The goddess Nike riding on a two-horse chariot, Apulian patera (tray), 4th century BC. His grandson Hieronymus however made an alliance with Hannibal, which prompted the Romans to besiege the city, which fell in 212, despite the machines of Archimedes as Proclus writes in his commentary on Euclid's Elements Archimedes constructed weapons functioning with compressed air, with weights and counterweights as Ctesibius and Hero explain. Only Syracuse remained independent until 212, because its king Hiero II was a devoted ally of the Romans. Sicily was conquered by Rome during the First Punic War. The other Greek cities in Italy followed during the Samnite Wars and the Pyrrhic War Taras was the last to fall in 272. The first Greek city to be absorbed into the Roman Republic was Neapolis in 327 BC. These Hellenic colonies became very rich and powerful, and some still stand today such as Neapolis ('New City', now Naples), Syracuse, Akragas (Agrigento), Taras (Taranto), Rhegion (Reggio Calabria), or Kroton (Crotone). The most important cultural transplant was the Chalcidean/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. An original Hellenic civilization soon developed and later interacted with the native Italic civilisations. With colonization, Greek culture was exported to Italy in its dialects of the Ancient Greek language, its religious rites and its traditions of the independent polis. Ancient geographers differed on whether the term included Sicily or merely Apulia, Campania and Calabria, Strabo being the most prominent advocate of the wider definitions. The Romans called this area Magna Graecia (Latin for 'Greater Greece') since it was so densely inhabited by the Greeks. Colonies began to be established all over the Mediterranean and Black Seas (with the exception of Northwestern Africa, in the sphere of influence of Carthage), including in Sicily and the southern part of the Italian Peninsula. In the 8th and 7th century BC, due to demographic crises (famine, overcrowding, etc.), stasis, a developing need for new commercial outlets and ports, and expulsion from their homeland after wars, Greeks began to settle in southern Italy. The Roman poet Ovid notably referred to the south of Italy as such in his poem Fasti.Īccording to Strabo's Geographica, the colonization of Magna Graecia had already begun by the time of the Trojan War and lasted for several centuries. The term Magna Graecia first appears in Polybius' Histories. They also influenced the native peoples, especially the Sicilian Sicels, who became hellenised after they adopted the Greek culture as their own. The settlers who began arriving in the 8th century BC brought with them their Hellenic civilization which left a lasting imprint on Italy such as in the culture of ancient Rome. Sicily, although also a region of Greek colonization, is not usually included in this area.Magna Graecia (/ˌmæɡnə ˈɡriːsjə, ˈɡriːʃə/, US: /ˌmæɡnə ˈɡreɪʃə/ Latin meaning 'Greater Greece', Ancient Greek: Μεγάλη Ἑλλάς, Megálē Hellás, Italian: Magna Grecia) was the name given by the Romans to the coastal areas of Southern Italy in the present-day regions of Campania, Apulia, Basilicata, Calabria and Sicily these regions were extensively populated by Greek settlers. Magna Graecia (Megal? Hellas) refers to the coastal areas of southern Italy which were colonized by various ancient Greek city-states from the 8th to 5th centuries BCE. Ancient Greek Cities in Italy – Magna Graecia.Documentary ancient civilizations | ancient Greece | Magna ….History of Magna Graecia, part 2, Southern Italy.Why did some Greek settlements fight each other?.Who is the father of history pronunciation?.