Scidrus and Laos, and, further north, on the lower Silarus, Posidonia [afterwards Pæstum], whose temple to-day arises in solemn majesty from out its desolate surroundings, the most beautiful monument of Grecian architecture which has been preserved on the western side of the Ionian Sea. Pyxus [afterwards Buxentum], between Posidonia and Laos, is probably a colony from Siris, which was directly opposite it on the Ionian Sea, and was later closely associated with it. Croton founded Pandosia in the upper valley of the Crathis, and Terina and Scylletium (Scylacium) on the isthmus of Catanzaro where the Ionian and Tyrrhenian seas approach to within a few miles of each other. The Achæans now controlled the whole region from the Bradanus and Silarus southward to the gulf of Terina and the gulf of Scylletium, an area of fifteen thousand square kilometres.

The Achæans were soon followed by the Locrians, who lived opposite them on the gulf of Corinth. They founded a new Locri, south of the Achæan settlements not far from the Zephyrian promontory. This city also soon became rich and powerful, so that its territory was extended to the west coast of the peninsula, where it established the colonies Hipponium and Medma.

In the meantime the inhabitants of eastern Greece had begun to direct their gaze to the newly discovered lands in the west—first of all the Chalcidians, the bravest men in Hellas, as they are called in an old proverb. Since the coast of the gulf of Tarentum was already occupied, they sailed further, to Sicily the land famed in fable as the home of the Cyclops and Læstrygones. These were no longer to be found there, but instead a people of Italic race, the Siceli, or the Sicani, as they were called in the western part of the island, a brave and warlike people, but with no national unity so that they were unable successfully to oppose the invaders. Here, at the foot of the lofty snow pyramid of Ætna, the Chalcidians founded Naxos, their first settlement and the first Hellenic town on Sicilian soil. In gratitude to the god, Apollo Archegetes, who had brought them over the sea in safety, the settlers erected an altar. Later on, when Sicily had become an Hellenic land, all those who were setting sail to attend the festivals in the mother-land used to sacrifice at this place.