Livius.Org about ancient Macedonia

[Tsontos]

Well first of all its quite sad (for 2 distinct reasons) that maybe the thread with the biggest posting in that forum is about the anti-Greek propaganda...

As far as I m concerned, the most worrying is when it comes from non FYROM sources
Following the links of this website (http://www.livius.org/) which is rather popular in the web, I came across very awful commenting on the pro Greek sites about Macedonia..actually its very close to the FYROM views
http://www.isidore-of-seville.com/alexander/19.html#GreekMacedonian

Just make sure you dont give to similar individuals the chance to comment on you the way they have commented the other sites which show the Greek prespective (ie avoid Greek propaganda of half truth, or shall I say the "Greek truth")



interesting site.


Quotes from Peter Green's work subjected to pro-Macedonian (Skopje) reasoning. These guys have an absolutely enormous collection of such pages, taking apart ancient and modern authors to prove their case. This mostly means pointing out that ancient and modern authors will contrast "Greek" and "Macedonian" troops. But, of course, nobody disputes that. It's a shame that so much scholarly zeal should be wasted in poor methodology and for ugly ends. If we could only put these people to work typing up Arrian for the internet...


hes got that right.

[Tsontos]

In response to his part about the albanians I sent the following email:

Hi. On your Alexander site and in particular you politics and Nationalism title you wrote the following:

"This is, of course, bunk. Alexander is regularly called "Greek," and, in antiquity, "Macedonian" was not always in apposition to Greek. But the Albanian claim is quite good. Alexander's mother Olympias was from Epirus, and most scholars think the Epirotes are—as much as anyone can be at such a remove—the ancestors of the modern Albanians. I don't know what the state of the evidence is, but elite Epirotes, like Olympias, were clearly much hellenized. So, Albanians get a piece of him, but, um, so what?"


I guarantee you with my life you will not find one non-albanian scholar who beleives the Epirots are "removed ancestors of modern Albanians". It is the Illyrians from whom the Albanians are considered by many to be descended. The Illyrians were not Greeks. If you knew about Alexander's campaigns you would know that he defeated the Illyrians and that the Illyrians, although Hellenized in some respect were not Greek. The Epirots, including the famous Phyrrus of Epirus (synonymous with the Greek-Roman wars and from whom the phrase Phyrric victory is derived), Olympias, Ajax (of the Illiad) were all Greek.

Whether or not you consider the modern Greeks the descendents of the ancients is not relevant. the Epirots are only considered non Greek and the same as the Illyrians by extreme Albanian nationalists. If you dont beleive my look it up, practice what you preach, and change what you've written there.


P.S I am Greek and I commend you on a very good site.

[paniskos]

in the macedonia highlands under the hellenic sky

[Ptolemy]

I just read this one.

http://www.livius.org/maa-mam/macedonia/macedonia.html

Its author is Jona Lendering. His further infos can be found in the following link.

http://www.nlpvf.nl/basic/auteur1.php?Author_ID=246

What do you think about it??

I will read it carefully and comment it myself tomorrow when i will some more free time.

[Orphic_Hymn]

Im not really sure about it. I get the feeling that when an author has a vested skopjian interest they go as close as they can to their positions but are afraid to go all the way. a bit fishy me thinks..

My thoughts exactly.. I'll explain..


Firstly, the language being Hellinized is out of the question simply because we know that if they where somehow Hellinized, then that must have been caused by the colonies that other Hellinic states had on Makedonia's coasts, and which were Ionian-speaking.
So, if they were Hellinized, then the Hellinic words in the newly adopted "language" should have been produced by the "Hellenization" and that means that they were supposed to be of the Ionian dialect.. which we know beyond doubt that they were not..

But that wasn't what smells rat.. it was the reference to Babylonian cuneiform...

I did a little search and fell on this site:
http://www.upennmuseum.com/cuneiform.cgi

Here when placing the letter 'F' to find the spelling for (Φερενικη or Φιλιππος) we see the following :

http://www.upennmuseum.com/images/cunF.gif


OK, I guess...
The interesting part appears when we look into the possible Makedonian pronounciation of the same name and place the letter 'V' to represent the sound in (Βερνικη)


http://www.upennmuseum.com/images/cunV.gif

Its exactly the same scribble.. :angry:



By the way, never seen this Eumenes issue before...
Anyone have any idea where he picked this one up (if he did) ???

[Ptolemy]

I have got the feeling that its another hidden skopjan attempt to falsificate history through this "professor".

First thing that seems fishy is the first paragraph.

Macedonia: ancient landscape and state, situated in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and northern Greece

The greek province of Macedonia territory covers most of the original northern Greek region of ancient Macedonia with a tiny part being in FYROM. We should contact him to change it. As it is written, its misleading.


the Greek commander Eumenes needed a translator to address the soldiers of the Macedonian phalanx.

Thats crap!!! Eumenes sent a Macedonian to speak to them in the Macedonian dialect, in order to win their confidence.

According to this person's logic by reading the following we should conclude that Atheneans...needed interpreters to communicate with Dorians!!!


At dawn he fell upon the Ambraciots while they were still abed, ignorant of what had passed, and fully thinking that it was their own countrymen—Demosthenes having purposely put the Messenians in front with orders to address them in the Doric dialect, and thus to inspire confidence in the sentinels, who would not be able to see them as it was still night.

[Thucydides (3-112)]


Thinking of Philotas incident, Philotas had stated that using the Koine would make his speech "easier to understand", indicating that the Macedonian dialect was not incomprehensible to the non-Macedonians but a bit more difficult to understand. In fact, the whole incident shows the Macedonian dialect was not that different from the Koine and could be understood eventhough it had some difficulty by other Greeks. This also explains the quick disappearance of the Macedonian dialect and the quick adoption of the Koine from Macedonians.

[Ptolemy]

However this may be, Alexander was a loyal ally of Darius' son Xerxes when he tried to conquer Greece in 480. As is well known, the Persian annexation of Greece was not successful.

Yeah so loyal that he was betraying his secrets to the rest of Greeks!! The author makes many mistakes.

Let me write the whole story. Alexander being a subject of the Persian Empire was obliged to be in the Persian side, just like next year he would be in the Persian camp at Plataiai.


Xerxes, being aware of the Greeks expecting him at Tempi, found another pass and was intending to take them aback and easily slaughter them.


But Alexander I was a Greek. And he couldn't tolerate Greeks being slaughtered and free Greece being invaded and occupied by Persians. So he sent a message to Themistocles (from up to this moment their personal friendship started) and announced him the itinerary, through another mountain path, that Xerxes and his army intended to follow. Therefore he saved the Athenians from the Persian assault.


For his acts in Tempi and Plataies Alexander A received an official diploma-award from the Ellanodikai ("Greek Senate-Jury") of the Panhellenion (pan-hellenic league). This "diploma" recognised him as...


ÅËËÇÍ ÔÙÍ ÐÁÍÕ ÅËËÇÍÙÍ


ELLIN TON PANY ELLINON


GREEK OF THE GREATEST GREEKS


After the victory at Plataies, the southern Greeks erected a golden bust of Alexander A at Delphoi, the pan-hellenic Greek Sanctuary and Oracle of Apollo.



He tried to deny the increasing differences by calling himself philhellenos ("friend of the Greeks"), and claimed that his family descended from the Greek city of Argos (text), a claim that was recognized by the authorities at the Olympic Games. Still it must be noted that the title philhellenos itself implies that the nation that Alexander represented was not Greek (no Greek king needed to call himself "friend of the Greeks").

When will these know-it-all "professors" will learn that both greek kings (Agesilaos, Euagoras) and greek leaders (Iason of Pherai, etc) were repeatedly called 'Philhellenes'? What kind of ass arguments this guy uses!!!

[Ptolemy]

Alexander also claimed that he had never been fully loyal to his Persian overlord, but this is contradicted by his behavior during the war, by the marriage alliance, and -as late as the 460's- by his support of Themistocles, who had been exiled by the Athenians and was on the run to Persia.

The one who is self-contradicted is this "professor". He wasnt indeed fully loyal. If he was, he wouldnt betray secrets to the greek army. What does his support for Themistocles has to do about it?? Themistocles was supported also by the king of Epirus while he was exiled. So???

[Ptolemy]

Thirdly, many historical sources are written in Greek, and it was a common practice among Greek historians to hellenize foreign names. For example, the name of the powerful first king of the Persian empire, Kuruš, ought to be transcribed as Kourous or Kouroux in Greek, but became Kyros, because this looks like a Greek word ("Mr. Almighty"). The name that is rendered as Alexandros, which has a perfect Greek etymology, may in fact represent something like Alaxandus, which is not Greek. A related argument that forces us to hesitate is that the Greeks nearly always converted the names of foreign deities. Supreme gods like Jupiter and Marduk are called "Zeus". So, the fact that Greek authors use Greek names for Macedonian people and deities does not prove very much about the Macedonian language.

How many times are we gonna repeat ourselves into this?

I agree Greeks had a tedency to regularize foreign names. Examples are:

- The name Artaxerxes is the regularization of the original Persian name Artakhshathra.

- The name Xerxes is the regularization of the original Persian name Khshayarsha.

- The name Darius from the regularization of the old Persian name Dârayawuð.

Or even the name of the famous Indian founder of the Mauryan empire Chandragupta was regularised from Greeks into Sandracottus.

BUT All these regularised foreign names like the ones above have no meaning in Greek. From the other hand All Macedonian names like Alexandros and Phillipos are completely meaningful in greek in their original forms therefore there was no need anyone to regularize them.

This guy found one name having meaning in greek and act if its the rule with all foreign names. :angry:

Behindthename has this definition:

From Κυρος (Kyros), the Greek form of the Persian name Kûrush, which may mean "far sighted" or may be related to the Persian word khur "sun". The name is sometimes associated with Greek κυριος (kyrios) "lord". This was the name of several kings of Persia, including Cyrus the Great, who conquered Babylon. He is famous in the Old Testament for freeing the captive Jews and allowing them to return to Israel.

I happen to disagree with behindthename. Noone is telling us that 'Κύρος' wasnt adopted in the greek language AFTER Cyrus the great. The meaning of Κύρος is indeed Almighty as the ancient Greeks considered the particular King of Persia. Anyone knows more about the word 'κύρος'??

Dont forget that the name Croesos (=Κροίσος) was adopted in Greek language AFTER the legendary lydian King, NOT BEFORE.

His argument is flawed.

[Tsontos]

ton gamises ton ollando!

[Ptolemy]

A nice reply from George Cawkwell's (Fellow of the University College,
Oxford) in his book "Philip of Macedon," Faber & Faber, London, 1978, pp. 22

"The Macedonians were Greeks. Their language was Greek, to judge by their personal names and by the names of the months of the calendar;
Macedonian ambassadors could appear before the Athenian assembly without needing interpreters; in all Demosthenes' sneers about their civilization there is no hint that Macedonians spoke other than Greek. But it was a distinct dialect not readily intelligible to other Greeks; linguistically as geographically, Macedonia was remote from the main stream of Greek life.

[Ptolemy]

With the valuable contribution of Orphic:

Cyrus
L., from Gk. Kyros, from O.Pers. Kurush, a name of unknown etymology. In Heb., Koresh, and in that form taken c.1990 by Wayne Howell of Texas, U.S., when he became head of the Branch Davidian cult there.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?...earchmode=none



Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon


kuros , eos, to,

A. supreme power, authority, k. echein amphi tinos A.Supp. 391 ; tôn prêgmatôn to k. echein Hdt.6.109 ; hapan to k. echein Th.5.38 , cf. Pl.Grg.450e, al.; k. echein peri tinos Id.Cra.435c ; to k. tês energeias principle or origin of a function, Gal.10.459.

2. concrete, one invested with authority, Pl.Lg.70cc.

II. confirmation, validity, echein k., = kekurôsthai, S.OC1779 (anap.), cf. POxy.2110.12 (iv A.D.), etc.; hê nun . . huparxei k. hêmera kalôn S.El.919 ; k. labein, of a law, to be ratified, D.C.38.17, al.:--kuros and all derivs. are post-Hom. (Cf. Skt. śūas 'valiant', OIr. caur 'hero', Welsh cawr 'giant'

post-Hom!!! Sounds like we have another case like Croesus!!

[Ptolemy]

To continue with livius.org and the claims of the author.

However, there is some room for doubt. To start with, there are also Macedonian names that have no Greek parallel (Arridaeus or Sabattaras).

Looks like we have here another inaccuracy!!
Arridaeos according to an inscription was a man from Kos (BC BCH 86 (1962) P.275 N 4, 5) (Spoudes Klassikis Filol. APT)
The greek etymology is Ari (= much) + adj Daios (= terrifying). Its full meaning is "too terrifying". Its Aeolian type is Arribaeos.

[Tsontos]

I dont know if anyones brought this up before but this site is promintently linked on the side of the FYROM propaganda site historyofmacedonia.org!

see for yourselves! History of Macedonia and the Macedonian Nation (http://www.historyofmacedonia.org/)