The origin of the city of Taranto dates from the 8th century BC when it was founded as a Greek colony, known as Taras.
Taras gradually increased its influence, becoming a commercial power and a city-state of Magna Graecia and ruling over many of the Greek colonies in southern Italy.
Greek period
Foundation
Taranto was founded in 706 BC by Dorian immigrants hailing from Sparta. Its origins are peculiar: the founders were Partheniae, sons of unmarried Spartan women and perioeci (free men, but not citizens of Sparta); these unions were decreed by the Spartans to increase the number of soldiers (only the citizens of Sparta could become soldiers) during the bloody First Messenian War, but later they were nullified, and the sons were forced to leave. There are some doubts about Taranto being of Spartan origin.The Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. xxxiii 1913 p. 246-275Arnold J. Toynbee, A Study of History vol. iii p. 52
According to the legend Phalanthus, the Parthenian leader, went to Delphi to consult the oracle and received the puzzling answer that he should found a city where rain fell from a clear sky. After all attempts to capture a suitable place to found a colony failed, he became despondent, convinced that the oracle had told him something that was impossible, and was consoled by his wife. She laid his head in her lap and herself became disconsolate. When Phalanthus felt her tears splash onto his forehead he at last grasped the meaning of the oracle, for his wife's name meant clear sky. The harbour of Taranto in Apulia was nearby and he decided this must be the new home for the exiles. The Partheniae arrived and founded the city, naming it Taras after the son of the Greek sea god, Poseidon, and the local nymph Satyrion. A variation says Taras was founded in 707 BC by some Spartans, who, the sons of free women and enslaved fathers, were born during the Messenian War. According to other sources, Heracles founded the city. Another tradition indicates Taras himself as the founder of the city; the symbol of the Greek city (as well as of the modern city) is Taras riding a dolphin.
Herodotus mentions a certain Aristophilides of Taras, whom he describes as basileus (king) of Taras in the late archaic period.Herodotus iii 136 The nature of his rule has been debated. As basileus, Aristophilides is said to have exercised enough authority to direct action against Persian ships, which suggests either that he ruled as king, or that he held supreme executive power as the foremost magistrate of the polis. Many scholars have considered Aristophilides a tyrant, in line with the pattern of personal rule found in several Western Greek cities. However, Arther Ferrill has noted that Herodotus rarely applied the title basileus to Greek tyrants, reserving it instead for legitimate monarchs, and that his use of the term for Aristophilides may reflect a favorable source tradition rather than a neutral synonym for tyrant.Arther Ferrill, “Herodotus on Tyranny,” Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte 27, no. 3 (1978): 385–398, pp. 388-391. Massimo Nafissi likewise observes that the possibility of Taras having basileis “cannot be disproved,” suggesting that Aristophilides may have been a king whose powers were consistent with a recognized politeia in the Aristotelian sense.Massimo Nafissi, “From Sparta to Taras: Nomima, ktiseis and relationships between colony and mother city,” in S. Hodkinson & A. Powell (eds.), Sparta: New Perspectives (Swansea, 2009), p. 251. Nafissi further points to local cults, such as Aphrodite Basilis and the Dioscuri, as carrying royal connotations that may support this interpretation. The existence of a basileus at Taras may not necessarily indicate monarchy in the strict sense, but rather the title of a chief magistrate within a republican framework.Robert Drews, Basileus: The Evidence for Kingship in Geometric Greece (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983), pp. 37-38. Given the fragmentary evidence for Archaic Tarentum, historians have been unable to draw a definitive conclusion about the nature of the Tarentine executive.
Expansion and conflict
The expansion of Taranto was limited to the coast because of the resistance of the populations of inner Apulia. In 472 BC, Taranto signed an alliance with Rhegion, to counter the Iapygian tribes of the Messapians and Peucetians, and the Oscan-speaking Lucanians (see Iapygian-Tarentine Wars), but the joint armies of the Tarentines and Rhegians were defeated near Kailia, in what HerodotusHerodotus, vii 170. claims to be the greatest slaughter of Greeks in his knowledge, with 3,000 Rhegians and uncountable Tarentines killed. In 466 BC, Taranto was again defeated by the Iapygians; according to Aristotle,Politica, v 1303a. who praises its government, there were so many aristocrats killed that the democratic party was able to get the power, to remove the monarchy, inaugurate a democracy, and expel the Pythagoreans. Thus; Tarentum became an aristocratic republic, and became democratic when the ancient nobility dwindled.
However, the rise of the democratic party did not weaken the bonds of Taranto and her mother-city Sparta. In fact, Taranto supported the Peloponnesian side against Athens in the Peloponnesian War, refused anchorage and water to Athens in 415 BC, and even sent ships to help the Peloponnesians, after the Athenian disaster in Sicily. On the other side, Athens supported the Messapians, in order to counter Taranto's power.
In 432 BC, after several years of war, Taranto signed a peace treaty with the Greek colony of Thurii; both cities contributed to the foundation of the colony of Heraclea, which rapidly fell under Taranto's control. In 367 BC Carthage and the Etruscans signed a pact to counter Taranto's power in southern Italy.
Under the rule of its greatest statesman, strategist and army commander-in-chief, the philosopher and mathematician Archytas, Taranto reached its peak power and wealth; it was the most important city of the Magna Graecia, the main commercial port of southern Italy, it produced and exported goods to and from motherland Greece and it had the biggest army and the largest fleet in southern Italy. However, with the death of Archytas in 347 BC, the city started a slow, but ineluctable decline. Though the city’s hoplite infantry and cavalry continued to enjoy a notable reputation, its restrictive policies of citizenship meant that Taras could not match the numbers of first the Apulian tribes, then the Samnites, and finally the Romans.
In 343 BC Taranto appealed for aid against the barbarians to its mother city Sparta, in the face of aggression by the Bruttian League. In 342 BC, Archidamus III, king of Sparta, arrived in Italy with an army and a fleet to fight the Lucanians and their allies. In 338 BC, during the Battle of Manduria, the Spartan and Tarentine armies were defeated in front of the walls of Manduria (nowadays in province of Taranto), and Archidamus was killed.
In 333 BC, still troubled by their Italic neighbors, the Tarentines called the Epirotic king Alexander Molossus to fight the Bruttii, Samnites, and Lucanians, but he was later defeated and killed in the Battle of Pandosia (near Cosenza) in 331 BC. In 320 BC, a peace treaty was signed between Taranto and the Samnites. In 304 BC, Taranto was attacked by the Lucanians and asked for the help of Agathocles tyrant of Syracuse, king of Sicily. Agathocles arrived in southern Italy and took control of Bruttium (present-day Calabria), but was later recalled to Syracuse. In 303-302 BC Cleonymus of Sparta established an alliance with Taranto against the Lucanians, and fought against them.
Wars against Rome
First confrontations At the beginning of the 3rd century BC Rome's increasing power started to frighten Taranto, especially in terms of mastery of the sea and control over the Greek colonies in Magna Graecia. After the surrender of the Samnites in 290 BC, the Romans founded many colonies in Apulia and Lucania. Furthermore, some of the city-states in Magna Graecia, such as Rhegion, Croton and Locri, asked Rome for military help because of the wars that they were having with their neighbours. Also, Thurii, which was located on the Gulf of Taranto and under Tarentine rule, asked Rome for help in 282 BC, after being attacked by Lucanians. This situation inevitably led to a conflict between Taranto and Rome, since Taranto felt Rome was interfering in the affairs of the Greek colonies in southern Italy, which the Tarentines considered under their dominion.
Two political parties were present at the time within Taranto. The democrats, led by Philocharis or Ainesias, were dominant; they were against Rome, because they knew that if the Romans entered Taranto, the Greeks would have lost their independence. The second faction in Taranto were the aristocrats, led by Agis; they had lost their power when Taranto had become a democracy, and did not oppose surrendering to Rome as it would increase their own influence in the city, by reducing the power of the democrats. However, the aristocrats did not want to surrender openly to Rome and become unpopular with the population.
At that time, Taranto had the most powerful naval forces in Italy, and hastened to come to an agreement with Rome that stated that Roman ships could not enter into the Gulf of Taranto.
In 282 BC, Rome sent a fleet under Admiral Lucius Valerius, carrying troops to garrison Thurii, but ten ships were caught in a tempest and arrived in the sea off Taranto during a holy day (the festival of Dionysus). This angered the Tarentines, who considered it a hostile act openly in conflict with the pact, which forbade the Gulf of Taranto to Roman ships, and responded by attacking the Roman fleet: the Tarentine navy sunk four Roman ships, and captured a fifth.Cassius Dio, Roman History, xxxxix.4. According to some historians, Tarentine aristocrats had been asked by the Roman commanders Publius Cornelius and Lucius Valerius to arrest and execute the democrats and their followers during the arrival of the Roman fleet, which would allow the aristocrats to lead the city and sign an alliance with Rome.
The army and fleet of Taranto moved to Thurii and helped the democrats there exile the aristocrats. The Roman garrison placed in Thurii withdrew.
Pyrrhic War
Rome sent diplomats to Taranto, but the talks were broken off by the Tarentines: the Roman ambassador, Postumius, was insulted and mocked by Philonides, a member of the popular party. The Senate declared war on Taranto, and the Tarentines decided to call for help from King Pyrrhus of Epirus. In 281 BC, Roman legions, under the command of Lucius Aemilius Barbula, entered Taranto and plundered it. Taranto, with Samnite and Salentine reinforcements, then lost a battle against the Romans. After the battle, the Greeks chose Agis to sign a truce and begin diplomatic talks. These talks were also broken off when 3000 soldiers from Epirus under the command of Cineas entered the town. The Roman consul withdrew and suffered losses from attacks by the Greek ships.Zoronas viii.2.
Pyrrhus decided to help Taranto because he was in debt to them - they had earlier helped him conquer the island of Corcyra. He also knew that he could count on help from the Samnites, Lucanians, Bruttii, and some Illyrian tribes. His ultimate goal was to conquer Macedon, but he did not have enough money to recruit soldiers. He planned to help Taranto, then go to Sicily and attack Carthage. After winning a war against Carthage and capturing southern Italy, he would have enough money to organise a strong army and capture Macedon.