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The Conquests of Southern Italy
Southern Italy and Sicily for the most part had been under the dominion of the
Greeks for centuries, and had in many ways shared the cultural advantages of
Greece as well as her conflicts. As with their mother states, so also these
Italian Greeks failed to unite into a Greek state of any threatening size.
Tarenturn and Syracuse were two of the more significant cities of this area. Already
during the last half of the fourth century BC, kings from Epirus, a Greek state across the lower Adriatic Sea, and from Sparta fell fighting
as they were defending the honor of the Italian Greeks.
These several cities became consumed in war with Rome in 280 B.C., and so
theycalled in King Pyrrhus of Epirus, who came over with nearly twenty-five thousand well equipped
troops and a number of war elephants, which was very new to western warfare. Pyrrhus
achieved two hard-fought victories over Roman arms and was about to negotiate
peace when Carthage, the Phoenician power which had grown up in North Africa, became afraid of
the success of Pyrrhus and sent her fleet to support Rome. Rome refused to make
peace with the Greeks in Italy as long as they remained on Italian soil.
Pyrrhus won many wars and had a spectacular career and soon campaigned in
Sicily having great success against the Carthaginians. He soon lost any support
from the Greeks, and he returned to Italy and ultimately withdrew to Epirus. The
many yet non-united Greek cities were then reduced and added to the Roman
alliance. By 265 B.C., the entire Italian peninsula acknowledged the supremacy of
Rome.
The History of Rome - Part One 743 - 136 B.C. © Bible History Online (http://www.bible-history.com) |