ABSTRACT
In considering the relations of the Italiote Greeks with Rome, one is essentially considering the Italiotes as part of Italy. It is all too easy to forget that most cities in Magna Graecia retained a strong sense of their Greek identity and continued to play a significant part in the Greek world. An examination of the evidence shows that although the overt signs of Greekness disappeared in some cities as early as the third century BC, and declined in others, many continued to be conscious of their Greek background and to express this in ways adapted to their changed circumstances long after their conquest by Rome. Thus the question of the nature and extent of the contacts between Magna Graecia and the rest of the Mediterranean world has important repercussions for the study of the Italiotes and also for the way in which they interacted with Rome. Nor were the exchanges only one way. If the Italiotes actively maintained contact with the Greek world after the Roman conquest of the South, Aegean and Asiatic Greeks can equally be seen to have been involved with the cities of the West. Magna Graecia was a pivotal region with a central role in the diffusion of Hellenism in Italy.
