Peucetii (Iapygian tribe)

The Peucetii (or Poedicli, according to Strabo) are a tribe living in Apulia, southern Italy, in the country behind Barion (Latin Barium, modern Bari).

They are traditionally one of the tribes of the Iapygian civilization.

They have three important towns: Canosa, Silvium and Bitonto; the present capital of Apulia, Bari, having not much importance.With increasing Hellenization their eponymous ancestor, given the name Peucetis, was said by Dionysius of Halicarnassus to have been the son of the Arcadian Lycaon and brother of Oenotrus.

Lycaon having divided Arcadia among his twenty-two sons, Peucetios was inspired to seek better fortune abroad.

This etiological myth is considered by modern writers to suggest strongly that, as far as the Greeks were concerned, the Peucetii were culturally part, though an unimportant part, of Magna Graecia.Herodotus records an alternative tradition that sometime after the death of King Minos a large body of Cretans, all except the Polichnites and the Praisians, sailed for Sicania and besieged Camicus for a space of five years.

Failing to take the city, and suffering from hunger, they departed Sicania and began the voyage homewards.

A furious storm hit when they were at sea close to the shore of what later became Iapygia.

The storm threw them upon the coast and broke all their vessels to pieces; and so, as they saw no means of returning to Crete, they founded the town of Hyria (corresponding to the modern town Oria) and "changed their name from Cretans to "Iapygians".The most important centers created by the Peuceti are Sannace, about five kilometers from Gioia del Colle, and Rubi (Ruvo di Puglia).

The Peuceti probably settle together with the Dauni and Messapi in the 11th century BCE, coming from Illyria over the Otranto channel and expelling those Illyrians who had already settled in the area four or five centuries before.

Starting in the 4th century BCE, the Peuceti are subdued by the Roman Republic.The economy is based on cattle breeding and handicraft, which leads to the development of the spinning mill and wool weaving.

The contacts with the colonies of Magna Graecia are important, first with Metaponto and also with Taranto.

This is confirmed by the finds of coins and vases.

The contacts and wars with the Messapi are also numerous.

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