Epirus

Epirus ('mainland'), the ancient name of a part of Greece, extending between Illyria and the Ambracian Gulf, and from the Ionian Sea to the chain of Pindus. It was a wild and mountainous region, heavily wooded, and producing but little corn, though celebrated for its cattle and horses, and for its breed of Molossian dogs. The principal rivers were the Aous, Arachthus, Thyamis, and Acheron (q.v.); the chief towns, Dodona (q.v.) and Ambracia (q.v.). Anciently, as to-day, the inhabitants were only half Hellenic, the Greek colonies being confined to the coast and southern portion. Of the Molossian kings of Epirus, the most famous is Pyrrhus (q.v.), who long waged successful war against the Romans. On the conquest of Macedonia by the Romans (168 B.C.), the most revengeful measures were put in force against the Epirotes, who had assisted Persens, the Macedonian king. Æmilius Paulus, the Roman general, plundered and razed to the ground seventy towns of Epirus, and sold into slavery 150,000 of the inhabitants. From this period, Epirus shared the vicissitudes of the Roman and Byzantine empires, until 1204, when one of the Comneni made himself independent. Petty princes ruled the country until the 15th century, when it was finally conquered by the Turks (see SCANDERBEG). Epirus, peopled largely since the 14th century by Albanians (see ALBANIA), formed latterly a part of the Turkish vilayet of Janina. Under pressure from the great powers, Turkey ceded the strip of territory east of the river Arta to Greece in 1881.