Chapter X: Part 10

Byzantium was conquered by a Persian general of Darius, and for a time was nothing but a Persian fortress: the Greek inhabitants of the place then dispersed, but the whole of the Bosporus and the country on the other side of the Ceras as far as Selymbria, consisted of Byzantian προάστεια. The circumference of the ancient city was not great, occupying only about double the space of the present Seraglio. During the Macedonian period, Byzantium, with extraordinary skill, preserved its independence. In Olymp. 106, it undertook, in conjunction with Rhodes, Chios, and Mitylene, the Social war against Athens. Under Lysimachus, it appears to have formally maintained its political existence, paying homage to him only by presents, and thus throughout all changes it remained free until the time of the Romans. In the age of Cicero, for example, Byzantium, as we see from his speech against Piso, was a completely free city and in alliance with the Romans. As commerce was constantly increasing in the Roman empire, Byzantium also rose in prosperity, as is clear from certain statements of Tacitus. In the war of Pescennius Niger against Septimius Severus, Byzantium stood out against a desperate siege which lasted for three years; Niger had no hope of conquering Severus and the West, and this seems to have suggested to him the idea of dividing the empire, and of maintaining himself in the East, of which Byzantium was to be the capital. When the city was taken, Severus destroyed it completely, a piece of revenge which was otherwise opposed to the character of that prudent emperor. The unfortunate consequence was, that those seas were now thrown open to the barbarians. The Goths, without any obstacle, penetrated into the Propontis, overpowered the _claustra_ of the Hellespont, and spread over Greece. At length Constantine restored Byzantium under the name of Constantinople; he saw the necessity of founding a strong capital there, if he was to maintain himself in the East. This determination of Constantine has been censured, and the course of events seems to justify the censure; but people overlook the fact that, if Constantine had not acted as he did, the East would have been conquered first and much earlier, that part of the empire being then much more in danger than the West. The Goths were on the Danube, and the Huns were pressing on from the East, while the Germans had been completely overpowered by the victories of Aurelian and Probus; and in Gaul, too, not a man thought of making war against Rome. The fact that afterwards circumstances turned out differently is no proof that Constantine was wrong. Had not Constantinople been so strong a place at that time, the eastern empire would have been lost.

The gradual extension of Constantinople is a subject which would lead me too far; but if, after I have given you the topography of Rome, there he still time left, I shall add that of Constantinople.

Let us now proceed to the southern coast of the Propontis. I will only state in general, that the whole of the Asiatic side of the Hellespont, as far as the entrance into the Propontis was completely covered with Greek towns, nearly all of which, like Lampsacus and Dardanus, were Aeolian; a few only were Ionian. But CYZICUS, on the south coast of the Propontis, was a town which enjoyed great celebrity both in the earlier and the somewhat later periods of antiquity. It is a disputed point whether originally it was situated on a peninsula connected with the mainland by a narrow neck, or whether it was in reality an island which was artificially connected with the opposite coast by means of a causeway. It was a Milesian colony, protected against the barbarians by its isolated position, and it acquired importance at first by agriculture, and afterwards by navigation and commerce. It is mentioned by Thucydides and Xenophon, but its real greatness belongs to the Macedonian period, when, to judge from its ruins and the vast number of coins found there, it must have been a very large and wealthy city. It is historically important on account of the siege during which its inhabitants defended themselves bravely, resolutely, and heroically, against Mithridates; the Romans rewarded them for it with distinctions and favours of every kind; and Cyzicus, under the Romans, continued to be a considerable city. It seems to have been destroyed during the Gothic invasion in the third century; under the Byzantine emperors it was only a small provincial town.

There were several other little Greek colonies on the same coast, such as _Cios_, _Astacos_, and others, which were subsequently conquered by the Bithynian kings, in consequence of which their names were changed. I shall say more of them when I come to speak of Bithynia.

CHALCEDON, opposite to Byzantium, was according to tradition older than it; it may have existed before, but certainly not as a Greek town. It is likewise said to have been a Megarian colony; but it never was of any historical importance. On coins it is called Καλχεδών, but in many MSS. we find Καλχηδών, whence it is often confounded with Καρχηδών.

The Greek towns on the Thracian coast from the Bosporus onwards are in themselves of no historical importance. MESEMBRIA was built by the Byzantians at the time when, during the Ionian war, their own city had been taken by the Persians. Nearly all settlements in those parts were Ionian colonies sent out by Miletus, with the exception of CALATIS which was a Dorian colony of Heraclea; but APOLLONIA and all places further on as far as the Borysthenes are Milesian. All these towns as far as Olbia, as I said before, are of no importance in history, if we except Tomi, which derives its interest from the fact that Ovid lived there in exile.

TOMI is also called Τομεῖς, which is another instance of the variety of adjectives. Τομεύς (Τομεῖς) is an adjective, from which is formed Τομείτης, and from it again the Latin _Tomitanus_, so that we have three forms of the ethnic name. The description which Ovid, in his Tristia, gives of his sufferings in that place, as well as the Βορυσθενιτικὸς of Dion Chrysostomus, is of historical interest, because it furnishes us a picture of the mode of life in that country. Those distant Greeks maintained themselves as Greeks down to the times of the Romans, but they had enough intercourse with the barbarians to adopt many of their manners and customs, nay, even some peculiarities of language, so that they really were Μιξέλληνες.

The coast of Thrace as far as mount Haemus is beautiful, but in the north of Haemus as far as the Ister, it is inhospitable, for it is rocky, and the country a mere steppe. North of the Ister as far as the Crimea, the coast, though high, is a perfect steppe; the country is flat and often well adapted for agriculture, but unfit for trees, because the soil which is often very fertile is only a few feet deep, and rests upon a stony stratum of ochre, which destroys the roots of trees.

The coast to the north of the Ister as far as the Dniepr or the town of Tyras is called Γετῶν ἐρημία, either because it had been a desert at all times, or because it had been changed into a wilderness. At the mouth of the Dniepr, TYRAS, near Akermann, was the only town, and probably even this was only a factory. ODESSOS, which must not be confounded with the distant Odessa, was situated near the Ister. I will remark here by the way, that the name Odessa has been quite unreasonably adopted from the ancient town Odessos.

The ancient city of OLBIA, once, as its name indicates, a wealthy town, was situated between Odessa and Oczakow; it was also termed _Borysthenis_ or _Borysthenopolis_, but the city is generally called Olbia, while its inhabitants are spoken of under the names of Βορυσθενοπολῖται, Ὄλβιοι, and Ὀλβιοπολῖται. It was a great emporium for the Greek corn trade with the countries about the Dniepr. That trade was carried on from two points, first from the Ukraine and the Dniepr, and secondly from Phanagoria, the Cimmerian Bosporus, the Don, and the Taurian Chersonesus. As apparently unimportant circumstances often supply the place of historical information, so the decay of Olbia justifies the inference that the commerce of the Dniepr, to which Olbia owed its greatness, must have been destroyed, and that too in consequence of the invasion of those countries by the Gauls on the one hand, and by the Sarmatians on the other. Agriculture must have been ruined, and nomadic tribes appear to have settled there. The Bosporanian towns retained their importance, but Olbia was insignificant compared with what it had been, and never rose again. When a place, after its destruction, continues to be inhabited, the stones and especially marble, are ill preserved: Olbia had received its death-blow, and though it continued for a time to be inhabited by the Greeks, it was afterwards completely destroyed by the barbarians, and never restored. Innumerable inscriptions are thus buried in the ground, from which we can gather information about the condition of Olbia; one of them[84] refers to the period preceding the appearance of the Sarmatae. From Dion Chrysostomus, we know that in Caesar’s time the Sarmatae came across the Dniepr, and took and destroyed Olbia. In his own time Olbia was a thinly inhabited and decayed place of large circumference. Afterwards it is no longer mentioned. From Herodotus, who himself visited the place, we can best see how great it was in his time.

From Olbia, we proceed to the Crimea, the _Chersonesus Taurica_, in modern times sometimes called _Tauris_,—a name of which it has been justly remarked, that it was unknown to the ancients, but it does not follow that we too should not use it; only in writing Latin we should not employ it, but follow the practice of the ancients. The correct name is Ταυρική; and Ταυρίς, though correctly formed, does not occur, but the country was called from its inhabitants Ταῦροι, whence Ἰφιγένεια ἐν Ταύροις, and not _in Tauride_. This Taurian Chersonesus consists of two halves which are separated nearly equally by a diagonal running from north-west to south-east. The southern half has an excellent range of hills, whereas the other is a steppe. The former was inhabited by Taurians, the latter by Scythians; the Taurians were, as Herodotus says, foreign to the Scythians. The Greeks formed settlements on the coast of the Taurian country, and also on the Cimmerian Bosporus.

The great town called CHERSONESUS was situated on the promontory of a small island, as the isthmus could easily be defended by fortifications; it had an excellent harbour, for which reason it had been chosen as the site of a colony. The town was a colony of Heraclea in Bithynia, whose greatness belongs to the period previous to the Mithridatic wars; its vicissitudes are manifold; it must have been founded after the time of Herodotus, as he does not mention it. The passage in which he speaks of those countries, shows that he would have noticed it, if it had existed. But whenever it may have been founded, it became important at an early period, and was known under the name of Ἡρακλεία ἐν Χερσονήσῳ, or simply Χερσόνησος. In consequence of attacks from barbarous tribes, it was obliged to place itself under the protection of Mithridates Eupator. This was the beginning of happy times for the Greeks in those parts; the whole of the Crimea was united under one government, and the barbarians were excluded by fortifications on the isthmus. The kings of Bosporus, descendants of Mithridates, governed the peninsula as a splendid little kingdom under the protection of the Romans, who never introduced their provincial institutions there, but were satisfied with the recognition of their supremacy and presents. Under this government the Chersonesus retained its importance, and when the kingdom of Bosporus was broken up, Chersonesus, which now assumed the name of _Cherson_, became a republic. As such it existed not only in the reign of Justinian, when the Romans protected the inhabitants as their allies and in that of the descendants of Heraclius, but even afterwards under Constantine Porphyrogenitus (see his detailed article Χερσῶν in the work _De Administrando Imperio_). The constitution of this republic cannot be satisfactorily ascertained, but its magistrates were called πρωτεύοντες. The place was then still Greek, and Greek was spoken there, and national chronicles were kept in the Greek language, which the author of the work just mentioned made use of. Afterwards the peninsula was taken by the Russians under their prince Wladimir, the first great conqueror who aimed at the possession of Greece. The town was not indeed destroyed on that occasion, but many things of value were carried away, as for example, the bronze gates of the churches. Soon after, the Chazars and other barbarians came and took possession of the town, which then disappears from history. In 1784, when the Russians took the Crimea, the town no longer existed, but only extensive ruins. Regular and systematic excavations might have led to important discoveries, but the Russians built a harbour for their navy; everything was rudely demolished for the purpose of using it as building material; all the iron was torn away, and the bricks employed elsewhere, so that at present not a trace appears of what forty years ago promised certain reward for suitable exertion. Inscriptions, as far as I know, have not been found; but a large number of coins of the Byzantine period have been brought to light, from which we see that the town, like Venice, even then had its own right of coinage under the protection of Constantinople.

Larger or smaller Greek settlements existed near most of the harbours. THEODOSIA or THEUDOSIA in the neighbourhood of Kaffa, formed the western frontier of the kingdom of Bosporus. At present the name Theodosia (in Russian, Feodosia), has been transferred to Kaffa, but I believe that those are right who consider this transference to be without foundation.

PHANAGORIA, in the eastern part of the Crimea, was situated on an eminence, and was the chief Greek city in those parts. Although the antiquities there have been destroyed in a barbarous manner, the place still is an inexhaustible mine, and the remains show a degree of beauty which excites our astonishment; the Bosporan coins are beautiful, and the vases, statues, and the like are exquisite. Phanagoria was a very ancient Greek colony of Miletus; it rose to greatness at an early period, and was governed by a γένος bearing the name of Archaeanactidae, so that its form of government was at first aristocratic. The Archaeanactidae were probably succeeded by a democracy, and this by a tyrannis. Among the tyrants, Leucon is of some interest to us, because Demosthenes, in his speech against Leptines, speaks of an honorary right conferred upon him for having done service to Athens. He was succeeded by Satyrus and others, who completely undermined the republican constitution, which was perhaps not suited to those countries. The Greek inhabitants were really much indebted to those princes for preserving their wealth and happiness in the midst of impetuous barbarians. Their names show distinct traces of a connection with Persia; thus we often meet with the name Parysades, which is nothing else than Perisades, the son of a fairy (Peri); according to the Greek pronunciation the resemblance is stronger than according to ours.

The kingdom of Bosporus embraced the whole of the eastern Crimea as far as Theodosia, and the opposite island of _Taman_, _Tamacan_, or, as Strabo calls it _Tamyrace_. It formed settlements also on the Palus Maeotis and on the Euxine. In the time of Mithridates Eupator, it was governed by king Parysades, who, being unable to check the invading Sarmatae, surrendered his kingdom to Mithridates; the latter then undertook an expedition into the Crimea, partly for the purpose of extending his empire, and partly for that of training his army for the war against the Romans. As long as he lived, Bosporus was his province; it then passed into the hands of his family, which, like himself, had become completely hellenized, though they were of Persian origin. We can trace the names of the princes down to the fourth century from their coins, the later ones of which show on one side the head of the reigning emperor of Rome, and on the other that of the Bosporan king.

I cannot at this moment give you an accurate account of the towns in the island of Taman, but they were without importance. The town of TANAIS, which may have been very ancient, was situated at the mouth of the river Tanais.

This small kingdom, ever since the time of Mithridates, comprised the whole of the Crimea; across the isthmus, a line of fortifications had been constructed to defend the Crimea against the northern barbarians.

An ancient Περίπλους περὶ Πόντον Εὔξεινον, the beginning of which is lost, is a compilation from the earlier Greek Περίπλοι and from the work of Scymnus of Chios, and contains the distances. But it is very doubtful when it was composed; I believe that it is a late production, perhaps of the time of Justinian, or even later, for all the distances are given in stadia and Roman miles, and the town of Chersonesus is called Cherson.

Greek towns existed not only there, on the coast south of mount Kuban, about the promontory of mount Caucasus, but even in the easternmost corner of the Black Sea. On the eastern coast we find COLCHIS, which exported the products of those parts, which are extremely wealthy, and form one of the most fertile countries in the world. In the upper part it contains wide and beautiful valleys, but the land is too high and not as rich as in Mingrelia. DIOSCURIA, a port town on a gulf, PHASIS, and several other places on the south coast of the Euxine, were likewise founded by Greek colonists.

If we proceed further west in this direction, we come first to TRAPEZUS, a place well known from Xenophon’s Anabasis, to which it owes its celebrity; afterwards it is not prominent again, until the time when a dynasty of the Comneni established itself there, which even survived the fall of the empire of Constantinople. In the earlier times it is not very important. It did not belong to Cappadocia, but was situated in the country now occupied by the Lazes, a people speaking a peculiar Caucasian language. At Trapezus, the Greek language has maintained itself among the Christians, while otherwise it is almost extinct in Asia Minor. The statement made in the oral traditions of the Greeks, that the Doric dialect was spoken there, is very doubtful.

AMISOS, a Milesian colony[85] on the Euxine, the birth-place of Strabo, was an important Greek town in Cappadocia proper. It is strange that such a distant corner of the Greek world should have given birth to a Strabo; the number of faults that can be pointed out in his Greek diction is very small, and even these may be only dialectical; otherwise he writes excellently, for he thinks correctly; the loss of his history is ever to be lamented, for it was assuredly a first-rate work.

The whole country of Trapezus rests on rough Armenian mountains; it is a beautiful country, and to us northern people it would appear excellent, but it is, nevertheless, very different from the blessed fields of Asia Minor. The district containing Amisos and Sinope, on the other hand, is a paradise; its fertility even in antiquity reached a height which we can scarcely imagine in an ideal land, and such is the whole of the north coast of Asia Minor as far as Constantinople. The winters, however, are comparatively severe; the south winds from the Armenian mountains are indeed bracing, but do not much impede the growth of the most exquisite fruit of the south. All Greek towns in that part were free and independent, until the kings of Pontus became powerful and subdued them all, even Amisos.

SINOPE, north-west of the mouth of the Halys, and geographically within the boundaries of Paphlagonia, was in ancient times the greatest Greek town in those parts. Its site is one of those which must be noticed on account of its great excellence; it was situated on a peninsula connected with the main land by a narrow isthmus; the coast in the neighbourhood is rocky, so that foreign ships cannot easily land. The peninsula was of considerable extent, so that the town embraced large districts, which were used by the inhabitants as gardens, vineyards, and fields, and which in time of war furnished means of subsistence. The tunny fish from the sea of Azow arrive there first, and the Sinopians have the first advantage; these fish always pass along the coast, and in the end, as I have already remarked, go into the harbour of Byzantium. The advantages of its situation made the town great and prosperous, and its inhabitants maintained their independence till towards the end of the Hannibalian war, when Pharnaces, king of Pontus, took possession of it. From that time it was the capital of Pontus; the kings resided in it, and Mithridates Eupator adorned it with splendid buildings of every kind. It was then conquered by Lucullus, and though it was not destroyed, its fate was terrible. Under the Romans it was again a wealthy provincial town of considerable importance.

The Greek towns CYTOROS, CROMNA, TION, and SESAMOS anciently existed on the west of Sinope. Amastris, a daughter of a brother of the last Darius, and the wife of Dionysius of Heraclea (she was afterwards married to Lysimachus), united all these towns into one, which she called AMASTRIS, and which became Greek, although she herself was a barbarian. Tion afterwards revived as a separate town.

HERACLEA, a colony of Megara, and consequently a Dorian place, was founded at an early period in the country of the Mariandynians, who afterwards became the serfs of the Heracleotae, and stood to them in the same relation as the Helots did to the Spartans. The city ruled over an extensive and fertile country, took an active part in the navigation of the Black Sea, and founded the town of Chersonesus. During the Persian dominion it maintained its independence, and the satraps were unable to exercise much influence upon it. The later history of Heraclea is the same as that of all other towns, of which the constitution was not modified according to the exigencies of the time: the ancient forms could not be maintained, and the town fell into the hands of tyrants, who governed it uninterruptedly until the Macedonian period. Several of these tyrants were extremely mild, as, for example, Clearchus in the time of Plato, whose mind was cultivated by the study of philosophy, and several members of his family afterwards reigned in the same spirit. Amastris, too, ruled there for a long time, and through her the town became subject to Lysimachus. Afterwards a republican constitution was again established there, and remained until the time of the Romans. Heraclea was allied with Rome at an early period, and was favoured by her; but in the war against Mithridates, Heraclea unfortunately declared itself in his favour, in consequence of which it was taken and cruelly treated by Cotta, and the Romans even sent a colony to it, a measure which otherwise they never adopted in those countries. Thenceforth it always remained a considerable town, as is still attested by its ruins. We know the history of Heraclea from the extracts made by Photius from the local history of Memnon, whose work was based on that of Nymphis.

EPIRUS.

Epirus is one of the few names which, being originally adjectives, have by accident become proper names. Ἤπειρος, as is well known, occurs in the Odyssey as opposed to the Cephallenian islands. In this sense the meaning of the name is almost of indefinite extent, but afterwards, and ever since the Macedonian period, a definite usage, of which traces are found even before, became established; such a trace occurs particularly in Xenophon’s Hellenica, where the name Epirus is applied to the country north of the Ambracian gulf. But in the earlier times, and even in Thucydides, it comprises a tract of country of far greater extent, at least as far as the entrance to the Corinthian gulf; nay, it even reaches beyond, embracing Aetolia and the country of the Ozolian Locrians. This indefiniteness arises from the fact, that the towns in those districts were so far removed from the other Greeks, and were accordingly very little known to them. In all great nations consisting of many tribes, some of which form the real centre, there are others which are scarcely noticed at all; and such also was the case with the Greeks in those parts, as well as in Apulia in Italy. This is proved by the colonization of those coasts, which I have already mentioned, just as if they had been inhabited by barbarians; I need only recall to your recollection the colonies of Anactorium, Leucas, Alyzia on the Acarnanian coast, and Chalcis on the Aetolian. Those nations were even more foreign to the Greeks than the Thessalians, so that the Aetolians and Acarnanians did not belong to the Amphictyonic league, though it included even Malians, Dolopians, Aenianians, Magnetes, and others. These are antiquarian points, to which we must direct our attention, in order to obtain a clear and distinct view.

We shall speak of Epirus in its narrower sense. Its new and narrower frontiers were formed especially at the time when the great Pyrrhus became king of Epirus, and when the kingdom founded by him gained consistency. In later times it was of a still more limited extent. As those tribes, when they did speak Greek, spoke in the Doric dialect, they called themselves Ἀπειρῶται, as we see from their coins, both regal and republican. This form also remained the most familiar to the Romans, and has been preserved down to our own time in the word _apricots_ (_mala Apirotica_); in like manner, we find in Plautus _Alis_ and _Alii_ for _Elis_ and _Elii_. Later writers indeed used _Epirus_ and _Epiroticus_, but these are changes of the literary language, while the genuine and more ancient form continued to be used in the popular and spoken language. The Epirots must also have had a real national name of their own; and this name has been preserved by Mnaseas, a pupil of Aristarchus, in a scholion on the Odyssey. It was Siceli, like that of the Oenotrians in Italy, and of the inhabitants of Sicily. I have published a short essay on this subject in the _Rheinisches Museum_,[86] and have shown that the Siceli mentioned in the Odyssey must be those of Epirus, that the ancient grammarian is perfectly right in this respect, and that for this reason the last rhapsody of the Odyssey is of quite a different origin from the rest. Satisfactory results in the higher kind of criticism, regarding the age of authors, may be arrived at in many cases either by mere grammatical, or by mere historical philology, but it is infinitely better if both can be combined, and such is the case here, the one supporting the other. Bentley’s investigations on the Epistles of Phalaris and the Fables of Aesop are models of inquiries, in which historical and grammatical philology go hand in hand. Much that is excellent has already been done for the Homeric poems; but there is still much to be removed, and all the details must be treated of in connection with one another. I am not speaking here of that which has already been done by Wolf.

The name Siceli, as I said before, is ancient; but how long it was in actual use is a different question. The correctness of the statement, however, cannot be doubted. Another statement, from Theopompus, a writer who notwithstanding many faults contains much that is instructive, declares the Epirots to be Pelasgians. As regards the Pelasgian nations, I think I may refer you to what I have said elsewhere;[87] I will defer the discussion of this subject until I have made more progress in these Lectures; I should like here to explain my views, but the time would thereby become too short for the task I have proposed to myself. I will therefore compress what I have to say in few words. The Pelasgians were a race distinct from the Hellenes, but sprung from the same root as they, and essentially and nearly allied to them. The difference was not distinctly understood in the earliest times, whence many nations are called by one author Hellenes, and by another Pelasgians. The statement that the Hellenes in the Iliad are not yet mentioned by a common name, that Hellenes and non-Hellenes were first properly distinguished by Thucydides, refers to the difference existing between the Hellenes and Pelasgians. Thus, e.g., Dodona in the Homeric Catalogue is called Hellenic, and Herodotus calls the Molottians and Thesprotians Hellenes, and so also the Epirots, as he was guided by their religion. But Thucydides, who judged from the language of a nation, considers the Epirots as different from the Hellenes, nay, he expressly calls them barbarians. We understand by Epirots the nations extending from the frontier of Illyricum as far as upper Macedonia (without as yet deciding upon the name Macedonia), and then along mount Pindus as far as the Achelous. To these nations we shall apply the name Epirots. I will first mention what points they have in common, and then determine which of them are to be regarded as Epirots and which not. These nations, at least their educated classes, had so far adopted the Greek language, as to employ it everywhere in public and written transactions. This accounts for Polybius always distinctly including them among the Greeks; and he does so even in regard to those who lived beyond the boundaries of Epirus fixed by Pyrrhus: though on one occasion he makes Philip, the son of Demetrius, say of the Aetolians, that they ought not to boast too much of their Hellenic character, nor to distinguish the Macedonians from the Hellenes, since the greater part of them were descended from non-Hellenes and barbarians. And the nations there spoken of were Epirot tribes. In this manner, Polybius somewhat contradicts himself. But it is only critics fond of hair-splitting that can attach any weight to such a contradiction; an author like Polybius, even without scrupulously weighing his words, can not mislead a sensible reader.

Epirus, with the exception of the district on the Ambracian gulf, is altogether a mountainous country. The mountains coming down from the north rise, as in Illyricum, between the district of the Drino and the frontier of Epirus, where they remove considerably from the coast, so that this part consists of low hills on the coast, and of undulating river districts of great extent. The mountains which separate Macedonia and Illyricum, and which there form such gigantic masses, extend in the south towards the sea, and hence constitute the boundary between Epirus and the country, from which the Illyrians on their progress towards the south, were unable to expel the native tribes. The CERAUNIAN mountains, running parallel with the coast of Corfu, extend into the Adriatic Sea, and end in a promontory without having any continuation in Italy. The opposite mountains in Calabria (the modern Terra di Lecce) form a high plateau of limestone, whereas on the east of the Adriatic they consist partly of slate and partly of primary rocks. In the east of Epirus, PINDUS extends in a series of parallel ranges, and rises to its greatest height in those very parts, its summit separating Epirus and Thessaly. The mountains there are in a high degree volcanic, whence the name Ceraunian, for it is literally a perpetually thundering mountain. The ancients knew very well, what modern natural philosophers for a time disbelieved, that thunder-storms may arise from the earth as well as from the atmosphere; and the former is the case especially in volcanic districts. Aristotle and Pliny knew this quite well, but about fifty years ago it was unknown to our natural philosophers. Even at times when there is no volcanic eruption of mount Vesuvius, not only subterraneous but real thunder is often heard, and a person looking without prejudice may see flashes of lightning issuing from the volcano. Hence those mountains are described as seats of lightning. Those terrible mountains, _infames scopuli Acroceraunia_, fully deserve this name, because they form a rocky and harbourless coast. The scirocco, the destructive south wind, dashes the ships against those rocks, and there is no port far and wide in which they might take refuge. That part of the Adriatic is still notorious for numerous shipwrecks. Another circumstance which makes it dangerous, and which was known to the ancients, but of which moderns are ignorant, is the Syrtes. The accounts of the ancients about them are by no means fabulous: they are dangerous on account of the currents which flow straightway into both the larger and the lesser Syrtis; if a sailor gets into them, he knows not where he is, and during a north wind it is impossible for him to work his way against it and the Syrtes. The ancients understanding this, sailed closer to the coast; at present, when sailors keep more to the middle, there is less danger. If the countries east of the Adriatic should ever become the seat of commerce and exports, shipwrecks would again be very common. There are two currents, the one a continuation of that from the Black Sea, meets that from the Adriatic in the south-west of Malea; they then move on diagonally in a curve, and thus enter the Syrtes. The current from the Adriatic increases the danger of the Ceraunia. From the head of the Ceraunia, the inhospitable coast extends a considerable distance till opposite Corfu. The heights then extend inland towards Pindus, and the southern districts present fertile hills covered with cork-oaks; these hills are lower, and only a few lofty peaks rise out of them, which are very difficult of access. The country about the Ambracian gulf, to a very considerable extent, is mostly alluvial land (in modern Greek βάλτος). The marshes, now called Valtos, are formed by the sea, the Arachthus, and the other rivers; they are constantly increasing, yet the increase amounts to less than what is lost at the mouth of the Achelous.

THESPROTIA, the southern and lower country, is the true seat of subterraneous commotions, whence in antiquity it was the land of terrors, and was believed to be connected with the dismal regions of the lower world: in the autumn, scarcely a day passes on which the ground does not tremble under the feet of its inhabitants. From the Acherusian lake (the lake of Janina) a river issues, which is soon lost in the earth, but afterwards re-appears and discharges its waters into the sea. This re-appearance was naturally enough doubted by the ancients, and is a disputed point even now, though I for one have no hesitation in saying that it is the same river. This river is the ACHERON or STYX (for in some accounts the two are the same); these are the muddy waters of the lower world, for the soil of Thesprotia is loose and rich, and the rivers are heavy with mud; hence the country is wonderfully fertile, and a real storehouse of grain for Europe, but it is unhealthy, and, with the exception of the mountainous parts, the water is bad.

That country was until very recently a _terra incognita_ to Europeans; the ancients mention very few towns in it, and their descriptions are unsatisfactory. Before the year 1798, when the Ionian islands came into the hands of the French, no European traveller had ever visited the interior of Epirus. It was, therefore, an unknown country, the interior was a complete blank in geographical maps, and the rivers were drawn at random. D’Anville complains of the total want of information, and with his slender means he accomplished all that could be accomplished, but he himself says, that he drew his map of the country with great uncertainty. He did not know, e.g., the site of the lake of Janina, and imagined that it was somewhere near the coast. The geography of Melitios, archbishop of Janina, contains a very respectable description of Epirus; it was written at the beginning of the eighteenth century, and from it the excellent Barbié du Bocage made the first comparatively correct map of Epirus, which accompanies Barthélemy’s _Voyage du jeune Anacharsis_. Afterwards the country was much visited by French and English officers, and Vaudoncourt and the English consul[88] ... have immensely increased our knowledge of the country, so that now it is perfectly well known, and the obscurity in which many of the statements of the ancients were involved is now sufficiently removed; our present maps of Epirus, too, are quite satisfactory. The first map of this kind was one of the Turkish empire by a modern Greek, which was published at Trieste; it was made for Greeks, and in the modern Greek language; I received it with great pleasure, and Epirus appeared in it in quite a new light.

The exploits of the Suliots have made Epirus hallowed ground to every one who is not devoid of human feeling and sympathy. Their deeds of valour described in the history of Major Perrevos, and in the excellent abridgment of Fauriel, a Frenchman, surpass everything that is related in epic poetry, and transfer us from our artificial age, so thoroughly devoid of character, into an age of heroes. They are among the most remarkable people of our time: their sufferings have stirred up our keenest sympathy; to them we are indebted for the delight of having witnessed a heroic age, while our own life has become so uniformly European, that everything has assumed a general and vague character; the Suliots will have an interest for all succeeding ages. The Epirots, on the testimony of Thucydides, were formerly considered as barbarians, with the exception of Pyrrhus, and I myself have looked upon them in the same light; but they are now dear to us, and we honour them. For this reason, I shall here enter more into detail than elsewhere, and perhaps more than the relative importance of the country requires.

A country so near to a mighty internal power of the unfathomable earth may be expected to be distinguished for extraordinary fertility. Few parts of Greece have an _honos montium et silvarum_ like that of Epirus; it contains the most beautiful mountains, covered only in a few places with fir-wood, but for the most part with the most splendid foliage. The fertility in the valleys is almost fabulous. The fuller’s earth in the country of the Stymphaeans contains traces of volcanic decomposition. But the animal creation too is very rich: the Molottian dogs are the strongest in all Greece; the herds of cattle appear to have reached their perfection in antiquity by careful breeding, for at present they are much inferior. The flourishing farms resembling those of Switzerland have perished under the dominion of barbarians; in Buthroton alone they still are equally good. The horses are small, robust, and strong, but not lasting.

Epirus was full of small tribes; fourteen or fifteen are enumerated, some which occupied large, and others small districts; I shall speak only of the more important among them. The most prominent in what may be termed the history of Epirus Proper, are the CHAONIANS, THESPROTIANS, and MOLOTTIANS, to which I may add the AMPHILOCHIANS and ORESTIANS, both of which are to some extent beyond the boundaries of Epirus in its narrower sense. In the earliest times they did not form a definite union, but in one part of the country some tribes had a predominating influence at an early period, first the Chaonians, then the Thesprotians, and in the historical times the Molottians. We must not, however, imagine that these tribes subjugated the others, or reduced them to the condition of perioeci; but their relation resembled that of the free allies of Rome, and they recognised the majesty of the ruling people only by presents and fidelity. Several of these tribes had a regal government (the most ancient among all the Greek and kindred nations) down to very late times. One member of a γένος was either elected by the people, or enjoyed a hereditary right to the throne. This sacred hereditary principle continued for a long period; to it those tribes owed their importance in later times, and without it they never would have had the power and influence with which they afterwards appear in history. When all forms had become obsolete and effete, those nations which still adhered to the hereditary regal power, were enjoying a great advantage. This was the only reason why Sparta maintained itself so long: when its royal family perished, the Spartans, too, were lost. We find, however, in Epirus the same stages of development as among other nations, and royalty was succeeded by the dominion of the γένη. Traces of this occur in Thucydides; in speaking of the Chaonians, he mentions an ἀρχικὸν γένος, and I think I have found distinct evidence that the Καμπυλίδαι were this ruling γένος.

The CHAONIANS occupied the extreme north-west of the country, in and about the Ceraunian mountains, which is now inhabited by the Cimariots. They were, no doubt, the same as the Chonians in southern Italy, and of Pelasgic origin. Although they are said in the earliest times to have enjoyed a kind of supremacy, yet the Thesprotians are very conspicuous in the most ancient Greek records, because their country contained in its high mountains the oracle of DODONA, the centre of the public religion of the Pelasgians, as Samothrace, in the east, was the centre of their mysteries. The Greeks, as a kindred nation, were not excluded from either. Dodona must not be conceived as an important town; many inquiries have been made in Epirus to ascertain its site, but traces of a real town have not been found anywhere, and Epirus in general was inhabited only κωμηδόν, and not κατὰ πόλεις. The place, however, where Dodona stood has been discovered with some degree of certainty: the summit of a hill or mountain surrounded by Cyclopian walls, so that its sides are quite precipitous, is commonly supposed to be the site. The mountains of Epirus were no more fortified than Suli; whereas the idea of a πόλις is a place surrounded by a wall. The hill of Dodona was the κρησφύγετον, that is, the place to which, in times of war, women, children, old men, and moveable property were conveyed for the sake of safety. The sanctuary was situated in an ancient and immense oak-forest on mount Tmarus; but from a statement in Servius, we learn that this sanctuary was disturbed by Illyrian robbers. The passage of Servius is corrupt, and I have emended it, because it is of great interest in regard to Greek history. Our knowledge of Dodona is extremely defective; it was situated beyond the sphere of Greek culture, so that it is always mentioned only by the way, just as is the case with Delphi. What should we know of Delphi, had not Pausanias left us a description of it? The article in Stephanus Byzantinus contains the most important information about Dodona; and more may be elicited from it than has yet been done; the article has not yet been made quite clear. Bells, or pieces of metal, which were struck with hammers, seem to have been suspended from the trees around the sanctuary. Wagons in ancient times were likewise provided with pieces of metal or bells, in order that in the narrow streets timely warning might be given to others to make room; such things are still found among the antiquities of Herculaneum.

In the time of the Peloponnesian war, the Thesprotians were without kings, but the MOLOTTIANS had a regal government; the fact of their race being traced to Achilles was only an accommodation to Greek legends, and they did not call the hero Achilles, but Aspetus.[89] Their genealogies are very obscure. They regarded themselves as Pelasgians, and traced their ancestors back to the flood of Deucalion. They were insignificant until the time of their king, Tharyps,[90] who was said to have been educated at Athens, and introduced among them, at the time of the Peloponnesian war, Greek manners and culture, Greek gymnasia, buildings, language, etc., and gave them the Hellenic unction. From this time onward the Molottians rose, though slowly, to importance, and gradually became the predominating people in Epirus, in which they were assisted by various circumstances. The extent of the power of the Molottian kings, whose right was based upon their γένος, was not greater than that of the kings of the Greek tribes, or of the German chiefs before the migration of nations. But just like these latter, they had absolute power over conquered tribes, and the same Molottian kings, who in their own country were in reality no more than magistrates, and to whom the people might lawfully refuse obedience, ruled over the neighbouring Epirot tribes and the Greek cities under their dominion with unlimited power. In like manner, king Clovis was limited in his power over the Franks, but was a complete despot in regard to the Roman provincials. When, therefore, such a people made conquests, the king, notwithstanding the letter of the constitution (if we may use this term here for something which was not written), became absolute master of the conquered. Such was the case of Alexander, and such also was that of Pyrrhus, who was further strengthened by the splendour of his victories. The Spartan kings, too, would have liked to make themselves absolute masters of the perioeci, but the Ephors stepped in to prevent it.

Down to the time of Philip, who, while the succession was disputed, raised Alexander, his brother-in-law, the son of Neoptolemus, and brother of Olympias, to the throne, the Molottians had as yet little extended their power. But Philip gave Alexander the territory called Cassiopea containing three Greek towns; at that time the Thesprotians also came under the power of the Molottians. But notwithstanding this, the Molottian kings were obliged every year, at Passaro, the capital of their country, to promise on oath, that they would obey the laws of the land, and the people in return took a corresponding oath. Alexander, the son of Neoptolemus, may have extended his dominion a little in the west, he may even have made the Chaonians[91] his subjects; but I cannot decide these points, though it is probable that he penetrated into the northern parts. Ambracia which, geographically speaking, belongs to Epirus, is likewise mentioned as dependent upon the Epirots; and so also the Parauaeans and Amphilochians with their large towns; Philip possessed only the fortresses, Ambracia and the Amphilochian Argos, by means of which he kept his foot on the neck of the Epirots, for he took good care not to promote the independence of his brother-in-law, just as Napoleon kept his brothers in constant dependence on himself. For this reason he left Epirus as a state open on all sides, and put himself in possession of the principal fortresses without which the country could offer no resistance; it accordingly consisted of the beautiful western districts, while the eastern parts were under the dominion of Macedonia. In this condition things remained for a period of about forty years, until Pyrrhus established his supremacy and independence, and united the whole country under his sceptre. The earlier and more careful writers, e.g., the Attic orators, do not even call Alexander king of Epirus, but Alexander the Molottian: Justin and Livy call him king of Epirus, an inaccuracy with which we must neither charge Trogus, whose work Justin abridged, nor Livy, though the former might have been more careful; but Livy was not much concerned about the history of that country.

I will not here enter into the detail as to how Pyrrhus fled from his country, how he returned, and what were his misfortunes. He availed himself with great adroitness, nay even with cunning, of the circumstances of the time to take vengeance on his arch-enemies, the house of Cassander, which from his infancy had wronged him in every possible way. He avenged his own house and Alexander of Macedonia not only as an instrument of heaven, but at the same time following the impulse of his own heart. Alexander[92] was seen by his contemporaries in all his hideousness, while posterity saw him in the light of an undeserved glory. This glory, however, belonged to him in so far as great things were accomplished by him. He found in his contemporaries a miserable race; his war against Persia was only a struggle against a rotten empire; and as he attacked it vigorously, great things, of course, were done and great things were destroyed. His greatest deed was the foundation of Alexandria, and yet, if we judge soberly, the hurried Hellenisation was only injurious to true Hellenism. The beautiful still continued to linger among the Greeks, and was uncorrupted; but when the Lydians, Carians, Syrians, and others, became Hellenised, when they appeared as Greeks and wrote Greek, the little of Hellenism, which still stood forth in broad outlines, perished. I may here mention another great historical instance, but I beg you will not misunderstand me: previous to the time of Constantine, Christianity had been spreading in consequence of the conviction of its truth; but the fact that he compelled whole provinces to profess it with their lips, without the belief having taken root in their hearts, was followed by evil consequences. All mighty changes in the world, which take place with extraordinary rapidity, are injurious. Such also was the influence of Alexander. Still, however, we must not be unjust, and we must understand how a spirited youth like Pyrrhus, with a deep poetical mind, idealised Alexander; he was an instrument of vengeance upon Cassander and his family, the detestable diadochi. Pyrrhus is one of the most splendid, noble, and amiable characters in all history. Often have I, when a young man, exclaimed in full enthusiasm with Hesiod: εἰ μετ’ ἐκείνοις ἐγενόμην! at such times one has the feeling, that one would be greater by coming in contact with such men. I have collected much about the history of Pyrrhus, and I know him thoroughly; I hope one day to represent him in his true light and in his indescribable splendour.[93] To be great as a general is certainly one of the highest distinctions in the world: he was not always quite just, but always noble and generous, far from petty egotism, and free from everything that degrades man; he had a full, large, and warm heart; he looked upon his country not as a domain, but loved his people with his whole soul. Dear as Roman history is to me, I must nevertheless assign a higher place to the two greatest enemies of Rome, Pyrrhus and Hannibal.