The town of Velia, whose Greek name was Elea, was founded by the inhabitants of Focea, a Greek city of Asia Minor conquered by the Persians. According to Strabone, a Greek-born author who lived at the time of Emperor Tiberius, the foothills conquered a city of the Enotria (the name by which the Greeks indicated the South of Italy whose meaning is the country of vineyards), and they did Their homeland.