Greek colonization in the context of "Abdera, Thrace"

The oikistes (Greek: οἰκιστής), often anglicized as oekist or oecist, was the individual chosen by an ancient Greek polis as the leader of any new colonization effort. He was invested with the power of selecting a settling place, directing the initial labors of the colonists and guiding the fledgling colony through its hard early years. The oracle is also consulted during deliberations for choosing an oikistes. After he is appointed and directed to found a colony, he also consults the Delphic oracle. Due to his authority, the oikistes was often accorded his own cult after his death, and his name was preserved even when all other details of the founding of a colony were forgotten.

At the time of Greek colonisation, the oikistes is historically identifiable. He was usually responsible for providing the ship on which the colonists set sail from the Greek mainland to found a colony. He therefore ritually consulted an oracle about the advantages of the possible location of the new settlement and then determined the place of foundation. After arriving at the newly founded colony, the oikistes determined the distribution of land and the street grid. In his honour, sanctuaries were erected in the colony in the manner of the heroes of the mythical oikistes, games were sponsored, and festivals were held.

Cyrene, also sometimes anglicized as Kyrene, was an ancient Greek colony and Roman city near present-day Shahhat in northeastern Libya in North Africa. It was part of the Pentapolis, an important group of five cities in the region, and gave the area its classical and early modern name Cyrenaica.

Cyrene lies on a ridge of the Jebel Akhdar uplands. The archaeological remains cover several hectares and include several monumental temples, stoas, theatres, bathhouses, churches, and palatial residences. The city is surrounded by the Necropolis of Cyrene. Since 1982, it has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The city's port was Apollonia (Marsa Sousa), located about 16 kilometres (10 mi) to the north.

Chersonesus, contracted in medieval Greek to Cherson (Χερσών), was an ancient Greek colony founded approximately 2,500 years ago in the southwestern part of the Crimean Peninsula. Settlers from Heraclea Pontica in Bithynia established the colony in the 6th century BC.

The ancient city was located on the shore of the Black Sea on the outskirts of present-day Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula, where it is referred to as Khersones. The site is part of the National Preserve of Tauric Chersonesos. The name Chersonesos in Greek means "peninsula" and aptly describes the site on which the colony was established. It should not be confused with the Tauric Chersonese, a name often applied to the whole of the southern Crimea.

Sardinia is traditionally known to have been initially ruled by the Nuragic civilization, which was followed by Greek colonization, conquest by the Carthaginians, and occupied by the Romans for around a thousand years, including the rule of the Vandals in the 5th and 6th centuries CE. Before the foundation of the Kingdom of Sardinia, Sardinia was ruled by judices, and some rulers obtained the title of King of Sardinia by the Holy Roman Emperor but did not gain effective authority to rule it.

The title of as Rex Sardiniae et Corsicae (King of Sardinia and Corsica) was first established in 1297, when Pope Boniface VIII gave a royal investiture to James II of Aragon. The Crown of Aragon started effectively ruling Sardinia in 1323. Until 1479, when Ferdinand II of Aragon acknowledged Corsica as part of the Republic of Genoa, rulers of Sardinia used the nominal title of Rex Corsicae (King of Corsica). Corsica had been effectively ruled by Genoa since 1284 and the Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica had been renamed simply Kingdom of Sardinia in 1460, when it was incorporated into a sort of confederation of states, each with its own institutions, called the Crown of Aragon, and united only in the person of the king.