Sybăris

, a river of Lucania in Italy, whose waters were said to render men more strong and robust. Strabo , bk. 6 .— Pliny , bk. 3 , ch. 11 ; bk. 31 , ch. 2 .――There was a town of the same name on its banks on the bay of Tarentum, which had been founded by a colony of Achæans. Sybaris became very powerful, and in its most flourishing situation it had the command of four neighbouring nations, of 25 towns, and could send an army of 300,000 men into the field. The walls of the city were said to extend six miles and a half in circumference, and the suburbs covered the banks of the Crathis for the space of seven miles. It made a long and vigorous resistance against the neighbouring town of Croton a, till it was at last totally reduced by the disciples of Pythagoras, B.C. 501. Sybaris was destroyed no le than five times, and always repaired. In a more recent age the inhabitants became so effeminate, that the word Sybarise became proverbial to intimate a man devoted to pleasure. There was a small town built in the neighbourhood about 444 years before the christian era, and called Thurium, from a small fountain called Thuria, where it was built. Diodorus , bk. 12 .— Strabo , bk. 6 .— Ælian , Varia Hist or i a , bk. 9 , ch. 24 .— Martial , bk. 12 , ltr. 96 .— Plutarch , Pelopidas , . — Pliny , bk. 3 , ch. 10 , . ――A friend of Æneas, killed by Turnus. Virgil , Æneid , bk. 12 , li. 363 .――A youth enamoured of Lydia, . Horace , bk. 1 , ode 8, li. 2 .