The expulsion of Pyrrhus from Sicily and Italy (479) left by far the larger half of the island, and especially the important Agrigentum, in the hands of Carthage; the Syracusans retained nothing but Tauromenium and the south-east of the island.
Campanian Mercenaries In the second great city on the east coast, Messana, a band of foreign soldiers had established themselves and held the city, independent alike of Syracusans and Carthaginians.

These new rulers of Messana were Campanian mercenaries.

The dissolute habits that had become prevalent among the Sabellians settled in and around Capua,( 1) had made Campania in the fourth and fifth centuries--what Aetolia, Crete, and Laconia were afterwards--the universal recruiting field for princes and cities in search of mercenaries.

The semi-culture that had been called into existence there by the Campanian Greeks, the barbaric luxury of life in Capua and the other Campanian cities, the political impotence to which the hegemony of Rome condemned them, while yet its rule was not so stern as wholly to withdraw from them the right of self-disposal--all tended to drive the youth of Campania in troops to the standards of the recruiting officers.

As a matter of course, this wanton and unscrupulous selling of themselves here, as everywhere, brought in its train estrangement from their native land, habits of violence and military disorder, and indifference to the breach of their allegiance.