Submitted for award of PhD September 2006. - King's College London

The power of Cumae, the earliest Greek colony on the mainland of Italy, was
based on its maritime commerce and the agricultural produce of its hinterland. It had
a strong fleet and probably also controlled the ports of Dicaearchia and Misenum.
Clashes with the Etruscans over who controlled the lower Tyrrhenian Sea caused
economic problems and with the tyranny of Aristodemus Malacus the traditionally
aristocratic regime of Cumae lapsed into civil strife. Although the city won a second
naval victory over the Etruscans in 474 BC, this was due more to the help of Hieron
of Syracuse than to the military strength of
Cumae. 509
The power vacuum in the region allowed the conquest of the prosperous cities
of Campania by Samnites from inland Italy: the general decline of Cumaean power
culminated in the conquest of the city by the Samnites, from their base at Capua,
conventionally dated to 421/0 BC. 510 The Samnite occupation must have brought the
old regime to an abrupt end. Strabo mentions violent acts by the Samnites against the
Greek inhabitants of the city. 51 Those of the Cumaean leading classes who managed
to flee the city found shelter at neighbouring Naples, a colony of Cumae, where they
formed a special citizen community, as we learn from a description of the crisis that
broke out between Rome and Naples in 327 BC. 512 The Cumean mint, the first in
Campania, was soon transferred to Naples, and the striking of coins bearing the
Cumaean ethnic continued there until about 380 BC. 513 Another issue of Cumaean
coins has been dated to the period between 325 and 300 BC. 514
509 Hieron of Syracuse, friend of Cumae: Pindar, Pythian 1.71-5 and Diod. Sic. 11.51.1-2.
510 Livy 4.44.13 and Diod. Sic. 12.76.4 probably took their information from a Greek, or, even
common source because they agree on the year of the attack. Vell. Pat. 1.4.2.
511 Strabo 5.4.4.
512 Dion. Hal. 15.6.4. The Samnites, apart from offering military help in case of Roman attack, also
promised to recover Cumae and to restore possessions for those who fled to Naples two generations
earlier. It is difficult to reconcile this passage with the information about the Samnite occupation of
Cumae in Livy and Diodorus Siculus. Counting two generations back from 327 BC would take us
back to around 380 BC the earliest.
513
Rutter (1979) 96-7.
514
Rutter (2001) 67, Nr. 531-536.
143