Sybaris, Thurii, Copia: a piece of micro-history from modern Sibari
Sibari is a small municipality by the Ionian Sea in Calabria, Italy. It is placed in the gulf of Taranto and is now inhabited by just 5000 people. This little jewel in antiquity was a wealthy area which saw the rise and fall of three different towns: Sybaris, Thurii and Copia Romana. The overlap of three settlements has an undeniable fascination from an archaeological point of view, and in fact a number of studies have been conducted in the area.[1] However, in this article I aim to analyse the history of these settlements using ancient literary sources, giving an overview of the populations who inhabited the territory of Sibari, their laws and their customs. Successively, I shall place this micro-cosmos in the wider context of the Greek and Roman worlds, explaining the progressive decrease in the importance and autonomy of the area, as well as showing how the study of a single settlement can add precious elements for analysis of bigger questions.
The most important sources for the reconstruction of the history of Sibari are Strabo and Diorodus Siculus.[2] The former lived between the I century BC and the I century AD, so he possesses information on all three settlements, while the latter describes extensively the first two towns, Sybaris and Thurii. Sybaris is by far the most well-documented of the three, and it has captured the attention of a number of authors thanks to its wealth. Aristotle uses it as an example in his Politics, and wrote a Constitution of Sybaris which is unfortunately lost, while Athenaeus offers a curious perspective on the luxurious life of the Sybarites.[3] Also Herodotus mentions Sybaris en passant in some passages of his Histories, telling interesting anecdotes.
“You shall be happy, Sybarite, — very happy,
And all your time in entertainments pass,
While you continue to th’ immortal gods
The worship due: but when you come, at length,
To honour mortal man beyond the gods,
Then foreign war and intestine sedition
Shall come upon you, and shall crush your city.”
Ath. XII 18, tr. by C. D. Yonge
Strabo and Diodorus agree that Sybaris was founded by the Achaeans in the last decades of the VIII century BC.[4] Aristotle states that the Troezenians were co-founders of the city, but they were driven out as soon as the Achaeans became more numerous.[5] The settlers chose a remarkably favourable territory by the sea and between the rivers Crathis and Sybaris, after which the town was named. Thanks to the fertility of the land and the extension of their countryside, the Sybarites soon became extraordinarily rich. Strabo states that the city had twenty-five subject cities, and that by the river Crathis alone the settlement covered an area with diameter of fifty stadia (9250m). Diodorus Siculus affirms that the Sybarites granted citizenship to many foreigners, so Sybaris became the most inhabited centre in Italy with three hundred thousand citizens.[6]
Sybaris possessed an incredible power and wealth, for which the city became widely known even centuries after its fall (also in English “sybarite” means self-indulgent, luxurious). Athenaeus (II-III century AD) dedicates book XII of his Deipnosophistae to the vanity of pleasure and luxury, giving examples both of populations and of historical characters. He dedicates to Sybaris the biggest section of the book, even more extensive than Persia’s. According to the rhetorician’s account, its inhabitants were indolent and luxurious to the point that they forbid any noisy craft to be practiced inside the city, so that they could rest in silence.[7] Athenaeus immediately draws a contrast between their lifestyle and that of the Spartans whom he admires,[8] narrating that “[a] Sybarite, coming to Lacedæmon, and being invited to the phiditium, sitting down on a wooden seat and eating with them, said that originally he had been surprised at hearing of the valour of the Lacedæmonians; but that now that he had seen it, he thought that they in no respect surpassed other men: for that the greatest coward on earth would rather die a thousand times than live and endure such a life as theirs.”[9]
Other anecdotes include the Sybarites’ unwillingness to leave their city,[10] another sign of extreme indolence, and the absence of a harbour, which means that every good that their lands produce was consumed by them.[11] When speaking of their feasts, Athenaeus states that “they had carried their luxury to such a pitch that they had taught even their horses to dance at their feasts to the music of the flute”, and recounts that they held a banquet for which they prepared for a whole year to ensure their proverbial magnificence.[12]
That area was so tempting that, according to Athenaeus, when the men of Crotona occupied Sybaris they too indulged in luxury.[13]
Regardless of the historical accuracy of these anecdotes, which to my knowledge are not confirmed by any other source,[14] this description is intriguing because Sybaris is described in terms which are strongly divergent from Greek ideals. This could raise the question of the status of the Magna Graecia in the Greek conception: were the colonies considered as much Greek as the cities of Hellas, or were they less so? This opens a great theme, that of the Greeks and the “others”: where do colonies stand in this dualism?
I believe that the Achaean origin of Sybaris is key: the city is definitely not barbarian. Therefore, if this opposition really is dual, the Sybarites must be included on the Greek side. By considering the position of Sybaris in Athenaeus’ work, this can be once again confirmed. He opens his catalogue of exempla by talking of Persia, then Lydia and successively Sybaris.[15] After these three accounts, the others are much shorter and there is a mixture of populations and individuals, therefore it is proper to consider the three initial descriptions as an independent triptych. Persia’s description is the first one, and the empire is the Greek enemy par excellence, so the furthest away from Greek culture itself. Afterwards, the rhetorician illustrates Lydia’s luxury. If one believes what Herodotus says about the Lydians, that their customs are nearly the same as the Hellenes’,[16] it is appropriate to regard them as the middle ground: they are not quite Greeks, but they resemble them in various ways. Moving on to Sybaris with this mindset, the city is the closest to Hellas in customs and, as already mentioned, in origin.
However, is the opposition Greek vs others really so strongly dualistic? The example of Sybaris, which from Athenaeus’ description results much more similar to the Eastern empire than to the Greek peoples, could open a discussion on this aspect and perhaps belittle the antithesis between Greeks and non-Greeks, because, as we have seen, a city of Greek origin can be just as flawed as a barbaric one.
It is interesting to see that Sybarite individuals are described in the same terms as their city as a whole. Athenaeus, later in the book, cites Aristotle while telling that a certain “Alcisthenes of Sybaris, out of luxury, had a garment prepared for him of such excessive expensiveness that he exhibited it at Lacinium, at the festival of Juno, at which all the Italians assemble, and that of all the things which were exhibited that was the most admired”.[17] Herodotus mentions Smindyrides of Sybaris, “the most luxurious liver of his day”,[18] gone to Sicyon to seek (unsuccessfully) the hand of Agariste, daughter of Cleisthenes, tyrant of the city, who was looking for the best man in Greece to marry her.[19]
For what concerns Sybaris’ politics, unfortunately no source states which form of government the city had, but Diodorus Siculus speaks of a “leader of the people” (δημαγωγός) who “persuaded the Sybarites”, suggesting a democracy.[20] Athenaeus mentions that Aristotle wrote a Constitution of Sybaris, however this has not survived even in form of summary.[21] Heraclides Lembus’ work includes the summaries of Aristotle’s constitutions of Rhegium and Tarentum, as well as sixty-one others, and Sybaris’ absence significantly points out the area’s loss of importance in later times.
Sybarite prosperity does not last long: according to Diodorus’ account, Telys, leader of the people, convinces the Sybarites to send into exile five hundred of the wealthiest citizens and to confiscate their properties.[22] When the exiles went to Croton as suppliants, Telys gave the Crotonians an ultimatum: they could either send the exiles back, or expect war.[23] Following Pythagoras’ suggestion, the Crotonians decide to protect the suppliants and engage in a war against Sybaris.[24] Both Strabo and Diodorus tell that the Sybarites advanced against the enemy with three hundred thousand men and they were defeated so harshly that this war determined the end of the city itself.[25] Strabo says that the Crotonians deviated the course of the Crathis to submerge Sybaris and delete its memory, however this has not been confirmed by archaeological studies, nor is it mentioned by other sources.[26] Herodotus narrates that when Sybaris fell all the Milesians, who were great friends of the Sybarites — he affirms that “no cities which we know were ever so closely joined in friendship as these” — shaved their heads and made public lamentations.[27]
Fifty-eight years after Sybaris’ destruction, in 453 BC, Thessalians tried to settle in the area.[28] However, the Sybarites were determined to claim their territory back, and to do so they sought the aid of the Greeks.[29] At first only the Athenians offered help, but they then managed to involve some poleis of the Peloponnesus too. Before the departure they consulted the oracle in Delphi, and the response was to found a city in a place with “water to drink in due measure, but bread to eat without measure”.[30] They came to a place near the old Sybaris, found a spring of fresh water, Thuria, and settled there, naming their new town Thurii.[31]
However, peace did not last long: the former Sybarites were accused of assigning the best political positions and allotments of land to themselves and they were put to death by the rest of the citizens.[32] At this point, a second colonisation began, and many Greek poleis sent their citizens to settle in that rich land. Also Periclean Athens sent settlers among whom was Herodotus, who spent his last years there.
According to Diodorus Siculus, the new population divided the city in ten tries and established a democracy, choosing Charondas of Catana as their lawgiver. This cannot be literally true, because Aristotle talks of Charondas as a contemporary of Solon,[33] but it can be assumed that they took inspiration from other legislations given by him.
At this point Diodorus’ narrative is interrupted by an excursus on Charondas’ laws, and Strabo does not give any additional information. In later paragraphs Diodorus mentions continuous wars between Thurians and Tarantini around 444 BC,[34] and a significant civil strife between Athenians and Peloponnesians in 434, on the brink of the Peloponnesian war.[35] They were arguing on who should have been considered founder of the city, and they solved the question by going back to Delphi, as they did before sending the expedition against the Thessalians. The god told them to name himself as founder of Thurii, so they proclaimed Apollo as founder and resolved their conflict.
It is interesting to notice that Thucydides, in the so called πεντηκονταετία,[36] does not mention any of these events, from the foundation of Thurii to the civil strife between Athenians and Peloponnesians. The absence of the first military expedition at the hands of the Athenians who then managed to get on board some Peloponnesian cities is particularly significant, because Pericles must have been behind it (everything happened after the ostracism of Cimon). Gomme finds this omission particularly striking, but he dismisses the question assuming that Thucydides might have had the intention to recount the deed at a different point.[37] I believe that there is more to that. In his work, the historian gives a portrait of the statesman which subsumes every quality missing in his successors: he is eloquent, prudent, and attentive to the needs of the polis, regardless of people’s desires. Perhaps, in this occasion Pericles demonstrated a thirst for power which Thucydides does not want his character to have. While Diodorus Siculus belittles the impact of the Athenians on the execution of the Sybarites, or at least mentions the Peloponnesians as just as powerful, Strabo seems to suggest that the Athenians were the predominant power among the Greeks. If this is true, they would be the prime responsible of a mass homicide of allies, perpetrated with the sole purpose of increasing their own wealth. It comes with no wonder, then, that the historian preferred not to narrate the Thurian expedition, which supposedly happened with Pericles’ approval. This episode would make the statesman no different from his successors. With these premises, can Thucydides’ Pericles be considered a true representation of the historical figure, or does this omission bring the character of the History of the Peloponnesian War a further step away from reality? I believe that the second one is more feasible.
After these episodes, Thurii falls into oblivion. Strabo explains that after a long time of prosperity the Leucanii enslaved the city, which was then occupied by the Tarantini and at last the Thurians handed their own city to the Romans. In this last exchange of domain, Thurii became Copiae.[38] The name is significantly reminiscent of the city’s prosperity: in the Roman pantheon Copia is the goddess of wealth and harvest. Although the city had not been destroyed, the new settlers soon began a renovation of the buildings and infrastructures in line with Roman architecture.
During Roman times there is no story of the area that is worth mentioning: Sybaris had reached the apex of wealth and importance just before its first fall, and Thurii and Copia never reached that same level of significance in the Greek or Roman imagery. The town slowly ceased to be spoken of and became a secondary settlement.
Ironically, the most of what has been excavated and is now visible belongs to Copiae, although ruins of the previous settlements have been found in the course of the research which is still going on.
Concluding, the area represents a great peculiarity thanks to the presence of three different settlements with three independent histories. By retracing each one and analysing the sources that speak of the area it is possible not only to reconstruct the history of a piece of Magna Graecia, but also to find suggestive ideas for the bigger context. Sybaris is a fantastic example of how hubris can ruin a city in the Greek imagination, and gives a different perspective in the contraposition between Greeks and barbarians; in fact, despite being undeniably Greek, it is described as a barbarian city and is especially reminiscent of the Persian empire. Thurii offers an opportunity to talk about Thucydides’ reliability as a historian, as well as illustrating Athenian imperialism in action. Copiae contains in its name the greatness of the past which is irreversibly lost at its time. It is clear, then, that the study of micro-history adds invaluable details to our understanding of the ancient world.
Footnotes
[1] See, for example: Bernasconi, M. P.; Stanley, J. D.; Caruso, C.. “Sybaris-Thuri-Copia Deltaic Settings in Calabria, Italy: Molluscs, Associated Biogenic Components, and Ecobiostratigraphy Applied to Archaeology.” Journal of Coastal Research 26, no. 2 (2010): 377–90; Rainey, F.. “The Location of Archaic Greek Sybaris.” American Journal of Archaeology 73, no. 3 (1969): 261–73.
[2] Diod. Sic. XII 9–11: Str. VI 1.13.
[3] Ath. XII 15–22.
[4] Diod. Sic. XII 9.1; Str. VI 1.13.
[5] Arist. Pol. V 1303a25ff. The philosopher uses Sybaris and Thurii as exempla to prove that people of different origins who cohabit will eventually cause internal strife.
[6] Diod. Sic. XII 9.2. On the “Sybarite empire”, see: Pollini, A.. “Limites Et Occupation De L’espace Dans Les Colonies Grecques Du Sud De L’Italie.” Pallas, no. 89 (2012): 123–42.
[7] Ath. XII 15.
[8] Throughout the book the Spartans are described as disciplined, and they even try to change some characters’ otiose behaviour, see for example the episode of Magas, king of Cyrene: Ath. XII 74. The author’s appreciation of Sparta can also be assumed by the presence of Pericles among the luxurious characters: 45.
[9] Ath. XII 15, tr. by C. D. Yonge.
[10] Ibid. 17
[11] Ibid. 18
[12] Ath. XII 19.
[13] Ath. XII 22.
[14] Although the general idea of their hubris is, see: Strabo VI 1.13 “by reason of luxury and insolence they were deprived of all their felicity by the Crotoniates within seventy days”, tr. by H. L. Jones.
[15] Persia: Ath. XII 5–10; Lydia: Ath. XII 11–13; Sybaris: see note 3.
[16] Hdt. I 94.1.
[17] Ath. XII 58, tr. by C. D. Yonge.
[18] Hdt. VI 127.1, tr. by A. D. Godley.
[19] Ibid. 126.
[20] Diod. Sic. XII 9.2,4.
[21] Ath. XII 19; for summaries of Aristotle’s Constitutions, see: Heraclides Lembus. Heraclidis Politiarum Quae Extant, ed. F. G. Schneidewin.
[22] Diod. Sic. XII 9.2.
[23] Ibid. 9.3.
[24] Ibid. 9.4. I shall not engage with the question of Pythagoras’ historicity, because it is not relevant to the ends of the present article.
[25] Ibid. 9.5; Str. VI 1.13. See also Hdt. V 44–45.
[26] Str. VI 1.13; for archaeological studies see note 1 and also: Stanley, J. D.; Bernasconi, M. P.. “Sybaris-Thurii-Copia trilogy: three delta coastal sites become hand-locked” Méditerranée no. 112 (2009): 75–86. The authors explain how rather than being a deviation due to human action, the river might have changed its own course even at different points in time.
[27] Hdt. VI 21.1, tr. by A. D. Godley.
[28] Diod. Sic. XII 10.2.
[29] Ibid. 10.3.
[30] Ibid. 10.4–5, tr. by C. D. Yonge.
[31] Ibid. 10.6.
[32] Diod. Sic. XII 11.1–2.
[33] Arist. Pol. II 1274a22.
[34] Diod. Sic XII 23.
[35] Diod. Sic. XII 35.
[36] Thuc. I 89–118.2.
[37] Gomme, A.W.. Historical Commentary on Thucydides I (Oxford 1945): 369.
[38] Str. VI 1.13.
Do you have a suggestion for a future topic? Do you have an idea to share with your friends? Send us a message and follow the Durham University Classics Society on Twitter (@DUClassSoc) and Facebook (@DUClassics Society) to keep up with this blog and our other adventures!
