The naval Battle of Alalia took place between 540 BC and 535 BC off the coast of Corsica between Greeks and the allied Etruscans and Carthaginians. A Greek force of 60 Phocaean ships defeated a Punic-Etruscan fleet of 120 ships while emigrating to the western Mediterranean and the nearby colony of Alalia (now Aléria). Background The Phoenicians had planted trading posts in Africa, Sicily, Sardinia and Iberia during the 9th and 8th centuries BC while creating their trading monopoly. The Phoenicians were among the first peoples, if not the first, to begin trading around the Mediterranean on a wide scale after the period of economic decline that had accompanied the end of the Mediterranean Bronze Age. The Etruscans emerged as a local power in the 8th century BC, spreading their trade to Corsica, Sardinia and Iberia and creating a powerful navy to guard their interests. The Phoenicians and Etruscans became trading partners and rivals, exchanging goods with and engaging in opportunistic raids against each other. The situation changed with the beginning and growth of Greek activity in the western Mediterranean from around 750 BC onward. Greater Greece outside Greece The second (quite possibly the third) wave of Greek colonization efforts in this area started with the planting of Cumae in Italy by 750 BC and Naxos in Sicily by 735 BC. Within the next 100 years, several Greek cities had planted colonies along the coast of southern Italy and most of Sicily, creating a position to control trade routes around these areas and dominating the Strait of Messina. Etruscans clashed with the Greeks, but were unable to stop the process. Although the colonization process was not done according to any master plan, with several Greek cities acting simultaneously, it probably seemed to the Phoenicians and Etruscans that a flood of Greeks were drowning the Tyrrhenian seacoast. The Greek-colonized zone encompassing Sicily and Southern Italy came to be known as Magna Graecia. The Greeks living in this area behaved in a similar way to the mainland Greeks, expanding their political and commercial domain at the expense of their neighbors while keeping the Ionian–Dorian feud alive. The colonization offered greater opportunities for increased trade, piracy and other conflicts among the Etruscans, Phoenicians and Greeks competing for control of seaborne trade of the area. Carthaginian hegemony Carthage created her hegemony in part to resist Greek encroachments in the Phoenician sphere of influence. Phoenicians