To this great imperial state, Dionysius in the west formed a suitable counterpart. His recent victories in Southern Italy had already raised his power to a magnitude transcending all the far-famed recollections of Gelon; but he now still farther extended it by sending an expedition against Kroton. This city, the largest in Magna Græcia, fell under his power; and he succeeded in capturing, by surprise or bribery, even its strong citadel; on a rock overhanging the sea.[44] He seems also to have advanced yet farther with his fleet to attack Thurii; which city owed its preservation solely to the violence of the north winds. He plundered the temple of Hêrê near Cape Lakinium, in the domain of Kroton. Among the ornaments of this temple was one of pre-eminent beauty and celebrity, which at the periodical festivals was exhibited to admiring spectators: a robe wrought with the greatest skill, and decorated in the most costly manner, the votive offering of a Sybarite named Alkimenes. Dionysius sold this robe to the Carthaginians. It long remained as one of the permanent religious ornaments of their city, being probably dedicated to the honor of those Hellenic Deities recently introduced for worship; whom (as I have before stated) the Carthaginians were about this time peculiarly anxious to propitiate, in hopes of averting or alleviating the frightful pestilences wherewith they had been so often smitten. They purchased the robe from Dionysius at the prodigious price of one hundred and twenty talents, or about £27,600 sterling.[45] Incredible as this sum may appear, we must recollect that the honor done to the new gods would be mainly estimated according to the magnitude of the sum laid out. As the Carthaginians would probably think no price too great to transfer an unrivalled vestment from the wardrobe of the Lakinian Hêrê to the newly-established temple and worship of Dêmêtêr and Persephonê in their city—so we may be sure that the loss of such an ornament, and the spoliation of the holy place, would deeply humiliate the Krotoniates, and with them the crowd of Italiot Greeks who frequented the Lakinian festivals. [44] Livy has preserved the mention of this important acquisition of Dionysius (xxiv. 3). “Sed arx Crotonis, unâ parte imminens mari, alterâ vergente in agrum, situ tantum naturali quondam munita, postea et muro cincta est, quâ per aversas rupes ab Dionysio Siciliæ tyranno per dolum fuerat capta.” Justin also (xx. 5) mentions the attack of Dionysius upon Kroton. We may, with tolerable certainty, refer the capture to the present part of the career of Dionysius. See also Ælian, V. H. xii. 61. [45] Aristotel. Auscult. Mirab. s. 96; Athenæus, xii. p. 541; Diodor. xiv. 77. Polemon specified this costly robe, in his work Περὶ τῶν ἐν Καρχηδόνι Πέπλων....