Greek Texts & Translations

Some day, around the Dragon's stony tomb,
A mighty multitude shall meet their doom.
For the Greeks of Italy, enticed by this prophecy, marched against Laiis, and were defeated by the Leucani. ^note 2

Such, along the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea, are the possessions of the Leucani, which at first did not reach to the other sea; ^note the Greeks who dwelt on the Gulf of Tarentum possessed it. But before the coming of the Greeks there were no Leucani, the Chones ^note and Oenotri possessed these territories. But when the Samnites had greatly increased, and expelled the Chones and Oenotri, and driven the Leucani into this region, while the Greeks possessed the seacoast on both sides as far as the straits, the Greeks and the Barbarians maintained a lengthened contest. The tyrants of Sicily, and afterwards the Carthaginians, at one time making war against the Romans, for the acquisition of Sicily, and at another, for Italy itself, utterly wasted all these regions. The Greeks, however, succeeded in depriving the ancient inhabitants of a great portion of the midland country, beginning even as early as the Trojan war; they increased in power, and extent of territory, to such a degree, that they called this region and Sicily, the Magna Graecia. But now the whole region, except Tarentum, Rhegium, and Neapolis, has become barbarian, ^note and belongs partly to the Leucani and Bruttii, partly to the Campani; to these, however, only in name, but truly to the Romans; for these people have become Roman. However, it is incumbent on one who is treating of uni-