Scylletium

 ( Pre-roman Cities In Italy ) 

ScylletiumAlso spelled Scolacium, Scylacium, Scolatium, Scyllaceum, Scalacium, or Scylaeium in Latin – (Greek language: Σκυλλήτιον, per Stephanus of Byzantium and Strabo, or Σκυλάκιον, per Ptolemy), and later, Minervium and Colonia Minervia. See . or Skylletion or Scolacium was an ancient seaside city in Calabria, southern Italy. Its ruins can be found at the frazione of Roccelletta, near Catanzaro, facing the Gulf of Squillace.

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History

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Greek era Skylletion may originally have been founded in the 7th c. BC on the Punta di Staletti promontory.P. Courcelle, MEFR, 55(1938), 259-307, as modified by his article in Actes du Ve congrès international d'archéologie chrétienne (1957), 511-528

In any case Scylletium was situated from the 6th c. BC on the east coast of Calabria (ancient Bruttium), on the shores of an extensive bay, to which it gave the name of Scylleticus Sinus.Strabo vi. p. 261.

According to a tradition generally received in ancient times, Scylletium () Stephanus of Byzantium, Ethnica, § S579.7 was founded by an Athens colony of Magna Graecia, a part of the followers who had accompanied Menestheus to the Trojan War.Strabo l. c.; Pliny l. c.; Servius ad Aeneidos iii. 553.) Solinus also mention that the Scylaceum was established by Athenians. Solinus, Polyhistor, 2.10 Another tradition was, however, extant, which ascribed its foundation to Odysseus.Cassiod. Var. xii. 15; Servius l. c.. However, it did not display any friendship towards the Athenians.. 3.

It appears during this period to have been a minor place and a mere dependency of Crotona until it was wrested from its power by the elder Dionysius, who assigned it with its territory to the Locrians.Strabo vi. p. 261.

It was still a small and unimportant place at the time of the Second Punic War, as no mention is found of its name during the operations of Hannibal in Bruttium, though he appears to have had his headquarters for some time at Castra Hannibalis very near Scylletium.

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Roman era In 124 BC the ancient Rome, at the instigation of Gracchi, sent a colony to Scylletium, which appears to have assumed the name of Minervium or Colonia Minervia.Velleius Paterculus i. 15; Theodor Mommsen, in Berichte der Sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, 1849, pp. 49–51. The name is written by Velleius Scolatium; and the form Scolacium is found also in an inscription of the reign of Antoninus Pius, from which it appears that the place must have received a fresh colony under Nerva.Orell. Inscr. 136; Mommsen, l. c. Scylletium appears to have become a considerable town after it received the Roman colony, and continued such throughout the Roman Empire.Pomponius Mela ii. 4. § 8; Pliny iii. 10. s. 15; Ptolemy iii. 1. § 11.

Towards the close of this period it was distinguished as the birthplace of the Roman statesman Cassiodorus, founder of the Vivarium, a monastery dedicated to the coexistence of coenobitic monks and hermits, who has left us a detailed but rhetorical description of the beauty of its situation dated to around 530 AD, and fertility of its territory.Cassiod. Var. xii. 15. Cassiodorus also mentioned production of highly priced terra cotta. His villa was located at Punta di Staletti.Cassiodorus /ref>

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Sculpture In 2006 a sculpture with the title Time Horizon was set up in the park by the English sculptor Antony Gormley.

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Literature

• Antony Gormley: Time Horizon Intersecione, Intersecione 2 al Parco Archeologico di Scolacium, 2006

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Notes

• Roberto Spadea (a cura di), Scolacium una città romana in Calabria. Il museo e il parco archeologico, Milano, ET, 2005, pp. 506-542 e pp. 51-65

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