Repeated expeditions from Sparta and Epirus tried in vain to prop up the decaying Greek states against the Lucanians and Bruttians; and when in 282 the Romans appeared in the Tarentine Gulf the end was close at hand.
Among the poems written or at least sketched during this period were L'Oaristys, L'Aveugle, La Jeune Malade, Bacchus,Euphrosine and Ld Jeune Tarentine, the last a synthesis of his purest manner, mosaic though it is of reminiscences of at least a dozen classical poets.
La Jeune Tarentine is a work of personal emotion and inspiration.
Chenier's influence has been specially remarkable in Russia, where Pushkin imitated him, Kogloff translated La Jeune Captive, La jeune Tarentine and other famous pieces, while the critic Vesselovsky pronounces "Il a retabli le lyrisme pur dans la poesie frangaise."
On Tarentine coins a man and dolphin appear, and hence it may be thought that the monument at Taenarum represented Taras and not Anion.