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YDROUS (Ancient city) PUGLIA
Hydruntum called in Greek and sometimes also in Latin Hydrus (Hudrous:
Eth. Hudrountios; Hydruntinus, but an inscription has Hudrentinus: Otranto), a
city of Calabria, on the coast of the Adriatic, and a port of considerable importance,
for which it was indebted to the circumstance of its being the nearest point of
Italy to the coast of Greece, the passage being shorter even than that from Brundusium.
(Cic. ad Att. xv. 2. 1) We have very little information as to its early history;
but it seems probable that it was a Greek city, or at least had received a Greek
colony, though the tradition related by Stephanus of Byzantium (s. v. Biennos),
which represented it as founded by Cretans, is probably connected with the legends
which ascribed a Cretan origin to the Sallentines and Messapians, rather than
to any historical Greek colony. But Scylax distinctly notices the port of Hydrus,
in a passage where he is speaking only of Greek towns (Scyl. p. 5. § 14); and
though he there seems to imply that it was not an independent city like Metapontum
or Tarentum, he elsewhere (p. 11. § 27) calls it polis en tei Iapugiai: hence
it seems highly probable that it was at that time merely a dependency of Tarentum.
Nor do we hear anything of Hydruntum for some time after it had fallen, with the
rest of the Messapian peninsula, under the Roman yoke; the establishment of the
Roman colony at Brundusium and the increasing importance of that port having,
doubtless, tended to throw Hydruntum into the shade. But as early as B.C. 191
we find that it was a customary place of landing in Italy, for those who came
from Greece and crossed over from Corcyra (Liv. xxxvi. 21); and this probably
continued to be a route much frequented, while Brundusium was the point of communication
with Apollonia and the coast of Epirus. Cicero, however, recognises the fact,
that the shortest passage from Italy to the opposite coast was from Hydruntum,
which for that reason he himself seems to have preferred to Brundusium; though
Pliny tells us that the latter route, though longer, was the safer of the two.
(Cic. ad Att. xv. 2. 1, xvi. 6, ad Fam. xvi. 9; Plin. iii. 11. s. 16.) All the
ancient geographers mention Hydruntum as situated at the mouth or entrance of
the Adriatic: Pliny states the width of the strait which separated it from the
opposite coast near Apollonia at 50 M. P., which is just about the truth; and
this accords also with Strabo's statement, that it was 400 stadia (50 M. P.) from
Hydruntum to the island of Sason near the Acroceraunian Promontory. Pliny adds
a strange story, that Pyrrhus had at one time formed the project of closing up
the passage with a bridge of boats, and that the same idea had been taken up at
a later time by M. Varro, in the war against pirates. (Plin. iii. 11. s. 16; Strab.
vi. p. 281; Mel. ii. 4. § 7; Ptol. iii. 1. § 14.) Strabo speaks of Hydruntum as
in his time but a small place (polichne); but it seems to have risen into a considerable
municipal town under the Roman empire (Orell. Inscr. 2570; Lib. Col. p. 262),
and increased gradually in importance as Brundusium declined. In the fourth century
it appears to have become the usual place of passage, not only to Greece, but
to Apollonia, Dyrrhachium, and thence to Constantinople; so that the Itineraries
all give the routes of communication between Italy and the East upon this supposition.
(Itin. Ant. pp. 115, 323, 329; Itin. Marit. p. 489; Itin. Hier. p. 609.) The same
state of things continued also after the fall of the Western Empire: hence, during
the wars of the Goths with Belisarius and Narses, Hydruntum as sumes an importance
very different from what it possessed in Roman times. (Procop. B. V. i. 1, B.
G. iii. 30, &c., where the name is corruptly written Druous. It was one of the
last cities in the S. of Italy which remained in the hands of the Greek emperors,
from whom it was not finally wrested till the 11th century. The modern town of
Otranto is a poor decayed place, though still the see of a bishop: it was taken
and plundered in 1480 by the Turks; a calamity which it has never recovered. Galateo,
a local historian, who saw it previous to that event, describes it as then a flourishing
and populous place, though, like Taranto, occupying only the citadel or arx of
the ancient city: the circuit of the ancient walls could be distinctly traced,
inclosing a space of 11 stadia, and fortified with towers; but, he adds, all this
is now levelled with the ground. Recent travellers have found no vestiges of antiquity
but the pavement of the Via Trajana, and some marble columns and mosaic pavements
in the present cathedral. A ruined church of St. Nicholas is supposed to occupy
site of an ancient temple. (Galateo, de Situ Iapygiae, pp. 47--50; Romanelli,
vol. ii. pp. 110, 111; Craven, Travels, pp. 142--144.) Though in such a decayed
condition, Otranto still gives name to the province, which is known as the Terra
di Otranto, and includes the whole of the Iapygian or Calabrian peninsula.
The little river Idro, the sluggish waters of which enter the harbour
of Otranto, is evidently the stream called in ancient times the Hydrus, whose
name has been preserved to us in a line of Lucan (v. 375).
This is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited July 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
or Hydrus (Hudrous). The modern Otranto. One of the most ancient towns of Calabria, situated on the southeast coast, near a mountain of the same name. It had a good harbour, from which persons frequently crossed over to Epirus.
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