Epirus, Kingdom of

The Aeacidae, a well-respected family of Epirus who are members of the Molossian royal house and claim descent from Achilles, are the only Epirotes regarded by the Greeks as Greek.

From about 370 BCE on, the Aeacidae have been able to expand the Molossian state by incorporating tribes from the rival groups in Epirus.

Their efforts gain impetus from the marriage of Philip II of Macedon to their formidable princess, Myrtale, the daughter of the late King Neoptolemus, who died around 360 BCE, and niece of his brother and successor, Arybbas.

Apparently, the princess—who in the near future will become known as Olympias—was originally named Polyxena, as Plutarch mentions in his work Moralia, and changed her name to Myrtale prior to her marriage to Philip II of Macedon as part of her initiation into an unknown mystery cult.

Philip had first fallen in love with Myrtale when both were initiated into the mysteries of Cabeiri at the Sanctuary of the Great Gods, on the island of Samothrace.

Her younger brother Alexander is sent to Macedonia as well, to receive a Greek education.

All Philip's previous “marriages” are effectively displaced in 357 by his marriage to Myrtale, (who on or about July 20 of the following year will give birth to his son Alexander); the union helps to stabilize his western frontier.

Myrtale probably took the name Olympias, the third of four names by which she will be known, as a recognition of Philip's horse-race victory in the Olympic Games of 356 BCE, the news of which coincided with the birth of her first child, who will become known to posterity as Alexander the Great. (Plut. Alexander 3.8).

In ancient Greece people believe that the birth of a great man is accompanied by portents.

As Plutarch describes, the night before the consummation of their marriage Olympias had dreamed that a thunderbolt fell upon her womb and a great fire was kindled, its flames dispersed all about, then extinguished.

After the marriage Philip had dreamed that he put a seal upon his wife's womb, the device of which was the figure of a lion.

The interpretation of Aristander, a seer in Philip's entourage, had been that Olympias was pregnant of a son whose nature would be bold and lion-like.

Philip invades Molossia in 350 BCE and installs his brother-in-law Alexander as king.

Arybbas flees to Athens (where he will die peacefully in 342 BCE).

Philip's brother-in-law, King Alexander of Molossia (in Epirus, located in present Albania and northwestern Greece, with Illyria to the north, the Pindus mountains to the east, and the Gulf of Ambracia—near Préveza—to the south), around 340 unifies the Epirotes.

Contacts established with the Hellenistic world during the reign of Ashoka's predecessors serve him well.

He sends diplomatic-cum-religious missions to the rulers of Syria, Macedon, and Epirus, who learn about India's religious traditions, especially Buddhism.

India's northwest retains many Persian cultural elements, which might explain Ashoka's rock inscriptions—such inscriptions are commonly associated with Persian rulers.

Ashoka's Greek and Aramaic inscriptions found in Kandahar in Afghanistan may also reveal his desire to maintain ties with people outside of India.

King Alexander of Epirus, also known as Alexander Molossus and an uncle of Alexander III of Macedon, had in 334 accepted an invitation from the Tarentines to intervene in southern Italy, where the divided Greek colonies are under threat by the federation of mountain tribes known as the Samnites, formidable warriors who had, in the preceding century, conquered several Greek towns.

Alexander's most important motive (according to Livy) is the warning of an oracle to beware of the water of Acheron and the city of Pandosia; for it is there that the limits of his destiny are fixed.

This inspires him to cross over into Italy all the sooner, that he might be as far as possible from the city of Pandosia in Epirus and the river Acheron, which flows from Molossia into what Livy calls the Infernal Marshes and finally empties itself into the Thesprotian Gulf.

Alexander of Epirus crosses over to Italy in 333 BCE to assist the Tarentines against the Lucanians, Bruttians and Samnites.

The landing of Alexander near Paestum leads the Samnites to make common cause with the Lucanians, but their united forces are defeated by turn in a pitched battle.

Alexander captures the city of Heraclea, (a Greek town that had been taken by the Italian tribes), …

…takes Sipontum (a pirate haven on central Italy's Adriatic coast) from the Apulians, …