It owed its origin to an attempt made in 452 B.C. by Sybarite exiles and their descendants to repeople their old home.
By nature a sybarite, he took care to have the best cook in the capital, and women had for him an irresistible attraction, though he was never married.
The pretensions of the Sybarite colonists led to dissensions and ultimately to their expulsion; peace was made with Crotona, and also, after a period of war, with Tarentum, and Thurii rose rapidly in power and drew settlers from all parts of Greece, especially from Peloponnesus, so that the tie to Athens was not always acknowledged.