The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

138 NUMISMATIC CHRONICLE.
West of the Lakinian promontory. The sinking of the
Roman squadron which had appeared within actual sight
of their city by the infuriated Tarentines was the begin-
ning of hostilities, rapidly followed by the capture of
Thurioi and the surrender of its Roman garrison. The
Thurians were punished by the triumphant Tarentines
"
because, although they were Hellenes they had thrown
themselves on the protection of the Romans and not of
their kinsmen." The die was cast. The overtures of the
Romans, then anxious to gain time, for a peaceful settlement
were rejected, and in 282 the Tarentines and their
allies called to their assistance the greatest soldier of the
age, Pyrrhus of Epirus.
It is to the date of Pyrrhus' expedition that I venture
to refer the reduction of the Tarentine didrachm weight.
It has been already shown in the preceding section
that federal drachmae answering to a silver stater of
reduced weight had been already struck by the Tarentines
during Period VI., side by side with didrachms and litras
of the full traditional standard, and the inference has
been drawn from this, that the weight of the silver stater
in other Italiote cities had already been reduced before
Pyrrhus' time. It is to be observed, on the other hand,
that at Metapontion, taken by the Lucanians shortly before
300 B.C., and at Kroton, sacked by Agathokles in 299, no
didrachms or silver staters of reduced weight are forth-
coming, and it is therefore probable that at Herakleia
and Thurioi the reduction did not take till place after that
date. The issue of the reduced federal drachms at Ta-
rentum during a considerable part of Period VI. may,
on the other hand, be taken as an indication that some
at least of the League cities of the Ionian shore had re-
duced their standard at least not long after the date of the