EPI'RUS (Lat., from Gk. iprespoc, ,'peiros, mainland). The ancient name of the northwest ernmost division of Greece. It was bounded on the east by Thessaly, on the south by the Am braeian Gulf and .Etolia, on the west by the Ionian Sea, and on the north by Illyria and Macedonia. On the eastern border was the chain of the Pindns. The chief town was Dodona (q.v.), situated in the only fruitful and well watered plain, called Hellopia (now Janina). The rivers Acheron. Oropus, Aracthus, and others flow through rocky valleys. Anciently Epirus was celebrated for its cattle and its breed of Molossian dogs. The region was inhabit ed by a number of tribes, probably belonging to( the Illyrian races, and generally believed by the Greeks not to be of pure Hellenic blood. The Greeks first came in contact with the chief coast tribes, the Thesprotiarss on the south and the Chnonians on the north. The third great tribe, the Molossians, in the interior, seem to have been hut little touched by Creek influence before B.C. 400. About the beginning of the third century me., however. their King, Pyrrhus (q.v.), one of the most powerful princes of his time, succeeded in uniting Epirus under his rule. After his.
death a revolution occurred, which was followed about n.c. 230 by the formation of a league, which lasted until n.e. 168. Then the Romans, having conquered Macedonia, ravaged the coun try, destroyed its 70 towns, and united it to their empire. From the close of the fourth century A.D. Epirus formed part of the Byzantine Empire until 1204, when one of the Comneni made him self independent. His dynasty ruled the country until 1318. After this, confusion and disorder filled the land, until it was seized by the Turks in 1430. For a time it was in the power of Scan derbeg (q.v.), but later fell again into the hands of the Turks. The region has been peopled large lysince the fourteenth century by Albanians. (See ALBANIA.) It now forms part of the Turkish Vilayet of Jahina. The district east of the River Arta was ceded to Greece in ISS1. Con sult: Leake, Travels in Yorthern Greece (Lon don, 1835) ; Philippson, Thessalicn and Epirus (Berlin, 1897).