Tristan Hughes

But do we know which god was worshipped here?

The queen of the gods, so Hera, she's the wife of Zeus, so she is one of the top gods of the Maltese.

Being such a massive construction, not just one storey, two storeys high, do we know much about how they built this?

So it's that one right there behind us.

So interestingly, that one is almost, they're experimenting with Doric architecture and this is almost a finalized version of it when they've almost got the style nailed out more to a tee.

You mentioned that at the end of the 6th century BC, so that's within roughly a hundred years of Pestum being founded, it seems pretty quick.

Was this almost a statement of power, of the wealth of Pestum at that time?

That within a hundred years of it being founded they could already build massive temples like this?

So it's almost like the colony overtakes the mother city, almost kind of the apprentice becomes the master in a weird kind of way.

Yeah.

And so how powerful and significant does Greek Pestum, does Poseidonia become?

Pestum was one of many ancient Greek cities in Magna Graecia that has become prosperous by the 5th century BC.

Others included Syracuse and Akragas in Sicily, the latter famous for its own valley of temples at today's Agrigento.

There was also Regium at the toe of Italy, Tarentum at the heel, and of course Neapolis beneath Mount Vesuvius.

We know it today as Naples.

At the same time that famous Greek cities on the mainland like Athens and Sparta were fighting off the Persians and reaching their zeniths, these Greeks in the west were enjoying their own golden age.

Greek culture was thriving in southern Italy, and during these centuries, you would see a special development of Greek art in these cities, influenced by powerful Italian neighbours.

Like the Etruscans, who at that time were still the dominant power in Italy.

Rome, at that time, still paled in comparison.

Visit somewhere like the National Museum of Archaeology in Naples today and you can see great examples of this Italiot Greek art.