Aeolians, the name of one of the primitive divisions of the Hellenic race. They are said to have dwelt originally in the S. W. part of the plain of Thessaly, and thence to have spread over other regions of Greece, and after the Doric invasion of the Peloponnesus to have occupied the N. W. coast region of Asia Minor, from them called .Aeolis, and the islands of Lesbos and Tenedos. Of the Aeolic dialect of the Greek, which was chiefly developed in Lesbos, only scanty specimens have been preserved; these bring it nearer to the Doric than the Attic. Mythologically, the Aeolians were descended from Aeolus, the son of Hellen.