EPIRUS

epirus, or epeirus, an ancient district of northern greece extending along the ionian sea from the acroceraunian promontory on the n. to the ambracian gulf on the s. it was conterminous on the landward side with illyria, macedonia and thessaly, and thus corresponds to the southern portion of albania (q.v.). the name epirus ([greek: epeiros]) signified "mainland," and was originally applied to the whole coast southward to the corinthian gulf, in contradistinction to the neighbouring islands, corcyra, leucas, &c. the country is all mountainous, especially towards the east, where the great rivers of north-western greece--achelous, arachthus and aous--rise in mt lacmon, the back-bone of the pindus chain. in ancient times epirus did not produce corn sufficient for the wants of its inhabitants; but it was celebrated, as it has been almost to the present day, for its cattle and its horses. according to theopompus (4th cent. b.c.), the epirots were divided into fourteen independent tribes, of which the principal were the chaones, the thesproti and the molossi. the chaones (perhaps akin to the chones who dwelt in the heel of italy) inhabited the acroceraunian shore, the molossians the inland districts round the lake of pambotis (mod. jannina), and the thesprotians the region to the north of the ambracian gulf. in spite of its distance from the chief centres of greek thought and action, and the barbarian repute of its inhabitants, epirus was believed to have exerted at an early period no small influence on greece, by means more especially of the oracle of dodona. aristotle even placed in epirus the original home of the hellenes. but in historic times its part in greek history is mainly passive. the states of greece proper founded a number of colonies on its coast, which formed stepping-stones towards the adriatic and the west. of these one of the earliest and most flourishing was the corinthian colony of ambracia, which gives its name to the neighbouring gulf. elatria, bucheta and pandosia, in thesprotia, originated from elis. among the other towns in the country the following were of some importance. in chaonia: palaeste and chimaera, fortified posts to which the dwellers in the open country could retire in time of war; onchesmus or anchiasmus, opposite corcyra (corfu), now represented by santi quarante; phoenice, still so called, the wealthiest of all the native cities of epirus, and after the fall of the molossian kingdom the centre of an epirotic league; buthrotum, the modern butrinto; phanote, important in the roman campaigns in epirus; and adrianopolis, founded by the emperor whose name it bore. in thesprotia: cassope, the chief town of the most powerful of the thesprotian clans; and ephyra, afterwards cichyrus, identified by w.m. leake with the monastery of st john 3 or 4 m. from phanari, and by c. bursian with kastri at the northern end of the acherusian lake. in molossia: passaron, where the kings were wont to take the oath of the constitution and receive their people's allegiance; and tecmon, phylace and horreum, all of doubtful identification. the byzantine town of rogus is probably the same as the modern luro, the greek oropus. _history._--the kings, or rather chieftains, of the molossians, who ultimately extended their power over all epirus, claimed to be descended from pyrrhus, son of achilles, who, according to legend, settled in the country after the sack of troy, and transmitted his kingdom to molossus, his son by andromache. the early history of the dynasty is very obscure; but admetus, who lived in the 5th century b.c., is remembered for his hospitable reception of the banished themistocles, in spite of the fact that the great athenian had persuaded his countrymen to refuse the alliance tardily offered by the molossians when victory against the persians was already secured. admetus was succeeded, about 429 b.c., by his son or grandson, tharymbas or arymbas i., who being placed by a decree of the people under the guardianship of sabylinthus, chief of the atintanes, was educated at athens, and at a later date introduced a higher civilization among his subjects. alcetas, the next king mentioned in history, was restored to his throne by dionysius of syracuse about 385 b.c. his son arymbas ii. (who succeeded by the death of his brother neoptolemus) ruled with prudence and equity, and gave encouragement to literature and the arts. to him xenocrates of chalcedon dedicated his four books on the art of governing; and it is specially mentioned that he bestowed great care on the education of his brother's children. one of them, troas, he married; olympias, the other niece, was married to philip ii. of macedon and became the mother of alexander the great. on the death of arymbas, alexander the brother of olympias, was put on the throne by philip and married his daughter cleopatra. alexander assumed the new title of king of epirus, and raised the reputation of his country abroad. asked by the tarentines for aid against the samnites and lucanians, he made a descent at paestum in 332 b.c., and reduced several cities of the lucani and bruttii; but in a second attack he was surrounded, defeated and slain near pandosia in bruttium. aeacides, the son of arymbas ii., succeeded alexander. he espoused the cause of olympias against cassander, but was dethroned by his own soldiers, and had hardly regained his position when he fell in battle (313 b.c.) against philip, brother of cassander. he had, by his wife phthia, a son, the celebrated pyrrhus, and two daughters, deidamia and troas, of whom the former married demetrius poliorcetes. his brother alcetas, who succeeded him, continued unsuccessfully the war with cassander; he was put to death by his rebellious subjects in 295 b.c., and was succeeded by pyrrhus (q.v.), who for six years fought against the romans in south italy and sicily, and gave to epirus a momentary importance which it never again possessed. alexander, his son, who succeeded in 272 b.c., attempted to seize macedonia, and defeated antigonus gonatas, but was himself shortly afterwards driven from his kingdom by demetrius. he recovered it, however, and spent the rest of his days in peace. two other insignificant reigns brought the family of pyrrhus to its close, and epirus was thenceforward governed by a magistrate, elected annually in a general assembly of the nation held at passaron. having imprudently espoused the cause of perseus (q.v.) in his ill-fated war against the romans, 168 b.c., it was exposed to the fury of the conquerors, who destroyed, it is said, seventy towns, and carried into slavery 150,000 of the inhabitants. from this blow it never recovered. at the dissolution of the achaean league (q.v.), 146 b.c., it became part of the province of macedonia, receiving the name epirus vetus, to distinguish it from epirus nova, which lay to the east. on the division of the empire it fell to the east, and so remained until the taking of constantinople by the latins in 1204, when michel angelus comnenus seized aetolia and epirus. on the death of michel in 1216, these countries fell into the hands of his brother theodore. thomas, the last of the direct line, was murdered in 1318 by his nephew thomas, lord of zante and cephalonia, and his dominions were dismembered. not long after, epirus was overrun by the samians and albanians, and the confusion which had been growing since the division of the empire was worse confounded still. charles ii. tocco, lord of cephalonia and zante, obtained the recognition of his title of despot of epirus from the emperor manuel comnenus in the beginning of the 15th century; but his family was deprived of their possession in 1431 by murad (amurath) ii. in 1443, scanderbeg, king of albania, made himself master of a considerable part of epirus; but on his death it fell into the power of the venetians. from these it passed again to the turks, under whose dominion it still remains. for modern history see albania. authorities.--nauze, "rech. hist. sur les peuples qui s'etablirent en epire," in _mem. de l'acad. des inscr._ (1729); pouqueville, _voyage en moree, &c, en albanie_ (paris, 1805); hobhouse, _a journey through albania, &c._ (2 vols., london, 1813); wolfe, "observations on the gulf of arta" in _journ. royal geog. soc._, 1834; w.m. leake, travels in northern greece (london, 1835): merleker, darstellung des _landes und der bewohner von epeiros_ (konigsberg, 1841); j.h. skene, "remarkable localities on the coast of epirus," in _journ. roy. geog. soc._, 1848; bowen, _mount athos, thessaly and epirus_ (london, 1852); von hahn, _albanesische studien_ (jena, 1854); bursian, _geog. von griechenland_ (vol. i., leipzig, 1862); schafli, "versuch einer klimatologie des thales von jannina," _neue denkschr. d. allgem. schweizer. ges. f. naturw._ xix. (zurich, 1862); major r. stuart, "on phys. geogr. and natural resources of epirus," in _journ. r.g.s._, 1869; guido cora, in _cosmos_; dumont, "souvenirs de l'adriatique, de l'epire, &c." in _rev. des deux mondes_ (paris, 1872); de gubernatis, "l'epiro," _bull. soc. geogr. ital._ viii. (rome, 1872); dozon, "excursion en albanie," _bull. soc. geogr._, 6th series; karapanos, _dodone et ses ruines_ (paris, 1878); von heldreich, "ein beitrag zur flora von epirus," _verh. bot. vereins brandenburg_ (berlin, 1880); kiepert, "zur ethnographie von epirus," _ges. erdk._ xvii. (berlin, 1879); zompolides, "das land und die bewohner von epirus," _ausland_ (berlin, 1880); a. philippson, _thessalien und epirus_ (berlin, 1897). (j. l. m.) episcopacy (from late lat. _episcopatus_, the office of a bishop, _episcopus_), the general term technically applied to that system of church organization in which the chief ecclesiastical authority within a defined district, or diocese, is vested in a bishop. as such it is distinguished on the one hand from presbyterianism, government by elders, and congregationalism, in which the individual church or community of worshippers is autonomous, and on the other from papalism. the origin and development of episcopacy in the christian church, and the functions and attributes of bishops in the various churches, are dealt with elsewhere (see church history and bishop). under the present heading it is proposed only to discuss briefly the various types of episcopacy actually existing, and the different principles that they represent. the deepest line of cleavage is naturally between the view that episcopacy is a divinely ordained institution essential to the effective existence of a church as a channel of grace, and the view that it is merely a convenient form of church order, evolved as the result of a variety of historical causes, and not necessary to the proper constitution of a church. the first of these views is closely connected with the doctrine of the apostolical succession. according to this, christ committed to his apostles certain powers of order and jurisdiction in the church, among others that of transmitting these powers to others through "the laying on of hands"; and this power, whatever obscurity may surround the practice of the primitive church (see apostle, ad fin.) was very early confined to the order of bishops, who by virtue of a special consecration became the successors of the apostles in the function of handing on the powers and graces of the ministry.[1] a valid episcopate, then, is one derived in an unbroken series of "layings on of hands" by bishops from the time of the apostles (see order, holy). this is the catholic view, common to all the ancient churches whether of the west or east, and it is one that necessarily excludes from the union of christendom all those christian communities which possess no such apostolically derived ministry. apart altogether, however, from the question of orders, episcopacy represents a very special conception of the christian church. in the fully developed episcopal system the bishop sums up in his own person the collective powers of the church in his diocese, not by delegation of these powers from below, but by divinely bestowed authority from above. "ecclesia est in episcopo," wrote st cyprian (cyp. iv. _ep._ 9); the bishop, as the successor of the apostles, is the centre of unity in his diocese, the unity of the church as a whole is maintained by the intercommunion of the bishops, who for this purpose represent their dioceses. the bishops, individually and collectively, are thus the essential ties of catholic unity; they alone, as the depositories of the apostolic traditions, establish the norm of catholic orthodoxy in the general councils of the church. this high theory of episcopacy which, if certain of the ignatian letters be genuine, has a very early origin, has, of course, fallen upon evil days. the power of the collective episcopate to maintain catholic unity was disproved long before it was overshadowed by the centralized authority of rome; before the reformation, its last efforts to assert its supremacy in the western church, at the councils of basel and constance, had broken down; and the religious revolution of the 16th century left it largely discredited and exposed to a double attack, by the papal monarchy on the one hand and the democratic presbyterian model on the other. within the roman catholic church the high doctrine of episcopacy continued to be maintained by the gallicans and febronians (see gallicanism and febronianism) as against the claims of the papacy, and for a while with success; but a system which had failed to preserve the unity of the church even when the world was united under the roman empire could not be expected to do so in a world split up into a series of rival states, of which many had already reorganized their churches on a national basis. "febronius," indeed, was in favour of a frank recognition of this national basis of ecclesiastical organization, and saw in episcopacy the best means of reuniting the dissidents to the catholic church, which was to consist, as it were, of a free federation of episcopal churches under the presidency of the bishop of rome. the idea had considerable success; for it happened to march with the views of the secular princes. but religious people could hardly be expected to see in the worldly prince-bishops of the empire, or the wealthy courtier-prelates of france, the trustees of the apostolical tradition. the revolution intervened; and when, during the religious reaction that followed, men sought for an ultimate authority, they found it in the papal monarch, exalted now by ultramontane zeal into the sole depositary of the apostolical tradition (see ultramontanism). at the vatican council of 1870 episcopacy made its last stand against papalism, and was vanquished (see vatican council). the pope still addresses his fellow-bishops as "venerable brothers"; but from the roman catholic church the fraternal union of coequal authorities, which is of the essence of episcopacy, has vanished; and in its place is set the autocracy of one. the modern roman catholic church is episcopal, for it preserves the bishops, whose _potestas ordinis_ not even the pope can exercise until he has been duly consecrated; but the bishops as such are now but subordinate elements in a system for which "episcopacy" is certainly no longer an appropriate term. the word episcopacy has, in fact, since the reformation, been more especially associated with those churches which, while ceasing to be in communion with rome, have preserved the episcopal model. of these by far the most important is the church of england, which has preserved its ecclesiastical organization essentially unchanged since its foundation by st augustine, and its daughter churches (see england, church of, and anglican communion). the church of england since the reformation has been the chief champion of the principle of episcopacy against the papal pretensions on the one hand and presbyterianism and congregationalism on the other. as to the divine origin of episcopacy and, consequently, of its universal obligation in the christian church, anglican opinion has been, and still is, considerably divided.[2] the "high church" view, now predominant, is practically identical with that of the gallicans and febronians, and is based on catholic practice in those ages of the church to which, as well as to the bible, the formularies of the church of england make appeal. so far as this view, however, is the outcome of the general catholic movement of the 19th century, it can hardly be taken as typical of anglican tradition in this matter. certainly, in the 16th and 17th centuries, the church of england, while rigorously enforcing the episcopal model at home, and even endeavouring to extend it to presbyterian scotland, did not regard foreign non-episcopal churches otherwise than as sister communions. the whole issue had, in fact, become confused with the confusion of functions of the church and state. in the view of the church of england the ultimate governance of the christian community, in things spiritual and temporal, was vested not in the clergy but in the "christian prince" as the vicegerent of god.[3] it was the transference to the territorial sovereigns of modern europe of the theocratic character of the christian heads of the roman world-empire; with the result that for the reformed churches the unit of church organization was no longer the diocese, or the group of dioceses, but the christian state. thus in england the bishops, while retaining their _potestas ordinis_ in virtue of their consecration as successors of the apostles, came to be regarded not as representing their dioceses in the state, but the state in their dioceses. forced on their dioceses by the royal _conge d'elire_ (q.v.), and enthusiastic apostles of the high church doctrine of non-resistance, the bishops were looked upon as no more than lieutenants of the crown;[4] and episcopacy was ultimately resisted by presbyterians and independents as an expression and instrument of arbitrary government, "prelacy" being confounded with "popery" in a common condemnation. with the constitutional changes of the 18th and 19th centuries, however, a corresponding modification took place in the character of the english episcopate; and a still further change resulted from the multiplication of colonial and missionary sees having no connexion with the state (see anglican communion). the consciousness of being in the line of apostolic succession helped the english clergy to revert to the principle _ecclesia est in episcopo_, and the great periodical conferences of anglican bishops from all parts of the world have something of the character, though they do not claim the ecumenical authority, of the general councils of the early church (see lambeth conferences). of the reformed churches of the continent of europe only the lutheran churches of denmark, iceland, norway, sweden and finland preserve the episcopal system in anything of its historical sense; and of these only the two last can lay claim to the possession of bishops in the unbroken line of episcopal succession.[5] the superintendents (variously entitled also arch-priests, deans, provosts, ephors) of the evangelical (lutheran) church, as established in the several states of germany and in austria, are not bishops in any canonical sense, though their jurisdictions are known as dioceses and they exercise many episcopal functions. they have no special powers of order, being presbyters, and their legal status is admittedly merely that of officials of the territorial sovereign in his capacity as head of the territorial church (see superintendent). the "bishops" of the lutheran church in transylvania are equivalent to the superintendents. episcopacy in a stricter sense is the system of the moravian brethren (q.v.) and the methodist episcopal church of america (see methodism). in the case of the former, claim is laid to the unbroken episcopal succession through the waldenses, and the question of their eventual intercommunion with the anglican church was accordingly mooted at the lambeth conference of 1908. the bishops of the methodist episcopal church, on the other hand, derive their orders from thomas coke, a presbyter of the church of england, who in 1784 was ordained by john wesley, assisted by two other presbyters, "superintendent" of the methodist society in america. methodist episcopacy is therefore based on the denial of any special _potestas ordinis_ in the degree of bishop, and is fundamentally distinct from that of the catholic church--using this term in its narrow sense as applied to the ancient churches of the east and west. in all of these ancient churches episcopacy is regarded as of divine origin; and in those of them which reject the papal supremacy the bishops are still regarded as the guardians of the tradition of apostolic orthodoxy and the stewards of the gifts of the holy ghost to men (see orthodox eastern church; armenian church; copts: _coptic church_, &c). in the west, gallican and febronian episcopacy are represented by two ecclesiastical bodies: the jansenist church under the archbishop of utrecht (see jansenism and utrecht), and the old catholics (q.v.). of these the latter, who separated from the roman communion after the promulgation of the dogma of papal infallibility, represent a pure revolt of the system of episcopacy against that of papalism. (w. a. p.) footnotes: [1] see bishop c. gore, _the church and the ministry_ (1887). [2] neither the articles nor the authoritative homilies of the church of england speak of episcopacy as essential to the constitution of a church. the latter make "the three notes or marks" by which a true church is known "pure and sound doctrine, the sacraments administered according to christ's holy institution, and the right use of ecclesiastical discipline." these marks are perhaps ambiguous, but they certainly do not depend on the possession of the apostolic succession; for it is further stated that "the bishops of rome and their adherents are not the true church of christ" (homily "concerning the holy ghost," ed. oxford, 1683, p. 292). [3] "he and his holy apostles likewise, namely peter and paul, did forbid unto all ecclesiastical ministers, dominion over the church of christ" (_homilies appointed to be read in churches_, "the v. part of the sermon against wilful rebellion," ed. oxford, 1683, p. 378). princes are "god's lieutenants, god's presidents, god's officers, god's commissioners, god's judges ... god's vicegerents" ("the ii. part of the sermon of obedience," ib. p. 64). [4] juridically they were, of course, never this in the strict sense in which the term could be used of the lutheran superintendents (see below). they were never mere royal officials, but peers of parliament, holding their temporalities as baronies under the crown. [5] during the crisis of the reformation all the swedish sees became vacant but two, and the bishops of these two soon left the kingdom. the episcopate, however, was preserved by peter magnusson, who, when residing as warden of the swedish hospital of st bridget in rome, had been duly elected bishop of the see of westeraes, and consecrated, c. 1524. no official record of his consecration can be discovered, but there is no sufficient reason to doubt the fact; and it is certain that during his lifetime he was acknowledged as a canonical bishop both by roman catholics and by protestants. in 1528 magnusson consecrated bishops to fill the vacant sees, and, assisted by one of these, magnus sommar, bishop of strengness, he afterwards consecrated the reformer, lawrence peterson, as archbishop of upsala, sept. 22, 1531. some doubt has been raised as to the validity of the consecration of peterson's successor, also named lawrence peterson, in 1575, from the insufficiency of the documentary evidence of the consecration of his consecrator, paul justin, bishop of abo. the integrity of the succession has, however, been accepted after searching investigation by men of such learning as grabe and routh, and has been formally recognized by the convention of the american episcopal church. the succession to the daughter church of finland, now independent, stands or falls with that of sweden.