PHOCAEANS, THE LINK BETWEEN MARSELHA & EMPÚRIES

Today, The Grandma has been walking through the streets of Marselha and after devouring a fantastic local breakfast, she has decided to visit the City's History Museum to learn a little more about the city's Greek past and the links of Massalia as a Hellenic colony with other colonies such as Empúries.

Phocaea or Phokaia, in Ancient Greek Φώκαια, Phókaia; modern-day Foça in Turkey, was an ancient Ionian Greek city on the western coast of Anatolia. 

Greek colonists from Phocaea founded the colony of Massalia (modern-day Marseille, in Provence) in 600 BC, Emporion (modern-day Empúries, in Catalonia) in 575 BC and Elea (modern-day Velia, in Campania) in 540 BC.

Massalia, in Greek Μασσαλία, was an ancient Greek colony (apoikia) on the Mediterranean coast, east of the Rhône. Settled by the Ionians from Phocaea in 600 BC, this apoikia grew up rapidly, and became the centre of Greek trade in western Mediterranean, branching out and creating many outposts on the coasts of what is now Spain, the south of France including Corsica island, and northwestern Italy (Liguria).  

Massalia persisted as an independent colony until the Roman campaign in Gaul in the 1st century BC. The ruins of Massalia still exist in the contemporary city of Marseille, which is considered the oldest city of France and one of Europe's oldest continuously inhabited settlements.

Massalia was established ca. 600 BC by Ionian Greek settlers from Phocaea, in Western Anatolia. After the capture of Phocaea by the Persians in 545 BC, a new wave of settlers fled towards the colony. A creation myth telling the meeting between the Greeks and the local population is given by Aristotle and Pompeius Trogus.

After the middle of the 6th century BC, Massalia became an important trading post of the western Mediterranean area. It grew into creating colonies of its own on the sea coast of Gallia Narbonensis during the 4th and 3rd centuries BC, including Agathe (late 5th-early 4th c. BC), Olbia  (ca. 325), Tauroentium (early 3rd c.), Antipolis and Nikaia (ca. mid-3rd c.).  

Massalia was known in ancient times for its explorers: Euthymenes travelled to the west African coast in the late 6th century BC, and Pytheas explored northwestern Europe in the late 4th century BC.

The colony remained a faithful ally of Rome during all of the Punic Wars (264-146 BC). The retreat of Carthage from the Iberian coast after its defeat in the Second Punic War (218-201) gave Massalia the dominancy over the Gulf of Lion, and the fall of Carthage in 146 probably led to the intensification of trade between the Greek colony and the Celtiberians.

Archaeological evidence, in the form of amphora fragments, indicate that the Greeks were producing wine in the region (Provence) soon after they settled. By the time the Romans reached the area in 125 BC, the wine produced there had a reputation across the Mediterranean for high quality.

Massalia initially chose neutrality during the Civil War between Caesar and the Senate, but sided with Caesar's opponents after the arrival of Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus. The city was besieged in 49 BC and eventually had to surrender to Caesar's army. Massalia lost most of its inland territory in the aftermath of this defeat.

During the Roman and Late Antique periods, the city, then known as Massilia in Latin, remained a major center of maritime trade. It became a civitas within the Roman Empire at the latest ca. 300 AD.

The Greeks used the proverbs Ἐκ Μασσαλίας ἥκεις (you are coming out of Massalia) and Ἐς Μασσαλίαν πλεύσειας (you might sail to Massalia) in reference to those living an effeminate and soft life, apparently because the men of Massalia were wearing fancy long perfumed robes and tying their hair up, which other Greeks interpreted as signs of disgrace.

The Romans on the other hand had a more positive view of the city as a bastion of Greek civilisation in barbarian lands, and as a loyal ally of Rome.

A genetic study conducted in 2011 found that 4% of the inhabitants of Provence belong to the haplogroup E-V13 lineage, which is especially frequent among Phocaeans (19%), and that 17% of the Y-chromosomes in Provence may be attributed to Greek colonization. According to the authors, these results suggest a Greek male elite-dominant input into the Iron Age Provence population.

More information: The Collector 

Empúries was an ancient Greek city on the Mediterranean coast of Catalonia. The city Ἐμπόριον, in Greek  Ἐμπόριον, (Emporion meaning trading place) was founded in 575 BC by Greeks from Phocaea. The invasion of Gaul from Iberia by Hannibal the Carthaginian general in 218 BC, prompted the Romans to occupy the city, in Latin Emporiae, thus initiating the Roman conquest of Hispania. In the Early Middle Ages, the city's exposed coastal position left it open to marauders and it was abandoned.

Empúries is located within the Catalan comarca of Alt Empordà on the Costa Brava. The ruins are midway between the town of L'Escala and the tiny village of Sant Martí d'Empúries.

More information: MAC

The vast number of the Greek colonies, 
their wide-spread diffusion 

over all parts of the Mediterranean, 
which thus became a kind of Grecian lake, 
and their rapid growth in wealth, power, and intelligence, 
afford the most striking proofs of the greatness 

of this wonderful people. 
Civil dissensions and a redundant population 

were the chief causes of the origin 

of most of the Greek colonies.

William Smith