194. Southern Illyria.-Two important trading settlements were founded in the Illyrian coast plains in 634 and 627 B.C. by Corinthian colonists: Apollonia (ruins now called Pollina), with its harbour Aulon (modern Italian Valona, Albanian Vliora), and Epidamnos, or, to give it its more ancient name, afterwards reintroduced by the Romans, Dyrrhachion' (modern Italian Durazzo, Albanian Dratch). Both these towns were in Roman times ordinary points of transit for the land intercourse between Italy and the Greek provinces. They lay within the territory of the Taulantii, at that time the most powerful of Illyrian tribes, who occupied the whole stretch of coast plain and in the third century B.C. even annexed these Greek cities to their kingdom. It was only under Alexander's régime that they were in a certain degree dependent on Macedonia. On the other hand, the tribe of the Dassaretes, who occupied the inner mountain region about Lake Lychnitis with Lychnidos (now Okhrida) for their capital, were subdued to the Macedonian kingdom as early as the time of Philip II. After the Roman occupation, which began with the coast towns in 229 B.C., both territories were in 130 B.C. annexed to the province of Macedonia, until, when the empire was portioned out anew in the fourth century A.D., they were at length made into a separate province as Epirus Nova.

In the northern part of the plain about the Drilon and the Labeatic Lake there was formed by the union of several tribes-especially the Autariates and Ardiaei (Vardaeans) who had been driven from their northern seats in the fourth century B.C. by the inroads of Keltic hordes, a kingdom which in a narrower sense bore the name of Illyrian, with a capital Skodra (still the Albanian Shkodra, Italian Scutari). It attained its greatest extent about 250, when it stretched northward beyond the Narōn and southward as far as the borders of Epiros. Curtailed when

the Romans occupied this southern portion in 205 B.C., the kingdom was in 168 completely conquered by them, and first put under the province of Macedonia. In 118 it was administered as a separate province of Illyricum, and was at last in imperial times annexed to Dalmatia.2

I The territory of the Parthini on the coast about Dyrrhachion, formed only a subdivision of the Taulantian domain. 2 In this whole southern half of ancient Illyria, including the north-western half of the mountain region of Epiros, the successors of the ancient inhabitants have preserved their existence and their peculiar dialect, in which they call themselves Shkyipetari. By their neighbours they are called Albanians, the name of a particular tribe already mentioned in ancient times ('AXBavoi). The Italians (and therefore other Europeans) call them Albanesi, the Slavs Arbanashi, the Greeks 'Apßaviral, and the Turks Arnaut.

195. Dalmatia or Delmati a, the mountainous central part of the coast land, was in early times subject to the kingdom of Skodra, but in 180 B.C. it became an independent league of several autonomous tribes, who gave themselves the collective name of Dalmatae, and had Delminium for their federal capital. Conquered by the Romans in 118 B.C. and annexed to the province of Illyria, the country formed in imperial times the separate province of Dalmatia, in which, in contradistinction to the strongly Hellenised Southern Illyria, the Latin language shortly became prevalent. The capital under Roman administration was Salonae, also of great importance for its trade'; other Roman colonies of note were Narona and Epidaurum (now Old Ragusa).

Liburnia was the name given to the north-western half of this mountainous coast region. Its inhabitants were likewise of Illyrian stock, and, like the other Illyrians of the coast, formidable pirates. They stood in lasting enmity towards the Dalmatian League, and accordingly as carly as

united with the province of Dalmatia, forming its third judicial district (conventus), with the capital Scardona (still so called in Italian, Slav. Skradin), besides which we have Fader (now Slav. Zadar, Ital. Zara) mentioned as a flourishing and active centre of commerce.

Liburnians formed also the original population of the numerous islands lying off the coast as far south as the Epeirote Kerkyra before it was occupied by the Greeks. At the same time we find on several of the islands lying off the Dalmatian coast Greek settlements, though not founded till between 390 and 380 B.C. by Dionysios of Syracuse. These were specially on Issa (afterwards a chief station for the Roman fleet, now Lissa),3 Pharos (modern Slav. Hvar, Italian Lesina), and Korkyra, called "the black," μéλaiva K. to distinguish it from its Epeirote namesake (modern Slav. Karkar, Ital. Curzŏla).+

I The modern town of Spalato consists of the palace which Diocletian built in the neighbourhood of this the town of his birth, in the village of Spalatum.

2 Liburnicae naves were celebrated among the Romans for their specially light build and swift sailing.

3 It possessed also trading settlements on the mainland in the little towns of Tragurium (modern Slav. Trogir, Ital. Traù) and Epetium.

4 Cf the remaining islands, only the most important have retained their ancient names: Melita, now Meleda (Malta); Brattia, Brazza; Solentia or Olynta, Solta; Curicta, Slav. Krk, Ital. Veglia; Crexa, Slav. Tchres, Ital. Cherso.

196. Pannonia. The low country which lies northward at the back of Dalmatia, and about the course of the rivers Saus (Sau, Sava) and Draus (Drau, Drava), and the great lake of Pelso or Peiso (Balaton, Plattensee), and as far north as the Danuvius,' was inhabited, when Roman armies first set foot on it in the first century B.C., by various tribes belonging partly to the Illyrian, partly to the Keltic family. These were collectively called by the Greeks Paionians (the same name as that borne by the population of Northern

Macedonia, cf. § 174) but by the Italians Pannonians. To the Kelts, who pressed in here from the west in the fourth century B.C., belonged the Carni on the Upper and the Scordisci on the Lower Saus, whose rule reached far into what later became Upper Moesia. As they had supported the Dalmatians in the stand they made against Rome, they were subdued when the Dalmatians submitted in 34 B.C. In the first century B.C. the Keltic Boii, who had been driven out of Boiohemum (Bohemia) by the Germans, made themselves almost entire masters of Pannonia, but were for the most part extirpated in the wars carried on under Augustus down to 9 B.C. After this the whole of Pannonia as far as the Danube became a permanent border province under Roman occupation, first as part of Illyricum, to which it was allied both by position and its prevailing population; under Vespasian it was made a separate province apart from Dalmatia, and under Trajan divided into Pannonia Inferior and Superior. The capital of Eastern or Lower Pannonia was Sirmium (now Mitrovitza in the district of Sirmia), important both as a commercial and strategic centre. Other important colonies dating from the middle of the second century were Mursa (now Eszeg) and Aquincum (Alt-Ofen). The capital of Upper Pannonia as early as the days of Claudius was Savaria (Stein am Anger). Of other important towns in the north on the German border may be mentioned Carnuntum, an extremely active commercial centre (ruins of Deutsch-Altenburg, near Haimburg), and Vindobona (Vienna), both in ancient times belonging to the Noric Kelts. In the south on the Draus was Poetovio (Pettau); on the Saus, Segestica or Siscia (Siszeg) and Emona (Laibach), the latter a vigorous. trading town at the eastern outlet of the lowest pass over the so-called Alpis Julia, then reckoned as part of

natural

I This, and not Danubius, is the correct form of the Keltic name for this river, which was adopted by all the later dwellers on its banks (Byzantine Aoúvaßis, Slav-Magyar Duna, Vlachian Dunarea), and even entirely supplanted the name Istros given by the Thracians to its lower course.

197. Noricum.-The eastern third of the Alpine region, whose spurs run northward as far as the Danube, but also include wider plains on this river, the Drau and the Mur, than are found in the Central or Western Alps, was, like the more remote Pannonia, completely occupied and ruled by Keltic peoples (who were probably in a minority beside the ancient Illyrian inhabitants). Their special name was Taurisci, but after the town of Noreia, probably the seat of their kings, they were also called Norici and their country itself Noricum (sc. regnum), a name which after its conquest by Drusus in 15 B.C. was retained for the province which in Roman imperial times counted as part of Illyria. The Roman capital seems to have been Virunum (ruins in the Zollfeld plain near Klagenfurt). The most important towns beside were Celeia (Cilli), Iuvavum (Salzburg), Ovilava (Wels), and Lauriacum, a border fortress and naval station on the Danube (ruins of Lorch at the mouth of the Enns, the ancient Anisus).

I This name testifies to the high antiquity of the designation Tauern still current for the passes over the Central Noric Alps, though it does not happen to occur in the older literature.

2 Noric (or, as in modern times it is called, Steiric) iron was celebrated among the Romans, and was largely exported to Italy and beyond. The procuring of salt from the beds of rock salt and from salt springs was also carried on even in prae-Roman times, when on the other hand the yield of the gold dust from the Alpine streams, which was also much talked of by the ancients, cannot have been considerable.

1