As during the summer of this year, the Ambrakiots had brought down a numerous host of Epirotic tribes to the invasion of Akarnania, in conjunction with the Peloponnesians,—so during the autumn, the Athenians obtained aid against the Chalkidians of Thrace from a still more powerful barbaric prince, Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian Thracians. Amidst the numerous tribes, between the Danube and the Ægean sea,—who all bore the generic name of Thracians, though each had a special name besides,—the Odrysians were at this time the most warlike and powerful. The Odrysian king Têrês, father of Sitalkês, had made use of this power to subdue[359] and render tributary a great number of these different tribes, especially those whose residence was in the plain rather than in the mountains. His dominion, the largest existing between the Ionian sea and the Euxine, extended from Abdêra, or the mouth of the Nestus, in the Ægean sea, to the mouth of the Danube in the Euxine; though it seems that this must be understood with deductions, since many intervening tribes, especially mountain tribes, did not acknowledge his authority. Sitalkês himself had invaded and conquered some of the Pæonian tribes who joined the Thracians on the west, between the Axius and the Strymon.[360] Dominion, in the sense of the Odrysian king, meant tribute, presents, and military force when required; and with the two former, at least, we may conclude that he was amply supplied, since his nephew and successor Seuthes, under whom the revenue increased and attained its maximum, received four hundred talents annually in gold and silver as tribute, and the like sum in various presents, over and above many other presents of manufactured articles and ornaments. These latter came from the Grecian colonies on the coast, which contributed moreover largely to the tribute, though in what proportions we are not informed: even Grecian cities not in Thrace sent presents to forward their trading objects, as purchasers for the produce, the plunder, and the slaves, acquired by Thracian chiefs or tribes.[361] The residence of the Odrysians properly so called, and of the princes of that tribe now ruling over so many of the remaining tribes, appears to have been about twelve days’ journey inland from Byzantium,[362] in the upper regions of the Hebrus and Strymon, south of Mount Hæmus, and northeast of Rhodopê. The Odrysian chiefs were connected by relationship more or less distant with those of the subordinate tribes, and by marriage even with the Scythian princes north of the Danube: the Scythian prince Ariapeithês[363] had married the daughter of the Odrysian Têrês, the first who extended the dominion of his tribe over any considerable portion of Thrace. [359] Thucyd. ii, 29, 95, 96. [360] Thucyd. ii, 99.