Anaxilas
Anaxilas or Anaxilaus (Ancient Greek: Ἀναξίλας, Ἀναξίλαος), son of Cretines, was a tyrant of Rhegium (modern Reggio Calabria) in Magna Graecia. He was originally from Messenia, a region in the Peloponnese.
Born~Died 500 BCE ~ 476 BCELast edited Oct 15, 2026, 4:21 PM
Contents
Anaxilas or Anaxilaus (Ancient Greek: Ἀναξίλας, Ἀναξίλαος), son of Cretines, was a tyrant of Rhegium (modern Reggio Calabria) in Magna Graecia. He was originally from Messenia, a region in the Peloponnese.1
Life
Anaxilas was master of Rhegium in 494 BC, when he encouraged the Samians and other Ionian fugitives to seize Zancle, a city across the strait in Sicily which was then under the rule of the tyrant Scythes.2 Shortly after the Samian takeover, Anaxilas besieged the city himself, drove the Samians out, peopled it with fresh inhabitants, and changed its name to Messana, after his native Messene.34
Pausanias tells a somewhat different story. After the second war with the Spartans, Anaxilas assisted the refugees from Messina in the Peloponnese to take Zancle in Sicily.5
Anaxilas married Cydippe, daughter of Terillus, tyrant of Himera.2 In 480 BC he obtained the assistance of the Carthaginians for his father-in-law, who had been expelled from his city by , tyrant of . It was this auxiliary army that defeated at . Anaxilas wanted to destroy the , but was prevented by , as related by .
This page is based on “Anaxilas” from English Wikipedia, (r1360216286) CC BY-SA 4.0 used under the license. The original authors are listed in its page history.
Last edited Oct 15, 2026, 4:21 PM · r123773 · Text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.