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The Historical Geography Of Europe

Edward A. (Edward Augustus) Freeman

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THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE VOL. I.

THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE VOL. I.

LONDON: PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE AND PARLIAMENT STREET THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE BY EDWARD A. FREEMAN, D.C.L., LL.D. HONORARY FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, OXFORD IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I.—TEXT LONDON LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 1881 All rights reserved...

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PREFACE.

PREFACE.

It is now several years since this book was begun. It has been delayed by a crowd of causes, by a temporary loss of strength, by enforced absence from England, by other occupations and interruptions of various kinds. I mention this only because of the effect which I fear it has had on the book itself. It has been impossible to make it, what a book should, if possible, be, the result of one continuous effort. The mere fact that the kindness of the publishers allowed the early part to be printed s

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ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS.

ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS.

P. 88 , l. 14. Since this was written, I wrote the article ‘Goths,’ in the Encyclopædia Britannica, where I have gone rather more fully into their history from later and minuter study. P. 90 , l. 4 from the bottom. I believe the existence of a Gothia by that name in Spain is a little doubtful. As to the Gothia in Gaul, otherwise Septimania , and the other Gothia in the Tauric Chersonêsos, there is no doubt. P. 105 , l. 14 from bottom. I believe however that the coins of some of the Provençal cit

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HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE.

HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE.

INTRODUCTION. The work which we have now before us is to trace out the extent of territory which the different states and nations of Europe and the neighbouring lands have held at different times in the world’s history, to mark the different boundaries which the same country has had, and the different meanings in which the same name has been used. It is of great importance carefully to make these distinctions, because great mistakes as to the facts of history are often caused through men thinkin

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§ 1. Geographical Aspect of Europe.

§ 1. Geographical Aspect of Europe.

Our present business is with the Historical Geography of Europe, and with that of other parts of the world only so far as they concern the geography of Europe. But we shall have to speak of all the three divisions of the Old World, Europe, Asia, and Africa, in those parts of the three which come nearest to one another, and in which the real history of the world begins. ♦ The Mediterranean Lands. ♦ These are those parts of all three which lie round the Mediterranean sea, the lands which gradually

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§ 2. Effect of Geography on History.

§ 2. Effect of Geography on History.

Now this geographical aspect of the chief lands of Europe has had its direct effect on their history. We might almost take for granted that the history of Europe should begin in the two more eastern among the three great southern peninsulas. Of these two, Italy and Greece, each has its own character. Greece, though it is the part of Europe which lies nearest to Asia, is in a certain sense the most European of European lands. The characteristic of Europe is to be more full of peninsulas and islan

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§ 3. Geographical Distribution of Races.

§ 3. Geographical Distribution of Races.

Our present business then is with geography as influenced by history, and with history as influenced by geography. With ethnology, with the relations of nations and races to one another, we have to deal only so far as they form one of the agents in history. And it will be well to avoid, as far as may be, all obscure or controverted points of this kind. But the great results of comparative philology may now be taken for granted, and a general view of the geographical disposition of the great Euro

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§ 1. The Eastern or Greek Peninsula.

§ 1. The Eastern or Greek Peninsula.

Taking the great range of mountains which divides southern from central Europe as the northern boundary of the eastern or Greek peninsula, it may be said to take in the lands which are cut off from the central mass by the Dalmatian Alps and the range of Haimos or Balkan . It is washed to the east, west, or south, by various parts of the Mediterranean and its great gulf the Euxine. But the northern part of this region, all that lies north of the Ægæan Sea, taking in therefore the whole of the Eux

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§ 2. Insular and Asiatic Greece.

§ 2. Insular and Asiatic Greece.

Greece Proper then, what the ancient geographers called Continuous Hellas as distinguished from the Greek colonies planted on barbarian shores, is, so far as it is part of the mainland, made up of a system of peninsulas stretching south from the general mass of eastern Europe. But the neighbouring islands equally form a part of continuous Greece; and the other coasts of the Ægæan, Asiatic as well as Thracian, were so thickly strewed with Greek colonies as to form, if not part of continuous Greec

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§ 3. Ethnology of the Eastern Peninsula.

§ 3. Ethnology of the Eastern Peninsula.

The immediate Greek world then as opposed to the outlying Greek colonies, consists of the shores of the Ægæan sea and of the peninsulas lying between it and the Ionian sea. Of this region a great part was exclusively inhabited by the Greek nation, while Greek influences were more or less dominant throughout the whole. But it would further seem that the whole, or nearly the whole, of these lands were inhabited by races more or less akin to the Greeks. They seem to have been races which had a good

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§ 4. The Earliest Geography of Greece and the Neighbouring Lands.

§ 4. The Earliest Geography of Greece and the Neighbouring Lands.

Our first picture of Greek geography comes from the Homeric catalogue. Whatever may be the historic value of the Homeric poems in general, it is clear that the catalogue in the second book of the Iliad must represent a real state of things. It gives us a map of Greece so different from the map of Greece at any later time that it is inconceivable that it can have been invented at any later time. We have in fact a map of Greece at a time earlier than any time to which we can assign certain names a

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§ 5. Change from Homeric to Historic Greece.

§ 5. Change from Homeric to Historic Greece.

The state of things which is set before us in the catalogue was altogether broken up by later changes, but changes which still come before the beginnings of contemporary history, and which we understand chiefly by comparing the geography of the catalogue with the geography of later times. ♦ Changes in Peloponnêsos. ♦ According to received tradition, a number of Dorian colonies from Northern Greece were gradually planted in the chief cities of Peloponnêsos, and drove out or reduced to subjection

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§ 6. The Greek Colonies.

§ 6. The Greek Colonies.

It must have been in the time between the days represented by the catalogue and the beginnings of contemporary history, that most of the islands of the Ægæan became Greek, and that the Greek colonies were planted on the Ægæan coast of Asia. We have seen that the southern islands were already Greek at the time of the catalogue, while some of the northern ones, Thasos , Lêmnos , and others, did not become Greek till times to which we can give approximate dates, from the eighth to the fifth centuri

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§ 7. Growth of Macedonia and Epeiros.

§ 7. Growth of Macedonia and Epeiros.

But while the spread of the Greek language and civilization, and therewith the growth of the artificial Greek nation, was brought about in a great degree by the planting of independent Greek colonies, it was brought about still more fully by events which went far to destroy the political independence of Greece itself. This came of the growth of the kindred nations to the north of Greece, in Macedonia and Epeiros. The Macedonians were for a long time hemmed in by the barbarians to the north and w

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§ 8. The later Geography of Independent Greece.

§ 8. The later Geography of Independent Greece.

The political divisions of independent Greece, in the days when it gradually came under the power of Rome, differ almost as much from those to which we are used during the Persian and Peloponnesian wars, as these last differ from the earlier divisions in the Homeric catalogue. The chief feature of these times was the power which was held, as we have before seen, by the Macedonian kings, and the alliances made by the different Greek states in order to escape or to throw off their yoke. The result

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§ 1. The Inhabitants of Italy and Sicily.

§ 1. The Inhabitants of Italy and Sicily.

We seem to have somewhat clearer signs in Italy than we have in Greece of the men who dwelled in the land before the Aryans who appear as its historical inhabitants came into it. ♦ Ligurians. ♦ On the coast of Liguria , the land on each side of the city of Genoa, a land which was not reckoned Italian in early times, we find people who seem not to have been Aryan. And these Ligurians seem to have been part of a race which was spread through Italy and Sicily before the Aryan settlements, and to ha

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§ 2. Growth of the Roman power in Italy.

§ 2. Growth of the Roman power in Italy.

The history of ancient Italy, as far as we know it, is the history of the gradual conquest of the whole land by one of its own cities; and the changes in its political geography are mainly the changes which followed the gradual bringing of the whole peninsula under the Roman dominion. But the form which the conquests of Rome took hindered those conquests from having so great an effect on the map as they otherwise might have had. The cities and districts of Italy, as they were one by one conquere

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§ 3. The Western Provinces.

§ 3. The Western Provinces.

The great change in Roman policy, and in European geography as affected by it, took place when Rome began to win territory out of Italy. The relation of these foreign possessions to the ruling city was quite different from that of the Italian states. The foreign conquests of Rome were made into provinces . ♦ Nature of the Roman Provinces. ♦ A province was a district which was subject to Rome, and put under the rule of a Roman governor, which was not done with the dependent allies in Italy. But i

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§ 4. The Eastern Provinces.

§ 4. The Eastern Provinces.

The Hadriatic Sea may be roughly taken as the boundary between the Eastern and Western parts of the Roman dominion. In the West, the Romans carried with them not only their arms, but their tongue, their laws, and their manners. They were not only conquerors but civilizers. The native Iberians and Celts adopted Roman fashions, and the isolated Greek and Phœnician cities, like Massalia and Gades, gradually became Roman also. East of the Hadriatic the state of things was quite different. Here the l

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§ 5. Conquests under the Empire.

§ 5. Conquests under the Empire.

At the same moment when the Roman commonwealth was practically changed into a monarchy, the Roman dominion was thus brought, not indeed to its greatest extent, but to an extent of which its further extension was only a natural completion. ♦ Conquests under Augustus and Tiberius. ♦ There seems a certain inconsistency when we find Augustus laying down a rule against the enlargement of the Empire, while the Empire was, during his reign and that of his successor, extended in every direction. But the

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§ 1. The Later Geography of the Empire.

§ 1. The Later Geography of the Empire.

Italy had thus been mapped out afresh; what was done with Italy in the time of Augustus was done with the whole Empire in the time of Constantine. What Italy was in the earlier time the whole Empire was in the later; the old distinctions had been wiped out, and the whole of the Roman world stood ready to be parted out into fresh divisions. Under Diocletian, the Empire was divided into four parts, forming the realms of the four Imperial colleagues of his system, the two Augusti and their subordin

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§ 2. The Division of the Empire.

§ 2. The Division of the Empire.

The mapping out of the Empire into Prefectures, and its division between two or more Imperial colleagues, led naturally to its more lasting division into what were practically two Empires. The old state of things had altogether passed away. Rome was no longer the city ruling over subject states. From the Ocean to the Euphrates all was alike, if not Rome, at least Romania ; all its inhabitants were equally Romans. But to be a Roman now meant, no longer to be a citizen of a commonwealth, but to be

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§ 3. The Teutonic Settlements within the Empire.

§ 3. The Teutonic Settlements within the Empire.

Our subject is historical geography, and neither ethnology nor political history, except so far as either national migrations or political changes produce a directly geographical effect. ♦ The Wandering of the Nations. ♦ The great movement called the Wandering of the Nations, and its results in the settlement of various Teutonic nations within the bounds of the Roman Empire, concern us now only so far as they wrought a visible change on the map. The exact relations of the different tribes to one

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§ 4. Settlement of the English in Britain.

§ 4. Settlement of the English in Britain.

Meanwhile, in another part of Europe, a Teutonic settlement of quite another character from those on the mainland was going on. ♦ The Romans withdrawn from Britain. A.D. 411. ♦ Spain and Gaul fell away from the Empire by slow degrees; but the Roman dominion in Britain came to an end by a definite act at a definite moment. The Roman armies were withdrawn from the province, and its inhabitants were left to themselves. Presently, a new settlement took place in the island which was thus left undefe

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§ 5. The Eastern Empire.

§ 5. The Eastern Empire.

We have already seen the differences between the position of the Eastern and Western Empires during this period. While in the West the provinces were gradually lopped away by the Teutonic settlements, the provinces of the East, though often traversed by Teutonic armies, or rather nations, did not become the seats of lasting Teutonic settlements. ♦ The Tetraxite Goths. ♦ We can hardly count as an exception the settlement of the Tetraxite Goths in the Tauric Chersonêsos, a land which was rather in

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§ 1. The Reunion of the Empire.

§ 1. The Reunion of the Empire.

It was during the reign of Justinian that this work was carried out through a large part of the Western Empire. Lost provinces were won back in two continents. The growth of independent Teutonic powers was for ever stopped in Africa, and it received no small check in Europe. The Emperor was enabled, through the weakness and internal dissensions of the Vandal and Gothic kingdoms, to win back Africa and Italy to the Empire. The work was done by the swords of Belisarius and Narses—the Slave and the

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§ 2. Settlement of the Lombards in Italy.

§ 2. Settlement of the Lombards in Italy.

The conquests of Justinian hindered the growth of a national Teutonic kingdom in Italy, such as grew up in Gaul and Spain, and they practically made the cradle of the Empire, Rome herself, an outlying dependency of her great colony by the Bosporos. But the reunion of all Italy with the Empire lasted only for a moment. The conquest was only just over when a new set of Teutonic conquerors appeared in Italy. ♦ Pannonian kingdom of the Lombards. ♦ These were the Lombards , who, in the great wanderin

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§ 3. Rise of the Saracens.

§ 3. Rise of the Saracens.

But, before we give any account of the revolutions which took place among the already existing powers of Western Europe, it will be well to describe the geographical changes which were caused by the appearance of absolutely new actors on two sides of the Empire. ♦ Roman province in Spain recovered by the Goths. 534-572. ♦ One point however may be noticed here, as standing apart from the general course of events, namely, that the Roman province in Spain was won gradually back by the West-Goths. ♦

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§ 4. Settlements of the Slavonic Nations.

§ 4. Settlements of the Slavonic Nations.

The movements of the sixth century began to bring into notice a branch of the Aryan family of nations which was to play an important part in the affairs both of the East and of the West. ♦ Movements of the Slaves. ♦ These nations were the Slaves . It is needless for our purpose to attempt to trace their earlier history; but the movements of the Avars in the sixth century seem to have had much the same effect upon the Slaves which the movements of the Huns in the fourth century had upon the Teuto

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§ 5. The Transfer of the Western Empire to the Franks.

§ 5. The Transfer of the Western Empire to the Franks.

Meanwhile we must go back to the West, and trace the growth of the great power which was there growing up, a power which, while the elder Empire was thus cut short in the East, was in the end to supplant it in the West by the creation of a rival Empire. For a while the Franks and the Empire had only occasional dealings with each other. Next to Britain, which had altogether ceased to be part of the Roman world, the part of the Western Empire which was least affected by the re-awakening of the Rom

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§ 6. Northern Europe.

§ 6. Northern Europe.

Meanwhile other nations were beginning to show themselves in those parts of Europe which lay beyond the Empire. In north-western Europe two branches of the Teutonic race were fast growing into importance; the one in lands which had never formed part of the Empire, the other in a land which had been part of it, but which had been so utterly severed from it as to be all one as if it had never belonged to it. These were the Scandinavian nations in the two great peninsulas of Northern Europe, and th

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§ 1. The Division of the Frankish Empire.

§ 1. The Division of the Frankish Empire.

The earliest among those endless divisions that we need mention is the division of 817, by which two new subordinate kingdoms were founded within the Empire. Lewis and his immediate colleague Lothar kept in their own hands Francia , German and Gaulish, and the more part of Burgundy. South-western Gaul, Aquitaine in the wide sense, with some small parts of Septimania and Burgundy, formed the portion of one under-king; South-eastern Germany, Bavaria and the march-lands beyond it, formed the portio

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§ 2. The Eastern Empire.

§ 2. The Eastern Empire.

The effect of the various changes of the seventh and eighth centuries, the rise of the Saracens, the settlement of the Slaves, the transfer of the Western Empire to the Franks, seem really to have had the effect of strengthening the Eastern Empire which they so terribly cut short. It began for the first time to put on something of a national character. ♦ It takes a Greek character. ♦ As the Western Empire was fast becoming German, so the Eastern Empire was fast becoming Greek. ♦ Rivalry of the E

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§ 3. Origin of the Spanish Kingdoms.

§ 3. Origin of the Spanish Kingdoms.

The historical geography of two of the three great Southern peninsulas is thus bound up with that of the Empires of which they were severally the centres. ♦ Position of Spain. ♦ The case is quite different with the third great peninsula, that of Spain. There the Roman dominion, even the province which had been recovered by Justinian, had quite passed away, and it was only a small part of the land which was ever reincorporated, even in the most shadowy way, with either Empire. ♦ The Saracen conqu

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§ 4. Origin of the Slavonic States.

§ 4. Origin of the Slavonic States.

We left the borders of both the Eastern and the Western Empire beset by neighbours of Slavonic race, who, in the case of the Eastern Empire, were largely mingled with other neighbours of Turanian race. Of these last, Avars , Patzinaks , Khazars , have passed away; they have left no trace on the modern map of Europe. With two of the Turanian settlements the case is different. ♦ Bulgarians. ♦ The settlement of the Bulgarians , the foundation of a kingdom of Slavonized Turanians south of the Danube

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§ 5. Northern Europe.

§ 5. Northern Europe.

The European importance of the Scandinavian nations at this time chiefly arises from their settlements in various parts of Europe, and specially in Britain and Ireland. The three great Scandinavian kingdoms were already formed. Sweden was doing its work towards the east; the Norwegians, specially known as Northmen, colonized the extreme north of Britain, the Scandinavian earldoms of Caithness and Sutherland, together with the islands to the north and west of Britain, Orkney, Shetland, Faroe, the

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§ 1. The Great Patriarchates.

§ 1. The Great Patriarchates.

The highest ecclesiastical divisions, the Patriarchates, though they did not exactly answer to the Prefectures, were clearly suggested by them. And whenever the boundaries of the Patriarchates departed from the boundaries of the Prefectures, they came nearer to the great divisions of race and language. For our purpose, it is enough to take the Patriarchates, as they grew up, after the establishment of Christianity, in the course of the fourth and fifth centuries. The four older ones were seated

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§ 2. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Italy.

§ 2. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Italy.

In no part of Christendom do the bishoprics lie so thick upon the ground as in Italy, and especially in the southern part. But from that very fact it follows that the ecclesiastical divisions of Italy are of less historical importance than those of most other Western countries. ♦ Small size of the provinces. ♦ In southern Italy above all, the bishoprics were so numerous, and the dioceses therefore so small, that the archiepiscopal provinces were hardly so large as the episcopal dioceses in more

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§ 3. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Gaul and Germany.

§ 3. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Gaul and Germany.

By taking a single view of the ecclesiastical arrangements of the whole of the Western Empire on this side of the Alps and the Pyrenees, some instructive lessons may be learned. Such a way of looking at the map will bring out more strongly the differences between bishoprics of earlier and later foundation. ♦ Gaulish and German dioceses. ♦ And, if we take the name of Gaul in the old geographical sense, taking in the German lands west of the Rhine which formed part of the older Empire, we shall fi

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§ 4. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Spain.

§ 4. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Spain.

The ecclesiastical history of the Spanish peninsula presents phænomena of a different kind from those of Italy, Gaul, or Germany. In Italy and Gaul the ecclesiastical divisions go on uninterruptedly from the earliest days of Christianity. Western Germany must count for these purposes as part of Gaul. In eastern Germany the ecclesiastical divisions were formed in later times, as Christianity was spread over the country. In Spain the country must have been mapped out for ecclesiastical purposes at

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§ 5. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of the British Islands.

§ 5. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of the British Islands.

The historical phænomena of the British islands have points in common with more than one of the continental countries. In a very rough and general view of things, Britain has some analogies with Spain. It is not altogether without reason that in some legendary stories the names of Saxons and Saracens get confounded. In both cases a land which had been Christian was overrun by conquerors of another creed; in both a Christian people held their ground in a part of the country; and in both the whole

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§ 6. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Northern and Eastern Europe.

§ 6. The Ecclesiastical Divisions of Northern and Eastern Europe.

In the other parts of Europe which formed part of the communion of the Latin Church, the ecclesiastical divisions mark the steps by which Christianity was spread either by conversion or conquest. They continued the process of which the ecclesiastical organization of Eastern Germany was the beginning. As a rule, they strictly follow the political divisions of the age in which they were founded. ♦ The Scandinavian provinces. ♦ As the Church in the Scandinavian kingdoms became more settled, its bis

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§ 1. The Kingdom of Germany.

§ 1. The Kingdom of Germany.

In tracing out, for our present purpose, the geographical revolutions of Germany, it will be enough to look at them, as far as may be, mainly in their European aspect. Owing to the gradual way in which the various members of the Empire grew into practical sovereignty—owing to the constant division of principalities among many members of the same family—no country has undergone so many internal geographical changes as Germany has. In few countries also has the nomenclature shifted in a more singu

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§ 2. The Confederation and Empire of Germany.

§ 2. The Confederation and Empire of Germany.

Our survey in the last section has carried us down to the beginning of the changes which led to the break-up of the old German Kingdom. Germany is the only land in history which has changed from a kingdom to a confederation. ♦ Sketch of the process, 1806-1815. ♦ The tie which bound the vassal princes to the king became so lax that it was at last thrown off altogether. In this process foreign invasion largely helped. Between the two processes of foreign war and domestic disintegration, a chaotic

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§ 3. The Kingdom of Italy.

§ 3. The Kingdom of Italy.

We parted from the Italian kingdom at the moment of its separation from the Eastern and Western kingdoms of the Franks. Its history, as a kingdom, consists in little more than its reunion with the East-Frankish crown, and in the way in which the royal power gradually died out within its limits. There is but little to say as to any changes of frontier of the kingdom as such. As long as Germany, Italy, and Burgundy acknowledged a single king, any shiftings of the frontiers of his three kingdoms we

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§ 4. The Later Geography of Italy.

§ 4. The Later Geography of Italy.

Under Charles the Fifth it might have seemed that both the Roman Empire and the kingdom of Italy had come to life again. A prince who wore both crowns was practically master of Italy. But though the power of the Emperor was restored, the power of the Empire was not. In truth we may look on all notion of a kingdom of Italy in the elder sense as having passed away with the coronation of Charles himself. The thing had passed away long before; after the pageant at Bologna the name was not heard for

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§ 5. The Kingdom of Burgundy.

§ 5. The Kingdom of Burgundy.

The Burgundian Kingdom, which was united with those of Germany and Italy after the death of its last separate king Rudolf the Third, has had a fate unlike that of any other part of Europe. ♦ Dying out of the kingdom. ♦ Its memory, as a separate state, has gradually died out. ♦ Chiefly annexed by France; ♦ The greater part of its territory has been swallowed up bit by bit by a neighbouring power, and the small part which has escaped that fate has long lost all trace of its original name or its or

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§ 6. The Swiss Confederation.

§ 6. The Swiss Confederation.

I have just spoken of the Swiss Confederation as being in its origin purely German. This statement is practically correct, as all the original cantons were German in speech and feeling, and the formal style of their union was the Old League of High Germany . But in strict geographical accuracy there was, as we have seen in the last section, a small Burgundian element in the Confederation, if not from the beginning, at least from its aggrandizement in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. ♦ th

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§ 7. The State of Savoy.

§ 7. The State of Savoy.

The growth of the power of Savoy, the border state of Burgundy and Italy, has necessarily been spoken of more than once in earlier sections; but it seems needful to give a short connected account of its progress, and to mark the way in which a power originally Burgundian gradually lost on the side of Burgundy and grew on the side of Italy, till it has in the end itself grown into a new Italy. ♦ Geographical position of the Savoyard lands. ♦ The lands which have at different times passed under th

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§ 8. The Duchy of Burgundy and the Low Countries.

§ 8. The Duchy of Burgundy and the Low Countries.

Among all the powers which we have marked as having for their special characteristic that of being middle states, the one which came most nearly to an actual revival of the middle states of earlier days was the Duchy of Burgundy under the Valois Dukes. A great power was formed whose princes held no part of their dominions in wholly independent sovereignty. ♦ Their twofold vassalage. ♦ In practical power they were the peers of their Imperial and royal neighbours; but their formal character throug

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§ 9. The Dominions of Austria.

§ 9. The Dominions of Austria.

We now come to one among these German states which have parted off from the kingdom of Germany whose course has been widely different from the rest, and whose modern European importance stands on a widely different level. As the Lotharingian and Frisian lands parted off on the north-west of the kingdom, as a large part of the Swabian lands parted off to the south-west of the kingdom, so the Eastern Mark , the mark of Austria , parted off no less, but with widely different consequences. ♦ Origin

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§ 1. Incorporation of the Vassal States.

§ 1. Incorporation of the Vassal States.

At the accession of the Parisian dynasty, the royal domain took in the greater part of the later Isle of France , the territory to which the old name specially clung, the greater part of the later government of Orleans , besides some outlying fiefs holding immediately of the King. ♦ Chief vassals within the royal domain. ♦ Within this territory the counties of Clermont , Dreux , Moulins , Valois , and Gatinois , are of the greatest historical importance. Two of the great rivers of Gaul, the Sein

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§ 2. Foreign Annexations of France.

§ 2. Foreign Annexations of France.

When the Western Kingdom finally parted off from the body of the Empire, its only immediate neighbours were the Imperial kingdoms to the east, and the Spanish kingdoms to the south. ♦ England. ♦ The union of Normandy and England in some sort made England and France immediate neighbours. And the long retention of Aquitaine by England, the English possession of Calais for more than two hundred years and of the insular Normandy down to our own day, have all tended to keep them so. ♦ Small acquisiti

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§ 3. The Colonial Dominion of France.

§ 3. The Colonial Dominion of France.

France, like all the European powers which have an oceanic coast, entered early on the field of colonization and distant dominion. At one time indeed it seemed as if France was destined to become the chief European power both in India and in North America. ♦ French colonies in North America. 1506. ♦ French attempts at colonization in the latter country began early in the sixteenth century. ♦ 1540. 1603. ♦ Thus Cape Breton at the mouth of the Saint Lawrence was reached early in the sixteenth cent

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§ 4. Acquisitions of France during the Revolutionary Wars.

§ 4. Acquisitions of France during the Revolutionary Wars.

Thus the French monarchy grew from the original Parisian duchy into a kingdom which spread north, south, east, and west, taking in all the fiefs of the West-Frankish kings, together with much which had belonged to the other kingdoms of the Empire. ♦ Acquisitions in the Revolutionary Wars. ♦ With the great French revolution began a series of acquisitions of territory on the part of France which are altogether unparalleled. ♦ Different classes of annexations. ♦ First of all, there were those small

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§ 1. Changes in the Frontier of the Empire.

§ 1. Changes in the Frontier of the Empire.

In tracing the fluctuations of the frontier of the Eastern Empire from the beginning of the ninth century, we are struck by the wonderful power of revival and reconquest which is shown throughout the whole history. Except the lands which were won by the first Saracens, hardly a province was finally lost till it had been once or twice won back. No one could have dreamed that the Empire of the seventh century, cut short by the Slavonic settlements to a mere fringe on its European coasts, could eve

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§ 2. The Kingdom of Sicily.

§ 2. The Kingdom of Sicily.

This is the power which, in the course of the eleventh century, was formed by the Norman adventurers in southern Italy and in Sicily. It was not wholly formed at the expense of the Eastern Empire. But all its insular, and the greater part of its continental, territory, was either won from the Eastern Empire and its vassals, or else had once formed part of that Empire. Its kings also more than once established their power, for a longer or shorter time, in the Imperial lands east of the Hadriatic.

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§ 3. The Crusading States.

§ 3. The Crusading States.

The Sicilian kingdom has much in common with the states formed by the crusaders in Asia and Eastern Europe. Both grew out of lands won by Western conquerors, partly from the Eastern Empire itself, partly from Mussulman holders of lands which had belonged to the Eastern Empire. But the order of the two processes is different. The Sicilian Normans began by conquering lands of the Empire, and then went on to win the island which the Saracens had torn from the Empire. The successive crusades first f

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§ 4. The Eastern Dominion of Venice and Genoa.

§ 4. The Eastern Dominion of Venice and Genoa.

We have already seen the origin of the Venetian state, and the beginning of Venetian rule over the Slavonic coasts of the Hadriatic. ♦ Connexion of the Dalmatian and Greek dominion of Venice. ♦ The Eastern dominion of Venice now began, and, in a strictly geographical view, her Istrian and Dalmatian dominion cannot be separated from her Albanian and purely Greek dominion. But Venice did not become a great European power till she passed from the Slavonic lands whose connexion with the Empire was n

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§ 5. The Principalities of the Greek Mainland.

§ 5. The Principalities of the Greek Mainland.

The Greek possessions of Venice, of Genoa, and of the Knights of Saint John, consisted mainly of islands and detached points of coast. The Venetian conquest of Peloponnêsos was the only exception on a great scale. In this they are distinguished from the several powers, Greek and Frank, which arose on the Greek mainland. We have already heard, and we shall hear again, of the Greek despotat of Epeiros, which for a moment grew into an Empire of Thessalonikê. Among the Latin powers two rose to Europ

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§ 6. The Slavonic States.

§ 6. The Slavonic States.

The Greek and Frank states of which we have just been speaking arose, for the most part they directly arose, out of the Latin partition of the Empire. ♦ Effects of the partition of the Empire on the Slavonic states. ♦ On the Slavonic powers the effect of that partition was only indirect. Servia and Bulgaria had begun their second career of independence before the partition. The partition touched them only so far as the splitting up of the Empire into a number of small states took away all fear o

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§ 7. The Kingdom of Hungary.

§ 7. The Kingdom of Hungary.

The origin of the Hungarian kingdom and the reasons for dealing with along with the states which arose out of the break-up of the Eastern Empire have already been spoken of. [46] ♦ Character of the Hungarian kingdom. ♦ The Finnish conquerors of the Slave, admitted within the pale of Western Christendom, founding a new Hungary on the Danube and the Theiss while they left behind them an older Hungary on the Kama, have points of contact at once with Asia and with both Eastern and Western Europe. ♦

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§ 8. The Ottoman Power.

§ 8. The Ottoman Power.

Last among the powers which among them supplanted the Eastern Empire, comes the greatest and most terrible of all, that which overthrew the Empire itself and most of the states which arose out of its ruins, and which stands distinguished from all the rest by its abiding possession of the Imperial city. This is the power of the Ottoman Turks. ♦ Their special character as Mahometans. ♦ They stand distinguished from all the other invaders of the European mainland of the Empire by being Mahometan in

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§ 9. The Liberated States.

§ 9. The Liberated States.

The losses which the Ottoman power has undergone at the hands of its independent neighbours, Russia, Montenegro, and Austria or Hungary, must be distinguished from the liberation of certain lands from Turkish rule to form new or revived European states. We have seen that the kingdom of Hungary and its dependent lands might fairly come under this head, and we have seen in what the circumstances of their liberation differ from the liberation of Greece or Servia or Bulgaria. But it is important to

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§ 1. The Scandinavian Lands after the Separation of the Empires.

§ 1. The Scandinavian Lands after the Separation of the Empires.

At the end of the eighth century the Scandinavian and Slavonic inhabitants of the Baltic lands as yet hardly touched one another. The most northern Scandinavians and the most northern Slaves were still far apart; if the two races anywhere marched on one another, it must have been at the extreme south-western corner of the Baltic coast. ♦ The Baltic still mainly held by the earlier races. ♦ The greater part of that coast, all its northern and eastern parts, was still held by the earlier nations,

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§ 2. The Lands East and South of the Baltic at the Separation of the Empires.

§ 2. The Lands East and South of the Baltic at the Separation of the Empires.

At the beginning of the ninth century the inland region stretching from the Elbe a little beyond the Dnieper was continuously held by various Slavonic nations. Their land marched on the German kingdom at one end, and on various Finnish and Turkish nations at the other. ♦ Their lack of sea-board. ♦ But their sea-board was comparatively small. Wholly cut off from the Euxine, from the northern Ocean, and from the great gulfs of the Baltic, their only coast was that which reaches from the modern hav

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§ 3. The German Dominion on the Baltic.

§ 3. The German Dominion on the Baltic.

In the first half of the twelfth century, no Teutonic power, German or Scandinavian, had any lasting hold on any part of the eastern coast of the Baltic or its gulfs, nor had any such power made any great advances on the southern coast. Early in the fourteenth century the whole of these coasts had been brought into different degrees of submission to several Teutonic powers, German and Scandinavian. ♦ German influence stronger than Scandinavian. ♦ Of the two influences the German has been the mor

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§ 4. The Growth of Russia and Sweden.

§ 4. The Growth of Russia and Sweden.

The work of the last four centuries on the Baltic coast has been to drive back the Scandinavian power, after a vast momentary advance, wholly to the west of the Baltic—to give nearly the whole eastern coast to Russia—to make the whole southern coast German. These changes involve the wiping out, first of the German military Order, and then of Poland and Lithuania. ♦ Growth of Russia and creation of Prussia. ♦ This last change involves the growth of Russia, and the creation of Prussia in the moder

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§ 5. The Decline of Sweden and Poland.

§ 5. The Decline of Sweden and Poland.

In the last section we traced out the greatest advance of Sweden and a large advance of Russia, both made at the cost of Poland, that of Sweden also at the cost of Denmark. We saw also the beginnings of a power which we still called Brandenburg rather than Prussia . ♦ Growth of Prussia. ♦ In the present section, describing the work of the eighteenth century, we have to trace the growth of this last power, which now definitely takes the Prussian name, and which we have to look at in its Prussian

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§ 6. The Modern Geography of the Baltic Lands.

§ 6. The Modern Geography of the Baltic Lands.

The territorial arrangements of Northern and Eastern Europe were not affected by the French revolutionary wars till after the fall of the Western Empire. At that moment the frontier of Germany and Denmark was still what it had been under Charles the Great; “Eidora Romani terminus Imperii.” Only now the Danish king ruled to the south of the boundary stream in the character of a prince of the Empire. ♦ Holstein incorporated with Denmark, and Swedish Pomerania with Sweden. 1806. ♦ The fall of the E

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§ 1. The Foundation of the Spanish Kingdoms.

§ 1. The Foundation of the Spanish Kingdoms.

We have seen how the union of the small independent lands of the north, Asturia and Cantabria , grew into the kingdom, first of Oviedo and then of Leon . Gallicia , on the one side, representing in some sort the old Suevian kingdom, Bardulia or the oldest Castile , the land of Burgos, on the other side, were lands which were early inclined to fall away. ♦ Christian advance. ♦ The growth of the Christian powers on this side was favoured by internal events among the Mussulmans, by famines and revo

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§ 2. Growth and Partition of the Great Spanish Monarchy.

§ 2. Growth and Partition of the Great Spanish Monarchy.

After the thirteenth century the strictly geographical changes within the Spanish peninsula were but few. The boundaries of the kingdoms changed but little towards one another, and not much towards France, their only neighbour from the fifteenth century onwards. But the five kingdoms were gradually grouped under two kings, for a while under one only. ♦ Territories beyond the peninsula. ♦ The external geography, so to speak, forms a longer story. We have to trace out the acquisition of territory

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§ 3. The Colonial Dominion of Spain and Portugal.

§ 3. The Colonial Dominion of Spain and Portugal.

The distinction between Spain and Portugal is most strikingly marked in the dominion of the two powers beyond the bounds of Europe. ♦ Character of the Portuguese dominion out of Europe. ♦ Portugal led the way among European states to conquest and colonization out of Europe. She had a geographical and historical call so to do. Her dominion out of Europe was not indeed a matter of necessity like that of Russia, but it stood on a different ground from that of England, France, or Holland. It was not

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§ 1. The Kingdom of Scotland.

§ 1. The Kingdom of Scotland.

In Northern Britain, as in some other parts of Europe, we see a land which has taken its name from a people to which it does not owe its historic importance. Scotland has won for itself a position in Britain and in Europe altogether out of proportion to its size and population. But it has not done this by virtue of its strictly Scottish element. ♦ Greatness of Scotland due to its English element. ♦ The Irish settlers who first brought the Scottish name into Britain [88] could never have made Sco

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§ 2. The Kingdom of England.

§ 2. The Kingdom of England.

The changes of boundary between England and Wales begin, as far as we are concerned with them, with the great Welsh campaign of Harold. ♦ Enlargement of the border shires. ♦ All the border shires, Cheshire, Shropshire, Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, seem now to have been enlarged; the English border stretched to the Conway in the north, and to the Usk in the south. ♦ The Marches. ♦ But part of this territory seems to have been recovered by the Welsh princes, while part passed into the great mar

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§ 3. Ireland.

§ 3. Ireland.

The second great island of the British group, Ireland , the original Scotia , has had less to do with the general history of the world than any other part of Western Europe. Its ancient divisions have lived on from the earliest times. ♦ The five provinces. ♦ The names of its five great provinces, Ulster , Meath , Leinster , Munster , and Connaught , are all in familiar use, though Meath has sunk from its old rank alongside of the other four. The Celtic inhabitants of the island remained independ

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§ 4. Outlying European Possessions of England.

§ 4. Outlying European Possessions of England.

Ireland, the sister island of Britain, has thus been united with Britain into a single kingdom. Man, lying between the two, remains a distinct dependency. ♦ The Norman Islands. 1205. ♦ This last is also still the position of that part of the Norman duchy which clave to its own dukes, which never became French, but always remained Norman. It might be a question what was the exact position of Guernsey , Jersey , Alderney , Sark , and their smaller neighbours, when the English kings took the titles

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§ 5. The American Colonies of England.

§ 5. The American Colonies of England.

England, like France and Holland, became a colonizing power by choice. Extension over barbarian lands was not a necessity, as in the case of Russia, nor did it spring naturally out of earlier circumstances, as in the case of Portugal. But the colonizing enterprise of England has done a greater work than the colonizing enterprise of any other European power. The greatest colony of England—for in a worthier use of language the word colony would imply independence rather than dependence [93] —is th

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§ 6. Other Colonies and Possessions of England.

§ 6. Other Colonies and Possessions of England.

The story of the North-American colonies may be both compared and contrasted with the story of two great groups of colonies in the southern hemisphere. ♦ Australia. ♦ In Australia and the other great southern islands, a body of English colonies have arisen, the germs at least of yet another English nation, but which have not as yet reached either independence or confederation. ♦ South Africa. ♦ In South Africa, another group of possessions and colonies, beginning, like Canada, in conquest from a

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THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE VOL. II.

THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE VOL. II.

LONDON: PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE AND PARLIAMENT STREET THE HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE BY EDWARD A. FREEMAN, D.C.L., LL.D. HONORARY FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, OXFORD IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. II.—MAPS LONDON LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 1881 All rights reserved...

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LIST OF MAPS.

LIST OF MAPS.

[Transcriber’s Note: If supported by your device, click any map to view a larger version.] I HOMERIC GREECE and the NEIGHBOURING LANDS II GREECE and the GREEK COLONIES III GREECE in the Fifth century B.C. IV THE LANDS round the ÆGÆAN at the beginning of THE KLEOMENIC WAR. C. B.C. 227. V DOMINIONS and DEPENDENCIES of ALEXANDER c. B.C. 323. VI KINGDOMS of the SUCCESSORS of ALEXANDER C. B.C. 300 VII ITALY before the growth of the Roman Power VIII THE MEDITERRANEAN LANDS at the beginning of the SECO

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