In classical history, Illyria or Illyricum or Illyrikon was a region of the western Balkan Peninsula The Balkans is the historic and geographic name used to describe southeastern Europe (see the Definitions and boundaries section below). The region has a combined area of 550,000 km² and a population of around 53 million.
The countries of Greece, Albania, Bulgaria, European part of Turkey, and the states which were previously part of the former Yugoslavia are normally described as being in the Balkans. Sometimes, Romania is also assigned to the region.
..... Click the link for more information. inhabited by the tribes and clans of Illyrians, an ancient people who probably spoke an Indo-European
Indo-European is originally a linguistic term, referring to the Indo-European language family. By extension, it became a collective name for cultures and religions associated with these languages. Hypothetically, these cultures arose from the expansion of an ancient people, the Proto-Indo-Europeans, possibly originating from somewhere around the Black Sea region from the 5th millennium BC onward.
..... Click the link for more information. language (the Illyrian languages Illyrian languages are a group of Indo-European languages that were found in the western part of the Balkans. Around 230 BC the languages were Romanized (sometime completely, as in the case of the Dalmatian), but, since the 7th century they began to lose ground in front of other languages spoken in the area, mainly Slavic languages in the rural areas and the Venetian language in the urban areas.
..... Click the link for more information. ) and who are believed to be the main ancestral group of modern Albanians The Albanians or Shqiptarë are a people of the western Balkan peninsula, numbering today approximately six million. Due to the high rate of migration of various ethnic groups throughout the Balkans in the last two decades, exact figures are difficult to obtain. A tenuous breakdown of Albanians by location is as follows:
2,900,000 in Albania according to the preliminary data from the 2001 census
http://pages.albaniaonline.net/repob...t/prel_eng.htm , but estimates for 2002
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/...al.html#People put it at around 3,544,841
..... Click the link for more information. . The main cities of Illyria were Lissus Lezhë (Albanian: Lezhë or Lezha) is a city in northwest Albania, in the district and county with the same name. It is located at 41.79°N 19.65°E and has a population of about 17,000 (2004 est). It was known in ancient times of Illyria as Lissus.
Lezhë was the site of the League of Lezhë in 1444 where Gjergj Kastriot Skanderbeg united the Albanian princes in the fight against the Ottoman Empire.
..... Click the link for more information. and (probably) Epidamus
Durrës (Albanian: Durrës or Durrësi) is the most ancient city of Albania and one of the most economically important as the biggest port city. It is located at 41.33°N, 19.45°E and has a population of around 114,000 (2003 estimate). The city and its harbour is located on the eastern side of the Adriatic Sea. The beaches of Durrës are local hotspots for many Albanians and are an important part of tourism in Albania.
..... Click the link for more information. .
The name "Albania" is derived from the same Proto-Indo-European root as "Alps The Alps is the collective name for one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria in the east, Slovenia, Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany, through to France in the west. The highest mountain in the Alps is the Mont Blanc at 4808 meters on the French-Italian border.
Position and name of the Alps
Limits of the Alps
Climate of the Alps
..... Click the link for more information. "; an Illyrian tribe of "mountain folk" called the Arber, or Arbereshë, and later Albanoi, lived near Durrës
Durrës (Albanian: Durrës or Durrësi) is the most ancient city of Albania and one of the most economically important as the biggest port city. It is located at 41.33°N, 19.45°E and has a population of around 114,000 (2003 estimate). The city and its harbour is located on the eastern side of the Adriatic Sea. The beaches of Durrës are local hotspots for many Albanians and are an important part of tourism in Albania.
..... Click the link for more information. .
The Illyrians may have appeared in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula about 1000 BC Centuries: 12th century BC - 11th century BC - 10th century BC
Decades: 1050s BC 1040s BC 1030s BC 1020s BC 1010s BC - 1000s BC - 990s BC 980s BC 970s BC 960s BC 950s BC
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Events and Trends
1006 BC - David becomes king of the ancient Israelites (traditional date)
1002 BC - Death of Zhou zhao wang, King of the Zhou Dynasty of China.
1001 BC - Zhou mo wang becomes King of the Zhou Dynasty of China.
..... Click the link for more information. , a period coinciding with the end of the Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a period in a civilization's development when the most advanced metalworking has developed the techniques of smelting copper from natural outcroppings and alloys it to cast bronze. The Bronze Age is part of the Three-age system for prehistoric societies and follows the Neolithic in some areas of the World. In most parts of subsaharan Africa, the Neolithic is directly followed by the Iron Age.
..... Click the link for more information. and beginning of the Iron Age
The Iron Age is the period in a civilisation's development at which time iron working was the most sophisticated form of metalworking achieved. Its hardness, high melting point and the abundance of iron ore sources made iron more desirable and cheaper than bronze and contributed greatly to its adoption as the most commonly used metal. The Iron Age is part of the Three-age system for prehistoric societies.
..... Click the link for more information. . For at least the next millennium, they occupied lands extending from the Danube The Danube (Bulgarian Dunav, German Donau, Greek Ister, Hungarian Duna, Latin Danuvius or Danubius, Romanian Dunăre, Serbian and Croatian Dunav, Slovak Dunaj, Ukrainian Dunay) is the second-longest river in Europe (the Volga being the longest).
It is the only major European river to flow from west to east. It rises in Germany in the Black Forest as two smaller rivers called Brigach and Breg, which join in Donaueschingen and are called Donau henceforth, flowing south-east for a distance of about 2850 km (1770 miles), to the Black Sea in Romania where the Danube Delta is.
..... Click the link for more information. , Sava Sava also Save (German Save, Hungarian Száva) is a river in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbiam a right side tributary of Danube at Belgrade. It is 940 km long and drains 95,720 km2 of surface area. In Roman times the river was named Savus.
The Sava has two main sources, both in the north-western, Alpine region of Slovenia The spring of Sava Dolinka is in Zelenci near Kranjska Gora. The other leg of the river originates as Savica ("little Sava") and then flows into Lake Bohinj, which it leaves as Sava Bohinjka. Both legs meet at Radovljica, and the river is known as the Sava past that point.
..... Click the link for more information. , and Morava The Morava (as it is called in Czech and Slovak languages) or the March (as it is known in German) is a river located in Central Europe. It is the most important river of Moravia, which derives its name from it. The river originates at the Králický SněžnÃ*k mountain in the north-western corner of Moravia, near the border between the Czech Republic and Poland and has a vaguely southern trajectory. The lower part of the course of the rivers forms the border between the Czech Republic and Slovakia and then between Austria and Slovakia.
..... Click the link for more information. rivers to the Adriatic Sea The Adriatic Sea is an arm of the Mediterranean Sea separating the Apennine peninsula (Italy) from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges.
The western coast is Italian, while the eastern coast runs along the countries of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro, and Albania.
Name and etymology
..... Click the link for more information. and the Å*ar Mountain Å*ar Planina (Шар планина), also called Å*ar mountain is a mountain on the border of Serbia and Montenegro and the Republic of Macedonia.
The mountain is around 80 kilometers long, some 10-20 kilometers wide. Its tallest peak has 2747 meters.
Vegetation on the mountain includes crops up to around 1000 meters, forests up to 1700 meters, and above that lie high pastures which encompass around 550 square kilometers. This mountain is most known as the origin of the dog breed Å*arplaninac which was bred on these pastures.
..... Click the link for more information. s. At various times, groups of Illyrians migrated over land and sea into Italy
The Italian Republic or Italy (Italian: Italia) is a country in the south of Europe, consisting mainly of a boot-shaped peninsula together with two large islands in the Mediterranean Sea: Sicily and Sardinia. To the north, where it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia, the country is bounded by the Alps. The independent countries of San Marino and the Vatican City are enclaves within Italian territory.
..... Click the link for more information. .
In the 19th and early 20th century, archaeologists associated the Illyrians with the Hallstatt culture Hallstatt is a village in the Austrian Salzkammergut where a large prehistoric cemetery of 1045 graves was excavated by Ramsauer in the second half of the 19th century. The community at Hallstatt exploited the salt mines from the eighth to the fifth century BCE. The style and decoration of the grave goods found in the cemetery is very distinctive and artifacts made in this style are widespread
..... Click the link for more information. , an Iron Age people noted for production of iron and bronze swords with winged-shaped handles (Ha C) and for horse breeding. Nowadays, the equation of material culture with linguistic and political groups is seen as problematical, as neither the rate of culture change nor of linguistic change is well known.
The area had initially been settled by two groups that would later be known as the Pannonians
Pannonia is an ancient country bounded north and east by the Danube, conterminous westward with Noricum and upper Italy, and southward with Dalmatia and upper Moesia.
Its original inhabitants were the Pannonii (sometimes called Paeonii by the Greeks). From the 4th century BC it was invaded by various Celtic tribes. Little is heard of Pannonia until 35 BC, when its inhabitants, allies of the Dalmatians, were attacked by Augustus, who conquered and occupied Siscia (Sisak). The country was not, however, definitely subdued until 9 BC, when it was incorporated with Illyria, the frontier of which was thus extended as far as the Danube.
..... Click the link for more information. and the Dalmatians Dalmatia (Croatian Dalmacija, Italian Dalmazia, Serbian Далмација) is a region of Croatia on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, spreading between the island of Pag in the northwest and the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The inner Dalmatia (Dalmatinska Zagora) stretches from up to fifty kilometers inland in the north to just a few kilometers in the south.
..... Click the link for more information. in Roman Empire
The Roman Empire is not the Holy Roman Empire (843–1806).
The Roman Empire is the term conventionally used to describe the Roman state in the centuries following its reorganization under the leadership of Caesar Augustus. Although Rome possessed a collection of tribute-states for centuries before the autocracy of Augustus, the pre-Augustan state is conventionally described as the Roman Republic. The difference between the Roman Empire and the Roman Republic lies primarily in the governing bodies and their relationship to each other.
..... Click the link for more information. times, but modern ideologies of racial nationalism tend to minimize the amount of tribal mixing that has taken place over the last three millennia.
The Illyrians carried on commerce and warfare with their neighbors. The ancient Macedonians
Macedonia is a geographical and historical region of the Balkan peninsula in south-eastern Europe. It is divided between Greece, Bulgaria and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.
GeographyMacedonia has an area of around 67,000 square kilometres and a population of 4.65 million. The territory corresponds to the basins of (from west to east) the Aliákmon, Vardar/Axios and Strymon rivers (of which the Vardar drains by far the largest area) and the plains around Thessaloniki and Serrai (Salonika and Serres in English).
..... Click the link for more information. probably had some Illyrian roots, but under Philip of Macedon Philip II (382 BC – 336 BC), King of Macedon (359 BC – 336 BC) Olympionike, was the father of Alexander the Great (Alexander III of Macedon) and Philip III of Macedon.
Coin with likeness of Philip II
Born in Pella in 382 BC, he was King Amyntas III of Macedon and Queen Eurydice's youngest son, but the deaths of his elder brothers Kings
..... Click the link for more information. their ruling class adopted Greek
Greece is a country in the southeast of Europe on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula. It is bounded on land by Bulgaria, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Albania to the north, to the east by Turkey and the waters of the Aegean Sea and to the west and south by the Ionian and Mediterranean Seas. Regarded by many as the cradle of Western civilization, Greece has a long and rich history during which it spread its influence over three continents.
..... Click the link for more information. cultural characteristics. The Illyrians also mingled with the Thracians The Thracians were an Indo-European tribe, inhabitants of Thrace, a region to the north of ancient Greece (currently southern Bulgaria, northern Greece, European Turkey and eastern FYR Macedonia).
They spoke Thracian language. As non-Greek speakers, they were viewed as barbarians by the Greeks.
Josephus claims the founder of the Thracians was the biblical character Tiras, son of Japheth. "Thiras also called those whom he ruled over Thirasians; but the Greeks changed the name into Thracians.", AotJ I:6.
..... Click the link for more information. in adjoining lands on the east. In the south and along the Adriatic The Adriatic Sea is an arm of the Mediterranean Sea separating the Apennine peninsula (Italy) from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges.
The western coast is Italian, while the eastern coast runs along the countries of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro, and Albania.
Name and etymology
..... Click the link for more information. coast, the Illyrians were heavily influenced by the Greeks, who founded trading colonies Colonies in antiquity were city-states founded from a mother-city, not from a territory-at-large. Bonds remained close, and took specific forms, discussed in the individual sections below.
Phoenician coloniesThe Phoenicians were the major trading power in the Mediterranean in the early part of the 1st millennium BC. They had trading contacts in Egypt and Greece, and established colonies as far west as modern Spain, at Gadir (modern Cádiz) and later at Barcino (modern Barcelona). From there they controlled access to the Atlantic Ocean and the trade routes to Britain. The most famous and successful of Phoenician colonies was Kart-Hadasht (Carthage), a colony founded from Tyre.
..... Click the link for more information. there. The present-day city of Durrës evolved from a Greek colony known as Epidamnos, which was founded at the end of the 7th century BC (8th century BC - 7th century BC - 6th century BC - other centuries)
(700s BC - 690s BC - 680s BC - 670s BC - 660s BC - 650s BC - 640s BC - 630s BC - 620s BC - 610s BC - 600s BC - other decades)
(2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium AD)
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EventsScythians arrived in Asia
Collapse of Susa, end of Elamite Empire
Assyrians conquer Egypt (674 BC - 670 BC)
Collapse of Nineveh, end of Assyria (612 BC)
Japanese capital founded
Zoroastrianism founded
..... Click the link for more information. Another famous Greek colony, Apollonia, arose between Durrës and the port city of Vlorë.
The Illyrians produced and traded cattle, horses, agricultural goods, and wares fashioned from locally-mined copper and iron. Feuds and warfare were constant facts of life for the Illyrian tribes, and Illyrian pirates plagued shipping on the Adriatic Sea. Councils of elders chose the chieftains who headed each of the numerous Illyrian tribes. From time to time, local chieftains extended their rule over other tribes and formed short-lived kingdoms. During the 5th century BC, a well-developed Illyrian population center existed as far north as the upper Sava River valley in what is now Slovenia. Illyrian friezes discovered near the present-day Slovenian city of Ljubljana depict ritual sacrifices, feasts, battles, sporting events, and other activities.
The Illyrian kingdom of Bardhyllus became a formidable local power in the 4th century BC. In 359 BC, King Perdiccas III of Macedonia was killed by attacking Illyrians. In 358 BC, however, Macedonia's Philip II, the father of Alexander the Great, defeated the Illyrians and assumed control of their territory as far as Lake Ohrid. Alexander himself routed the forces of the Illyrian chieftain Clitus in 335 BC, and Illyrian tribal leaders and soldiers accompanied Alexander on his conquest of Persia. After Alexander's death in 323 BC, independent Illyrian kingdoms again arose. In 312 BC, King Glaucius expelled the Greeks from Durrës. By the end of the third century, an Illyrian kingdom based near what is now the Albanian city of Shkodër controlled parts of northern Albania, Montenegro, and Herzegovina. Under Queen Teuta, Illyrians attacked Roman merchant vessels plying the Adriatic Sea and gave Rome an excuse to invade the Balkans.
In the Illyrian Wars of 229 BC and 219 BC, Rome overran the Illyrian settlements in the Neretva river valley and suppressed the piracy that had made the Adriatic unsafe. In 180 BC the Dalmatians declared themselves independent of the Illyrian king Gentius, who kept his capital at Skodra (Shkoder). The Romans made new gains in 168 BC, and Roman forces captured Gentius at Shkoder, which they called Scodra, and brought him to Rome in 165 BC. A century later, Julius Caesar and his rival Pompey fought their decisive battle near Durrës (Dyrrachium). Rome finally subjugated recalcitrant Illyrian tribes in the western Balkans during the reign of Emperor Tiberius in 9 AD, and established the province of Illyricum, governed by an Imperial legate. The Romans divided the lands that make up present-day Albania among the provinces of Macedonia, Dalmatia, and Epirus
For about four centuries, Roman rule brought the Illyrian-populated lands economic and cultural advancement and ended most of the enervating clashes among local tribes. The Illyrian mountain clansmen retained local authority but pledged allegiance to the emperor and acknowledged the authority of his envoys. During a yearly holiday honoring the Caesars, the Illyrian mountaineers swore loyalty to the emperor and reaffirmed their political rights. A form of this tradition, known as the kuvend, has survived to the present day in northern Albania.
The Romans established numerous military camps and colonies but complete latinization was confined to the coastal cities. They also oversaw the construction of aqueducts and roads, including the Via Egnatia, a famous military highway and trade route that led from Durres through the Shkumbini River valley to Macedonia and Byzantium (later Constantinople). Copper, asphalt, and silver were extracted from the mountains. The main exports were wine, cheese, oil, and fish from Shkodër Lake and Lake Ohrid. Imports included tools, metalware, luxury goods, and other manufactured articles. Apollonia became a cultural center, and Julius Caesar himself sent his nephew, later the Emperor Augustus, to study there.
Illyrians distinguished themselves as warriors in the Roman legions and made up a significant portion of the Praetorian Guard. Several of the Roman emperors had their origin in the Romanized population of Illyria. They included Diocletian (284-305) who saved the empire from disintegration by introducing institutional reforms, Constantine the Great (324-337) who accepted Christianity and transferred the empire's capital from Rome to Byzantium, which he called Constantinople and Justinian (527-565) -- who codified Roman law, built the most famous Byzantine church, the Hagia Sophia, and reextended the empire's control over lost territories.
Christianity came to the Illyrian-populated lands in the 1st century Saint Paul wrote that he preached in the Roman province of Illyricum, and legend holds that he visited Durres. When the Roman Empire was divided into eastern and western halves in 395, the lands that now make up Albania were administered by the Eastern Empire but were ecclesiastically dependent on Rome. However in 732 a Byzantine emperor, Leo the Isaurian, subordinated the area to the patriarchate of Constantinople. For centuries thereafter, the Albanian lands became an arena for the ecclesiastical struggle between Rome and Constantinople. Most Albanians living in the mountainous north became Roman Catholic, while in the southern and central regions, the majority became Orthodox.
The name "Illyria" went out of use after the division of the Roman empire under Diocletian. It was revived by Napoleon for the 'Provinces of Illyria' that were incorporated into the French Empire from 1809 to 1813, and the 'Kingdom of Illyria' was part of Austria until 1849, after which time it was not used in the reorganised Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The name Illyrians was used by some groups among the Croats up to their period of romantic nationalism in the 19th century, but was eventually abandoned as a potentially misleading anachronism.
In drama and literature Illyria can be a half-fictional country, e.g., in William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and in Lloyd Alexander's The Illyrian Adventure ISBN 0141303131.
Illyrian tribesAlban
Arbër
Ardian
Dalmat
Dardan
Dasaret
Enkelejt
Eordej
Epiriot
Japod
Japyg
Kaon
Labeat
Liburn
Mesap
Mollos
Paion
Parthin
Penest
Pirust
Taulant
Thesprot