Modern historians on the Ancient Macedonians and ancient Macedonia

[Makedonia25]

Here are some thoughts on what the modern historians believe about the Ancient Macedonians...

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Origins and Languages of the Ancient Macedonians

A.H.M. Jones, ‘The Greek City: From Alexander to Justinian’, Oxford University Press (Clarendon Press), 1998 p. 289

"In Greece and Macedonia Greek was of course the indigenous language of all classes of the population."


Eugene N. Borza, ‘Makedonika’,
Regina Books, Claremont CA, p.114

"Our understanding of the Macedonians' emergence into history is confounded by two events: the establishment of the Macedonians as an identifiable ethnic group, and the foundation of their ruling house. The "HIGHLANDERS" or "MAKEDONES" of the mountainous regions of western Macedonia ARE DERIVED FROM NORTHWEST GREEK STOCK; THEY WERE AKIN BOTH TO THOSE WHO AT AN EARLIER TIME MAY HAVE MIGRATED SOUTH TO BECOME THE HISTORICAL "DORIANS", and to other Pindus tribes who were the ancestors of the Epirotes or Molossians. That is, we may suggest that NORTHWEST GREECE PROVIDED A POOL OF INDO-EUROPEAN SPEAKERS OF PROTO-GREEK from which were drawn the tribes who later were known by different names as they established their regional identities in separate parts of the country."

"First, the matter of the Hellenic origins of the Macedonians: Nicholas Hammond's general
conclusion (though not the details of his arguments)that the origin of the Macedonians lies in the pool of proto-Greek speakers who migrated out of the Pindus mountains during the Iron Age, is acceptable."


David Noel Freedman, ‘The Anchor Bible Dictionary’
Doubleday, 1992, pg 1093

“The first Greek-speaking people in the southern Balkan Peninsula arrived in Macedonia, Thessaly, and Epirus sometime after 2600 B.C. and developed, probably due to the extreme mountainous nature of the country, their several different dialects.”


Charles Edson ‘Ancient Macedonian Studies in honor of Charles F. Edson’
London, 1981, pgs 27-71

“After the end of the Bronze Age another migration of peoples entered the Greek peninsula. These peoples, whom modern scholars call ‘West Greeks’ and of whom the most important single element was the Dorians, came from the rugged Pindos mountains of northwest of the Greek peninsula proper. But the Pindos area with little arable land could not support the expanding population and the lands to the south could no longer receive immigrants from the north. Important West Greek elements remained in the Pindos. These are those whom Herodotus called ‘Makednon ethnos’ and there developed a gradual movement towards the northeast across the Pindos range into the region which was to become known as ‘Upper Macedonia.’ By around 700 we find ‘Macednic’ tribes occupying the eastern slopes of the Pindos.

Among these tribes were the Orestai in the area of Lake Kastoria. From Orestis - as the regions was called - came a clan called the Argeadai, ‘descendants of Argeas”, whose kings claimed descent from the Temenid kings of Argos and thus from Herakles. The validity of this claim was never challenged in antiquity. The Argeadai, in search of fertile land for settlement, moved eastward and occupied the coastal plain along the northwestern shore of the Aegean Sea between Mount Olympus and the Haliakmon River. They expelled the Pieres, who left their name to the region called after them, Pieria. In northwest Pieria, close to the Haliakmon, the kings founded their citadel Aigai where the royal tombs were situated. The next step in the expansion of the Argead kingdom was the expulsion of the Bottiaians. These two regions, Pieria and Bottiaia, were to become the heartland of the kingdom. Unlike their ‘Macednic’ relatives in Upper Macedonian the Argead Macedonians were exposed to all the political and economic currents and cultural influences of the Aegean world.

The basic institutions of the kingdom were those of early Greeks. At the head of the folk was the king who was the war commander and was responsible for the relations of his people with the gods. An assembly of the fighting men chose the new king from the available males of the royal family, usually the oldest son of the former king, and could express the desires and attitudes of the folk. Of high importance were the king’s Companions, the hetairoi. They were the king’s personal retainers. They fought for him in battle and in peace served as he desired. In return they received land grants and other perquisites. In social status and function they recall the Homeric hetairoi of the Achaian rulers. This personal relationship of mutual benefit and obligation was to become the specifically Macedonian system of government. It was solemnized by the festival of the Hetairideia in honour of Zeus Hetairides at which the king presided.

This society had its peculiar customs and practices. There are traces of the blood feud. A Macedonian who had not yet killed an enemy was obliged to wear a halter around his waist. The marriage ceremony was the severing of a loaf of bread by the bride and groom, who then tasted the two portions. Feasting and wassail were the relaxations of the aristocracy and hunting their passionate avocation. In the early spring of each year the formal purification of the army, headed by the king, took place with the fighting men in full panoply. A sham battle ended the purification. Although the basic religion of the Macedonians was Greek, as is shown by the names of the months and by the belief that the folk descended from Makedon, son of Zeus, and the royal family from Herakles, there was strong Thracian influence from the peoples the Macedonians had expelled or subdued. This is the origin of the emotional Sabazios worship among the Macedonians with its local variant of the satyrs, the Sauadai, and bacchantes, Klodones and Mimallones. It is little wonder that to the Greeks of the city-states this society should seem alien, un-Hellenic, or, as they would say, ‘barbarian’.”


Malcolm Errington, ‘A History of Macedonia’
University of California Press, February 1993, pg 3

"That the Macedonians and their kings did in fact speak a dialect of Greek and bore Greek names may be regarded nowadays as certain."

"Ancient allegations that the Macedonians were non-Greeks all had their origin in Athens at the time of the struggle with Philip II. Then as now, political struggle created the prejudice. The orator Aeschines once even found it necessary, in order to counteract the prejudice vigorously fomented by his opponents, to defend Philip on this issue and describe him at a meeting of the Athenian Popular Assembly as being 'Entirely Greek'. Demosthenes' allegations were lent on appearance of credibility by the fact, apparent to every observer, that the life-style of the Macedonians, being determined by specific geographical and historical conditions, was different from that of a Greek city-state. This alien way of life was, however, common to western Greeks of Epiros, Akarnania and Aitolia, as well as to the Macedonians, and their fundamental Greek nationality was never doubted. Only as a consequence of the political disagreement with Macedonia was the issue raised at all."

"The Molossians were the strongest and, decisive for Macedonia, most easterly of the three most important Epirote tribes, which, like Macedonia but unlike the Thesprotians and the Chaonians, still retained their monarchy. They were Greeks, spoke a similar dialect to that of Macedonia, suffered just as much from the depredations of the Illyrians and were in principle the natural partners of the Macedonian king who wished to tackle the Illyrian problem at its roots."


Robert Morkot, ‘The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Greece’
Penguin Publishing USA, January 1997

"Certainly the Thracians and the Illyrians were non-Greek speakers, but in the northwest, the peoples of Molossis (Epirot province), Orestis and Lynkestis spoke West Greek. It is also accepted that the Macedonians spoke a dialect of Greek and although they absorbed other groups into their territory, they were essentially Greeks."


Nicholas G. L. Hammond, ‘Philip of Macedon’
Duckworth Publishing, February 1998

"Philip was born a Greek of the most aristocratic, indeed of divine, descent... Philip was both a Greek and a Macedonian, even as Demosthenes was a Greek and an Athenian...The Macedonians over whom Philip was to rule were an outlying family member of the Greek-speaking peoples."

"As subjects of the king the Upper Macedonians were henceforth on the same footing as the original Macedonians, in that they could qualify for service in the King's Forces and thereby obtain the elite citizenship. At one bound the territory, the population and wealth of the kingdom were doubled. Moreover since the great majority of the new subjects were speakers of the West Greek dialect, the enlarged army was Greek-speaking throughout."


Nicholas G. L. Hammond, ‘The Macedonian State: The Origins, Institutions and History’
Oxford University Press, Reprint Edition, July 1997; 4. The Language of the Macedonians, pgs 413, pgs12-14

"What language did these 'Macedones' speak? The name itself is Greek in root and in ethnic termination. It probably means 'highlanders,' and it is comparable to Greek tribal names such as 'Orestai' and 'Oreitai,' meaning 'mountain-men.' A reputedly earlier variant, 'Maketai,' has the same root, which means 'high,' as in the Greek adjective 'makednos' or the noun 'mekos.' The genealogy of eponymous ancestors which Hesiod recorded (p. 3 above) has a bearing on the question of Greek speech. First, Hesiod made Macedon a brother of Magnes; as we know from inscriptions that the Magnetes spoke the Aeolic dialect of the Greek language, we have a predisposition to suppose that the Macedones spoke the Aeolic dialect. Secondly, Hesiod made Macedon and Magnes first cousins of Hellen's three sons - Dorus, Xouthus, and Aeolus - who were the founders of three dialects of Greek speech, namely Doric, Ionic, and Aeolic. Hesiod would not have recored thisrelationship, unless he had believed, probably in the seventh century, that the Macedones were a Greek-speaking people. The next evidence comes from Persia. At the turn of the sixth century the Persians described the tribute-paying peoples of their province in Europe, and one of them was the 'yauna takabara,' which meant the 'Greeks wearing the hat.' There were Greeks in Greek city-states here and there in the province, but they were of various origins and not distinguished by a common hat, the 'kausia.' We conclude that the Persians believed the Macedonians to be speakers of Greek. Finally, in the latter part of the fifth century a Greek historian, Hellanicus, visited Macedonia and modified Hesiod's genealogy by bringing Macedon and his descendants firmly into the Aeolic branch of the Greek-speaking family.

Hesiod, Persia, Hellanicus had no motive for making a false statement about the language of the Macedonians, who were then an obscure and not a powerful people. Their independent testimonies should be accepted as conclusive. That, however, is not the opinion of most scholars. They disregard or fail to assess the evidence which I have cited, and they turn instead to 'Macedonian' words and names, or/and to literary references. Philologists have studied words which have been cited as Macedonian' in ancient lexica and glossaries, and they have come to no certain conclusion; for some of the words are clearly Greek, and some are clearly not Greek. That is not surprising; for as the territory of the Macedonians expanded, they overlaid and lived with peoples who spoke Illyrian, Paeonian, Thracian and Phrygian, and they certainly borrowed words from them which excited the authors of lexica and glossaries. The philological studies result in a verdict, in my opinion, of 'non liquet.'

The toponyms of the Macedonian homeland are the most significant. Nearly all of them are Greek: Pieria, Lebaea, Heracleum, Dium, Petra, Leibethra, Aegae, Aegydium, Acesae, Acesamenae; the rivers Helicon, Aeson, Leucus, Baphyras, Sardon, Elpe'u's, Mitys; lake Ascuris and the region Lapathus. The mountain names Olympus and Titarium may be pre-Greek; Edessa, the earlier name for the place where Aegae was founded, and its river Ascordus were Phrygian.

The deities worshipped by the Macedones and the names which they gave to the months were predominantly Greek, and there is no doubt that these were not borrowings. To Greek literary writers before the Hellenistic period the Macedonians were 'barbarians.' The term referred to their way of life and their institutions, which were those of the 'ethne' and not of the city-state, and it did not refer to their speech. We can see this in the case of Epirus. There Thucydides called the tribes 'barbarians.' But inscriptions found in Epirus have shown conclusively that the Epirote tribes in Thucydides' lifetime were speaking Greek and used names which were Greek.

In the following century 'barbarian' was only one of the abusive terms applied by Demosthenes to Philip of Macedon and his people. In passages which refer to the Macedonian soldiers of Alexander the Great and the early successors there are mentions of a Macedonian dialect, such as was likely to have been spoken in the original Macedonian homeland. On one occassion Alexander 'called out to his guardsmen in Macedonian ('Makedonisti'), as this [viz. the use of 'Macedonian'] was a signal ('symbolon') that there was a serious riot.' Normally Alexander and his soldiers spoke standard Greek, the 'koine,' and that was what the Persians who were to fight alongside the Macedonians were taught. So the order 'in Macedonian' was unique, in that all other orders were in the 'koine.' It is satisfactorily explained as an order in broad dialect, just as in the Highland Regiment a special order for a particular purpose could be given in broad Scots by a Scottish officer who usually spoke the King's English.

The use of this dialect among themselves was a characteristic of the Macedonian soldiers (rather that the officers) of the King's Army. This point is made clear in the report - not in itself dependable - of the trial of a Macedonian officer before an Assembly of Macedonians, in which the officer (Philotas) was mocked for not speaking in dialect. In 321 when a non-Macedonian general, Eumenes, wanted to make contact with a hostile group of Macedonian infantrymen, he sent a Macedonian to speak to them in the Macedonian dialect, in order to win their confidence. Subsequently, when they and the other Macdonian soldiers were serving with Eumenes, they expresed their affection for him by hailing him in the Macedonian dialect ('Makedonisti'). He was to be one of themselves. As Curtius observed, 'not a man among the Macedonians could bear to part with a jot of his ancestral customs.' The use of this dialect was one way in which the Macedonians expressed their apartness from the world of the Greek city-states.


A.B. Bosworth, ‘Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great’
Cambridge University Press, Reissue Edition, March 1993

"Alexander ruled the world as his father had ruled Macedon, concentrating power in his own hands and office to his Companions. In nationality the Companions remained overwhemingly Hellenic."


Richard Stoneman, ‘Alexander the Great’
Routledge, September 1997, pgs 11-12

"In favour of the Greek identity of the Macedonians is what we know of their language: the place-names, names of the months and personal names, which are without exception Greek in roots and form. This suggests that they did not merely use Greek as a lingua franca, but spoke it as natives (though with a local accent which turns Philip into Bilip, for example). The Macedonians' own traditions derived their royal house from one Argeas, son of Macedon, son of Zeus, and asserted that a new dynasty, the Temenids, had its origin in the sixth century from emigrants from Argos in Greece, the first of these kings was Perdiccas. This tradition became a most important part of the cultural identity of Macedon. It enabled Alexander I to compete at the Olympic Games (which only true Hellenes were allowed to do); and it was embedded in the policy of Archelaus who invited Euripides from Athens to his court, where Euripides wrote not only the Bacchae but also lost play called Archelaus. (Socrates was also invited but declined.). It was in keeping with this background that Philip employed Aristotle - who had until then been helping Hermias of Atarneus in the Troad to rule as a Platonic "philosopher-king" - as tutor to his son, and that Alexander grew up with a devotion to Homer and the Homeric world which his own kingship so much recalled, and slept every night with the Iliad under his pillow.

The Macedonians, then, were racially Greek. The relation might not be so much that of British and Scots as of Germans and Austrians; but in the case of Macedon it was the smaller partner which effected the "Anschluss", as Philip's reign was devoted to gaining control not only of the northern Aegean but of the city-stated to mainland Greece, too."


Robin Lane Fox, ‘Alexander the Great’
Penguin USA, Reissue Edition, September 1994

"These plains would be the envy of any Greek visitor who crossed their southern border by the narrow vale of Tempe and the foot of Mount Olympus. He would pass the frontier post of Heraclion, town of Heracles, and stop at the harbour town of Dion, named after the Greek god Zeus, ancestor of the Macedonian kings, and site of a yearly nine-day festival of the arts in honour of Zeus and the nine Greek Muses. There he would walk through city gates in a wall of brick, down the paved length of a sacred way, between the theatre, gymnasiums and a temple with Doric pillars: suitably, the nearby villages were linked with the myth of Orpheus, the famous bard of Greek legend. He was still in a world of Greek gods and sacrifices, of Greek plays and Greek language, though the natives might speak Greek with a northern accent which hardened 'ch' into 'g', 'th' into 'd' and pronounced King Philip as 'Bilip'. Bearing on up the coast, he would find the plain no less abundant and the towns more defiantly Greek.’


J.R. Hamilton, ‘Alexander the Great’
Hutchinson, London, 1973

"That the Macedonians were of Greek stock seems certain. The claim made by the Argead dynasty to be of Argive descent may be no more than a generally accepted myth, but Macedonian proper names, such as Ptolemaios or Philippos, are good Greek names, and the names of the Macedonian months, although differed from those of Athens or Sparta, were also Greek. The language spoken by the Macedonians, which Greeks of the classical period found intelligible, appears to have been a primitive north-west Greek dialect, much influenced by the languages of the neighboring barbarians."


Ulrich Wilcken, ‘Alexander the Great’
W.W. Norton & Company, Reissue Edition March 1997

"It seems more and more certain that the Macedonians were a Greek tribe related to the Dorians. However, as they stayed high up in the distant north, they could not participate in the progress of civilization of the Greek people that migrated southward..."

"A strong Illyrian and Thracian influence can thus be recognized in Macedonian speech and manners. These however are only trifles compared with the Greek character of the Macedonian nationality; for example the names of the true full blooded Macedonians, especially of the princes and nobles, are purely Greek in their formation and sounds."

"And yet when we take into account the political conditions, religion and morals of the Macedonians, our conviction is strengthened that they were a Greek race akin to the Dorians."


Olivier Masson, ‘Oxford Classical Dictionary’
Edited by Simon Hornblower and Anthony Spawforth, 3rd edition (1996), Oxford University Press, Macedonian Language, pgs 905-906.

“The problem of the nature and origin of the Macedonian language is still disputed by modern scholars, but does not seem to have been raised among the ancients. We have a rare adverb ‘makedovisti’ (important passages in Plutarch, Alex.51 and Eum.14), but the meaning of this form is ambiguous. The adverb cannot tell us whether Plutarch had in mind a language different from Greek (cf. ‘foivikisti’, 'in Phoenician'), or a dialect (cf. ‘megaristi’, 'in Megarian'), or a way of speaking (cf. ‘attikisti’).

We have some 'Macedonian' glosses, particularly in Hesychius' lexicon, but they are mostly disputed and some were corrupted in the transmission. Thus ‘abroutes’, 'eyebrows' probably must be read as ‘abrouFes’ (with 't' which renders a digamma). If so, it is a Greek dialect; yet others (e.g. A.Meillet) see the dental as authentic and think that the word belongs to an Indo-European language different from Greek.

After more than a century we recognise among linguists two schools of thought. Those who reject the Greek affiliation of Macedonian prefer to treat it as an Indo-European language of the Balkans, located geographically and linguistically between Illyrian in the west and Thracian in the east. Some, like G.Bonfante (1987), look towards Illyrian; others, like I.I.Russu (1938), towards ‘Thraco-Phrygian’ (at the cost, sometimes, of unwarranted segmentations such as that of ‘Ale3avdros’ into ‘+ale-‘ and ‘+3avd’).

Those who favour a purely Greek nature of Macedonian as a northern Greek dialect are numerous and include early scholars like A.Fick (1874) and O.Hoffmann (1906). The Greek scholars, like G.Hatzidakis (1897, etc.) and above all J.Kalleris (1964 and 1976), have turned this assumption into a real dogma, with at times nationalistic overtones. This should not prevent us, however, from inclining towards this view.

For a long while Macedonian onomastics, which we know relatively well thanks to history, literary authors, and epigraphy, has played a considerable role in the discussion. In our view the Greek character of most names is obvious and it is difficult to think of a Hellenization due to wholesale borrowing. ‘Ptolemaios’ is attested as early as Homer, ‘Ale3avdros’ occurs next to Mycenaean feminine a-re-ka-sa-da-ra- ('Alexandra'), ‘Laagos’, then ‘Lagos’, matches the Cyprian 'Lawagos', etc. The small minority of names which do not look Greek, like ‘Arridaios’ or ‘Sabattaras’, may be due to a substratum or adstatum influences (as elsewhere in Greece).

Macedonian may then be seen as a Greek dialect, characterised by its marginal position and by local pronunciations (like ‘Berevika’ for ‘Ferevika’, etc.).

Yet in contrast with earlier views which made of it an Aeolic dialect (O.Hoffmann compared Thessalian) we must by now think of a link with North-West Greek (Locrian, Aetolian, Phocidian, Epirote). This view is supported by the recent discovery at Pella of a curse tablet (4th cent. BC) which may well be the first 'Macedonian' text attested (provisional publication by E.Voutyras; cf. the Bulletin Epigraphique in Rev.Et.Grec.1994, no.413); the text includes an adverb ‘opoka’ which is not Thessalian.

We must wait for new discoveries, but we may tentatively conclude that Macedonian is a dialect related to North-West Greek.”


Emeritus Professor of the University of Paris, Olivier Masson, Université de Paris X et Ecole des Hautes Etudes

‘Encyclopaedia of Greece and Hellenic Tradition’, Volume 2, Edited by Graham Speake, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2000, pg 972.

“The latest archaeological findings have confirmed that Macedonia took its name from a tribe of tall, Greek-speaking people, the Makednoi (ma(e)kos = length). They shared the same religious beliefs as the rest of the Hellenic world but up until the Classical period remained outside the cultural and political development of the southern city states.”

“Yet ‘vulgar’ Macedonians were not unanimously accepted by ‘refined’ southern Greeks, especially by Athenians, as brethren. Occasionally they were classified as ‘barbarians’. This was not due to some latent but still distinguishable Thracian and Paeonian cultural influences or to local linguistic peculiarities. To a certain extent Athenian reluctance could be attributed to the Macedonian’s rough manners, their monarchic government, and their delayed appearance on the scene. But the main source of antipathy was more than a century of conflict over eastern Macedonia, Thrace, the Chalcidice colonies, and, of course, the final victorious military involvement of Macedonia in southern affairs from 350 B.C. onwards which signalled the end of the Classical period.”


Thomas Martin, ‘Ancient Greece – From Prehistoric to Hellenic Times’
Yale University Press, 1996, pgs 188-189.

“Macedonians had their own language related to Greek, but members of the elite that dominated Macedonian society routinely learned to speak Greek because they thought of themselves and indeed all Macedonians as Greek by blood. At the same time, Macedonians looked down on the Greeks to the south as a soft lot unequal to the adversities of life in Macedonia. The Greeks reciprocated this scorn.”

“The situation was therefore grave in 359 B.C., when the Macedonian king Perdiccas and four thousand Macedonian troops were slaughtered in battle with the Illyrians, hostile neighbours to the north of Macedonia.”


John V.A. Fine, ‘The Ancient Greeks: A Critical History’ Harvard University Press, 1983, pgs 605-608.

“Since so little is known about the early Macedonians, it is hardly strange that in both ancient and modern times there has been much disagreement on their ethnic identity. The Greeks in general and Demosthenes in particular looked upon them as barbarians, that is, not Greek. Modern scholarship, after many generations of argument, now almost unanimously recognises them as Greeks, a branch of the Dorians and ‘NorthWest Greeks’ who, after long residence in the north Pindus region, migrated eastwards. The Macedonian language has not survived in any written text, but the names of individuals, places, gods, months, and the like suggest strongly that the language was a Greek dialect. Macedonian institutions, both secular and religious, had marked Hellenic characteristics and legends identify or link the people with the Dorians. During their sojourn in the Pindus complex and the long struggle to found a kingdom, however, the Macedonians fought and mingled constantly with Illyrians, Thracians, Paeonians, and probably various Greek tribes. Their language naturally acquired many Illyrian and Thracian loanwords, and some of their customs were surely influenced by their neighbours.

To the civilised Greek of the fifth and fourth centuries, the Macedonian way of life must have seemed crude and primitive. This backwardness in culture was mainly the result of geographical factors. The Greeks, who had proceeded south in the second millennium, were affected by the many civilising influences of the Mediterranean world, and ultimately they developed that very civilising institution, the polis. The Macedonians, on the other hand, remained in the north and living for centuries in mountainous areas, fighting with Illyrians, Thracians, and amongst themselves as tribe fought tribe, developed a society that may be termed Homeric. The amenities of city-state life were unknown until they began to take root in Lower Macedonia from the end of the fifth century onwards.”


Hermann Bengtson, ‘History of Greece’
Translated and updated by Edmund F. Bloedow, University of Ottawa Press, 1988. Chapter 10 Philip of Macedonia, pgs 185-186.

“It was he (Philip II) who accustomed this people of shepherds and peasants to urban life, who subdued the belligerent barbarian neighbours, opened up access to the sea and the country itself to Hellenic culture. For the Greeks, however, the Macedonians always remained ‘barbaroi’, never recognised by the Hellenes as cultural equals, not even when on the crest of world dominion.

In the cultural gulf between Greeks and Macedonians the question of Macedonian national origin was never more than of secondary importance in antiquity. For modern scholars the evidence from names - there is not a single sentence extant from the language of the Old Macedonians - tilts the scales in favour of the view that includes the Macedonians among the Greeks. The theory, therefore, advocated by the student of Indo-European linguistics, P.Kretschner , that the Macedonians were of Graeco-Illyrian hybrid stock, is not to be regarded as very probable. So the majority of modern historians, admittedly with the noteworthy exception of Julius Kaerst , have argued correctly for the Hellenic origin of the Macedonians. They should be included in the group of the North-West Greek tribes . This does not, however, discount the statement of Thucydides (II 99) that the Macedonians were related to the Epirotes from possibly having an element of truth. From the point of view of history it is more important that a century of isolation in the country which bears their name moulded the Macedonians into a distinctive social, political and anthropological unit, developing their essential features from within, and without domination by Hellenic influence. Thus the character of the Macedonian people had long since been moulded when, in the great power struggle between Athens and Philip, the hate-filled orations of Demosthenes repeatedly emphasised the divisive features between Greeks and Macedonians.”

[akritas]

Paul Cartledge in Great Alexander, Chapter12

"While Alexander's posthumous presence is ubiquitous, there are 5 areas of particular influebnce & contention. The was a politico-ethnic issue in his own day as to whether or not counted, wholly or in part, as a 'Greek' under the act. This aspect of his legacy exploded again, very recently in the early 1990's with the disolution of the former Yugoslav establishment, on part of it's ruins, a new state: the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, but known unofficially (by it's government) as just Macedonia.
This name is shared with the province of Macedonia in today's contemporary Hellenic Republic, which was once part of ancient Macedon.
The new, putative Macedonians compounded thier heinous - in official & unofficial Greek eyes - offence by appropriating major symbols drawn from thier name sake.
For example, the iconic (originally Venetian or Turkish) White Tower of Thessaloniki, a city founded soon after Alexander's death, was pressed into service, as was the 16-pointed star that appears conspicuously on the gold-coffin found in the 'tomb of Philip' at Vergina."

Also the book is published in the Greek language

[Kassander]

"Yet the vast majority of Greeks (as distinct from Macedonians) saw things very differently indeed. Up to the final battle against the Persian great king, Alexander had more Greeks against him than for him.....This is not to say that he did not hold Hellenizm in high regard and seek to promote them widely, only he would not allow the promotion of that or any Altruistic way that would come in the way of his own self-promotion - ultimately - the son of a non-greek god and a new god in his own right" Alexander the Great, Paul Cartledge

“It blew the lid off of the whole Panhellenic project – or fraud – that Alexander, following Phillip, was seeking to perpetrate. Not only did the Thebans call Alexander a tyrant a despot rather than a legitimate or constitutional monarch, just as Demosthenes had labelled – and libelled - his father Phillip. But they were actually appealing for (a) in liberating Greece from Alexander’s tyranny to the great King of Persia – that is to the very figure who was supposed to be the boogeyman of the united freedom loving Greeks.”

“This was because for many Greeks, the Macedonians too – not just the Persians – were barbarians. Furthermore, it was Macedon, not the Great King, which they thought was the real, or at any rate the more immediately present, danger and enemy. For many Macedonians conversely Greeks were members of the recently defeated and so despised people who did not know how to conduct their political and military life sensibly. This I think is the true light in which we must view Alexander’s inherited panhellenic propaganda. If he kept it up until 330, despite it’s increasing awkwardness, this was because it was his only means of attempting to conciliate the considerable amount of hostile Greek opinion and so of helping to keep the Greek mainland quiet.”

“Of course, he could not enslave Aspendus as Parmenion had enslaved Gryneum, since that would have made a total mockery of his Panhellenic ‘liberation’ propaganda.”

"While Alexander's posthumous presence is ubiquitous, there are 5 areas of particular influebnce & contention. The was a politico-ethnic issue in his own day as to whether or not counted, wholly or in part, as a 'Greek' under the act. This aspect of his legacy exploded again, very recently in the early 1990's with the disolution of the former Yugoslav establishment, on part of it's ruins, a new state: the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, but known unofficially (by it's government) as just Macedonia. This name is shared with the province of Macedonia in today's contemporary Hellenic Republic, which was once part of ancient Macedon. The new, putative Macedonians compounded thier heinous - in official & unofficial Greek eyes - offence by appropriating major symbols drawn from thier name sake. For example, the iconic (originally Venetian or Turkish) White Tower of Thessaloniki, a city founded soon after Alexander's death, was pressed into service, as was the 16-pointed star that appears conspicuously on the gold-coffin found in the 'tomb of Philip' at Vergina."

"The Greeks, on thier side, responded in kind. A coin of the old Drachma currency (superseded by the euro) showed on it's obverse a head of Alexander in profile. Here, as on near contemporary ancient coins, he was depicted wearing the sacred hornes of Ammon, and his image was accompanied by the superscriptions 'Megas Alexandros' (Alexander the Great) & 'Basileus Makedonon' (King of the Macedonians). On the reverse was the very same 16-ray sun-burst or star, followed by 2 more speaking legends: 'Ellenike Demokratia' & Vergina.

Here was just a modern variation of an ancient theme - the use of coins as political propaganda."

Cartledge.

[akritas]

kassander for the best debating please must show us the chapter of the Cartledge book.
And I know that you have the book.
Is unfair to bring here broken quotes or fragments from his work because distorting the meaning of what Cartledge want to say.

Now if I am right your quotes come from the book with the name Alexander the Great
Let's see what some editorial reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Alexander the Great's brilliant military campaigns in the fourth century B.C. spread not only his reputation as a heroic and ingenious leader but also the culture of ancient Greece throughout the known world. With his usual riveting storytelling, Cartledge (The Spartans), chair of Cambridge University's classics faculty, narrates Alexander's life and rise to power. Cartledge takes issue with those who contend that Alexander's greatest contribution was to spread Hellenism. He argues instead that Alexander, while sincerely attached to Hellenism, was more concerned with the glory his conquests brought him. Cartledge provides detailed chronicles of Alexander's battles with the Persians, the Tyrians and the Babylonians as he demonstrates the young king's military genius and hunger for success in war. According to Cartledge, Alexander's love of hunting game offers the key to his life and reign. It led him, for example, to successfully adapt for military battles many hunting strategies, such as the surprise attack, a uniquely Alexandrine contribution. A number of appendixes, including a glossary and an extensive bibliography, enhance the book. Cartledge's knack for bringing history to life makes for an absorbing new biography of the legendary Greek leader. 37 b&w illus., 4 maps, 6 battle plans.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


Book Description

The remarkable life of Alexander the Great, one of the greatest military geniuses of all time, vividly told by one of the world's leading experts in Greek history. With all the intensity, insight, and narrative drive that made The Spartans such a hit with critics and readers, Paul Cartledge's Alexander the Great: glowingly illuminates the brief but iconic life of Alexander (356-323 BC), king of Macedon, conqueror of the Persian Empire, and founder of a new world order. Cartledge, the distinguished scholar and historian long acknowledged as the leading international authority on ancient Sparta and Greece, brilliantly evokes Alexander's remarkable political and military accomplishments, leads us along the geographical path of his victorious armies, and compellingly charting the tremendous field of this warrior hero's influence. Alexander's legacy has had an astounding impact on military tacticians, scholars, and statesmen—in his own lifetime and in ours. In various countries and at various times he has been seen as hero, holy man, Christian saint, a new Achilles, philosopher, scientist, prophet, and visionary. Cartledge brilliantly explains why and how Alexander is endlessly fascinating, with a view to a better understanding of such fundamental topics as charismatic leadership, imperialism, and Middle Eastern geopolitics.

as you see kassander the book describe the life of the Great Greek leader.
if anyone want to buy the book you can go to:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1585675652/002-39...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1585675652/002-39...

[admin]

Yeah I just read that book description at Amazon....

the Great Greek Leader....

Really you Vardaskans are a serious confused lot.... do some real about your history....

although it is short and doesn't include Alexander or Macedonia...

just make sure you dont' confuse yourself reading it...

[Ptolemy]

Macedonia centred in the fertile alluvium of the lower Axios was a land of stalwart peasants and horse riding squires, speaking a rough dialect of Greek, unintelligible to Athenians and so reckoned barbarous" -
A.R. Burn The Pelican History of Greece 1966 (p 326).

"The Macedonian people and their Kings were of Greek stock as their
traditions and the scanty remains of their language combined to testify" -
J.B.Bury A History of Greece 3rd Edition 1973 (p 683).

At the end of the bronze age a residue of Greek tribes stayed behind in
Southern Macedonia........ one of these, the "Makedones" occupied Aegae and expanded into the coastal plain of lower Macedonia which became the Kingdom of Macedon; their descendants were the Macedonians proper of the classical period and they worshipped Greek gods. The other Greek tribes became intermingled in upper Macedonia with Illyrians, Paeonians and Thracians...... in the early 5th century the royal house of Macedon, the Temenidae was recognised as Greek by the Presidents of the Olympic Games. Their verdict was and is decisive. It is certain that the Kings considered themselves to be of Greek descent from Heracles son of Zeus. "Macedonian" was a strong dialect of very early Greek which was not intelligible to contemporary Greeks
- Professor N.G.L. Hammond, A History of Greece to 323 BC Cambridge University, 1986 (p 516).

"Modern scholarship after many generations of argument, now almost
unanimously recognises [the Macedonians] as Greeks, a branch of the Dorians and "Northwest Greeks" who, after long residence in the north Pindus region, migrated eastward. The Macedonian language has not survived in any written text, but the names of individuals, places, gods, months and the like suggest strongly that the language was a Greek dialect. Macedonian institutions, both secular and religious, had marked Hellenic characteristics, and legends identify or link the people with the Dorians."
John V.A. Fine The Ancient Greeks: A Critical History Harvard University Press 1983 (p 607)

"As a Macedonian [Philip] was looked down upon by the more refined Athenians, but they shared the same Hellenistic culture. How deep this went is evident in aesthetically the least spectacular, but politically the most explosive, of the finds in Vergina. In the Great Tumulus above Philip's tombs, which was raised by the invading Galatians in 274 BC, the archaeologists found fragments of no fewer than seventy-five funeral monuments, or stelai. The names on these were entirely Greek, save two which appeared to be Hellenised versions of Thracian and Phoenician names. The implication is that Philip's Macedonia was thoroughly Hellenised, an outpost of classical Greek culture...
" Robert Fox, The Inner Sea: The Mediterranean and its People Sinclair- Stevenson, London 1991 (p 229-230).

[Ptolemy]

Modern Linguists about ancient Macedonians:

Whoever does not consider the Macedonians as Greeks must also conclude that by the 6th and 5th centuries BC the Macedonians had completely given up the original names of their nation - without any need to do so - and taken Greek names in order to demonstrate their admiration for Greek civilisation. I think it not worth the trouble to demolish such a notion; for any hypothesis of historical linguists which is put forward without taking into account the actual life of a people, is condemned as it were out of its own mouth".
O.Hoffman, Die Makedonen, Ihre Sprache und Ihr Volkstum(Gottingen 1906) p 230


P. Kretschmer, who was one of the first linguists to entertain doubts about the Greek descent of the ancient Macedonians - (Ein leitung in die Geschichte der Griechischen Sprache (Gottingen 1896) p 288). However, after further research Kretschmer was obliged to revise his view. Accepting that the Macedonians were originally a Greek tribe (Sprache Vol.1 No 6 p 87). Kretschmer's revised opinion was accepted both by E.Schwyer (Griesche Grammatik (Munchen 1939) Vol 1 p 69) and by Otto Reche who writes "Macedonians were the final wave of the Greek Nation after the Dorians"(Rasse und Heimat der Indogermanen (Munchen 1936) p 54.).

F. Munzer "the problem of the nationality of the Macedonians has been studied a great deal. Otto Hoffman with linguistics as his starting point solved it correctly and decisively when he accepted that the Macedonians were Greeks".(Die Politische Vernichtung des Griechentums (Leipzig 1925) p 4).

W. Christ A quote even from the most doubting: "it is now recognised by everybody that the Macedonians were a Greek tribe, it is just that the foreign (Thraco Phrygian) influence on their language is somewhat under estimated" (Geschichte der Griechischen Literatur Vol. 2 pg 2 note 3)

[PhiliptheUniterchaeronea]

Just for the record. Paul Cartledge does state that Macedonia was Hellenic. There are many references to that. Macedonian, without question was Greek. It was however, without question, a distinct dialect.

"Demosthenes (384-322) called him a 'barbarian'. or non-Greek speaker,... But even in the narrowest linguistic terms of Greek culture, this was strictly inaccurate. Philip was perfectly capable of conversing in standard Greek and reading Greek literature, even though the local Macedonian dialect was so interlarded with non-Greek (especially Illyrian) linguistic forms that it could be unintelligible to standard Greek-speakers."

Alexander the Great, Paul Cartledge p.64

Look at the language of the Inscription frm Calindoea on p.65 All in Greek, and this is from Macedonia

[Spartan]

Here is contemporaneous(Same time as the event) proof that the Slavic invasion did actually occur. This also PROVES that there was NO MIXING with the Ancient Macedonians, but only massacres, evacuation, and mass exodus of the Ancient Macedonians!

Enjoy!

Contemporaneous evidence is what you want then here you go!

From the following site:

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:...invasion&hl=en



1) Another testimony was Procopius of Caesarea, who in his "Secret History" he relates how "Besides, the Medes
and the Saracens had ravaged most of Asia, and the Huns and Slavs all of Europe; captured cities had either been razed to
their foundations, or made to pay terrible tribute; men had been carried off into slavery together with all their property, and
every district had been deserted by its inhabitants because of the daily raids: yet no tax was remitted, except in the case of
cities that had been captured by the enemy, and then only for one year."

ABOUT PROCOPIUS

http://procopius.net/


2)Also St. John of Ephesus in his "Ecclesiastical
History" is refered the Slav invasion as follows: "[VI. 25] That same year, being the third after the death of king Justin, was
famous also for the invasion of an accursed people, called Slavonians, who overran the whole of Greece, and the country of
the Thessalonians, and all Thrace, and captured the cities, and took numerous forts, and devastated and burnt, and reduced
the people to slavery, and made themselves masters of the whole country, and settled in it by main force, and dwelt in it as
though it had been their own without fear. And four years have now elapsed, and still, because the king is engaged in the war
with the Persians, and has sent all his forces to the East, they live at their ease in the land, and dwell in it, and spread
themselves far and wide as far as God permits them, and ravage and burn and take captive. And to such an extent do they
carry their ravages, that they have even ridden up to the outer wall of the city, and driven away all the king's herds of horses,
many thousands in number, and whatever else they could find. And even to this day, being the year 895 (A. D. 584), they still
encamp and dwell there, and live in peace in the Roman territories, free from anxiety and fear, and lead captive and slay and
burn [...]".


3) when Anastasius I (419-518)
was Caesar "the two Macedonias and Thessaly were devastated by the Ghetic [Slavic] cavalry that robbed all the way
through Thermopylae and Ancient Epirus"


4) Procopius, "Illyricum and all of Thrace, i.e. the whole
country from the Ionian Gulf [the Adriatic to the outskirts of Byzantium, including Greece and the Chersonese, was overrun
almost every year by Huns, Slavs and Antae, from the time when Justinian became Roman emperor [527], and they wrought
untold damage among the inhabitants of those parts. For I believe that in each invasion more than two hundred thousand
Romans were killed or captured, so that a veritable 'Scythian wilderness' came to exist everywhere in this land."


5) Abbreviator of Strabo: "Nothing was speared. The Slavs after killing whoever had remained in the city, took whatever they
could, and destroyed every thing else. From the large library of Dioclea not even a book remained, after everything was
burned down, not even one!"


6) or in 617, according to the Miracula, "a new swarm of lowered Slavs settled further down,
and from there took incursions in most of Prevalitania, Dardania, New and Old Epirus and Macedonia, and making the
majority of towns and provinces inhabitable"

Miracula testifies, hundreds of thousands of refugees, who had
escaped from the teeth of death, left their fertile lands in Moesia, Panonnia, Mediterranian Dacia and Naissus to settle
in Dardania and the mountainous regions of Prevalitania, in the mounts.

7) John of Ephesus wrote about the early evil of the
Avars and Slavs: "[ they ] ravaged, burned, pillaged and conquered the country, and finally settled there themselves,
as if in their own country, by killing or expelling the natives with vicious hostility"


Pay close attention to all the highlighted "BOLD" words.

These are especially good!

1)"[ they ] ravaged, burned, pillaged and conquered the country, and finally settled there themselves, as if in their own country, by killing or expelling the natives with vicious hostility"


2) hundreds of thousands of refugees, who had
escaped

3) lowered Slavs settled further down... and Macedonia

4) The Slavs after killing whoever had remained in the city,

5) "and they wrought untold damage among the inhabitants of those parts. For I believe that in each invasion more than two hundred thousand
Romans(Byzantines/MY WORDS) were killed or captured, so that a veritable 'Scythian wilderness' came to exist everywhere in this land."

6) "the two Macedonias and Thessaly were devastated by the Ghetic [Slavic] cavalry"

7) "who overran the whole of Greece, and the country of
the Thessalonians,... and reduced
the people to slavery, ... and settled in it by main force, [b]and [b]dwelt in it as though it had been their own "

THIS ONE WAS ESPECIALLY GOOD, because it proves that the name was Thessaloniki and the the Slavs were NEW COMERS and there was no mixing of cultures.

8) "Slavs all of Europe; captured cities had either been razed to
their foundations... every district had been deserted by its inhabitants because of the daily raids:"

These lines PROVE that there WAS NO MERGING OF CULTURES AND THERE WAS AN INVASION!!

So Bosnian or Nitkov?? What do you have to say now? Do you finally accept all of our arguments for the Ancient Macedonians being of Greek blood and that there was no MIXING OF CULTURES as is claimed by the FYROMs??

[Spartan]

30]Ay, and you know this also, that the wrongs which the Greeks suffered from the Lacedaemonians or from us, they suffered at all events at the hands of true-born sons of Greece, and they might have been regarded as the acts of a legitimate son, born to great possessions, who should be guilty of some fault or error in the management of his estate: so far he would deserve blame and reproach, yet it could not be said that it was not one of the blood, not the lawful heir who was acting thus.

31]But if some slave or superstitious bastard had wasted and squandered what he had no right to, heavens! how much more monstrous and exasperating all would have called it! Yet they have no such qualms about Philip and his present conduct, though he is not only no Greek, nor related to the Greeks, but not even a barbarian from any place that can be named with honor, but a pestilent knave from Macedonia, whence it was never yet possible to buy a decent slave.


Here is an important part ALWAYS left ou tby the FYROMs. The previous paragraph puts the claims against Philip in PERSPECTIVE!

As you can see here "that the wrongs which the Greeks suffered from the Lacedaemonians or from us"

So does this mean to the FYROMs that the Lacedaemonians(Spartans) are not Greek also??

So Kassander or anyone else who uses this to try and prove the non-Greekness of the Ancient Macedonians, what do you have to say about this part in which Demosthenes SEPERATES the Spartans from the Greeks??