On the south side was Actium, where the battle was fought. Directly across, only half mile distant, on the northern promontory, was the encampment of Augustus. To commemorate the victory over his antagonist, the Roman emperor built a city on the exact spot where his army had encamped "Victory City". On the hill now called Michalitzi, on the site of his own tent, he built a temple to Neptune and instituted games in honor of Apollo, who was supposed to have helped him in the sea-fight.
Nicopolis soon became the metropolis of Epirus, with an autonomous constitution, according to Greek custom. But in the time of the emperor Julian the city had fallen into decay, at least in part. It was plundered by the Goths, restored by Justinian, and finally disappeared entirely in the Middle Ages, so far as the records of history show. One document has Nikopolis he nun Prebeza, "Nicopolis, which is now Prebeza. The emperor concentrated here the population of Aetolia and Acarnania, and made the city a leading member of the Amphictyonic Council.
There are considerable ruins of the ancient city, including two theaters, a stadium, an aqueduct, etc. Kuhn, Ueber die Entstehung der staate der Alten. He visited Nicopolis during his tour of Greece to take part in the Aktian games. In 67, while in Greece, Emperor Nero granted tax-exempt status to the cities of Achaia and in return he conferred administration of Sardinia and Corsica to the Senate. Around 93, Emperor Domitian expelled philosophers from Rome, including the Stoic philosopher Epictetus , who went to Nicopolis where he died around AD Around , under Emperor Trajan , the Roman government carved out the province of Epiros from parts of Macedonia and Achaia, making it a separate province in its own right.
A procurator Augusti headquartered at Nicopolis governed Epirus. The new province of Epirus included Arkanania to the south as far as the Achelous, but not Apollonia to the north, plus the Ionian islands — Kerkyra , Leukas , Ithaca , Cephalonia , and Zakynthos.
The reason for the reform was that the territory needed a stricter government to yield higher revenues. The new province was put under the control of an Imperial procurator , together with other special procuratores , including a procurator of the purple fisheries whose sphere of office, however, extended to Achaia and Thessalia. This administrative set up appears to have remained intact through the reforms of Emperor Septimius Severus and up until Emperor Diocletian Around this time the so-called western gate was constructed, several hundred meters north of the south gate, becoming the main gate of Nicopolis.
Around , the next mention of Nicopolis with respect to Church history is actually a bishop of Rome, Pope Eleutherius , who reigned from around He was born in Nicopolis, according to the Liber Pontificalis , and served as a deacon in Rome.
During his term in office as Bishop of Rome, the Church was involved in the Montanist controversy. Around , Emperor Severus , based in Syria, campaigned in Mesopotamia, with indirect consequences for Achaia and Epirus: to help pay for these campaigns, Emperor Severus apparently required several cities to mint special coins, including Nicopolis, Patrae , Epidaurus , Apollonia, Thuria , Plautilla , and the Thessalia koinon.
In , the Goths launched a combined land-sea invasion against the Roman Empire, assisted by Heruli sailors and other tribesmen. Their naval forces ravaged Byzantium and Chrysopolis , though the Imperial fleet successfully counter-attacked on the Propontis. Meanwhile the land forces overran Thrace and continued into Achaia as far south as Sparta; the invading Goths and Heruli sacked Athens, crossed the isthmus, sacked and burned the lower part of Corinth, and advanced to Argos and Sparta, ravaging the countryside along the way and burning the two cities.
Here Imperial land and sea forces counter-attacked, and the invaders wandered their way through Boeotia, Akarnania, Epiros, Macedonia, and Thrace on their way back to Moesia. Not long after the catastrophe, the Athenians built a wall to enclose the Acropolis and a small area to the north.
In Epiros, while the inhabitants of Nicopolis made hasty repairs to fortifications and managed to avert the danger, the leaders of Kerkyra organized their own army, crossed over into Epiros and defeated the Goths on land. The Imperial army chased the Goths and their allies and defeated them at Naissus. In , as part of Diocletian's reforms, the province of Epiros became known as Epirus Vetus including Adrianopolis , Phoiniki , Ogchismos , and Bouthroton as the most northerly major cities, and Akarnania and the islands of Kerkyra, Ithaca, and probably Leukas to the south.
The capital was Nicopolis. Meanwhile, the territory of northern Epiros including, Apollonia, Byllis and Amantia on its southern borders became known as Epirus Nova , capital at Dyrrachion. Both provinces, along with Makedonia, Thessalia and Achaia, are included in the dioceses of Moesia which also included four provinces in the northwest Balkans.
The islands of Cephalonia, Zakynthos, and Kythira were included in the province of Achaia. Writing around , one Arnobius of Numidia mentioned the existence of Christian communities in Achaia, Macedonia, and Epirus.
Writing around , the first great recorded Church historian Eusebius of Caesarea mentions that bishops from Epiros attended the first Ecumenical Council of Nicaea in This implies that bishoprics and an episcopal administrative system had been set up some time before Until the time of Constantine , it is supposed that the bishopric of Nicopolis came under the jurisdiction of the metropolitan of Corinth, but with the administrative reforms under Emperor Diocletain and Constantine , Nicopolis itself became the metropolitan city of Epirus Vetus.
The two provinces of Epirus, along with the provinces of Macedonia, Thessaly, and Achaia, became part of the diocese of Macedonia capital Thessalonica. In , in the Acts of the Council of Serdica , we have for the first time mention of a bishop of Nicopolis, one Isidoros.
In , newly appointed Consul Claudius Mamertinus delivered a panegyric to the young Emperor Julian , mentioning heavy taxation in Dalmatia and Epirus. Based on the record of Julian's close ties with certain leading men from Epirus involved in the Empire-wide cultural circuit led by Libanios and Themistios , it appears that Christianity was not widespread in Epirus in the mid-4th century, but after his death it spread far and wide in the region, judging from legislation issued by Valentinian in and , trying to offset some of the negative effects its rapid spread, and the fact that there is no written record of the bishops of the cities of Epiros until the 5th century, except for the Bishop of Nicopolis in In , the Acts of the Council of Constantinople — as well as the Third , and Fourth Ecumenical Councils — recognized the see of Thessalonica as holding sixth place in the Church administrative hierarchy, after the five patriarchs.
Among the sees of Illyricum , Thessalonica held the first position in the hierarchy, followed by Corinth and Nicopolis. Donatos of Nikopolis c. The majority of the bishops from Epiros and Illyricum and other representatives sustained the Orthodox theological position of the Bishop Celestine I of Rome and Bishop Cyril of Alexandria against the Patriarch of Constantinople. In the bishops of Epirus then held a provincial synod to ratify the validity of the Fourth Ecumenical Council.
We have a list of as many as nine bishops signing a letter written by Bishop Eugenios of Nikopolis to Bishop Leo of Rome. This was also the time of Bishop Diadochos of Photiki c. Not only was he the bishop of what was the major city of an Epiros sub-region called Thresprotia , he was also the author of important theological treatises, three of which are extant. In combination with the notice of the correspondence between the bishop of Nikopolis and the bishop of Alexandria mentioned previously, from the writings of Diadochos we can infer that learned texts, along with amphorae, traveled between the eastern Mediterranean and Epirus in the 5th century.
From around in Nikopolis, construction of a series of six basilicas, beginning with the five-aisled metropolitan basilica B. Artisans of Nikopolis decorated many of the city's basilicas with some high-quality mosaics, developing their own workshop, operating until the s, whose influence extended to the rest of Epirus and perhaps further afield in eastern Illyricum. An inscription informs us that Bishop Alkison sponsored some additions to the southern annex of Basilica B, possibly around In , Eastern Emperor Zeno initiated peace negotiations with the Vandals.
But during the negotiations, in order to strengthen their position, the Vandals again devastated the coast of Greece during which they captured Nicopolis and took prisoners who had to be ransomed to secure their release. Evidently the walls of Nikopolis built in the time of Augustus were not for defensive purposes, or at least were not functioning in , since the Vandals took the city apparently without being equipped with siege weapons, in view of the fact that they failed to take the walled city of Tainaros.
If this is true, then the so-called Justinian walls of Nikopolis, enclosing only one-sixth of the city founded by Augustus, were erected not before In any case, the Nikopolis walls, probably built sometime in the ss period like the walls of Dyrrachion , were made of bricks, mortar, and rubble.
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