Marseille, which can be called the oldest city in France, is founded in 600 BCE by Greeks from Phocaea in Asia Minor as a trading port under the name Massalia.

The connection between Massalia and the Phoceans is mentioned in Book I, 13 of the History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides.

The precise circumstances and date of founding remain obscure, but nevertheless a legend survives.

Protis, while exploring for a new trading outpost or emporion for Phocaea, discovered the Mediterranean cove of the Lacydon, fed by a freshwater stream and protected by two rocky promontories.

Protis was invited inland to a banquet held by the chief of the local Ligurian tribe for suitors seeking the hand of his daughter Gyptis in marriage.

At the end of the banquet, Gyptis presented the ceremonial cup of wine to Protis, indicating her unequivocal choice.

Following their marriage, they moved to the hill just to the north of the Lacydon; and from this settlement grew Massalia, located on the Mediterranean Sea near the mouth of the Rhône River along the well-protected bay now called Vieux-Port (Old Harbor).

Archaeological finds exhibited in the Museum of Antiquities in the eighteenth-century Château Borély suggest that Phoenicians had settled here even earlier.

Carthage, allied with the Etruscans against the Phocaean Greeks, confines them to Massilia and the surrounding coast.

The Battle of Alalia leads to a new distribution of power in the western Mediterranean Sea.

Although the battle had no clear winner, Carthage manages to expand its sphere of influence at the expense of both the Etruscans and the Greeks.

Etruria sees itself relegated to the northern Tyrrhenian Sea.

The Phocaean Greeks remain confined to Massillia and its coastal environs.

Massalia (modern Marseille), an outpost of Greek culture, takes care to maintain good relations with Rome; at the same time, it maintains a strong independent navy and a stable oligarchic government.

When their great trade rivals, the Carthaginians, fight the Romans in the Punic Wars, Marseille supports Rome and receives help in subduing the native tribes of Liguria, who openly side with Carthage in the Second Punic War.

Massalia, one of the first Greek ports in Western Europe, soon growing to a population of over a thousand, is the first settlement given city status in the region of present France.

Facing an opposing alliance of the Etruscans, Carthage and the Celts, the Greek colony had allied itself with the expanding Roman Republic for protection.

This protectionist association had brought aid in the event of future attacks, and perhaps equally important, it had also brought the people of Massalia into the complex Roman market.

The city has thrived by acting as a link between inland Gaul, hungry for Roman goods and wine (which Massalia was steadily exporting by 500 BCE), and Rome's insatiable need for new products and slaves.

In 125 BCE, Rome comes to the defense of Massalia against invading Celts.

Lucius dies at the age of nineteen of an illness on August 20 of the same year, in Massilia (Marseille) on his way to Spain, leaving Gaius as the emperor’s sole heir.

Ataulf has spent the past few years operating in the Gallic and Spanish countrysides, diplomatically playing competing factions of German and Roman commanders against one another to skillful effect.

The Visigoths, a nation of fewer than two hundred and fifty thousand, soon return to fighting the Romans, attacking Marseille and taking over such cities as …

Constantius poisons official relations with Ataulf and gains permission to march into Gaul, blockading the the Mediterranean ports and initiating hostilities with the Visigoths.

In reply, Attalus is again raised to the throne as a puppet emperor, this time by Ataulf at Bordeaux, in order for the Visigoths to impose their terms on Honorius.

Euric conquers Hispania and the harbor city of Marseille in southern Gaul, adding them to the existing Visigothic Kingdom.

…Marseilles is guaranteed to Childebert by his brothers.