Misplaced Pages

#615384

59-519: Founded c.  710 BC as the Achaean colony of Kroton ( Ancient Greek : Κρότων or Ϙρότων ; Latin : Crotona ), it became a great Greek city, home of the renowned mathematician-philosopher Pythagoras amongst other famous citizens, and one of the most important centres of Magna Graecia . It was known as Cotrone from the Middle Ages until 1928, when its name was changed to

118-765: A building in 2010 dating to the Republican age in Via Discesa Fosso indicated the possibility of locating of the Roman colony in the acropolis. The building had painted plaster in Pompeian style with tiled and marble floors. An important domus found in Discesa Fosso includes baths and indicates a Roman-era "neighbourhood" which may have been distinguished from the rest of the Roman town by its secluded position of absolute prestige. It seems that it also had

177-416: A cord round his forehead as though it were a ribbon or a crown. Holding his breath and filling with blood the veins on his head, he would break the cord by the strength of these veins. It is said that he would let down by his side his right arm from the shoulder to the elbow, and stretch out straight the arm below the elbow, turning the thumb upwards, while the other fingers lay in a row. In this position, then,

236-597: A national archaeological museum, a municipal museum, a municipal art gallery, and a provincial museum of contemporary art, as well as the Antiquarium di Torre Nao. F.C. Crotone is a football club in Serie C . The team was promoted to top flight Serie A for the first time in its history for the 2016–17 season , and after one year in Serie B , was again promoted to play in Serie A for the 2020–21 season . Achei Crotone

295-598: A political equilibrium within the empire. The rule of Achaea in Roman times was placed under the Senate while a proconsul of Praetorian rank was appointed as its governor with the administrative seat in Corinth . However, Rome exercised fairly light control over Achaea: no Roman garrisons were posted there, native religious and social groups were widely tolerated by the Romans, and a general sense of free determination amongst

354-492: A popular subject in art in late Italian Renaissance sculpture , continuing to around 1900, allowing the sculptor to show his skill in a dramatic anatomical pose. It was a more compact equivalent of the Roman group of Laocoön and His Sons . Ancient sources and legends report that he took great pleasure in showing off his strength. He had a number of feats he would perform, such as: Legend has it that such feats were his eventual undoing. His final test of strength came when he

413-607: A portal with a single architrave , surmounted by a stained glass window, depicting the Virgin, and two niches with statues, all topped by a triangular gable and side pinnacles . Crotone appears in the Philippine national epic Florante at Laura as the Kingdom of Krotona . The poem narrates this as the homeland of the protagonist Florante's mother, Princess Floresca. In Petronius' Satyricon , which survives in fragments,

472-562: A small service port for the domus, perhaps a breakwater built to protect the port from which the Krotonian aristocrats during the second Punic war, having descended from the upper part of the city, embarked for Locri. Perhaps it is the Krotonian port mentioned by Cicero that determined the location of the colony as overlapping with the Greek polis. Crotone enjoys a Mediterranean climate ( Köppen : Csa ). Crotone Airport (Sant'Anna Airport)

531-483: A stable urban settlement. The second was in 720-709 at the head of an Achaean colonial expedition, hoping to settle in the Sybaris area. The third time in ca. 708 when, at the head of a similar expedition, he founded Kroton. Archaeology has shown that colonisation in the second half of the 8th century BC had an impact on the settlement organisation and on the economic and social structure of the indigenous communities: in

590-489: Is twinned with: 39°05′N 17°07′E  /  39.083°N 17.117°E  / 39.083; 17.117 Achaea (ancient region) Achaea ( / ə ˈ k iː ə / ) or Achaia ( / ə ˈ k aɪ ə / ; Greek : Ἀχαΐα , Akhaḯa , Ancient Greek: [akʰaía] ) is the northernmost region of the Peloponnese , occupying the coastal strip north of Arcadia . Its approximate boundaries are: to

649-649: Is an American football club in Italy's 3rd division. It was established in 1989 and is considered one of the most storied teams in Italy. Church of the Immaculate Conception : the original construction of the Cathedral dates back to the 9th century. Initially it was dedicated to St. Dionysius, and later, around 1462–1463, to the Assumption of Saint Mary into heaven. During the centuries, the church

SECTION 10

#1732772246616

708-914: Is not mentioned. The region later known as Achaea is instead referred to as Aegialus . Both Herodotus and Pausanias recount the legend that the Achaean tribe was forced out of their lands in the Argolis by the Dorians , during the legendary Dorian invasion of the Peloponnese. Consequently, the Achaeans forced the Aegialians (now known as the Ionians ) out of their land. The Ionians took temporary refuge in Athens, and Aegialus became known as Achaea. It

767-595: Is served by Italiatour.it and other charter airlines. Crotone also has a railway station, although much of the tourism traffic is served by the Salerno-Reggio Calabria highway and the National Road (called 106 Ionica) leading all the Jonic (eastern) coast from Taranto to Reggio Calabria . In recent times, Crotone Port has been used by visitors on yacht charter cruising vacations. Crotone hosts

826-711: The Blessed Virgin Mary by a group of lay people who had decided to give birth to a lay congregation in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Souls in Purgatory , which was also called La Congregazione dei Plebei ("The Congregation of the Plebeians"). The façade , which recalls in its features the sober and austere neoclassical style setting, is a harmonious and unifying element. It has

885-595: The Bruttian peninsula founding possibly Caulonia in the second half of the 7th century BC. The victory of Locri and Rhegium over Croton in the battle of the Sagra in middle of the sixth century BC interrupted the expansion of the city. The walls of the city were 12 miles long and enclosed a vast area. Its inhabitants were famous for their physical strength and for the simple sobriety of their lives. From 588 BC onwards, Croton produced many generations of winners in

944-466: The Greek colonisation , by the lack of cultivatable land in their mountainous region and by population pressure. Although the Greek foundation of Kroton was thought to be 710 BC, it is likely that Myscellus made three founding expeditions to Kroton, the first in ca. 733 in the company of Archias of Corinth at the head of an Achaean-Spartan venture (when they founded Syracuse ), but which did not result in

1003-518: The Olympics and the other Panhellenic Games , the most famous of whom was Milo of Croton . The physicians of Croton were considered the foremost among the Greeks, and among them Democedes , son of Calliphon , was the most prominent in the 6th century BC. Accordingly, he travelled around Greece and ended up working in the court of Polycrates , tyrant of Samos. After the tyrant was murdered, Democedes

1062-527: The 16th-century castle of Charles V , overlooking modern Crotone, serves as a reminder. Its successor, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was conquered by the Kingdom of Sardinia in 1860 and incorporated into the new Kingdom of Italy in 1861. Crotone's location between the ports of Taranto and Messina , as well as its proximity to a source of hydroelectric power, favoured industrial development during

1121-585: The Achaean League would play an important role in Greek politics. According to Pausanias , in 688 BC the city of Hyperesia was threatened by an army from Sicyon . The locals defended their city by placing burning torches on their goats' ( aiges in Greek) horns. The Sicyonians retreated and the Hyperesians renamed their town Aigeira (Greek: Aίγειρα) to honor the goats. During the 5th century BC

1180-452: The Altis. His feats with the pomegranate and the quoit are also remembered by tradition. He would grasp a pomegranate so firmly that nobody could wrest it from him by force, and yet he did not damage it by pressure. He would stand upon a greased quoit, and make fools of those who charged him and tried to push him from the quoit. He used to perform also the following exhibition feats. He would tie

1239-793: The Battery, and northwards beyond the river Esaro, in an area still unoccupied by the modern town. The urban layout has emerged with a sequence of superimpositions throughout the life of the colony, datable between the end of the 7th and start of the 6th century BC. Three large urban blocks have been identified, organised with an orthogonal network of narrow streets (stenopoi) and streets between individual houses (ambitus). Numerous houses, both of residential nature and mixed house-artisan workshops, have been excavated, as have furnaces and shops specialising in pottery products, areas of necropolis of Hellenistic date. The construction techniques were functional and economical, generally using roughly cut stone, typical of

SECTION 20

#1732772246616

1298-460: The Esaro river. On St. Lucia hill material had been reused which confirms that it had been built or rebuilt after of Dionysius' siege. The archaeological data give a city area of at least 617 hectares which may not have been entirely occupied by buildings and may not originally have been entirely surrounded by walls. A stretch near the river brought to light in 1978 was also described by Paolo Orsi at

1357-675: The Greeks at the Battle of Salamis , the only one from the Italian coast. Half of a stone anchor block bearing his name was found at Capo Cimiti and currently preserved in the Museum of Capo Colonna. It founded the colony of Terina on the Tyrrhenian coast in 480–470 BC. Shortly afterwards, however, a bloody revolt led by the oligarch Cylon , during which many Pythagoreans were massacred and Pythagoras himself had to flee to Metapontum, led to

1416-580: The Greeks was commonplace. After the reign of Augustus the province of Achaea was combined with Macedonia from the years 15 until 44, coinciding with the frontier troubles. This combined imperial province was overseen by a governor placed at Moesia along the Danube River . In the year 67, Emperor Nero declared Greece to be politically free from the Roman Empire, and the Greeks began their own autonomous rule. However, Roman authority over Greece

1475-537: The Kroton area most of the existing settlements disappeared, while grave goods from the Carrara necropolis highlight a widespread practice of mixed marriages between Greeks and indigenous women, since the first generation of settlers. It soon became one of the most flourishing cities of Magna Graecia reaching a population between 50,000 and 80,000 around 500 BC. During its early history Croton expanded its influence over

1534-509: The Pertusola factory towards the sea. Urban excavations between from 1975 have considerably expanded knowledge of the history of the settlement. As on all sites where modern cities are built over ancient towns, archaeological research is limited. The data seems to confirm the contemporary occupation of the whole walled area by reasonably close nuclei, between the hill of the Castle and that of

1593-582: The Pythagoreans being driven out and a democracy established. At the same time, other similar governments also fell and there were massacres and persecutions of Pythagoreans in all the Italian poleis . Croton then experienced a period of decline. Around this time the Italiote league was founded to defend itself from the expansionist aims of Syracuse and from attacks by the Lucanians, with Croton as

1652-575: The Sybarite exiles, the Crotonians refused and Sybaris began the war. Croton sent an army of 100,000 men commanded by the wrestler Milo against Sybaris and destroyed it. As a consequence, Croton became the capital of a confederation including the 25 city-states in the region of Sybaris, as shown by numerous coins minted between 480 and 460 BC. In 480 BC, Croton sent a ship led by the famous athlete Phayllos and armed at his own expense in support of

1711-659: The ancient area of Achaea dating back to the Neolithic period. Flint axes and blades fabricated from materials such as quartz or obsidian have been found in megalithic chamber tombs from this ancient region. Among other finds, alabaster pottery sherds have been discovered during excavations at Antheia in Achaia and dated to the thirteenth century BC. The twelve cities of Achaea were grouped into an early Achaean League which had important cultural and religious functions. In its later 3rd century BC incarnation

1770-548: The ancient region of Achaea, showing that the name, locally at least, still preserved the use from the Classical period. The name, Achaea, was later used in the crusader state, the Principality of Achaea (1205–1432), which comprised the whole Peloponnese, thus more closely following Roman use. The modern Greek prefecture of Achaea is largely based on the ancient region. Dolmens and cromlechs have been found in

1829-470: The archaic age. To prevent the deterioration of the lower part of the walls due to rain water, stone footings were additionally protected by tiles or pieces of pithoi (large pottery vessels). Prior to the construction of a new school in Acquabona di Crotone an excavation over a larger area has recently been possible. Two stenopoi about 5 m wide run across it on an alignment of + 30° E. The discovery of

Crotone - Misplaced Pages Continue

1888-730: The author of the Suda , but there are many legendary stories surrounding him. Diodorus Siculus wrote in his history that Milo was a follower of Pythagoras and also that he commanded the Crotonian army which defeated the Sybarites in 511 BC, while wearing his Olympic wreaths and dressed like Hercules in a lion's skin and carrying a club. Hereupon the Sybarites took the field with an army of three hundred thousand men. The Crotonians had but an hundred thousand, which were commanded by Milo

1947-548: The beginning of the century. Also of notable importance are the sections on the "Vigna Nuova" hill and in the water collector of the industrial area of the Papaniciaro stream, where a large fragment was found with a double facing in opus quadratum and emplecton, dating to the mid-4th century BC. From excavations carried out from 1975 the line of the Hellenistic walls was completed going up Battery hill and descending by

2006-638: The cathedral but were not able to occupy the city. Over a hundred years later, Otto II, Holy Roman Emperor , mounted a campaign in southern Italy to reduce the power of the Byzantines. Later, Crotone was conquered by the Normans . In 1806, it was occupied and sacked by the British, and later by the French. Thereafter it shared the fate of the Kingdom of Naples , including the period of Spanish rule of which

2065-484: The cities of Achaea they allied with Sparta against Epaminondas. At the Battle of Mantinea in 362 BC the Achaeans were allied to Sparta, Athens and Mantinea against Thebes. The Achaeans were part of the Greek alliance led by Thebes and Athens which was defeated by King Philip II of Macedon at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC. Subsequently, Achaea was part of the Macedonian dominated Corinthian League . Achaea

2124-460: The cities of Achaea were neutral in the Persian Wars and were usually neutral in the struggles between Athens and Sparta . We begin to hear more of Achaea in the following centuries. In 373 BC, the Achaean city of Helike was destroyed in a great cataclysm. "Immense columns of flame", the first record in history of the phenomenon of earthquake lights , were seen in the days leading up to

2183-517: The city has undergone urban renewal and risen in quality-of-life rankings. The overall layout of the ancient wall circuit of Kroton was reconstructed by archaeology in recent decades. It descends from the St. Lucia hill to the nearby Carrara hill from where it headed north-west towards the Cimone Rapignese on which, at 40 m above sea level, traces of wall have been found, and from here it crossed

2242-561: The city was not recaptured until 205 or 204 BC after the Battles of Croton . In 194 BC, it became the site of a Roman colony. Little more is heard of it during the Republican and Imperial periods, though the action of one of the more significant surviving fragments of the Satyricon of Petronius is set in Croton, where he mentions the corrupt morals of its inhabitants. Around 550 AD,

2301-699: The city was unsuccessfully besieged by Totila , king of the Ostrogoths . At a later date it became a part of the Byzantine Empire . Around 841, the Republic of Venice sent a fleet of 60 galleys (each carrying 200 men) to assist the Byzantines in driving the Arabs from Crotone, but it failed. About 870, it was sacked by the Saracens , who put to death the bishop and many people who had taken refuge in

2360-628: The current one. In 1992, it became the capital of the newly established Province of Crotone . The promontory of Kroton was inhabited by indigenous populations, perhaps Oenotrians and Japigi, in the Bronze Age and early Iron Age. Kroton's oikistes (founder) was Myscellus , from the city of Rhypes in Achaea in the northern Peloponnese , after consulting the Delphic Oracle who announced: The Achaeans were motivated, like others of

2419-479: The earthquake. The quake hit at night causing Helike to subside and then a massive tsunami rushed in from the Corinthian Gulf to inundate the city. All the inhabitants perished. The city of Boura , further inland, was also destroyed in the earthquake. In 367 BC, during Epaminondas ' third invasion of the Peloponnese, the Achaean cities agreed to an alliance with Thebes . But soon when oligarchs retook

Crotone - Misplaced Pages Continue

2478-486: The hegemon of the league. The meeting place for the league was the Sanctuary of Hera Lacinia at Capo Collone 10 km away, which was also used as the federal treasury of the league. The decline was followed by general anarchy, not only in Croton but also in other cities. The intervention of Achaeans brought a truce to the anarchy and the colonies adopted the laws of their original homeland. This calm lasted until Dionysius ,

2537-415: The little finger was lowest, but nobody could bend it back by pressure. They say that he was killed by wild beasts. The story has it that he came across in the land of Crotona a tree-trunk that was drying up; wedges were inserted to keep the trunk apart. Milo in his pride thrust his hands into the trunk, the wedges slipped, and Milo was held fast by the trunk until the wolves—a beast that roves in vast packs in

2596-438: The narrator and his friends arrive at Croton, famous for its legacy hunters. The narrator's companion, the manic poet Eumolpus, poses as a childless, rich old man. Upon arrival to the city, Philomela, a citizen of Croton, seduces Eumolpus by means of her children. The extant portion of the Satyricon ends with Eumolpus explaining that the people of Croton must agree to eat his dead body if they wish to claim his inheritance. Crotone

2655-400: The period between the two World Wars. In the 1930s its population doubled. However, after the two main employers, Pertusola Sud and Montedison , collapsed by the late 1980s, Crotone was in economic crisis, with many residents losing their jobs and leaving to find work elsewhere. In 1996, the river Esaro flooded the city, which dealt a further blow to the city's morale. Since that low point,

2714-480: The philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer Philolaus . The Pythagoreans acquired considerable influence with the supreme council of one thousand by which the city was ruled. Sybaris started to become the rival of Croton under the influence of the Pythagoreans who disliked excess, until 510 BC when Sybaris was shaken by various political events leading to the rule of the tyrant Telys. Many aristocrats were forced to flee to Croton and when Telys asked them to hand over

2773-404: The south, Mount Erymanthus ; to the south-east, Mount Cyllene ; to the east, Sicyon ; and to the west, the Larissos river . Apart from the plain around Dyme in the west, Achaea is generally a mountainous region. The name of Achaea has a slightly convoluted history. Homer uses the term Achaeans as a generic term for Greeks throughout the Iliad ; conversely, a distinct region of Achaea

2832-432: The tyrant of Syracuse , aiming at hegemony in Magna Graecia, captured Croton in 379 BC and held it for twelve years. Croton was then occupied by the Bruttii , with the exception of the citadel, in which the chief inhabitants had taken refuge; these soon after surrendered and were allowed to withdraw to Locri. In 295 BC, Croton fell to another Syracusan tyrant, Agathocles . When Pyrrhus invaded Italy (280–278, 275 BC), it

2891-415: The wedges. As he pulled the stump open, the wedges fell out, trapping Milo's fingers. Without the wedges there to hold the crack open, when Milo tried, he could not free his fingers from the stump. There he waited for the villager to return with food. Legend then says that Milo met his end when wolves, or a lion, took advantage of his predicament and descended upon him. The statue of Milo the son of Diotimus

2950-452: The wrestler, who at the first onset put to flight that wing of the army which was opposite to him: for he was of invincible strength, and had courage answerable to his strength, and had been six times victor at the olympic games; when he began his fight, he was crowned with olympic wreaths, wearing (like Hercules) a lion's skin and a club; at last he gained an absolute victory, and thereupon was much admired by his countrymen. Milo's death became

3009-519: Was a six-time Olympic victor; once for boys wrestling in 540 BC at the 60th Olympics, and five-time wrestling champion at the 62nd through 66th Olympiads. Milo kept on competing, even well after what would have been considered a normal Olympic athlete's prime; by the 67th Olympiad, he would have been over 40 years of age. He also attended many of the Pythian Games . His historicity is attested by many classical authors, among them Aristotle , Pausanias , Cicero , Herodotus , Vitruvius , Epictetus , and

SECTION 50

#1732772246616

3068-434: Was captured by the Persians and brought to King Darius, curing him of a dislocated ankle. Democedes' fame was, according to Herodotus, the basis for the prestige of Croton's physicians. Croton formed a league with Sybaris against Siris and in the war that ensued after 550 BC Siris was destroyed. Pythagoras founded his school at Croton c. 530 BC. Among his pupils were the early medical theorist Alcmaeon of Croton and

3127-399: Was conquered by the Romans in the year 146 BC. Emperor Augustus established Achaea as a senatorial province; generally speaking, the region benefited from the enlightened attitude of Roman emperors such as Augustus. This was because Achaea was geographically closer to Rome than other provinces, and so it was given political advantages and greater status in order for the Roman court to maintain

3186-443: Was made by Dameas, also a native of Crotona. Milo won six victories for wrestling at Olympia, one of them among the boys; at Pytho he won six among the men and one among the boys. He came to Olympia to wrestle for the seventh time, but did not succeed in mastering Timasitheus, a fellow-citizen who was also a young man, and who refused, moreover, to come to close quarters with him. It is further stated that Milo carried his own statue into

3245-413: Was reestablished soon after with Emperor Vespasian , who placed the province once again in the hands of the Roman Senate. 38°05′12″N 21°51′35″E  /  38.0868°N 21.8598°E  / 38.0868; 21.8598 Milo of Croton Milo or Milon of Croton ( fl.  540 – 511 BC ) was a famous ancient Greek athlete from the Greek colony of Croton in Magna Graecia . He

3304-429: Was still a considerable city, with twelve miles (19 km) of walls, but after the Pyrrhic War , half the town was deserted. What was left of its population submitted to Rome in 277 BC. After the Battle of Cannae in the Second Punic War (216 BC), Croton was betrayed to the Brutii by a democratic leader named Aristomachus , who defected to the Roman side. Hannibal made it his winter quarters for three years, and

3363-401: Was subject to various restoration, although in the 16th century the bishop A. Lucifero undertook its complete reconstruction, using materials removed from the ancient temple of Hera Lacinia. The interior of the church has three naves divided by pillars. The Cathedral : in 1686, as attested by an existing marble plaque in the current church, on the old oratory a church was built and dedicated to

3422-432: Was supposedly for this reason that the region known as Achaea in Classical Greece did not correspond to Homeric references. Under the Romans, Achaea was a province covering much of central and southern Greece. This is the Achaea referenced in the New Testament (e.g., Acts 18:12 and 19:21; Romans 15:26 and 16:5). However, Pausanias, writing in the 2nd century AD, devotes one of the books of Description of Greece to

3481-406: Was traveling the countryside and met a villager trying to split a stump with hammer and wedges. Milo excitedly asked the man if he could attempt to split the wood with his strength, not using any tools at all. The villager, honored by Milo's offer, went off to fetch food while Milo worked. Milo immediately tried to pull the stump apart by inserting his fingers in the crack where the villager had driven

#615384