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The people commonly known as Greeks called themselves Hellenes, and Greece was Hellas (after and ancestor called Hellen). The name Greek came from a Roman error. As the Romans expanded down the Italian peninsula, the came on an Italian tribe called the Graeci. As they went further, they ran into the Hellenic colonies on the coast - Tarentum, Sybaris, Croton etc. Thinking them to be more Graeci, they called them collectively Magna Graeci (great greeks). The word Greek stuck, and was applied to the rest of the Hellenic world.

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