Zangle
Ancient Messana A Greek city formerly of the Siceli called Zancle. The city was taken over in 490 B.C. by Anaxilas who changed the name of the city to Messana. Later the Mamertini mercenaries took over the city in 282 B.C. killed all the males and took the women and children. Later the Carthaginians attacked them and the Mamertini cried to Rome for help. Rome came to their aid and this was the initial cause of the First Punic War. After 227 B.C. Messana was a leading city of the Roman province of Sicily, controlling the straits. Its modern name is Messina.
Messana Messāna (Μεσσήνη). The modern Messina; a celebrated town of Sicily, on the strait separating Italy from this island, which is here about four miles broad. The Romans called the town Messana, according to its Doric pronunciation, but Messené was its more usual name among the Greeks.
It was originally a town of the Siceli, and was called Zanclé, or a sickle, on account of the shape of its harbour, which is formed by a singular curve of sand and shells. It was first colonized by Chalcidians, and was afterwards seized by Samians, who had come to Sicily after the capture of Miletus by the Persians (B.C. 494).
The Samians were shortly afterwards driven out of Zanclé by Anaxilas, who changed the name of the town into Messana or Messené, both because he was himself a Messenian and because he transferred to the place a body of Messenians from Rhegium.
In B.C. 396 it was taken and destroyed by the Carthaginians, but was rebuilt by Dionysius. It afterwards fell into the hands of Agathocles. Among the mercenaries of this tyrant were a number of Mamertini, an Oscan people from Campania, who had been sent from home, under the protection of the god Mamers, or Mars, to seek their fortune in other lands. These Mamertini were quartered in Messana; and after the death of Agathocles (B.C. 282) they made themselves masters of the town, killed the male inhabitants, and took possession of their wives, their children, and their property.
The town was now called Mamertīna, and the inhabitants Mamertini; but its ancient name of Messana continued to be in more general use. The new inhabitants could not lay aside their old predatory habits, and in consequence became involved in a war with Hieron of Syracuse, who would probably have conquered the town had not the Carthaginians come in to the aid of the Mamertini, and, under the pretext of assisting them, taken possession of their citadel.
The Mamertini had at the same time applied to the Romans for help, who gladly availed themselves of the opportunity to obtain a footing in Sicily. Thus Messana was the immediate cause of the First Punic War, 264. The Mamertini expelled the Carthaginian garrison, and received the Romans, in whose power Messana remained till the latest times. - Harry Thurston Peck. Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. New York. Harper and Brothers. 1898.
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