A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

(Τῆλυς), a citizen of Sybaris, who raised himself to the tyranny by the arts of a demagogue, and persuaded the people to banish 500 of the richest citizens, and to confiscate their property. The exiles having taken refuge at Crotona, Telys sent to demand that they should be given up, but, if we may believe Diodorus, Pythagoras prevailed on the Crotoniats to persevere in protecting them. The consequence was the war between Sybaris and Crotona, in which the former was destroyed, B. C. 510. (Hdt. 5.44; Diod. 12.9.) In opposition to the above statement, Heracleides of Pontus (apud Athen. xii. p. 521) represents the tyranny of Telys as overthrown by the Sybarites before the fatal war with Crotona. In this revolution, he tells us, they were guilty of great cruelty, massacring all the adherents of Telys even at the altars, so that the statue of Hera turned aside in horror and anger, and a fountain of blood gushed forth from the earth, which nothing but walls of brass could check. The destruction of their city followed as their punishment.

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