akritas
06-18-2007, 01:15 PM
Historian and Professor Eugene Borza is credited as a "Macedonian specialist" by the American Philological Association and has completed extensive studies regarding the ethnicity of the ancient Macedonians. Borza has also presented in-depth analysis that the ancient Macedonians were not "Slavs" or a mixture of Slavs and Romans, as one of many different Macedonian Slav historiographical positions claim. In his Macedonia Redux Borza writes:
The Macedonian kingdom was absorbed into the Roman Empire, never to recover its independence. During medieval and modem times, Macedonia was known as a Balkan region inhabited by ethnic Greeks, Albanians, Vlachs, Serbs, Bulgarians, Jews, and Turks.
Also Borza in “In the shadow of Olympus; The emergence of Macedon” on the origin of the ancient Macedonians:
We have seen that the “Makedones” or “highlanders” of mountainous western Macedonia may have been derived from northwest Greek stock. That is, northwest Greece provided a pool of Indo-European speakers of proto-Greek from which emerged the tribes who were later known by different names as they established their regional identities in separate parts of the country. Thus the Macedonians may have been related to those peoples who at an earlier time migrated south to become the historical Dorians, and to other Pindus tribes who were the ancestors of the Epirotes or Molossians
Without a common national entity and distinguished historical path as a nation, the present FYROMacedonia was part of Serbia since 1912 with the name of VARDARSKA and with Skopje as its capital. In 1929, following an administrative reorganization of the "Kingdom of Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia", which consisted of 33 Districts (Oblasti), the "Kingdom of South-Slavia" (Yugoslavia) was created, with 9 Administrative Districts (Banobina) and a 10th one, independent, the Administrative District of Belgrade. The boundaries of the 9 Districts where set with geophysical criterias, in a way that they did not disturb any ethnological elements. Due to the inborn ethnological problem of the entire Dominion, which was composed of a mosaic of nationalities, the reformation law had foreseen the non existence, for each of the administrative districts, of common ethnographic elements, which could incubate future moves for independence.Loring Danforth points out in his book 'Who are the Macedonians?':
The history of the construction of a macedonian national identity does not begin with alexander the great in the fourth century b.c. or with saints cyril and methodius in the ninth century a.d., as Macedonian nationalist historians often claim. nor does it begin with tito and the establishment of the people's republic of macedonia in 1944 as Greek nationalist historians would have us beleive. It begins in the nineteenth century with the first expressions of macedonian ethnic nationalism on the part of a small number of intellectuals in places like thessaloniki, belgrade, sophia, and st.petersburg. this period marks the beginning of the process of "imagining" a macedonian national community, the beginning of the construction of a macedonian national identity and culture"
FYROMacedonian historiography had continued this “imagining process” via historical revisionism.
Historical revisionism is the attempt to change commonly held ideas about the past. In its legitimate form, it is the re-examination of historical facts, with an eye towards updating historical narratives with newly discovered, more accurate, or less biased information, acknowledging that history of an event, as it has been traditionally told, may not be entirely accurate.
However historical revisionism can also be used as a label to describe the views of self-taught historians who publish articles that deliberately misrepresent and manipulate historical evidence. This process or ideology in regards to FYROMacedonian historiography is identified by Bulgarian historians, Western historians and some Greek historians as Macedonism
Macedonism is the political idea currently prevalent in the Republic of Macedonia which advocates revising history in order to project the continuity of a Macedonian ethnic group since the Slavic migrations of the middle ages and even since antiquity. This is done by appropriating various historical figures and groups to have inhabited the Macedonian region as "ethnically" Slav Macedonian. For example, Tsar Samuil and his medival kingdom is denied to have Bulgarian, despite overwhelming evidence supporting it. Tsar Samuel is defined as a "Slavic" or "Macedonian" king in FYROMacedonian historiography. Further attempts are made to appropriate the Hellenic nature of the ancient kingdom of Macedon and to seek connections between present day ethnic Slav Macedonians and the Ancient Macedonians.
What are the aims of the Macedonists after the creation of the Macedonian Slav State ? Maria Nystazopoulou Pelekidou writes:Their first aim was to cut off every link between the so-called "Macedonians" and the Bulgarians, as a well as the Serbs, and to convince the people that they belonged to a separate Slavic nation, the "Macedonian" one
The second aim was to eliminate Greek character of Macedonia and Macedonian history; and this would be achieved by minimizing the Greek presence in this region and misinterpreting or falsifying their role, specifically the cultural and intellectual contribution of Hellenism, the orthodox Greek clergy and Greek schools.
The third aim was to search for, fabricate and project the historical development of the so-called "Macedonian people", so as to prove the separate national identity of the "Macedonians", as well as their cohesion and continuity from ancient times until today.
The fourth aim was to create a Great Idea, which would bring awareness to the masses. So the historians of Skopje started declaring that Macedonia, as a whole, was a Slavic country both in its historical tradition and its ethnic composition. For this reason, it had to be united and form a unified state.
This is why Macedonian Slav historiography claims the ancient Macedonians were Slavs or later mixed with Slavs. This is to say that the Macedonians of antiquity were a non-Greek tribe and that the Slavonic migrations of the 6th cent. found no Greek presence in Macedonia. According to the Slav migrations mix theory the Slav invaders assimilated the indigenous population and thus somehow the Macedonian Slav ethnogenesis occured. In this way, Skopje has appropriated for itself not only the ancient Greek history but also medival Bulgarian history and almost any other historical figure or achievement associated with the Macedonian region.
Source
1-Eugene Borza, “Macedonian Redux”
2-Loring Danforth, “The Macedonia Conflict”
3-Maria Nystazopoulou Pelekidou, “The Macedonian Question”
4-Historical Revisionism, wikipedia
Authors note:
This article is a responce the Macedonian Slav article of the title "Why is Greece Stealing the Macedonian History?"
The Macedonian kingdom was absorbed into the Roman Empire, never to recover its independence. During medieval and modem times, Macedonia was known as a Balkan region inhabited by ethnic Greeks, Albanians, Vlachs, Serbs, Bulgarians, Jews, and Turks.
Also Borza in “In the shadow of Olympus; The emergence of Macedon” on the origin of the ancient Macedonians:
We have seen that the “Makedones” or “highlanders” of mountainous western Macedonia may have been derived from northwest Greek stock. That is, northwest Greece provided a pool of Indo-European speakers of proto-Greek from which emerged the tribes who were later known by different names as they established their regional identities in separate parts of the country. Thus the Macedonians may have been related to those peoples who at an earlier time migrated south to become the historical Dorians, and to other Pindus tribes who were the ancestors of the Epirotes or Molossians
Without a common national entity and distinguished historical path as a nation, the present FYROMacedonia was part of Serbia since 1912 with the name of VARDARSKA and with Skopje as its capital. In 1929, following an administrative reorganization of the "Kingdom of Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia", which consisted of 33 Districts (Oblasti), the "Kingdom of South-Slavia" (Yugoslavia) was created, with 9 Administrative Districts (Banobina) and a 10th one, independent, the Administrative District of Belgrade. The boundaries of the 9 Districts where set with geophysical criterias, in a way that they did not disturb any ethnological elements. Due to the inborn ethnological problem of the entire Dominion, which was composed of a mosaic of nationalities, the reformation law had foreseen the non existence, for each of the administrative districts, of common ethnographic elements, which could incubate future moves for independence.Loring Danforth points out in his book 'Who are the Macedonians?':
The history of the construction of a macedonian national identity does not begin with alexander the great in the fourth century b.c. or with saints cyril and methodius in the ninth century a.d., as Macedonian nationalist historians often claim. nor does it begin with tito and the establishment of the people's republic of macedonia in 1944 as Greek nationalist historians would have us beleive. It begins in the nineteenth century with the first expressions of macedonian ethnic nationalism on the part of a small number of intellectuals in places like thessaloniki, belgrade, sophia, and st.petersburg. this period marks the beginning of the process of "imagining" a macedonian national community, the beginning of the construction of a macedonian national identity and culture"
FYROMacedonian historiography had continued this “imagining process” via historical revisionism.
Historical revisionism is the attempt to change commonly held ideas about the past. In its legitimate form, it is the re-examination of historical facts, with an eye towards updating historical narratives with newly discovered, more accurate, or less biased information, acknowledging that history of an event, as it has been traditionally told, may not be entirely accurate.
However historical revisionism can also be used as a label to describe the views of self-taught historians who publish articles that deliberately misrepresent and manipulate historical evidence. This process or ideology in regards to FYROMacedonian historiography is identified by Bulgarian historians, Western historians and some Greek historians as Macedonism
Macedonism is the political idea currently prevalent in the Republic of Macedonia which advocates revising history in order to project the continuity of a Macedonian ethnic group since the Slavic migrations of the middle ages and even since antiquity. This is done by appropriating various historical figures and groups to have inhabited the Macedonian region as "ethnically" Slav Macedonian. For example, Tsar Samuil and his medival kingdom is denied to have Bulgarian, despite overwhelming evidence supporting it. Tsar Samuel is defined as a "Slavic" or "Macedonian" king in FYROMacedonian historiography. Further attempts are made to appropriate the Hellenic nature of the ancient kingdom of Macedon and to seek connections between present day ethnic Slav Macedonians and the Ancient Macedonians.
What are the aims of the Macedonists after the creation of the Macedonian Slav State ? Maria Nystazopoulou Pelekidou writes:Their first aim was to cut off every link between the so-called "Macedonians" and the Bulgarians, as a well as the Serbs, and to convince the people that they belonged to a separate Slavic nation, the "Macedonian" one
The second aim was to eliminate Greek character of Macedonia and Macedonian history; and this would be achieved by minimizing the Greek presence in this region and misinterpreting or falsifying their role, specifically the cultural and intellectual contribution of Hellenism, the orthodox Greek clergy and Greek schools.
The third aim was to search for, fabricate and project the historical development of the so-called "Macedonian people", so as to prove the separate national identity of the "Macedonians", as well as their cohesion and continuity from ancient times until today.
The fourth aim was to create a Great Idea, which would bring awareness to the masses. So the historians of Skopje started declaring that Macedonia, as a whole, was a Slavic country both in its historical tradition and its ethnic composition. For this reason, it had to be united and form a unified state.
This is why Macedonian Slav historiography claims the ancient Macedonians were Slavs or later mixed with Slavs. This is to say that the Macedonians of antiquity were a non-Greek tribe and that the Slavonic migrations of the 6th cent. found no Greek presence in Macedonia. According to the Slav migrations mix theory the Slav invaders assimilated the indigenous population and thus somehow the Macedonian Slav ethnogenesis occured. In this way, Skopje has appropriated for itself not only the ancient Greek history but also medival Bulgarian history and almost any other historical figure or achievement associated with the Macedonian region.
Source
1-Eugene Borza, “Macedonian Redux”
2-Loring Danforth, “The Macedonia Conflict”
3-Maria Nystazopoulou Pelekidou, “The Macedonian Question”
4-Historical Revisionism, wikipedia
Authors note:
This article is a responce the Macedonian Slav article of the title "Why is Greece Stealing the Macedonian History?"