The term is derived from the Greek verb διασπείρω ("diaspeirō"), "I scatter", "I spread about" which in turn is composed of διά ("dia"), "between, through, across" and the verb σπείρω ("speirō"), "I sow, I scatter". In Ancient Greece the term διασπορά ("diaspora") hence meant "scattering" and was inter alia used to refer to citizens of a dominant city-state who emigrated to a conquered land with the purpose of colonization, to assimilate the territory into the empire. An example of a diaspora from classical antiquity is the century-long exile of the Messenians under Spartan rule and the Ageanites as described by Thucydides in his "history of the Peloponnesian wars."