Epirus from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century : autonomy and heterogeneity of a Balkan region
The region of Epirus from the 13th to the 15th century is studied within several aspects linked to the notions of autonomy and heterogeneity by which the history of the region was marked during the examined period. First of all, the recapitulation of political historiography shows the agitation of this period interposed between the long periods of stability that are the byzantine period and the ottoman one. The above mentioned three centuries actually witnessed the succession of the Fourth Crusade (1204), the reigns of the Comnenian dynasty (1205-1340), then of the Cephalonian branch (1318-1340), the Serbian invasion and the Albanian migrations (1340’s and 1350’s), the expansion of Carlo I Tocco (beginning of the 15th century) and finally the progressive conquest by the Ottomans from 1418 to 1502.Then, the study of historical geography of the region (territory, vocabulary, administrative, political and ecclesiastical geography, official buildings) shows the interdependency between historical events and geographical conditions. Indeed we can notice that the heterogeneity of the territory existed before the various migrations.Finally, we have tried to learn which were the ideological reactions to the political upheavals undergone by the region. On the one hand a political pattern emerged both in rupture and continuity with the traditional byzantine political pattern. On the other hand, the various migrations put the ethnic issue on the political foreground. Nevertheless, the ethnical cleavages were not as determining as the social and political ones; anyway they did not lead to the anachronistic idea of Nation-State.