This passage–the significance of which is hotly debated–identifies one of the most prominent features of the development of the Greekcolonised areas of the western Mediterranean, namely that the conceptualisation of polis membership, citizenship and territory, may have developed along significantly different lines from those of the rest of the Greek world. 1 The Greek cities of the mainland and the Aegean underwent a period of social and political upheaval in the archaic period, leading to the establishment of tyrannies in many communities in the seventh and early sixth centuries BC, before developing various forms of representative government–whether oligarchic or democratic, in conventional Greek terminology–in the late sixth century. In the west, in contrast, and particularly in Sicily, the tyrant remained a prominent feature of the political scene from the seventh century right down to the period of Roman conquest, with only relatively brief interludes of representative government. The nature of tyranny and kingship in the western Mediterranean, and the possible reasons for the prevalence of tyranny as a political system, are contentious issues. This chapter, I would like to thank Prof. TJ Cornell and Dr JRW Prag for comments and discussion on various aspects of this paper, especially on the material from Messana, and Prof. MH Crawford for access to epigraphic data from Messana included in the Imagines Italicae database.