re usually undertaken
with the approbation of the cities from which they issued, and under
the management of leaders appointed by them. But a Greek colony was
always considered politically independent of the mother-city and
emancipated from its control. The only connexion between them was one
of filial affection and of common religious ties. Almost every
colonial Greek city was built upon the sea-coast, and the site usually
selected contained a hill sufficiently lofty to form an acropolis.

The Grecian colonies may be arranged in four groups: 1. Those founded
in Asia Minor and the adjoining islands; 2. Those in the western parts
of the Mediterranean, in Italy, Sicily, Gaul, and Spain; 3. Those in
Africa; 4. Those in Epirus, Macedonia, and Thrace.

1. The earliest Greek colonies were those founded on the western shores
of Asia Minor. They were divided into three great masses, each bearing
the name of that section of the Greek race with which they claimed
affinity. The AEolic cities covered the northern part of this coast,
together with the islands of Lesbos and Tenedos; the Ionians occupied
the centre, with the islands of Chios and Samos; and the Dorians the
southern portion, with the islands of Rhodes and Cos. Most of these
colonies were founded in consequence of the changes in the population
of Greece which attended the conquest of Peloponnesus by the Dorians.
The Ionic cities were early distinguished by a spirit of commercial
enterprise, and soon rose superior in wealth and in power to their
AEolian and Dorian neighbours. Among the Ionic cities themselves
Miletus and Ephesus were the most flourishing, Grecian literature took
its rise in the AEolic and Ionic cities of Asia Minor. Homer was
probably a native of Smyrna. Lyric poetry flourished in the island of
Lesbos, where Sappho and Alcaeus were born. The Ionic cities were also
the seats of the earliest schools of Grecian philosophy. Thales, who
founded the Ionic school of philosophy, was a native of Miletus.
Halicarnassus was one of the most important of the Doric cities, of
which Herodotus was a native, though he wrote in the Ionic dialect.

2. The earliest Grecian settlement in Italy was Cumae in Campania,
situated near Cape Misenum, on the Tyrrhenian sea. It is said to have
been a joint colony from the AEolic Cyme in Asia and from Chalcis in
Euboea, and to have been founded, according to the common chronology,
in B.C. 1050. Cumae was for a long t