Ancient States of the Balkans and Greece: Map & History
19 states of the Balkans and Greece on one map, from 1600 BCE to 673 CE.The largest, Hunnic Empire, covered about 1,913,269 km²; the longest-lived, Greek City-States, lasted 800 BCE – 83 CE. Each has its own section below with its rulers, capitals, wars and pictures where the records hold them.
Each state in its own colour. Move the timeline to see which existed in any year from 1600 BC to 673 AD; select a territory to read about it. Borders: Cliopatria / Seshat (CC BY 4.0).
The Ancient States of the Balkans and Greece Compared
The North Portico in Knossos, Crete, GreeceBernard Gagnon · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Commons
The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age culture centered on the island of Crete. Known for its monumental architecture and Minoan art, it is often regarded as the first civilization in Europe. They traded extensively, exporting agricultural products and luxury crafts in exchange for raw metals which were difficult to obtain on Crete. Through traders and artisans, their cultural influence reached beyond Crete to the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean. Today, the ruins of the Minoan palaces at Knossos and Phaistos have become popular tourist attractions.
Arthur Evans thought the Minoans worshipped, more or less exclusively, a mother goddess, which heavily influenced views for decades. Recent scholarly opinion sees a much more diverse religious landscape although the absence of texts, or even readable relevant inscriptions, leaves the picture very cloudy. We have no names of deities until after the Mycenaean era. Much Minoan art is given a religious significance of some sort, but this tends to be vague, not least because Minoan government is now often seen as a theocracy, so politics and religion have a considerable overlap. The Minoan pantheon featured many deities, among which a young, spear-wielding male god is also prominent. Some scholars see in the Minoan Goddess a female divine solar figure.
The Minoans raised cattle, sheep, pigs and goats, and grew wheat, barley, vetch and chickpeas. They also cultivated grapes, figs and olives, grew poppies for seed and perhaps opium. The Minoans also domesticated bees.
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Vegetables, including lettuce, celery, asparagus and carrots, grew wild on Crete. Pear, quince, and olive trees were also native. Date palm trees and cats (for hunting) were imported from Egypt. The Minoans adopted pomegranates from the Near East, but not lemons and oranges.
They may have practiced polyculture, and their varied, healthy diet resulted in a population increase. Polyculture theoretically maintains soil fertility and protects against losses due to crop failure. Linear B tablets indicate the importance of orchards (figs, olives and grapes) in processing crops for "secondary products". Olive oil was used as the primary cooking fat.
We may have been over-influenced by the lack of what we might think of as solid fortifications to assess the archaeological evidence properly. As in so many other instances, we may not have been looking for evidence in the right places, and therefore we may not end with a correct assessment of the Minoans and their ability to avoid war.
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The construction of fortified sites is often assumed to reflect a threat of warfare, but such fortified centres were multifunctional; they were also often the embodiment or material expression of the central places of the territories at the same time as being monuments glorifying and merging leading power.
Minoan art is marked by imaginative images and exceptional workmanship. Sinclair Hood described an "essential quality of the finest Minoan art, the ability to create an atmosphere of movement and life although following a set of highly formal conventions". It forms part of the wider grouping of Aegean art, and in later periods came for a time to have a dominant influence over Cycladic art. Wood and textiles have decomposed, so most surviving examples of Minoan art are pottery, intricately carved Minoan seals, palace frescos which include landscapes (but are often mostly "reconstructed"), small sculptures in various materials, jewellery, and metalwork.
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The relationship of Minoan art to that of other contemporary cultures and later Ancient Greek art has been much discussed.
Mycenaean Greece, also called Mycenaean civilization, was the last phase of the Bronze Age in ancient Greece, spanning the period from approximately 1750 to 1050 BC. It represents the first advanced and distinctively Greek civilization in mainland Greece with its palatial states, urban organization, works of art, and writing system. The Mycenaeans were mainland Greek peoples who were likely stimulated by their contact with insular Minoan Crete and other Mediterranean cultures to develop a more sophisticated sociopolitical culture of their own.
The Neolithic agrarian village (6000 BC) constituted the foundation of Bronze Age political culture in Greece. The vast majority of the preserved Linear B records deal with administrative issues and give the impression that Mycenaean palatial administration was highly systematized, featuring thoroughly consistent language, terminology, tax calculations, and distribution logistics. Considering this sense of uniformity, the Pylos archive, which is the best preserved one in the Mycenaean world, is generally taken as a representative one.
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The state was ruled by a king, the wanax (ϝάναξ), whose role was religious and perhaps also military and judicial. The wanax oversaw virtually all aspects of palatial life, from religious feasting and offerings to the distribution of goods, craftsmen and troops. Under him was the lāwāgetas ("the leader of the people"), whose role appears mainly religious.
Trade over vast areas of the Mediterranean was essential for the economy of Mycenaean Greece. The Mycenaean palaces imported raw materials, such as metals, ivory and glass, and exported processed commodities and objects made from these materials, in addition to local products: oil, perfume, wine, wool and pottery. International trade of that time was not only conducted by palatial emissaries but also by independent merchants.
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Based on archaeological findings in the Middle East, in particular physical artifacts, textual references, inscriptions and wall paintings, it appears that Mycenaean Greeks achieved strong commercial and cultural interaction with most of the Bronze Age people living in this region: Canaanites, Kassites, Mitanni, Assyrians, and Egyptians.
The military nature of the Mycenaean Greeks is evident from the numerous weapons unearthed, the use of warrior and combat representations in contemporary art, and the preserved Greek Linear B records. The Mycenaeans invested in the development of military infrastructure, with military production and logistics being supervised directly from the palatial centers. According to the Linear B records in the palace of Pylos, every rural community (the damos) was obliged to supply a certain number of men who had to serve in the army. Similar service was also performed by the aristocracy.
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Mycenaean armies were initially based on heavy infantry, equipped with spears, large shields and on some occasions, armor.
The construction of defensive structures was closely linked to the establishment of the palaces in mainland Greece. The principal Mycenaean centers were well-fortified and usually situated on an elevated terrain, like on the Acropolis of Athens, Tiryns and Mycenae or on coastal plains, in the case of Gla. Mycenaean Greeks in general appreciated the symbolism of war as expressed in defensive architecture, reflected by the visual impressiveness of their fortifications.
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Cyclopean is the term normally applied to the masonry characteristics of Mycenaean fortification systems and describes walls built of large, unworked boulders more than 8 m (26 ft) thick and weighing several metric tonnes. They were roughly fitted together without the use of mortar or clay to bind them, though smaller hunks of limestone fill the interstices.
The reasons for the end of the Mycenaean culture have been hotly debated among scholars. At present, there is no satisfactory explanation for the collapse of the Mycenaean palace systems. The two most common theories are population movement and internal conflict. The first attributes the destruction of Mycenaean sites to invaders.
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The hypothesis of a Dorian invasion, known as such in Ancient Greek tradition, that led to the end of Mycenaean Greece, is supported by sporadic archaeological evidence such as new types of burials, in particular cist graves, and the use of a new dialect of Greek, the Doric one. It appears that the Dorians moved southward gradually over a number of years and devastated the territory, until they managed to establish themselves in the Mycenaean centers.
In the 8th century BC, after the end of the so-called Greek Dark Ages, Greece emerged with a network of myths and legends, the greatest of all being that of the Trojan Epic Cycle. In general, the Greeks of Classical antiquity idealized the Mycenaean period as a glorious period of heroes, closeness of the gods and material wealth. The legends of Homer's Epics were especially and generally accepted as part of the Greek past and it was not until the 19th century that scholars began to question Homer's historicity. At this time, German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann undertook the first modern archaeological excavations in Greece at the site of Mycenae in 1876. Thus, Schliemann set out to prove the historical accuracy of the Iliad by identifying the places described by Homer.
Polis (pl.: poleis) is a term used to refer to Ancient Greek city-states. About 1,500 such states are known to have existed. Primarily located in Greece & Asia Minor, Greek poleis were founded throughout the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions.
The word polis had a different meaning in Ancient Greek than it does in Modern Greek. The Modern Greek word πόλη (póli), "city", is located within a χώρα (chóra), "country", which is a πατρίδα (patrída) or "homeland" for its citizens. In ancient Greece, a polis was also considered to be a "homeland."
Republic, or commonwealth. The ultimate authority was considered to reside in the citizenry, the demos, despite the broad variation in the form of the administration.
Peloponnesian League
550 BCE – 338 BCE · Capital: Sparta · 22,523 km²
The Peloponnesian League was an alliance of ancient Greek city-states, dominated by Sparta and centred on the Peloponnese, which lasted from c. 550 to 366 BC. It is known mainly for being one of the two rivals in the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), against the Delian League, which was dominated by Athens.
In its early history, Sparta expanded by conquering Laconia and Messenia and reducing their population into slavery (as helots), but the subjugation of Tegea on its northern border failed at the battle of the Fetters. Following this defeat, Sparta abandoned its military conquests and adopted a diplomatic strategy, known as the "bones policy", by appropriating the relics of mythical heroes worshipped in the Peloponnese, starting with Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, whose bones were transferred from Tegea to Sparta. This new diplomacy was likely sponsored by Chilon, ephor c. 556, who therefore enabled Sparta to present itself as the natural successor of the mythical Achaean kingdom of Agamemnon as described by Homer. Tegea then signed an alliance treaty with Sparta, which became the starting point of the subsequent Peloponnesian League.
Tensions between the Peloponnesian and Delian Leagues were key in the outbreak of the First Peloponnesian War in 460 BC. The conflict between two Peloponnesian League members, Corinth and Megara, specifically the latter's defection to the Athenians due to perceived neglect by the Spartans, was a key factor in the outbreak of hostilities between the two Leagues. That war ended with the reintegration of Megara into the League. The two Leagues eventually came into conflict again with each other in the Peloponnesian War. Under Spartan leadership, the League defeated Athens and its allies in 404 BC.
During its hegemony, Sparta adopted a more interventionist policy to preserve its supremacy over Greece. Elis had left the League since 420, but Sparta had to wait until the end of the Peloponnesian War to act on it; c. 400, Sparta forced Elis back into the League, but also massively weakened it by giving independence to its periokoi cities of the Akrorians and Triphylians. These cities organised as federal states joined the Peloponnesian League as single units.
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In 385, Mantinea was disbanded into villages to punish its hegemonic behaviour in Arcadia, where Sparta had always adopted a "divide and rule" policy to prevent its unification. This blatant violation of the autonomy proclaimed during the King's Peace of 387 was bitterly received. The defeat of Sparta by Thebes at Leuctra in 371 BC decisively shook its control of the League members.
National Archaeological Museum Sofia - Bronze Head from the Golyama Kosmatka Tumulus near ShipkaAnn Wuyts · CC BY 2.0 · Commons
The Odrysian kingdom (Ancient Greek: Βασίλειον Ὀδρυσῶν) was an ancient Thracian state that thrived between the early 5th century BC and the early 3rd / late 1st century BC. Located in present-day Bulgaria, southeastern Romania (Northern Dobruja), northern Greece and European Turkey, it was a tribal amalgam dominated by the Odrysians that was the first large political entity to develop in the eastern Balkans. Before the foundation of Seuthopolis in the late 4th century it had no fixed capital.
Since the ancient Thracians lacked an indigenous writing tradition, the most important sources for the reconstruction of their history are archaeological remains, coins as well as accounts of ancient Greek historians. Said historians considered the Thracians to be a numerous people and their country, Thrace, to be of barely comprehensible size, so large that Andron of Halicarnassus (4th century BC) thought of it as a continent of its own. While the boundaries of Thrace fluctuated throughout history, Thrace can be divided in a northern and a southern half, which were also culturally different. The border between the two halves has been identified as the Haemus Mountains or the Danube slightly further north. Southern Thrace covered the fertile valley between the Haemus and the Rhodopes, the Strandzha and the shores of the Propontis and the Aegean and Black Seas.
Thracian, Greek (used in writing and among trade and administration)
Religion
Thracian polytheism
Coins, Currency and Symbols
Labrys-symbol-transparentAnonMoos · Public domain · Commons
Wars and Battles
As early as 359, the year of his coronation, Philip II of Macedon I contacted a "Thracian king" to persuade him to not harbour a Macedonian pretender to the throne. This king is probably to be identified with the western Odrysian king Berisades. A year later he unified Macedon and subjugated the Paeonians to the northeast. In these early years he did not bother much with Thrace yet, as he regarded the infighting Odrysian kingdoms as no threat for his rule. A first push into the kingdom of Berisades and his successor Cetriporis occurred in 357/6, when he conquered Amphipolis and Crenides. The latter was made into a garrison town called Philippi that was to serve as a launch pad for future invasions into the interior. Cetriporis allied himself with the kings of Paeonia and Illyria, but Philip II defeated them one by one.
Odrysian crafts and metalworking were largely a product of Persian influence. Thracians as Dacians and Illyrians all decorated themselves with status-enhancing tattoos. Thracian warfare was affected also by Celts and the Triballi had adopted Celtic equipment. Thracian clothing is regarded for its quality and texture and was made up of hemp, flax or wool. Their clothing resembled that of the Scythians including jackets with coloured edges, pointed shoes and the Getai tribe were so similar to the Scythians that they were often confused with them. The nobility and some soldiers wore caps. There was a mutual influence between the Greeks and the Thracians. Greek customs and fashions contributed to the recasting of east Balkan society. Among the nobility Greek fashions in dress, ornament and military equipment were popular. Unlike the Greeks, the Thracians often wore trousers.
It is unknown when Seuthes III died, with estimations ranging from the end of the 4th century to the 280s. Coins minted in his name include overstruck coins of Cassander (died 297) and Lysimachus (died 281), implying that his coins were produced until the early years of the 3rd century BC. Seuthes was symbolically buried in the tumulus of Golyama Kosmatka, without his actual corpse. It may well be that he had been killed in battle, perhaps fighting against Lysimachus or with him as an ally.
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A long inscription from Seuthopolis attests to the decline of the fortunes of the town and the trouble in Seuthes' household. It mentions the wife of Seuthes, Berenice, and their four (probably underage) sons Hebryzelmis, Teres, Satocos and Satalas.
Thebes (THEEBZ; Greek: Θήβα, Thíva [ˈθiva]; Ancient Greek: Θῆβαι, Thêbai [tʰɛ̂ːbai̯]) is a city in Boeotia, Central Greece, and one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It is the largest city in Boeotia and a major center for the region.
Ancient Thebes was the largest and leading polis of the Boeotian League. It sided with the Persians during the 480 BC invasion under Xerxes I. Theban forces under the command of Epaminondas defeated Spartans at the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC, giving rise to a short-lived Theban hegemony.
Archaeological excavations in and around Thebes have revealed a Mycenaean settlement and clay tablets written in the Linear B script, indicating the importance of the site in the Bronze Age.
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Archaeological excavations in and around Thebes have revealed cist graves dated to Mycenaean times containing weapons, ivory, and tablets written in Linear B. Its attested name forms and relevant terms on tablets found locally or elsewhere include 𐀳𐀣𐀂, te-qa-i, understood to be read as *Tʰēgʷai̮s (Ancient Greek: Θήβαις, Thēbais, i.e. "at Thebes", Thebes in the dative-locative case), 𐀳𐀣𐀆, te-qa-de, for *Tʰēgʷasde (Θήβασδε, Thēbasde, i.e. "to Thebes"), and 𐀳𐀣𐀊, te-qa-ja, for *Tʰēgʷaja (Θηβαία, Thēbaia, i.e. "Theban woman").
In the late 6th century BC, the Thebans were brought for the first time into hostile contact with the Athenians, who helped the small village of Plataea to maintain its independence against them, and in 506 BC repelled an inroad into Attica. The aversion to Athens best serves to explain the apparently unpatriotic attitude which Thebes displayed during the Persian invasion of Greece (480–479 BC). Though a contingent of 400 was sent to Thermopylae and remained there with Leonidas before being defeated alongside the Spartans, the governing aristocracy soon after joined King Xerxes I of Persia with great readiness and fought zealously on his behalf at the Battle of Plataea in 479 BC.
In the Third Sacred War (356–346 BC) with its neighbor Phocis, Thebes lost its predominance in central Greece. By asking Philip II of Macedon to crush the Phocians, Thebes extended the former's power within dangerous proximity to its frontiers. The revulsion of popular feeling in Thebes was expressed in 338 BC by the orator Demosthenes, who persuaded Thebes to join Athens in a final attempt to bar Philip's advance on Attica. The Theban contingent lost the decisive battle of Chaeronea and along with it every hope of reassuming control over Greece.
The Second Athenian League was a maritime confederation of Greek city-states that existed from 378 to 355 BC under the hegemony of Athens. It is sometimes referenced as the second Athenian Empire, despite operating as a confederation. The symmachia represented a partial revival of the Delian League, which had been disbanded in 404 BC following the defeat of Athens in the Peloponnesian War. The new League was centered in the Aegean and included over 60 states, among which were Kos, Mytilene, Rhodes, and Byzantium.
The formation of the League was stimulated by three major events that caused relations between Athens and Sparta to deteriorate. The first event was Spartan intervention in a factional conflict within Thebes. In 382 BC, Sparta sent a force led by the general Eudamidas and his brother Phoebidas to combat the expansion of Olynthus in Chalkidiki, northern Greece. On the way to Olynthus Phoebidas stopped near Thebes, where the two polemarchs Ismenias and Leontiades were locked in a power struggle for control of Thebes. Ismenias was pro-democracy and anti-Sparta so Leontiades convinced Phoebidas, who is described by Xenophon as driven by desire to perform good deeds but lacking in reasoning capacity, that it would be in Sparta's interest to help him take control of Thebes.
After Sparta's defeat in 371 BC, Thebes seceded from the League and was able to violate the terms of the Peace of Antalcidas with impunity. Later, a series of revolts rocked the league, culminating with the Social War (357–355 BC) in which the states of Chios, Rhodes, Kos, and Byzantium went to war against Athens. This war ended in the disintegration of the Second Athenian League.
Thebans is mapped in the atlas for 350 BCE – 338 BCE, with a peak mapped extent of about 5,165 km².
Athenian Coalition
323 BCE – 257 BCE · 23,257 km²
The Peloponnesian War was fought in the Eastern Mediterranean between the Athenian-led Delian League and the Spartan-led Peloponnesian League from 431 to 404 BC for hegemony over Ancient Greece. Initially inconclusive, the intervention of the Persian Empire in support of Sparta in 413 BC allowed the Spartan coalition to decisively defeat Athens, beginning a period of Spartan hegemony over Greece.
The war consists of four related conflicts which have traditionally been combined into one.
The first years of the war are known as the Archidamian War (431–421 BC), after Sparta's king Archidamus II. The first attack was by the Thebans on the Athenian outpost at Plataea, on 4 April 431 BC.
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Sparta and its allies, except for Corinth, were almost exclusively land-based, and able to summon large armies which were nearly unbeatable (thanks to the legendary Spartan forces). The Athenian Empire, although based in the peninsula of Attica, spread out across the islands of the Aegean Sea; Athens drew its immense wealth from tribute paid by these islands. Athens maintained its empire through naval power. Thus, the two powers were relatively unable to fight decisive battles.
The Spartan strategy during the Archidamian War was to invade the land around Athens.
The Aetolian League, also known as the League of the Aetolians (Ancient Greek: Κοινὸν τῶν Αἰτωλῶν), was an ancient Greek confederation of tribal communities and cities. Thermon served as its meeting place. At its peak in the 3rd century BC, in the aftermath of the Celtic invasion, it covered much of Central Greece and became one of the major powers of Hellenistic Greece.
It was probably established during the late Classical or the early Hellenistic era in Aetolia. Two annual meetings were held, during the Panaetolika and the Thermica festivals.
Sometime in the 4th century BC, the Koinon tōn Aitōlōn (League of the Aetolians) was founded, but it is uncertain when. One suggestion is that the league was founded by Epaminondas in 367 BC. Grainger believes that it was founded much later, around the time of the rise of Philip II of Macedon. Archaeology indicates that settlements in Aetolia began to grow in size and complexity over the course of this century.
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After the death of Philip II in 336 BC, the Aetolians joined the Thebans in opposing Alexander the Great and the stress of their defeat caused the league to implode. Over the next decade it seems to have been reconstituted and in the later years of Alexander's reign the Aetolians seized Oeniadae against his will.
The Aetolian League joined the Athenians in the Lamian war against Antipater which broke out after Alexander's death in 323 BC.
The Northwest Doric koine refers to a supraregional North-West common variety that emerged in the third and second centuries BC, and was used in the official texts of the Aetolian League. Such texts have been found in W. Locris, Phocis, and Phthiotis, among other sites. It contained a mix of native Northwest Doric dialectal elements and Attic Greek forms. It was apparently based on the most general features of Northwest Doric, eschewing less common local traits.
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Its rise was driven by both linguistic and non-linguistic factors, with non-linguistic motivating factors including the spread of the rival Attic-Ionic koine after it was recruited by the state of Macedon for administration, and the political unification of a vast territories by the Aetolian League and the state of Epirus. The Northwest Doric koine was thus both a linguistic and a political rival of the Attic-Ionic koine.
The league was the first Greek ally of the Roman Republic in the Greek mainland, siding with the Romans during the First Macedonian War, 214-205 BC, then allied to Philip V of Macedon at the Cretan War (205–200 BC) and then again sided with Romans helping them defeat Philip at the Battle of Cynoscephalae in 197 BC, during the Second Macedonian War. However, it grew increasingly hostile to Roman involvement in Greek affairs and only a few years later sided with Antiochus III the Great, the king of the Seleucid Empire, during the Roman-Seleucid War, also called Aetolian War.
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Roman forces in Greece, under Titus Quinctius Flamininus, largely withdrew after proclaiming its freedom from Roman control or taxation in 195 BC.
Harbor of Egio (Aigion), Peloponnes, GreecePitichinaccio · Public domain · Commons
The Achaean League (Ancient Greek: Κοινὸν τῶν Ἀχαιῶν, romanized: Koinon ton Akhaion, lit. 'League of Achaeans') was a Hellenistic-era confederation of Greek city-states on the northern and central Peloponnese. The league was named after the region of Achaea in the northwestern Peloponnese, which formed its original core. The first league was formed in the fifth century BC.
The government of the league consisted of an assembly of citizens, a smaller council, and a strategos (general).
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The strategos (general) controlled the league's military forces. Originally, two strategoi held office simultaneously, but from 251, there was only one, who was elected annually by the assembly. Until 217 the strategos entered office in May; afterwards he assumed power at the beginning of winter. Individuals could hold the office more than once (and frequently did so), but not in consecutive years. The general was assisted in his duties by a board of ten demiourgoi, a secretary, a hipparch (cavalry commander), a navarch (admiral), and hypostrategoi (sub-generals commanding in military districts). The position of Hegemon (leader) was given to various Antigonid and Ptolemaic kings at various points in Achaean history.
The Achaean army was an army of the traditional hoplite type. From the 270s onwards however, much like the rest of Greece, the emergence of the shield known as the thyreos was incorporated into Greek warfare and a new type of troop was developed. Reforming their troops into thyreophoroi, the Achaean army was now composed of light troops. The thyreophoroi were a mixture of evolved peltasts and light hoplites, carrying the thureos shield, a thrusting spear and javelins. Plutarch says that they could be effective at a distance, but in close combat the narrow thureos shield disadvantaged them. He also says that their formation was ineffective, because it lacked inter-locked shields or a 'leveled line of spears'.
The Greek colonisation was the expansion of Archaic Greeks across the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, particularly during the 8th–6th centuries BCE.
The Archaic expansion differed from the Iron Age migrations of the Greek Dark Ages, in that it consisted of organised direction by oikistes away from the originating metropolis rather than the simplistic movement of tribes, which characterised the aforementioned earlier migrations.
The Illyrian kingdom was an Illyrian political entity that existed on the western part of the Balkan Peninsula in ancient times. Regardless of the number of the alternately ruling dynasties, of their tribal affiliation, and of the actual extension of their kingdom, it represented an alliance of Illyrian tribes that united under the rulership of a single leader, expressly referred to as "King of the Illyrians" in ancient historical records (whether in Ancient Greek or in Latin).
The Molossians (Greek: Μολοσσοί or Μολοττοί, romanized: Molossoi or Molottoi) were a group of ancient Greek tribes which inhabited the region of Epirus in classical antiquity. Together with the Chaonians and the Thesprotians, they formed the main tribal groupings of the northwestern Greek group. On their northern frontier, they neighbored the Chaonians and on their southern frontier neighbored the kingdom of the Thesprotians. They formed their own state around 370 BC and were part of the League of Epirus.
In the following years, Epirus faced the growing threat of the expansionist Roman Republic, which fought a series of wars with Macedonia. The League remained neutral in the first two Macedonian Wars. However, they sided with the anti-Roman Macedonian-Illyrian pact in the Third Macedonian War (171–168 BC). After the Roman victory, a total of 150,000 Epirotes, mostly Molossians, were enslaved and sent to Italy, by decision of the Roman Senate. This decision is the only such act of the Roman senate and the largest, single, slave-hunting operation in Roman history. In the following years, Epirote slaves in Italy outnumbered slaves of other origins and the majority of slave marriages were between Epirotes.
In modern research, the question of identity has arisen about what constituted the ancient Greek identity, with mode of life as the main criterion of ethnicity construction, regardless of what language they spoke. In each given historical era, the Molossians were regarded as "barbarians" by many contemporary Greeks, not on the basis of language, but because of their tribal way of life, their organization, and their pastoral economy. In this context, the Epirotes were more similar to the Macedonians and the non-Greek Illyrians than to those ancient Greeks who were organized in city-states. A larger hellenization process among Molossians and other Epirotes continued after the Roman conquest, nevertheless most scholars don't object the fact that they were Greek in terms of language.
Thracian Kingdom is mapped in the atlas for 87 BCE – 50 CE, with a peak mapped extent of about 90,345 km².
Huns
106 CE – 425 CE · Capital: Attila's Court, (434–453) · 1,462,848 km²
German: Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanentitle QS:P1476,de:"Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanen"label QS:Lde,"Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanen"Peter Johann Nepomuk Geiger · Public domain · Commons
The Huns were a nomadic people who lived in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Eastern Europe between the 4th and 6th centuries CE. According to European tradition, they were first reported living east of the Volga River, in an area that was part of Scythia at the time. By 370 CE, the Huns had arrived on the Volga, causing the westward movement of Goths and Alans. By 430, they had established a vast, but short-lived, empire on the Danubian frontier of the Roman empire in Europe.
Since Joseph de Guignes in the 18th century, modern historians have associated the Huns who appeared on the borders of Europe in the 4th century CE with the Xiongnu who had invaded numerous Central Plain polities from the Mongolian Plateau between the 3rd century BCE and the 2nd century CE. After the devastating defeat by the Han dynasty, the northern branch of the Xiongnu retreated north-westward; their descendants may have migrated through the Eurasian Steppe and consequently they may have some degree of cultural and genetic continuity with the Huns. Scholars also discussed the relationship between the Xiongnu, the Huns, and a number of people in central Asia who were also known as or came to be identified with the name "Hun" or "Iranian Huns". The most prominent of these were Chionites, the Kidarites, and the Hephthalites.
Hunnic governmental structure has long been debated. Peter Heather argues that the Huns were a disorganized confederation in which leaders acted completely independently and that eventually established a ranking hierarchy, much like Germanic societies. Denis Sinor similarly notes that, with the exception of the historically uncertain Balamber, no Hun leaders are named in the sources until Uldin, indicating their relative unimportance. Thompson argues that permanent kingship only developed with the Huns' invasion of Europe and the near-constant warfare that followed. Regarding the organization of Hunnic rule under Attila, Peter Golden comments "it can hardly be called a state, much less an empire". Golden speaks instead of a "Hunnic confederacy". Kim, however, argues that the Huns were far more organized and centralized, with some basis in organization of the Xiongnu state.
he term 'nomad', if it denotes a wandering group of people with no clear sense of territory, cannot be applied wholesale to the Huns. All the so-called 'nomads' of Eurasian steppe history were peoples whose territory/territories were usually clearly defined, who as pastoralists moved about in search of pasture, but within a fixed territorial space.
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Maenchen-Helfen notes that pastoral nomads (or "seminomads") typically alternate between summer pastures and winter quarters: while the pastures may vary, the winter quarters always remained the same. This is, in fact, what Jordanes writes of the Hunnic Altziagiri tribe: they pastured near Cherson on the Crimea and then wintered further north, with Maenchen-Helfen holding the Syvash as a likely location.
They also sometimes fight when provoked, and then they enter the battle drawn up in wedge-shaped masses, while their medley of voices makes a savage noise. And as they are lightly equipped for swift motion, and unexpected in action, they purposely divide suddenly into scattered bands and attack, rushing about in disorder here and there, dealing terrific slaughter; and because of their extraordinary rapidity of movement they are never seen to attack a rampart or pillage an enemy's camp.
An account of the funeral of Attila is provided by Jordanes, who may derive it from Priscus: Jordanes reports that the Huns cut their hair and disfigured their faces with swords as part of the rite, a widely attested custom among steppe peoples. After this, Attila's coffin was placed in a silk tent, and horsemen rode around it singing funeral dirges called a strava. The coffin was then covered in precious metals and buried secretly together with weapons, and the slaves who dug the grave were killed to keep the location secret. Maenchen-Helfen suggests that the dirges and the horsemanship were likely separate events, with the latter possibly representing funereal horse races as found among other steppe peoples, while the killing of the slaves may have been a sacrifice.
Beginning in the High Middle Ages, Hungarian sources have claimed descent from or a close relationship between the Hungarians (Magyars) and the Huns. The claim appears to have first arisen in non-Hungarian sources and only gradually been taken up by the Hungarians themselves because of its negative connotations. The Anonymous Gesta Hungarorum (after 1200) is the first Hungarian source to mention that the line of Árpádian kings were descendants of Attila, but he makes no claim that the Hungarian and Hun peoples are related. The first Hungarian author to claim that Hun and Hungarian peoples were related was Simon of Kéza in his Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum (1282–1285). Simon claimed that the Huns and Hungarians were descended from two brothers, named Hunor and Magor. These claims gave the Hungarians an ancient pedigree and served to legitimize their conquest of Pannonia.
Gothia is mapped in the atlas for 207 CE – 382 CE, with a peak mapped extent of about 634,926 km².
Visigoths
396 CE – 425 CE · 44,637 km²
Painting by Joseph-Noel Silvestre "The Plunder of Rome"Joseph-Noël Sylvestre · Public domain · Commons
The Visigoths (Latin: Visigothi, Wisigothi, Vesi, Visi, Wesi, Wisi) were a Gothic people who emerged in the Balkans during late antiquity. Probably descended from the Thervingi who entered the Roman Empire in 376 and defeated the Romans at the Battle of Adrianople (378), they were first united under Alaric I (395–410), whose forces alternately fought and allied with Rome before famously sacking the city in 410.
In 418, the Visigoths were settled as foederati in southern Gaul, establishing a kingdom with its capital at Toulouse.
The Visigoths emerged from the Gothic tribes, probably a derivative name for the Gutones, a people believed to have their origins in Scandinavia and who migrated southeastwards into eastern Europe. This understanding of their origins is largely the result of Gothic traditions, and their true genesis as a people is as obscure as that of the Franks and Alamanni. The Visigoths spoke an eastern Germanic language that was distinct by the 4th century. Eventually the Gothic language died as a result of contact with other European people during the Middle Ages.
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Long struggles between the neighboring Vandili and Lugii people with the Goths may have contributed to their earlier exodus into mainland Europe.
Alaric IIlived 466–507 CECarlos Esquivel y Rivas · Public domain · Commons
Government, Society and Religion
Languages
Gothic
Religion
Gothic paganism, Arianism, Nicene Christianity, Roman paganism
Wars and Battles
The Goths remained in Dacia until 376, when one of their leaders, Fritigern, appealed to the Eastern Roman Emperor Valens to be allowed to settle with his people on the south bank of the Danube. Here, they hoped to find refuge from the Huns. Valens permitted this, as he saw in them "a splendid recruiting ground for his army". However, a famine broke out and Rome was unwilling to supply them with either the food they were promised or the land. Generally, the Goths were abused by the Romans, who began forcing the now starving Goths to trade away their children so as to stave off starvation. Open revolt ensued, leading to 6 years of plundering throughout the Balkans, the death of a Roman Emperor and a disastrous defeat of the Roman army.
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The Battle of Adrianople in 378 was the decisive moment of the war.
Before the Middle Ages, the Visigoths, as well as other Germanic peoples, followed what is now referred to as Germanic paganism. While the Germanic peoples were slowly converted to Christianity by varying means, many elements of the pre-Christian culture and indigenous beliefs remained firmly in place after the conversion process, particularly in the more rural and distant regions.
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The Visigoths, Ostrogoths and Vandals were Christianized while they were still outside the bounds of the Roman Empire; however, they converted to Arianism rather than to the Nicene version (Trinitarianism) followed by most Romans, who considered them heretics. There was a religious gulf between the Visigoths, who had for a long time adhered to Arianism, and their Catholic subjects in Hispania.
Muslim troops leaving Narbonne to Pepin le Bref in 759.Émile Bayard · Public domain · Commons
Ended
425 CE
Hunnic Empire
426 CE – 673 CE · Capital: Attila's Court, (434–453) · 1,913,269 km²
German: Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanentitle QS:P1476,de:"Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanen"label QS:Lde,"Die Hunnen im Kampf mit den Alanen"Peter Johann Nepomuk Geiger · Public domain · Commons
The Huns were a nomadic people who lived in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Eastern Europe between the 4th and 6th centuries CE. According to European tradition, they were first reported living east of the Volga River, in an area that was part of Scythia at the time. By 370 CE, the Huns had arrived on the Volga, causing the westward movement of Goths and Alans. By 430, they had established a vast, but short-lived, empire on the Danubian frontier of the Roman empire in Europe.
Since Joseph de Guignes in the 18th century, modern historians have associated the Huns who appeared on the borders of Europe in the 4th century CE with the Xiongnu who had invaded numerous Central Plain polities from the Mongolian Plateau between the 3rd century BCE and the 2nd century CE. After the devastating defeat by the Han dynasty, the northern branch of the Xiongnu retreated north-westward; their descendants may have migrated through the Eurasian Steppe and consequently they may have some degree of cultural and genetic continuity with the Huns. Scholars also discussed the relationship between the Xiongnu, the Huns, and a number of people in central Asia who were also known as or came to be identified with the name "Hun" or "Iranian Huns". The most prominent of these were Chionites, the Kidarites, and the Hephthalites.
Hunnic governmental structure has long been debated. Peter Heather argues that the Huns were a disorganized confederation in which leaders acted completely independently and that eventually established a ranking hierarchy, much like Germanic societies. Denis Sinor similarly notes that, with the exception of the historically uncertain Balamber, no Hun leaders are named in the sources until Uldin, indicating their relative unimportance. Thompson argues that permanent kingship only developed with the Huns' invasion of Europe and the near-constant warfare that followed. Regarding the organization of Hunnic rule under Attila, Peter Golden comments "it can hardly be called a state, much less an empire". Golden speaks instead of a "Hunnic confederacy". Kim, however, argues that the Huns were far more organized and centralized, with some basis in organization of the Xiongnu state.
he term 'nomad', if it denotes a wandering group of people with no clear sense of territory, cannot be applied wholesale to the Huns. All the so-called 'nomads' of Eurasian steppe history were peoples whose territory/territories were usually clearly defined, who as pastoralists moved about in search of pasture, but within a fixed territorial space.
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Maenchen-Helfen notes that pastoral nomads (or "seminomads") typically alternate between summer pastures and winter quarters: while the pastures may vary, the winter quarters always remained the same. This is, in fact, what Jordanes writes of the Hunnic Altziagiri tribe: they pastured near Cherson on the Crimea and then wintered further north, with Maenchen-Helfen holding the Syvash as a likely location.
They also sometimes fight when provoked, and then they enter the battle drawn up in wedge-shaped masses, while their medley of voices makes a savage noise. And as they are lightly equipped for swift motion, and unexpected in action, they purposely divide suddenly into scattered bands and attack, rushing about in disorder here and there, dealing terrific slaughter; and because of their extraordinary rapidity of movement they are never seen to attack a rampart or pillage an enemy's camp.
An account of the funeral of Attila is provided by Jordanes, who may derive it from Priscus: Jordanes reports that the Huns cut their hair and disfigured their faces with swords as part of the rite, a widely attested custom among steppe peoples. After this, Attila's coffin was placed in a silk tent, and horsemen rode around it singing funeral dirges called a strava. The coffin was then covered in precious metals and buried secretly together with weapons, and the slaves who dug the grave were killed to keep the location secret. Maenchen-Helfen suggests that the dirges and the horsemanship were likely separate events, with the latter possibly representing funereal horse races as found among other steppe peoples, while the killing of the slaves may have been a sacrifice.
Beginning in the High Middle Ages, Hungarian sources have claimed descent from or a close relationship between the Hungarians (Magyars) and the Huns. The claim appears to have first arisen in non-Hungarian sources and only gradually been taken up by the Hungarians themselves because of its negative connotations. The Anonymous Gesta Hungarorum (after 1200) is the first Hungarian source to mention that the line of Árpádian kings were descendants of Attila, but he makes no claim that the Hungarian and Hun peoples are related. The first Hungarian author to claim that Hun and Hungarian peoples were related was Simon of Kéza in his Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum (1282–1285). Simon claimed that the Huns and Hungarians were descended from two brothers, named Hunor and Magor. These claims gave the Hungarians an ancient pedigree and served to legitimize their conquest of Pannonia.
Ancient States of the Balkans and Greece: Frequently Asked Questions
Which states existed in the Balkans and Greece in this period?
This page maps 19 states of the Balkans and Greece founded between 1600 BCE and 426 CE: Minoan civilization, Mycenaean Greece, Greek City-States, Peloponnesian League, Odrysian Kingdom, Sacred Band of Thebes, Second Athenian League, Thebans, Athenian Coalition, Aetolian League, Achaean League, Greek Colonies and 7 more.
Which was the largest of the Ancient States of the Balkans and Greece?
Hunnic Empire had the largest mapped extent, about 1,913,269 km².
Which of the Ancient States of the Balkans and Greece lasted longest?
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Late Minoan cemetery at ArmeniNo machine-readable author provided. Apeto assumed (based on copyright claims). · CC BY-SA 2.5 · Commons
Bull-Leaping FrescoGleb Simonov · Public domain · Commons
Harvester vaseOlaf Tausch · CC BY 3.0 · Commons
Minoan villa of AchladiaOlaf Tausch · CC BY 3.0 · Commons
Chamezi Minoan houseC messier · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Commons
Sanctuary of Athena PronaiaLuarvick · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Commons
