XXIX.

Continuation of the journey.

Thurii.

The councils of Heraclea are dissolved. Archytas and Pontius return to Tarentum; Plato and I continue our journey toward Thurii, Crotone, and Locri.

We stop for a few hours in Siris, which is twenty-four stadia an ancient unit of distance, approx. 185 meters distant from Heraclea; and after crossing the river Siris, the border of the Heraclean territory, we arrive in the evening at Langaria, the first territory of the Thurians. There is nothing there worthy of note other than its wine (1).

THURII. How many memories this city awakens in the mind! You recall that Sybaris, in other times so powerful for its empire, so rich for the fertility of its soil, so vile for the softness of its customs. After many unhappy wars with their neighbors, those same Sybarites, who

(1) Strabo VI. Pliny. Mazzocchi on T. H.