The Italiote Greeks in 218 B.C.

The Italiote Greeks — Roman Republic › Socii (Italic Allies).

The Greek cities of the southern coast — the old Magna Graecia — were bound to Rome not as suppliers of legionaries but as socii navales, naval allies furnishing warships and crews. Tarentum was the greatest of them, Neapolis the most loyal; Rhegium, Thurii, Metapontum, Velia and the rest ringed the gulfs with their harbours and fleets. Their loyalties were divided as war approached: Neapolis would refuse Hannibal and lend Rome its treasure, while Tarentum, betrayed from within, would open its gates to him in 212.