The History of Greece Volume 1 (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IV. THE MIGRATIONS AND CHANGES OF SETTLEMENTS AMONG THE GREEK TRIBES. The earliest events of Greek history one T ... P Locality of ear- and all belong to a world combining the liest Greek his- coasts of the Archipelago into one great ry whole. What now ensues has its origin in the midst of the mainland of Northern Greece, and constitutes a reaction from within to without, from the highlands to the coast, from the West to the East. Unknown tribes arise in their distant hills, one pushing forward the other; whole series of populations are successively put in motion, the ancient states perish, their royal residences become desolate, new divisions of the land follow, and out of a long period of wild fermentations Greece at last issues forth with new tribes, states, and cities. A considerable number of the Greek tribes Hrfiasin which immigrated by land into the European EP'rua- peninsula followed the tracks of the Italicans, and, taking a westward route through Pseonia and Macedonia, penetrated through -Illyria into the western half of the Alpine country of Northern Greece, which the formation of ita hill-ranges and valleys renders more easily accessible from the north than Thessaly in its secluded hollow. The numerous rivers, abounding in water, which flow close by one another through long gorges into the Ionian Sea, here facilitated an advance to the south; and the rich pasture- land invited immigration; so that Epirus became the dwelling-place of a dense crowd of population, which commenced its civilized career in the fertile lowlands of the country. Among them three main tribes weremarked out, of which the Chaones were regarded as the most ancient; they dwelt to the south of the Acroeerau- nian promontory, as far down as the shore lying opposite the island o...