Basta
Basta a town of Calabria, described by Pliny (3.11. s. 16) as situated between Hydruntum and the Iapygian Promontory. Its name is still retained by the little village of Vaste near Poggiardo, about 10 miles SW. of Otranto, and 19 from the Capo della Leuca (the Iapygian Promontory). Galateo, a local topographer of the 16th century, speaks of the remains of the ancient city as visible in his time; while without the walls were numerous sepulchres, in which were discovered vases, arms, and other objects of bronze, as well as an inscription, curious as being one of the most considerable relics of the Messapian dialect. (Galateo, de Situ Iapygiae, pp. 96, 97; Romanelli, vol. ii. p. 30, 31; Gruter, Inscr. pp. 145-5; Mommsen, Unter Italischen Dialekte, p. 52--56.)
The BASTERBINI of Pliny, mentioned by him shortly afterwards among the Calabrorum Mediterranei,
must certainly be the inhabitants of Basta, though the ethnic form is curious.
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.