The region of present Salerno in Campania, located about thirty miles (fifty kilometers) southeast of present Naples on a hill overlooking the Gulf of Salerno, has been continuously settled since prehistoric times, although the first certain signs of human presence date to the period between the ninth and sixth centuries BCE.

The Oscan-Etruscan settlement of Irna (founded in the sixth century BCE), situated across the Irno river, in today's Salernitan quarter of Fratte, represented an important base for Etruscan trade with the Greek colonies of Posidonia and Elea.

The Samnites had occupied it around the fifth century BCE as a consequence of the Battle of Cumae (474 BCE) as part of the Syracusan sphere of influence.

With the Roman advance in Campania, Irna began to lose its importance, being supplanted by the new Roman colony (194 BCE) of Salernum, developing around an initial castrum.

…which sacks the Lombard province of Salerno.

Guaimar I had made his son, also Guaimar, co-prince, and it was he who had ruled Salerno in the elder Guaimar's absence.

Upon the elder prince's return, a Neapolitan faction in the city, supported by one Athanasius, revolts, but the two Guaimars put it down and the elder, like his father before him, retires (or is forced by his son) to a monastery, San Massimo, Guaifer's foundation, in 900 or 901, dying soon after.

The chronicles of his reign describe him in despotic terms and he does not seem to have been popular, despite the later popularity of his name within the dynasty his father had founded.

When Gisulf is deposed and removed from office in 973 by Pandulf's cousin, Landulf of Conza, in alliance with Marinus II of Naples and Manso of Amalfi, Pandulf restores Gisulf as his vassal.

…in 978, Salerno—into the Holy Roman Empire.

Pandulf, as vassal of Otto II, rules a large bloc of territories that stretches as far north as Tuscany and as far south as the Gulf of Taranto.

Otto II, following his brief war with Francia over Lower Lorraine, leads an expedition into Italy in 980 to restore Pope Benedict VII, who had been driven from his see by a Roman faction.

Pandulf's death in 981 deprives Otto II of one of his primary lieutenants.

Pandulf's lands are partitioned among his sons, though further quarrels between the local Lombard princes soon follow.

Pandulf's older son Landulf IV receives Capua and Benevento while his younger son Pandulf II receives Salerno.

Duke Manso I of Amalfi finally deposes Pandulf II of his rule in Salerno in 982.

By 982, the entire area once ruled by Pandulf has collapsed, weakening Otto II's position against Constantinople, which still claims sovereignty over the Lombard principalities.

The lack of singular leader to prevent their advances into Lombard territory allows the Eastern Romans to make inroads further north.

Otto II has attempted on several occasions to reunified the Lombard principalities politically and ecclesiastically into his Empire after Pandulf's death.

Though he unsuccessfully besieged Manso I in Salerno, Otto II ultimately obtains the recognition of his authority from all the Lombard principalities.

With his authority reestablished over the Lombard princes, Otto II turns his attention towards the threat from Muslim Sicily.

Since the 960s, the island had been under Muslim rule as the Emirate of Sicily, a state of the Fatimid Caliphate.

The ruling Kalbid dynasty had conducted raids against Imperial territories in southern Italy.

The death of Pandulf in 981 had allowed the Sicilian Emir Abu al-Qasim to increase his raids, hitting targets in Apulia and Calabria.

As early as 980, Otto II had demanded a fleet from the city of Pisa to help him carry out his war in southern Italy, and in September 981, he had marched into southern Italy.

Needing allies in his campaign against the Muslims and the Empire, Otto II reconciles with Manso I, granting imperial recognition of his rule over Salerno.

Basil's next move is to ally to the Greek Empire as many Lombard principalities as possible.

He visits Salerno in October, where Prince Guaimar III is nominally an imperial vassal.

He then moves on to …

…Monte Cassino, which monastery is sheltering Dattus on its lands, the anti-Greek monks, at the insistence of Pope Benedict VIII, having given him a fortified tower on the Garigliano.

Basil nevertheless confirms all the privileges of the monastery over its property in Greek territory.

The abbot, Atenulf, is a brother of the prince of Capua, Pandulf IV.

The monastery then promptly expels Dattus and he flees to papal territory.