Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/90

 EPEIL MDM fir nine, m well is place fbr place, Ep^ fliaoamsi£6-ciiester. Fnrthermore — ■8£6-€heeter ■rands on an eminence, the cum may represent the Brituh aom >k hOL ElhcbMtet stands on the WatUnK Street. [B. G. L.] EPEIL [ELia.] EPEIRUS or EPIHUS CHveifwi : Eik 'Hir«i- ^•^t, Epirotee: Adj. *H99tpwTut6s^ Epiroticaa), was the name given to the oonntry lying between the Ionian sea and the chain of Pindns, and extending from the Acrooeraanian promontory and the bonn* dariea of lllyxia and Macedonia on the north to the Ambrscian golf on the south. The word ffireipot signified the mainland, and was the name origmally gi?en to the whole of the weatem coast of Greece from the Acroceraunisn promontory as far as the entrance of the Corinthian gulf, in contradistinction to Corcyra and the Cephallenian blands. In this tense the word was used not only by Homer (Strab. z. p. 451 ; Hom. IL ii. 635, Od. xiv. 97), but even as late as the time of the Peloponnesian War. (Thnc L 5.) Epiroa, in its more limited extent, is a wild and monntsinons oonntiy. The mountains nm in a general direction from north to south, and have m all ages been the resort of semi-drilised and robber tribes. The valleys, though frequent, are not ex- tensive, and do not produce su£Beient com for the support d the inhabitants. The most extensive and fertile plain is that of Jo^biaMia, in which the oracle of Dodona was probably situated, but even at the present day Jodamma receives a huge quantity of its flour from Thessaly, and of its v^etables and fruit from the territory of Aria on the Ambrscian gulf. Epirus has been in all times a pastoral and not an agricultural country. Its fine oxen and horses, its shepherds, and its breed of Mdoesian dogs, were oe- kbrsted in antiquity. (Pind. Nem. iv. 82; " quanto majores herbida tauros non habet Epirus," Ov. Mel, viii. 283 ; *^ Eliadum palmas Epiros eqoarum,** Viig. Gtorg, u 57 ; ^ domus alta Molossis personuit eani- bus,** Hot. z&it iL 6. 114; Virg. Gwrg, iu. 405.) The Epirots were not collected in towns, as was the ease with the population in Greece Proper, It is ex* pressly mentioned by Scylax (p. 28) tluU the Epirots dwelt in villages, which was more suitable to their mode of life; and it was probably not till the time when the Holossian kings had extended their do- minion over the whole country, and had introduced among them Grecian habits and civilisation, that towns began to be built It is in accordance with this that we find no coins older than those of Pyirfaus. Along the coast of Epims southward, from the Acrooerannian promontory, a lofty and rugged range of nxmntains extends. [Ckbaunii Momtbs.] Hence the Corinthians founded no colony upon the coast of Epirus at the time when they planted so many settlements upon the coast of Acamania, and founded. Apdlonia and Epidamnus farther north. Of the mountains in the interior the names of hardly any are preserved with the exception ci Tomarus or Tnuuns above Dodona. [Dodoka.] Of the rivers the most important are: the Abacbthus, flowing into the Ambrscian gulf, and considered to form the boundary between Epirus and Hellas Proper; the Celydsicb, flowing into the Ionian sea between Oricum and the Acrocenunian promontory, and forming probably the northern boundary of Epirus; and tlwTHTAMia, Acusbon, and Cuaradbub, all flowing into the Ionian sea more to the south. . Epims WW ishaUfted bj various tribes, which EPEIBUS. 8St were not ref^rded by the Greeks themselves as members of the Hellenic race. Accordiiigly Epirus was not a part of Hellas, which was supposed to begin at Ambrada. [UsLLAa.] Some of the tribes however wera closely related to the Greeks, and may be looked upon as semi-Hellenic. Thucydides, it b true, treats both the Molossians and Thes- protians as barbaric (iL 80); but theee two tribes at all events were not entirely foreign to the Greeks like the Thrscians and Illyriaos; and accordingly Herodotus places the Thesprotisns in Hellas (ii« 56), and mentions the Molossian Alcon among the Heilenic suitors^ Agarista (vi 127). It would appear that towards the north the Epirots became blended with the Macedonians and Ulyrians, and towards the south with the Hellenes. Tlie northern Epirots, extending Atxn the Haoe« donian frontier as far as Contra, resembled the Macedonians in their mode of cutting the hair, in their language and dress, and in many other par- ticulan. (Strab. vii.p. 827.) Strabo also relates ((.&) that some of the tribes »poke two languages, — a £ict which proves the difierence of the races in the country and also their dose connection. According to Theopompus, who lived in the fixurth century a. <1, the number of Eptrot tribes was fonr^ teen (ap^ Strab. viL pp. 823, 324). Their names, as we f^ither from Stnbo, were the Chaones, Thes- proti, Cassopaei, Mdossi, Amphilochi, Athamanes, Aetbices, Tymphaei, Parauaei, Talares, Atintanes, Orestae, Pelagones, and Elimiotaa. (Stiab. viii. pp, 324, 326, X. p. 434.) Of these, the Orestae, PeUgones, and Elimiotae were situated east of Mt Pindus, and were subsequently annexed to Maceilonia, to which they properly belonged. In like manner, the Atha* manes, Aetbices, and Talares, who occupied Pindus, were united to Thessaly in the time of Strabo. The Atintanes and Paiauaei, who bordered upon Ulyria, were also separated from Epirus. The three chief Epirot tribes were the Chaones, Thesproti, and Blolossi. The Chaones, who were at one time the most powerful of the three, and who are said to have ruled over the whole countij (Strab, viL p. 324), inhabited in historical times the dis- trict upon the ooast from the Acrooeraunian country to the river Thyamis, which separated them from the Thesprotians (Thnc i. 46). The Thesproti ex- tended along the coast from the Thyamis beyond the Adieron to the confines of tlie Cassopaei, and in tlte inteiior to the boundaries of the territory of Dodona, which in ancient tiroes was regarded as a part of Tbesprvtia. [Dodona.] The Cassopaei, whom some writers called a Thesprotiao tribe, reached along the ooast, as fitf as the Ambrscian gulL The Mokwsi, who became subsequently the rders of Epirus, ori« ginally inhabited only a narrow strip of country, extending from the Arobradan gulf between the Cassopaei and Ambradotae, and subsequently be* tween the Thesprotians and Athamanes, northwards as ^ as the Dodonaea. (Leake, JVorCAerw Grtece^ voL iv. pp. 178, 179.) The Moloesi subsequently obtained possession of the Cassopeea and the Dodo- naea, and thdr country reached from the river Aoua on the north to the Ambradan gulf on the south. The most andent inhabitants of Epirus are said to have been Pelasgians. Dodona is represented as an orsde of the Pelasgians. [Doim>na.J Chaonia is also called Peksgian; and the Chaones are said, like the Sdli at Dodona, to have been interpreten of the oracle of Zens. (Steph. B. s.v. Xoerio.) There appear* to have been an ethnical ooonectaon between