ter the
discovery of America the civilized nations of Europe vied with one
another in sending out expeditions and forming settlements there;
and the new settlers when located amidst barbarians recognized their
common character and common interests as civilized Europeans more
strongly than they had done in their former home. So it was with
the new discovery of the Greeks. The privilege of navigating the
western waters and settling on the western land was not the exclusive
property of a single Greek province or of a single Greek stock,
but a common good for the whole Hellenic nation; and, just as in
the formation of the new North American world, English and French,
Dutch and German settlements became mingled and blended, Greek Sicily
and "Great Greece" became peopled by a mixture of all sorts of
Hellenic races often so amalgamated as to be no longer distinguishable.
Leaving out of account some settlements occupying a more isolated
position--such as that of the Locrians with its offsets Hipponium
and Medama, and the settlement of the Phocaeans which was not founded
till towards the close of this period, Hyele (Velia, Elea)--we may
distinguish in a general view three leading groups. The original
Ionian group, comprehended under the name of the Chalcidian towns,
included in Italy Cumae with the other Greek settlements at Vesuvius
and Rhegium, and in Sicily Zankle (afterwards Messana), Naxos,
Catana, Leontini, and Himera. The Achaean group embraced Sybaris
and the greater part of the cities of Magna Graecia. The Dorian
group comprehended Syracuse, Gela, Agrigentum, and the majority
of the Sicilian colonies, while in Italy nothing belonged to it
but Taras (Tarentum) and its offset Heraclea. On the whole the
preponderance lay with the immigrants who belonged to the more
ancient Hellenic influx, that of the lonians and the stocks settled
in the Peloponnesus before the Doric immigration. Among the Dorians
only the communities with a mixed population, such as Corinth and
Megara, took a special part, whereas the purely Doric provinces had
but a subordinate share in the movement. This result was naturally
to be expected, for the lonians were from ancient times a trading
and sea-faring people, while it was only at a comparatively late
period that the Dorian stocks descended from their inland mountains
to the seaboard, and they always kept aloof from maritime commerce.
The different groups of immigrants are very clearly distin