 Discovering VERGINA by M. Andronikos
The Hellenistic period, which began with Alexander the Great and ended with the close of the pre-Christian era, comprises the final illustrious chapter in the history of the ancient Hellenic world. If the Archaic period constituted a dynamic introduction, and the Classical period consolidated that which we call Greek culture, with its unique creations in the fields of art, letters and thought, in the Hellenistic period this culture spread to the very limits of the ancient world in a mighty wave, taking on universal dimensions, and providing fecund wellsprings to the new world which was to blaze the path to Christianity. The great new centers of political power were now situated in the capitals of the Macedonian kings who succeeded Alexander: in Alexandria, Antioch and Paramus. In these cities, where the world's great libraries were established, culture flourished anew, attracting philosophers and artists.
It is a well-known and accepted fact that the founders and organizers of these centers were the Macedonian comrades of the young king who had not only transformed the map but had also revolutionized the thought and lives of millions of people, both Greeks and speakers of other languages. To date, however, no historian of art or culture has sought out the roots of this phenomenon in Macedonia, homeland of these men, in their cultural origins, as if their background had consisted solely of hard military training bereft of culture, together with the lowly entertainment of the soldier. The splendor of the Athens of Pericles and Phidias was such as to make the backward regions of the rest of Greece seem even less enlightened. And the eloquent voice of Demosthenes had nearly persuaded us that the "barbaric Macedonian" who threatened his land was a crude and uncouth ruler, unfit to be considered a Civilized Greek.
But even the sparse information, which has come down to us, suggests that we could perhaps take the Athenian orator's words with a grain of salt. We know for a fact that this "barbaric king" engaged Aristotle, who came to Macedonia accompanied by his friend and disciple Theophrastus, as a tutor for his son, just as we know that he commissioned Leochares, one of the most brilliant sculptors of the 4th century B.C., to execute portraits of his family to be placed in Olympia. Many of the most renowned musicians, poets, sculptors and painters of the time lived and worked in the Macedonian capital. Most important, this relationship with men of art and letters was an old and well-established tradition in the Macedonian court. Philip himself had carried on a correspondence with Speusippus, nephew and successor of Plato at the Academy, thus following in the steps of his predecessor, Perdiccas III, whose political advisor was Euphraeos, another important disciple of Plato. Yet further in the past, early in the 5th century B.C., Alexander I had commissioned Pindar to write an ode, while his successor, Perdiccas II, played host to the poet Melanippides and to that most renowned physician, Hippocrates, at Aigai. But it would have been difficult to find more stimulating intellectual company in all of Greece than that of Archelaus (413-399 B.C.). The greatest painter of that time, Zeuxis, decorated his palace, where the two most outstanding contemporary poets, Agathon and Euripides, lived. Wrote and presented their works, including the most exciting play of the latter, the "Bacchae". Thus it is not at all surprising that Macedonians such as Marsyas, Ptolemy, Craterus and others not only had an excellent education, but wrote very distinguished works as well.
Bur perhaps not even this highly significant information, scattered and fragmentary, was enough to convince us of the cultural tradition of the Macedonian, who kindled the flame of Hellenism. We had to see their works of art, the houses in which they dwelt, the utensils they used and the tombs where they found eternal rest with our very own eyes and touch them with our hands. Only then could we understand how they wished - whether in Alexandria, Pergamum, Antioch or in far off Bactria - to recreate a world which they had left behind in their distant Macedonian homeland, in Aigai or Pella, Dion or other cities which the archaeologist's pick has just revealed to our astonished eyes. And if we had heard of Cleitus, and Antigonus, Harpalus and Philotas, Pankasta and Berenice, the generals, queens and concubines who became a part of history, the grave stones of Vergina now confirm that these same names were born by ordinary Macedonians, such as Alcimus, Alcetas, Cleander, Peucolaus, Menander and Pierio. Who, indeed, could question the etymology of these names or seek their roots in obscure reverberations of Illyrian or Thracians, when any Hellenic or Hellenist can encounter them not only in Greek texts but in everyday life today in Greece as well? And when we read: «Παρ' 'Ήρας' Αργείας είμi τών αέθλων» (I am victor of the games of Argive Hera) on a bronze tripod found in the tomb of Philip, in the knowledge that this trophy was won around 440-430 B.C. by some Macedonian champion, does this not help us to recall the descent of the Macedonian kings from Hercules, «Πατρώος Ηρακλής» (Hercules ancestor), as he is referred to on the inscription found in the palace at Vergina? And standing on the verandah of the palace, gazing down on the orchestra of the theatre at just a few meters’ distance and, beyond that, on the little temple of Eucleia, can we entertain any doubts as to the fact that this was a city inhabited by people of indisputably Greek origins?
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12-03-2005, 06:22 PM
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