So large an accession of size, walls, and population, rendered Syracuse the first Greek city in Sicily. And the power of Gelo, embracing as it did not merely Syracuse, but so considerable a portion of the rest of the island, Greek as well as Sikel, was the greatest Hellenic force then existing. It appears to have comprised the Grecian cities on the east and southeast of the island from the borders of Agrigentum to those of Zanklê or Messênê, together with no small proportion of the Sikel tribes. Messênê was under the rule of Anaxilaus of Rhegium, Agrigentum under that of Thêro son of Ænesidêmus, Himera under that of Terillus; while Selinus, close on the borders of Egesta and the Carthaginian possessions, had its own government free or despotic, but appears to have been allied with or dependent upon Carthage.[433] A dominion thus extensive doubtless furnished ample tribute; besides which Gelo, having conquered and dispossessed many landed proprietors and having recolonized Syracuse, could easily provide both lands and citizenship to recompense adherents. Hence, he was enabled to enlarge materially the military force transmitted to him by Hippokratês, and to form a naval force besides. Phormis[434] the Mænalian, who took service under him and became citizen of Syracuse, with fortune enough to send donatives to Olympia,—and Agêsias, the Iamid prophet from Stymphâlus,[435]—are doubtless not the only examples of emigrants joining him from Arcadia; for the Arcadian population were poor, brave, and ready for mercenary soldiership; nor can we doubt that the service of a Greek despot in Sicily must have been more attractive to them than that of Xerxes.[436] Moreover, during the ten years between the battles of Marathon and Salamis, when not only so large a portion of the Greek cities had become subject to Persia, but the prospect of Persian invasion hung like a cloud over Greece Proper, the increased feeling of insecurity throughout the latter probably rendered emigration to Sicily unusually inviting. [433] Diodor. xi, 21. [434] Pausan. v, 27, 1, 2. We find the elder Dionysius, about a century afterwards, transferring the entire free population of conquered towns (Kaulonia and Hipponium in Italy, etc.) to Syracuse (Diodor. xiv, 106, 107). [435] See the sixth Olympic Ode of Pindar, addressed to the Syracusan Agêsias. The Scholiast on v. 5, of that ode,—who says that not Agêsias himself, but some of his progenitors migrated from Stymphâlus to Syracuse,—is contradicted not only by the Scholiast on v. 167, where Agêsias is rightly termed both Ἀρκὰς and Συρακόσιος; but also by the better evidence of Pindar’s own expressions,—συνοικιστήρ τε τᾶν κλεινᾶν Συρακοσσᾶν,—οἴκοθεν οἴκαδε, with reference to Stymphâlus and Syracuse,—δύ’ ἀγκύραι (v, 6, 99, 101 = 166-174). Ergotelês, an exile from Knôssus in Krete, must have migrated somewhere about this time to Himera in Sicily. See the twelfth Olympic Ode of Pindar.