Crotone - History, Transportation, Museums

39º05N 17º07E, pop (2001e) 59 700. Port town, capital of Crotone province, Calabria region, S Italy; lies along the Gulf of Taranto NW of the Cape of Colonne, and ENE of Catanzaro; founded c.710 BC by Achaean Greeks led by Myscellus; celebrated for its successes in the Olympic Games from 588 BC, Milo of Croton being its most famous athlete; birthplace of Alcmaeon; formerly in the Kingdom of Naples until united with Italy, 1860; modern town is an agricultural and industrial centre; chemical plants, zinc-smelting works, hydroelectric plants, sulphur mines.

Comune di Crotone
Municipal coat of arms
Country	Italy
Region	Calabria
Province	Crotone (KR)
Mayor	Peppino Vallone (since May 2006)
Elevation	8 m
Area	179,8 km²
Population
- Total (as of December 31, 2004)	60,157
- Density	333,7/km²
Time zone	CET, UTC+1
Coordinates	39°05′N 17°07′E
Gentilic	Crotonesi
Dialing code	0962
Postal code	88900
Frazioni	Papanice, Apriglianello, Carpentieri, Cipolla, Farina, Gabella Grande, Iannello, Maiorano, Margherita
Patron	St. Denis
- Day	October 9
Website: www.comune.crotone.it

Crotone is a city in Calabria, southern Italy, on the Gulf of Taranto.

History

Croton was long one of the most flourishing cities of Magna Graecia. From 588 BC onwards, Croton produced many generations of victors in the Olympics and the other Panhellenic Games, the most famous of whom was Milo of Croton. Sybaris was the rival of Croton until 510 BC, when Croton sent an army of one hundred thousand men, commanded by the boxer Milo, against Sybaris and destroyed it.

In 480 BC, Croton sent a ship in support of the Greeks at the Battle of Salamis (Herodotus 8.47), but the victory of Locri and Rhegium over Croton in the same year marked the beginning of its decline. Dionysius, the tyrant of Syracuse, aiming at hegemony in Magna Graecia, captured Croton in 379 BC and held it for twelve years.

In 295 BC, Croton fell to another Syracusan tyrant, Agathocles. When Pyrrhus invaded Italy (280-278, 275 BC), Croton was still a considerable city, with twelve miles of walls, but after the Pyrrhic War, half the city was deserted (Livy 24.3). After the Battle of Cannae in the Second Punic War (216 BC), Croton revolted from Rome, and Hannibal made it his winter quarters for three years; Thereafter it shared the fate of the Kingdom of Naples—including the period of Spanish rule of which the 16th-century castle of Charles V, overlooking modern Crotone, serves as a reminder—and its successor, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, which was conquered by the Kingdom of Sardinia in 1860 and incorporated into the new Kingdom of Italy in 1861.

Crotone's location between the ports of Taranto and Messina, as well as its proximity to a source of hydroelectric power, favored industrial development during the period between the two World Wars.

Transportation

Crotone Airport (Sant'Anna Airport) is served by Air One and charter airlines.

Museums

Croton hosts a national archaeological museum, a municipal museum, a municipal art gallery, and a provincial museum of contemporary art, as well as the Antiquarium di Torre Nao.