Callipolis

CALLI´POLIS(Καλλίπολις).

1. （ Gallipoli), a maritime city of Calabria, situated on the Tarentine Gulf, about 30 miles from the Iapygian promontory, and between 50 and 60 from Tarentum. (Pliny gives the former distance at 32 M. P., and the latter at 75.) Its name sufficiently attests its Greek origin, which is further confirmed by Mela (2.4), who calls it Urbs Graia, Callipolis;and we learn from Dionysius (Fr. Mai. 17.4) that it was founded by a Lacedaemonian named Leucippus, with the consent and assistance of the Tarentines, who had themselves previously had a small settlement there. Pliny tells us that it was called in his time Anxa ( Callipolis quae nunc est Anxa,3.11. s. 16), but it would seem to have never lost its Greek appellation, which it retains almost unaltered at the present day. The ancient city doubtless occupied the same site with the modern Gallipoli, on a rocky peninsula projecting boldly into the sea, and connected with the mainland only by a bridge or cause-way. It is remarkable that we find in ancient times no allusion to the excellence of its port, to which it owes its present prosperity; it is now one of the most considerable trading towns in this part of Italy, and contains above 12,000 inhabitants. (Galateo, De Situ Iapygiae, p. 39; Romanelli, vol. ii. pp. 44—47; Swinburne, Travels, vol. 1. p. 368; Giustiniani, Diz. Geogr. s. v. ).


2. A city on the E. coast of Sicily, which was of Greek origin, and a colony from the neighbouring city of Naxos. (Scymn. Ch. 286; Strab. 6. p. 272.) It appears to have ceased to exist at an early period, as the only notice of it found in history is in Herodotus (Hdt. 7.154), who mentions it as having been besieged and reduced to subjection by Hippocrates, tyrant of Gela. It is probable that it was destroyed, or its inhabitants removed, either by that ruler, or his successor Gelon, according to a policy familiar to the Sicilian despots, as, from the absence of all mention of the name by Thucydides during the operations of the Athenians on the E. coast of Sicily, it seems certain that it was then no longer in existence. Nor is the name afterwards found in Diodorus; and it is only mentioned by Strabo as one of the cities of Sicily that had disappeared before his time. (Strab. 6. p. 272; Steph. B. s. v.) Silius Italicus,indeed, speaks of it as if it still existed during the Second Punic War (14.249); but his accuracy on this point may well be questioned. It was probably situated on the coast between Naxos and Messana. [E.H.B]