Major mints: Brundisium, Taras.

Ancient Calabria, in the heel of the Italian boot, thus not identical to modern Calabria, was the most Greek of the Italian district, largely because it was completely dominated by Taras. That city, on a site settled in prehistoric times, was claimed to have been founded by Spartan exiles. The name Taras derived from the legendary founder of the pre-Greek settlement, this Tarsa was a son of Poseidon, who when he was shipwrecked was rescued by a dolphin sent by his father. This event is commemorated on most of the familiar didrachms.

Taras was the center of the trade in luxury goods in the area. The city was particularly known for its purple cloth; it produced fine wool from its flocks, and the dye was made from the murex shellfish which abounded in the seas nearby. Added to this the city had the only safe harbor along that coast; hence built up a great luxury trade.

Taras took the lead from Kroton as that city declined. As the leader of the Greek cities it did its best to resist the rise of Rome. It supported Pyrrhos in his war of 281 BC, after which the Romans captured it; it was taken by Hannibal, but fell again to the Romans in 209 BC. After that event it fell into decline, so that by the first century it was of note mainly as a holiday resort.

Brundisium was a Calabrian or Messapian foundation, whose foundation legends involve Diomedes. The Romans planted a fortified colony there in 246, to keep the Carthaginians out of the Adriatic. The town became the Romans main port for transporting troops to Greece and the Balkans.