Page:History of Greece Vol III.djvu/412

 396 HISTORY OF GREECE. f attainment of fresh lots of fertile land, and excessive indulgences among the rich, to a degree forming marked contrast with Hellas proper, of which Herodotus characterized poverty as the foster-sister. 1 The extraordinary productiveness of the neighbor- ing territory, alleged by Varro, in his time, when the culture must have been much worse than it had been under the old Syb- aris, to yield an ordinary crop of a hundred-fold, 2 and extolled by modern travellers, even in its present yet more neglected cul- ture, has been already touched upon. The river Krathis, still the most considerable river of that region, at a time when there was an industrious population to keep its water-course in order, would enable the extensive fields of Sybaris to supply abundant nourishment for a population larger perhaps than any other Grecian city could parallel. But though nature was thus bountiful, industry, good management, and well-ordered govern- ment were required to turn her bounty to account : where these are wanting, later experience of the same territory shows that its 1 Herodot. vii, 102. rij 'E/lAu<St Ttcvir] fikv alei KOTE avvrpotyni; eari. simo rcdirc solitum." The land of the Italian Greeks stands first forwhcatcn bread and beef; that of Syracuse for pork and cheese (Hermippus ap. Athenae. i, p. 27) : about the excellent wheat of Italy, compare Sophokles, Triptolem. Fragm. 529, ed. Dindorf. Theophrastus dwells upon the excellence of the land near Mylae, in the territory of the Sicilian Messene, which produced, according to him, thirty- fold. (Hist. Plant, ix, 2, 8, p. 259, cd. Schneid.) This affords some measure of comparison, both for the real excellence of the ancient Sybaritan territory, and for the estimation in which it was held ; its estimated produce being more than three times that of Mylaj. See in Mr. Keppel Craven's Tour in the Southern Provinces of Naples (chapters xi, xii, pp. 212-218), the description of the rich and productive plain of the Krathis (in the midst of which stood the ancient Sybaris), extending about sixteen miles from Cassano to Corigliano, and about twelve miles from the former town to the sea. Compare, also, the picture of the same country, in the work by a French officer, referred to in a previous note, '' Calabria 'during a Military Residence of three years," London, 1832, Letter xxii, pp. 219-226. Hekataeus (c. 39, ed. Klauscn) calls Cosa, Koaaa, 7ro/Uf OlvurpCiv tv (leaoyaia. Cosa is considered to be identical, seemingly on good grounds, with the modern Cassano (Caesar, Bell. Civ. iii, 22) : assuming this to ba correct, there must have been an (Enotrian dependent town within eight miles of the ancient city of Sybaris.
 * Varro, DC Re Rustica. i, 44. " In Sybaritano dicunt ctiam cum cente-