TARANTO, ta-riin'tt. (Lat. Turentum, from Gk. Dipac, Taras). A town of South Italy, in the Province of Lecce, at the northern end of the Gulf of Taranto. tt is situated on a rocky islet, formerly an isthmus, between the Mare Piccolo (Little Sea), an 'extensive harbor on the east or landward side of the town, and the Mare Grande (Great Sea), or open gulf, on the west. The harbor is one of the finest in Italy, and can be entered safely by the largest vessels. principal buildings are a cathedral, dedi cated to Saint Cataldo; a fine episcopal palace; a castle and fortifications, erected by Charles V.: and two hospitals. The streets are as narrow and dark as those of an Oriental city. Taranto has manufactures of velvets, linens, and cottons, and carries on some commerce in wheat, oats, and olive oil. The Mare Piccolo is famous for its abundance of shell-fish, and a considerable por tion of the population derives its subsistence from the oyster and mussel fisheries. Population, about 40,000.
Ancient Tarentum was one of the most splendid cities of Magna Gruccia. It was founded, according to very doubtful tradition, about B.C. 707 by the Parthenians, a body of Laconian youth. It rapidly grew in wealth and power, extending its trade even to the Po, and supplying much of Southern Italy with pottery. It seems to have steadily reduced its Messapian neighbors till B.C. 473, when a bloody defeat was followed by the fall of the aristocratic govern ment and the establishment of a pure democracy.
About B.C. 400 Tarentum appears as the lead ing Greek city in Italy. When in B.C. 281 the Tarentines came into collision with Rome, they invited to Italy' Pyrrhus (q.v.) of Epirus. After his departure. his gen eral, Milo, surrendered the.town to the Romans, B.C. 272, who treated it leniently. During the Second Punic War it was captured by Hannibal, with the exception of the Acropolis, and when in n.c. 209 it was retaken by the Romans, it was sacked and 30.000 of the inhabitants sold into slavery, It continued to be inhabited and later was the seat of a prosperous Roman colony. Under the Empire it was quite overshadowed by Brundusium, on the Adriatic.bmt rose again dur ing the Gothic wars, which left it in the hands of the Byzantine Empire. It was captured in A.D. 661 by the Lombards. and later passed into the hands of the Saracens, who sacked it in 927, and of the Greeks, from the latter of whom it was wrested by Robert Gniscard, the Norman, in 1063. Later it shared the fortunes of the Kingdom of Naples. Few relics of the classic Tarentum are extant, the chief being bits of an amphitheatre and traces of a Doric temple. which from its form must be one of the early monuments of that style.