Concept

Chaonians

Summary
The Chaonians (Cháones) were an ancient Greek people that inhabited the historical region of Epirus which today is part of northwestern Greece and southern Albania. Together with the Molossians and the Thesprotians, they formed the main tribes of the northwestern Greek group. In historical times on their southern frontier lay the Epirote kingdom of the Molossians, to their southwest stood the kingdom of the Thesprotians, and to their north the Illyrians. By the 5th century BC, they had conquered and combined to a large degree with the neighboring Thesprotians and Molossians. The Chaonians were part of the Epirote League until 170 BC when their territory was annexed by the Roman Republic. The ethnic name Χάονες Cháones is attested indirectly in the fragments of Hecataeus of Miletus ( 500 BC), the author of Περίοδος Γῆς or Περιήγησις (Description of the Earth or Periegesis), which have been preserved in the geographical lexicon Ἐθνικά (Ethnica) of Stephanus of Byzantium ( 6th century AD). The Chaonians are directly mentioned for the first time in 429 BC by Thucydides, the author of History of the Peloponnesian War. The etymology of the ethnic name Χάονες Cháones is uncertain. In modern bibliography, a connection of Χᾱον- to words like χάος 'void' and χάσκω 'to yawn, gape', has been proposed by linguist Vladimir I. Georgiev (also by Radoslav Katičić). The semantic shift which is required for Chaones to be linked to them may contain irregularities, although a common root may point to a term referring to a "rugged area". Significant phonemic differences between them, in particular Χᾱον- and the root *χᾰF-, render their relation even more improbable. The original root of the name may have even been entirely different and unrelated to *χᾰF-, but became unrecognizable during the course of its historical uses. Several narratives were produced about the Chaonian ethnonym during the late classical era. According to the construction of mythological genealogies, Chaonians allegedly received their name from an eponymous ancestor named Xάων Cháon, a Trojan hero who supposedly settled in Epirus.
About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.