Megara Hyblaea

Megara Hyblaea

τὰ Μέγαρα (Ancient Greek)
Mosaics on the floor of a house near the western gate of Megara Hyblaea.
Shown within Italy
Location	Augusta, Sicily, Italy
Region	Sicily
Coordinates	37°12′14.04″N 15°10′54.84″E / 37.2039000°N 15.1819000°E / 37.2039000; 15.1819000Coordinates: 37°12′14.04″N 15°10′54.84″E / 37.2039000°N 15.1819000°E / 37.2039000; 15.1819000
Type	Settlement
History
Builder	Greek settlers from Megara
Founded	8th century BC
Abandoned	Approximately 483 BC
Periods	Archaic Greek
Cultures	Greek
Site notes
Excavation dates	1891
Condition	Ruined
Ownership	Public
Management	Soprintendenza per i Beni Culturali ed Ambientali di Siracusa
Public access	Yes

Megara Hyblaea (Ancient Greek: τὰ Μέγαρα) – perhaps identical with Hybla Major – is the name of an ancient Greek colony in Sicily, situated near Augusta on the east coast, 20 kilometres (12 mi) north-northwest of Syracuse, Italy, on the deep bay formed by the Xiphonian promontory. There were at least three (and possibly as many as five) cities named "Hybla" in ancient accounts of Sicily which are often confounded with each other, and among which it is sometimes very difficult to distinguish.

It was unquestionably a Greek colony, deriving its origin from the Megara in Greece; and the circumstances attending its foundation are related in detail by Thucydides. He tells us that a colony from Megara, under the command of a leader named Lamis, arrived in Sicily about the time that Leontini was founded by the Chalcidic colonists, and settled themselves first near the mouth of the river Pantagias, at a place called Trotilon (Latin: Trotilus, modern Brucoli). From thence they removed to Leontini itself, where they dwelt for a time together with the Chalcidians; but were soon afterwards expelled by them, and next established themselves on the promontory or peninsula of Thapsos (Latin: Thapsus, modern Magnisi), near Syracuse. Hence they again removed after the death of Lamis, and, at the suggestion of Hyblon, a Sicilian chief of the surrounding country, finally settled at a place afterwards called the Hyblaean Megara. (Thuc. vi. 4.) Scymnus Chius follows a different tradition, as he describes the establishment of the Chalcidians at Naxos and that of the Megarians at Hybla as contemporary, and both preceding the foundation of Syracuse, 734 BC. Strabo also adopts the same view of the subject, as he represents Megara as founded about the same time with Naxos (735 BC), and before Syracuse. (Scymn. Ch. 271-76; Strab. vi. p. 269.) It is impossible to reconcile the two accounts, but that of Thucydides is probably the most trustworthy. According to this the foundation of Megara may probably be placed about 726 BC. Professor Miller, in her reinvestigation of ancient source materials has determined that they point to various dates of foundation from 758 BC (per the Chronikon of Eusebius) to 728 BC (from her reconstructions of dates from Thucydides). Of its earlier history we have scarcely any information, but it would appear to have attained to a flourishing condition, as 100 years after its foundation it sent out, in its turn, a colony to the other end of Sicily, where it founded the city of Selinus, which was destined to rise to far greater power than its parent city. (Thuc. vi. 4; Scymn. Ch. 291; Strab. vi. p. 272.)