The Illyrians

For more than a thousand years before the arrival of the Slavs in the sixth century AD, the lands between the Adriatic and the river Danube, now Yugoslavia and Albania, were the home of the peoples known to the ancient world as Illyrians.

The Illyrians, now available in paperback, draws upon the considerable archaeological evidence that has become available since the Second World War to provide an account of the origins, culture, history, and legacy of the Illyrians.

John Wilkes describes the geography of Illyria and surveys the region in the prehistoric, Greek, Roman, and medieval periods. He discusses Illyrian art, material culture, religion, and customs. A chapter examines the Illyrian language, of which little trace survives, and its connection with other Indo-European languages.

Professor Wilkes also scrutinises the linguistic evidence for the Illyrians' relatedness to other peoples—Thracian, Italic, Greek, and Celtic. He concludes with a discussion of a possible survival of an Illyrian native culture in the Roman and Byzantine periods.