Messapian

/ məˈseɪpɪk, məˈseɪpɪən, -ˈsæpɪk /

noun

1. a scantily recorded language of an ancient people of Calabria (the Messapii ), thought by some to be related to ancient Illyrian

Example Sentences

He found a subterranean world tracing back before the birth of Christ: a Messapian tomb, a Roman granary, a Franciscan chapel and even etchings from the Knights Templar.

Read more on New York Times

Her good fortune supplied from among the contingent furnished to the war by her Messapian allies a man of a nature so sympathetic with her own and an imagination so vivid as to gain for the ideal thus created a permanent realisation.

Read more on Project Gutenberg

He laid claim to be descended from the old Messapian kings, a claim which Virgil is supposed to acknowledge in the introduction of Messapus leading his followers in the gathering of the Italian races, Ibant aequati numero regemque canebant.

Read more on Project Gutenberg

In the level country, the rich arable lands, such as the Campanian and Capuan plains, extended in vast tracts, and produced a profusion of fruits of every species, while on the acclivities, where the skirts of the mountains began to break into little hills and sloping fields, the olive and vine basked on soils famed for Messapian oil, and for wines of which the very names cheer and revive us.

Read more on Project Gutenberg

A notable figure is Ennius, a Messapian, who began to write at the close of the third century B. C.

Read more on Project Gutenberg