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MAGNA GRAECIA

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Bianca
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« Reply #15 on: September 25, 2008, 11:11:02 am »



                    










The Italian colonies were planted among friendly, almost kindred, races, and grew much more rapidly than the Sicilian Greek states, which had to contend against the power of Carthage.

After the Achaean cities had combined to destroy the Ionic Siris, and had founded Metapontum as a counterpoise to the Dorian Tarentum, there seems to have been little strife among the Italiotes.

An amphictyonic league, meeting in common rites at the temple of Hera on the Lacinian promontory, fostered a feeling of unity among them.

The Pythagorean and Eleatic systems of philosophy had their chief seat in Magna Graecia. Other departments of literature do not seem to have been so much cultivated among them.

The poet Ibycus, though a native of Rhegium, led a very wandering life.

They sent competitors to the Olympic games (among them the famous Milo of Croton); and the physicians of Croton early in the 6th century (especially in the person of Democedes) were reputed the best in Greece; but politically they appear to have generally kept themselves separate.

One ship of Croton, however, fought at Salamis, though it is not recorded that Greece asked the Italiotes for help when it sent ambassadors to Gelon of Syracuse
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« Reply #16 on: September 25, 2008, 11:14:27 am »









Mutual discord first sapped the prosperity of Magna Graecia.

In 510 Croton, having defeated the Sybarites in a great battle, totally destroyed their city. Croton maintained alone the leading position which had belonged jointly to the Achaean cities (Diod. xiv. 103); but from that time Magna Graecia steadily declined.

In the war between Athens and Syracuse Magna Graecia took comparatively little part; Locri was strongly antiAthenian, but Rhegium, though it was the headquarters of the Athenians in 427, remained neutral in 415.

Foreign enemies pressed heavily on it.

The Lucanians and Bruttians on the north captured one town after another.

Dionysius of Syracuse attacked them from the south; and after he defeated the Crotoniate league and destroyed Caulonia (389 B.C.), Tarentum remained the only powerful city.

Henceforth the history of Magna Graecia is only a record of the vicissitudes of Tarentum (q.v.).

Repeated expeditions from Sparta and Epirus tried in vain to prop up the decaying Greek states against the Lucanians and Bruttians; and when in 282 the Romans appeared in the Tarentine Gulf the end was close at hand.

The aid which Pyrrhus brought did little good to the Tarentines, and his final departure in 274 left them defenceless. During these constant wars the Greek cities had been steadily decaying; and in the second Punic war, when most of them seized the opportunity of revolting from Rome, their very existence was in some cases annihilated.

Malaria increased in strength as the population diminished.

We are told by Cicero (De am. 4), Magna Graecia nunc guidon deleta est.

Many of the cities completely disappeared, and hardly any of them were of great importance under the Roman empire; some, like Tarentum, 1 This passage should perhaps be referred to the 8th century B.C. It is the first mention of an Italian place in a literary record.

maintained their existence into modern times, and in these only (except at Locri) have archaeological investigations of any importance been carried on; so that there still remains a considerable field for investigation. (T. As.)



http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Magna_Graecia
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« Reply #17 on: September 25, 2008, 11:23:24 am »













                                                           Magna Graecia


                                                       Synthesis of cultures.
 





  From the eighth century B.C. the Greek started to found a series of colonies that extended along the coasts of the south of Italy , from Apulia to Campania,with some centres in Sicily:

"Taranto,Cuma, Metaponto, Sibari, Crotone, Reggio, Paestum and Naples"

these were the main centres of this big area colonized, that was then called Magna Graecia.




In these colonies, that were then defenitely submitted by the Romans between 280and 265b.C., commerces, agriculture and handcraft flourished: furthermore, very important is the role developed by these cities, spreading in Italy the Greek culture.

The philosophy, the literature and the art of the Greek world influenced in an evident way the artistic and cultural activities of these colonies, that gave life to refined expression: flourishing was the production of ceramics and the working in bronze, while the wonderful temples of Paestum attest the grade of refinement and the decent measure reached by the local architecture.


In this lively cultural and economic climate, even the jeweller's is diffused and finds a great variety of expressions. The most splendid period of the jeweller's of the Magna Graecia is the one included between the fourth and third century B.C.: the main centre of production and diffusion of jeweller's is "Taranto" and the literary sources testify that it was a very vivacious artistic and cultural centre.

We know the Hellenistic jeweller's through the archaeological rests effected in the tombs: in spite of
the repeated sacks that happened in the course of centuries, the funeral equipments of these ancient inhabitants are extremely rich and allow to find in a rather agile way the of a jeweller's production no doubt important.
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« Reply #18 on: September 25, 2008, 11:25:25 am »













The typology of the jewels found in the tombs is evidently determined by the social class of the dead(deceased) ,yet, even in the most modest tombs a great number of earrings are found (the favourite ornament of these people), that in the most sumptuous tombs are often accompanied by diadems, crowns, necklaces and sometimes even by one ore two rings.

Near Taranto fibulas are very rare and like we know, they were a determinate element of the clothes of those days, and even when they are found they are generally made of a material that is less precious, like silver, bronze,and sometimes iron: very diffused are the funeral equipments coming from the colonies of "Campania", where there aren't any earrings.


The earrings, that were the most frequent ornament among the Italiots, inhabitants of the Magna Graecia, have a great quantity of designs and solutions, in which the goldsmiths from "Taranto have showed a fantasy without limits. In the fourth century a certain type of earring was very fashionable, it had the the shape of a gold leech, flanked by filigreed decorations and pendants.; very appreciated were also the models with the most singular forms, for example the one with an helix, like the one found in "Taranto" and reproduced in fig,1.



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« Reply #19 on: September 25, 2008, 11:29:29 am »









But the earring that was most widely diffused and popular in the Hellenistic period was the disc one fig.2, sometimes, like in the precious exemplary of the fourth century, found in "Crispiano" fig.4, the decorative element , magnificent and exuberant , is balanced by the measure of the whole lot and by the Classic and severe line of the feminine line that is the centre of the earring. Human and animal figures fig.5. often recur as decorative motives in the jewels of these zones: in particular the leonine, retooken by the Classic art, is widely used in the decoration of necklaces, bracelets, rings and earrings. 






Fig. 2





                                               

                                                 Fig. 4







Fig. 5
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« Reply #20 on: September 25, 2008, 11:37:37 am »











Even the "Nodus Herculeus", very famous in the ancient times because it was considered a magic knot able to remove the evils, among the inhabitants of the Magna Graecia assumes the meaning of an amulet and with this magic valence the goldsmiths use it diffusely in jewelry, as pendants , centre of belts, decoration of diadems and bracelets.


                                   

                                     Fig. 3


A pair of earrings found in "Taranto" fig.3., shows how sometimes the desire of decorative exuberance excels the limits of a contained measure: these pendants are infact decorated with an elaborated vegetal composition, and with a series of human and animal figures , all of them supported and enriched by chains and pendants with the form of a bud. In the jeweller of "Taranto" an extraordinary richness of technique and decorative solutions is dedicated also to the creation of crowns and diadems, that become different from the simple gold band used in the Classic age.
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« Reply #21 on: September 25, 2008, 11:41:17 am »









The most rich and spectacular exemplary is the flourished diadem found in "Canosa" and dated back to the third century B.C. fig.6.




Fig. 6


The diadem is made up of two thick laminae joined together previously with a clasp, so it was easy to wear ; the structure is covered by a light green lamina decorated with more than one hundred and fifty country flowers, fixed with very thin gold stalks, and enamelled of green, white, light blue, and red, with stamens and pistils of gold granules, drops of vitreous dough and precious stones, that give it a varied polychromy.

In the third century B.C. the Magna Graecia colonies passed under the latin domination, and from that moment onwards the political vicissitudes of the Roman Italy followed; yet their cultural contribute to the hellinazation of the peninsula and of Rome was determinant, and in the latin jeweller's, clear traces of the motives and of the styles elaborated in the shops of these colonies, will found again.



http://www.stonesetting.com/us/culturale/storia/grecia/greciaart.html
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« Reply #22 on: September 25, 2008, 11:52:47 am »




             

              TARANTO
              Doric Columns
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« Reply #23 on: September 25, 2008, 11:59:11 am »










                                                             Magna Graecia
 
 




Magna Graecia around 280 b. C.


Columns of doric temple at TarantoMagna Graecia (Latin for "Greater Greece," Megal Hellas/Μεγάλη Ελλάς in Greek) is the name of the area in the southern Italian peninsula that was colonised by Greek settlers in the 8th century BC, who brought with them the lasting imprint of their Hellenic civilization.

Main article: Colonies in antiquity.






In the 8th and 7th centuries, driven by unsettled conditions at home, Greek colonies were established in places as widely separated as the eastern coast of the Black Sea and Massilia (what is now Marseille, France).

They included settlements in Sicily and the southern part of the Italian peninsula.

The Romans called the area of Sicily and the foot of the boot of Italy Magna Graecia (Latin, Greater Greece), since it was so thickly inhabited by Greeks.

The ancient geographers differed on whether the term included Sicily or merely Apulia and Calabria Strabo being the most prominent advocate of the wider definitions.

Colonies in antiquity were city-states founded from a mother-city, not from a territory-at-large. ...

 ... Apulia (official Italian name: Puglia) is a region in southeastern Italy bordering the Adriatic Sea in
the east, the Ionian Sea to the southeast, and the Strait of Otranto and Gulf of Taranto in the south.

... Calabria, formerly Brutium, is a region in southern Italy which occupies the toe of the Italian peninsula south of Naples. ...


With this colonisation, the Greek culture was exported to Italy, in its dialects of the Ancient Greek language, its religious rites, its traditions of the independent polis but it soon developed an original Hellenic civilisation, later interacting with the native Italic and Latin civilisations.

The most important cultural transplant was the Chalcidean/Cumaean variety of the Greek alphabet, which was firstly adopted by the Etruscans and subsequently evolved into the Latin alphabet, which went on to become the most widely used alphabet in the world.
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« Reply #24 on: September 25, 2008, 12:05:50 pm »











Many of the new cities become very powerful and rich, like



Kapu (Capua),

Neapolis (Νεάπολις, Naples),

Syracuse, Akragas,

Subaris(Σύβαρις, Sybaris).





Other cities in Magna Graecia included


Taras (Τάρας, Taranto),

Epizephyrioi Lokroi or Locri (Λοκροί),

Rhegion (Ρήγιον),

Kroton (Κρότων, Crotone),

Thurii (Θούριοι),

Elea (Ελέα),

Ankon (Αγκων, Ancona), etc.

Naples (Italian Napoli, Neapolitan N pule, from Greek Νέα όλις - Néa Pólis - meaning New City;





see also List of traditional Greek place names) is the largest city in southern Italy and capital of

Campania Region and the Province of Naples. ...




Syracuse (Italian, Siracusa, ancient Syracusa - see also List of traditional Greek place names) is a city on the eastern coast of Sicily and the capital of the province of Syracuse, Italy. ...

Map of central Mediterranean Sea, showing location of Agrigentum (modern Agrigento). ...

Sybaris, a city of Magna Graecia, on the Gulf of Taranto, between the rivers Crathis (Crati) and Sybaris (Coscile), which now meet 3 miles from the sea, but in ancient times had independent mouths, was the oldest Greek colony in this region. ... Founded 706 BC as Taras () Region Apulia




see also List of traditional Greek place names) was founded about 680 BC on the Italian shores of the

Ionian Sea, near modern



Capo Zefirio, by the Locrians, apparently by Opuntii (East Locrians) from the city of Opus, but including Ozolae (West... The ancient city of Rhegion was one of the Magna Graecia colonies founded by Calcidians in 730 BC.



Thucydides wrote that before to found Rhegion, there was a consulting to the Delphi oracle, and then the Messenes, coming from Messene in the Peloponnesos participate to the foundation

Crotone is a city in Calabria, southern Italy, on the Gulf of Taranto. ...

Elea (Velia by the Romans; see also List of traditional Greek place names) was a Greek coastal city founded around 540 BC in Lucania in southern Italy, 15 miles southeast of the Gulf of Salerno.


... Ancona is a city and a seaport in the Marche, a region of northeastern Italy, population 100,507 (2001). ...





Magna Graecia was absorbed into the Roman Republic following the Pyrrhic War. Combatants Roman republic Magna Graecia, Epirus Commanders Publius Valerius Laevinus, Publius Decius Mus Pyrrhus of Epirus The Pyrrhic War was a war between Pyrrhus of Epirus and Rome that lasted from 280 BC to 275 BC.




http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Magna-Graecia
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« Reply #25 on: September 25, 2008, 02:53:45 pm »



Apulia, Arpi Circa 3rd Century BC AE21 (6.12 gm)

Obv: Laureate head of Zeus left, [thunderbolt behind]

Rev: ARPANWN, boar right, spear above
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« Reply #26 on: September 25, 2008, 02:56:10 pm »



Campania, Hyria 405-385 BCE AR Nomos/didrachm (20.46 mm; 7.3 gm)


Obv:Helmeted head of Athena right, owl on helmet

Rev: Man-headed bull right; inscription above.

Ex: Ancient Imports

The Hyrian Celators didn't quite reach the level of most of the other city-states of Magna Graecia.
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« Reply #27 on: September 25, 2008, 02:58:34 pm »



Campania, Neapolis 400 - 350 BCE Nomos/didrachm (6.85 gm)


Obv: Head of Nymph right

Rev: Man-headed bull walking left being crowned by Nike
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« Reply #28 on: September 25, 2008, 03:01:08 pm »



Campania, Neapolis. Circa 300-280 BC. AR Nomos (7.34 gm)


Obv: Diademed head of Nymph left; pendant earring

Rev: Man-headed bull walking right being crowned by Nike; IS below; inscription in exergue.
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« Reply #29 on: September 25, 2008, 03:05:13 pm »



LUCANIA, Metapontion. Circa 330-300 BC. AR Nomos (6.80 gm)


Obv: Wreathed head of Demeter right.

Rev: barley ear, leaf; to the right, a plow.
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