THE VISION OF "GREATER MACEDONIA" Evangelos Kofos

[HellenicPride]

THE VISION OF "GREATER MACEDONIA"

During the period 1992-93, on instructions by the Kiro Grigorov 's government, new state scholl textbooks of History and Geography were introduced in the secondary level education of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. These books are still in use.

After an examination of 12 such textbooks it has become apparent that the new leadership in Skopje is perpetuating in its educational system certain negative features associated with the the former Commununist regime. This is the reason why it is important, at this juncture, to study carefully the contents of these textbooks. They may give us a better insight to the politics pursued by FYROM. But they may also generate interest in finding ways to overcome the repetition of past mistakes which have kept the Balkan peoples apart.

Such an approach is not a new one. Stamped with the bloodshed of two world wars, the role of school textbooks was finally understood by those sempiternal enemies, France and Germany. In the 1950 's the leaders of the two countries courageously decided to cleanse the festering abscess of hatred. They gathered their historians and the school textbook writers around a conference table for the purpose of finding a way to clear the atmosphere of the weight which generatiion after generation had created by reproducing the same antagonistic stereotypes. The task was far from easy, but the positive results are evident to the naked eye in the attitudes of today 's French and German youth.

The initiative of those traditional enemies has been imitated throughout Western Europe. Particularly active in this field today are the Council of Europe, UNESCO and the Georg Eckert Institute in Germany.

In the 1980's we in the Balkans also saw similar initiatives. Through the medium of UNESCO's Balkan National Committees two conferences were organized, one in Istabul in 1986 and one in Patra in 1988. The Patra conference was particularly successful. It established important principles to be observed by the authors of school textbooks in the Balkans, while a thorough review of the contents, particularly those reffering to neighbours, was also analysed, in order to help remove negative or provocative elements. Thus, a basis for bilateral co-operation on the national level was established.

A very constructive meeting was also held between Greeks and Bulgarians in Athens in May 1990, at which sensitive historical issues were examined and opinions were exchanged in all frankness and sincerity. This year another meeting is scheduled, this time in Sofia. Obviously all the historical issues dividing the two states cannot be settled immediately; but the seeds have been sown and, with both sides laying their cards on the table, the process has begun. There will be no easy solution, and it may not yet be possible even to approach particularly sensitive issues. It is nonetheless interesting that a number of stereotypes which had grown up in the isolation of many years have already been shaken. The final orientation of course remains with the political leaders, and depends on the social climate prevailing at any given time in each of the Balkan states.


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This brief parenthesis, I think, provides a useful and perhaps a hopeful framework for a long term approach to drawing the Balkan peoples closer together by means of a fair appreciation of inter-Balkan relationships on the level of school textbooks.

Returning to FYROM's new school textbooks, however, which are the object of our interest today, our reflections follow a different path, for unfortunately in this direction the prospects are, for the time being at least, less optimistic. The problem is an extremely difficult one, and resides in the philosophy and content of the school textbooks on the History and Geography of this newly established sovereign state. A state which is founded on a national ideology which is hotly - and justly - disputed by all its neighbours.

My personal opinion is that in the long term the political importance of these school textbooks will be far greater than that of all the party manifestos and personal political documents of FYROM's leaders, far greater than the reprehensible provisions of FYROM's constitution and the use of Greek emblems.

With considerable effort, it could possibly be accepted that all that is just part of the process of consolidation of the new state and reinforcement of the doctrine of "Macedonism". A process which must at the same time satisfy the extreme nationalists not only at home, but also abroad, where the new state has active and wealthy sponsors.

The new schoolbooks, however, reveal in the most authentic fashion the secret long term designs of the country's political leaders. The reason for this is evident: In the case of these school textbooks, FYROM's usual excuse and justification - that it is a poor, weak little state which in order to survive is obliged from time to time to proceed to deceitful measures - does not hold water. And the reason why it does not hold water is that the content of these books is not designed to serve the needs and purposes of the year 2000, the year 2010, or even farther into the future.

This is why, in an article I wrote last December for the Greek daily newspaper "To Vima", I felt obliged to use a style of language it is not my habit to indulge in, but which was rendered necessary by the evident tolerance and acceptance displayed by the international community toward the image of the poor underdog that President Kiro Gligorov likes to apply to himself and his state. I thus described the President of FYROM as a "Balkan Jean Valjean", who was caught stealing one small loaf of bread - the "Sun of Vergina" - in order to feed his family: that is, in order to give his tiny "oppressed" and "misunderstood" people a sense of pride. But he did not not stop at the minor offence of shop-lifting. He went one further and, making use of media exposure inconceivable for his state's economic and political means, began to disseminate falsehoods, to sequestrate historical and contemporary fact, in order to distort Greek positions in the eyes of the international community. His aim was to cast Greece in the role of the inhuman Javert.

The new school textbooks, however, which are jealously guarded from the view of the outside world, turn the sympathetic figure of the poor thief (FYROM, that is) inside out. They prove that the crime of this modern-day "Jean Valjean" was not merely the theft of a loaf of bread, but rather large-scale, wholesale robbery. And it was designed to serve two purposes: to appropriate the cultural heritage of the Greek world and to undermine and call into question Greece's supremacy in Greek Macedonia. And he is now striving to hand on to his children all he inherited from the Tito regime, so that via today's schoolchildren he may claim the right of usucaption over the stolen goods.


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For the purposes of my study I used 12 school history and geography textbooks from the period 1992-1993. They all bear the stamp of approval of the Gligorov government, and appear to have been printed between August 1992 and the beginning of 1993. They are designed for use in the equivalent of the Greek Junior and Senior High Schools (Grades 7- 12), both in the general and the technical-vocational streams. The material included covers historical periods from ancient times right up to 1990. Their coverage of world history is sufficient, and of the history of the Balkan peoples fairly extensive. As one would expect, the study of history throughout the entire secondary school programme focuses on the history of Macedonia.




The historical evolution and creation of the peoples of the Balkans is presented fairly and for the most part in a positive spirit. This attitude, however, changes as soon as the study approaches issues dealing with the general area of Macedonia. At that point the history lesson abandons its traditional mission of education and information and becomes a vehicle for the promotion of the doctrine of "Macedonism". The various levels of this procedure are obvious to the practised eye of the historian. Let us take a look at them:

A. The first level develops the doctrine of "Greater Macedonia" i.e. the vision of territorial expansion. This is intended to reinforce in the students' minds the concept of "our" land.


When dealing with Macedonia, the geographical context of the school textbooks is not that of the "Republic of Macedonia" (of FYROM, that is) but of a greater Macedonia determined not by national but by "ethnico-geographical" boundaries. The term geographical boundaries defines a Macedonian territory comparable to the one that has prevailed in recent history (despite the fact that it does not entirely correspond to the image of the ancient Kingdom of Macedonia). The term ethnic boundaries, however, gives the impression that this territory in its entirety has belonged across the centuries until this day , to Slavs, namely, the ethnic "Macedonians". The map that accompanies virtually all the texts gives visual support to this view, and for this reason is worthy of our close attention. But first of all we should go back to the various ethno-cartographic inspirations of the different Bulgarian and Slavo-Macedonian nationalist movements, in order to see where the versions in FYROM's textbooks today started from.
In the 1970's and 1980's, and even earlier, Slavo-Macedonian nationalists abroad, free of local expediencies within the balkans, proceeded to devote themselves to a nationalist "war of maps". They proved to be exceptionally adept at map-making. Their principal goal was to display and establish the greater Macedonian area as a single unliberated whole belonging to the "Macedonian" nation. This was not an original notion, inasmuch as they were imitating a similar enterprise on the part of Bulgarian Macedonians living abroad who, in their turn, had specialized in similar ethno-cartographic displays. The difference between the two presumptive rulers of Macedonia was that while the earlier claimants portrayed the territory of Macedonia in its entirety as ethnically "Bulgarian", their successors portray it as ethnically "Macedonian".

The iconography of the "Macedonists", however, has several variations. One type of map shows Greek Macedonia and the Bulgarian province of Blagoevgrad ("Pirin Macedonia") as unliberated sections of a whole whose third part - the "Socialist Republic of Macedonia" - was presented as a free entity within the framework of the Yugoslav Federation. Another series of maps, the product of extreme nationalist factions, portrayed all three sectors as under foreign occupation.

The 1991 declaration of independence by the former Yugoslav Fedrative Socialis "Republic of Macedonia" fostered the publication of maps -both within that state as well as abroad -showing a single united Macedonia. The classic map of this type is the one published in 1992 by the semi-official publishing house "Nova Makedonija". It shows the traditional - although disputed - boundaries of the geographical area of Macedonia as the (as we mentioned earlier) ethnic boundaries of the "Macedonian" nation.



The "Nova Makedonija" map in fact adheres faithfully to a Bulgarian production of the inter-war period, entitled "Map of Macedonia within its geographical boundaries", published by the "Macedonian Scientific Institute" of Sofia. The Bulgarian version, of course, does not indicate the ethnological boundaries of a "Macedonian nation", since at that time no such nation had ever been heard of. The composers of the map, in complete harmony with the intentions of the Bulgarian regime at that time, attempted to portray the geographical territory of Macedonia as one unit, and with a Bulgarian complexion at that. This is also why they used the old Turkish or Slav place names for localities in Greek Macedonia, instead of their Greek names.

It is interesting that the "Nova Makedonija" map retains the old Turkish and Slav names for places within Greece. This insistence on the use of Slav place names can only be interpreted as a refusal on the part of FYROM's political leaders to accept without reservation Greek sovereignty over Greek Macedonia. This practice, however, is in contravention of United Nations resolutions on rendering national place names in international cartography. This is why the Greek delegation during 1993 UN negotiations requested, and Lord Owen and Mr Vance in their draft agreement accepted, that one of the confidence-building measures in a future aggrement between the two neighbouring states should be a clear obligation with respect to the rendering of national place names in their officially-designated form.

Consequently, the "Nova Makedonija" map can be seen as an expression of the Great Macedonia doctrine which has begun to appear freely and publicly in Skopje after FYROM's declaration of independence. This is why the Greek delegation, in its January 1993 Memorandum to the UN arguing against FYROM's admission to that organization, also included a copy of this map as indisputable proof of the irredentist tendencies prevalent in Skopje. (The author has personal knowledge of the deep impression made by this map on foreign delegates who appeared to sense for the first time FYROM's real intentions).

In order to tone down these impressions and to deny that the Gligorov government was responsible for publication of this map, FYROM's unofficial representative in the USA, Ms Ljubica Acevska, in an interview with the New York Times in October 1993 attributed the publication of this map to the initiative of a private publisher.

Events, however, belied this denial. The "Nova Makedonija" map appeared at the same time as FYROM's new History and Geography textbooks for the school year 1992-1993. These books were, of course, published by the state under the seal of FYROM's Minister of Education. The maps in all the History textbooks were copies of that published by "Nova Makedonija" . And least there be any doubt as to the intentions of the editors, all the maps were accompanied by the same explanations of symbols. National borders between neighbouring countries were shown by broken lines, while the solid black line designated the "geografsko-etnitska granitsa", that is, the "geographical ethnic boundaries". This second line did not outline today's FYROM, as one might have expected, but encircled the entire geographical territory of Macedonia to its extreme southern limit, that is, the coast of the Aegean Sea, the crest of Mt Olympus and continuing west to the Albanian border. A remark made in fun by a foreign diplomat at the UN is not without foundation: on seeing the map with Mt Olympus divided in two, he forecast that FYROM's next step would probably be to demand that the gods of Olympus be re-assigned as well: six to the "Macedonians" and six to the Greeks!



The reproduction of this same map in all the school textbooks - two or three times in some of them - serves as a sort of background model on which are depicted the historical events that have taken place in Macedonia over the centuries. History is taught on the basis of this map, whether it is the history of the ancient Macedonians, the history of the Middle Ages, the history of the Ottoman occupation and the struggles for liberation, or the events of the 20th century which led in 1944 to the establishment of a federal Macedonian state within the framework of the communist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

What is at first sight less obvious - but by no means less important - is that the youth of FYROM become habituated to the idea that what is shown by this model, this depiction of Macedonia as a single unit, is their country. Even though FYROM occupies only 37-38% of the territory shown on the map, a broad general image of their "fatherland" has been engraved on the subconscious mind of these children and young people. Consequently, the presentation of the unfolding of history in Macedonia, as it is taught in FYROM's schools, establishes ever more firmly in the pupils' consciousness the view that every historical event and every cultural achievement associated with this territory are elements of their own national heritage.

This experience readily produces feelings of bitterness and injustice, since 68% of the lands the children have learned to regard as their own "national" territory are under foreign occupation by neighbouring states (Greece, Bulgaria, Albania). Their different perspective on Macedonian history is seen as subversive, capable of piercing the doctrinal armour that the eight year educational process works so methodically and systematically to build up. What is more, the use by another state - in this case Greece - of the Macedonian name, Macedonian historical emblems, Macedonian monuments and historical anniversaries, is easily perceived as hostile and "anti-Macedonian". With no opposition - for in matters of national ideology a sort of spiritual Stalinism still prevails in FYROM - it is inevitable that feelings of antagonism towards their neighbours will blow up to huge proportions in the near future.


B. Let us now look at the second level of the doctrine of Macedonism, as it is developed, not on the geographical level this time, but through the historical and cultural tenets of the Great Idea.

(a) A significant role is played by the ancient world. While the editors of the textbooks cannot claim direct descent from the ancient Macedonians in the period preceding the arrival of the Slav tribes in Macedonia (6th and 7th centuries A.D.), they can and do attempt to establish rights by inheritance, by plausibly excluding all other peoples (the Greeks, for instance) from any connection whatsoever with the glorious history of the Macedonian people under Philip and Alexander the Great.
This is another area where the subconscious does its work well, for the schoolchild has already acquired the concept of the greater Macedonian area as his ancestral land, and has completely assimilated the name of Macedonia, by which his country is identified. In this way his - initially - emotional identification with the ancient Macedonians, who had the same name and lived in his "ancestral lands", is both easy and at that age inevitable. Such identification is made even easier by the fact that all the schoolbooks teach that the Ancient Macedonians were unrelated to any other people, thus constituting a "free for all", so to speak, and an object to be appropriated on the basis of "first come, first served".

Certain extracts from Simo Mladenovski's history textbook for Grade 7 (Skopje 1992), dealing with world history, are particularly revealing:

-- The introduction states that the Ancient Macedonians differed from the Greeks "both in language and in customs, religion and social and national life" (page 129). They spoke "an independent Indo-European language, with no written form". With the exception of certain proper names, "only 104 Macedonian words have survived" (page 158).

-- "Today's geographical area of Macedonia was in the remote past inhabited by various tribes and peoples". These are said to have included "Thracians, Illyrians, Phrygians, Paionians, Pelagonians, etc." (page 131). Nowhere is there any mention of Greeks. In the 11th century B.C. "the entire area now known geographically as Macedonia, with the exception of the areas of Skopje and Kumanovo, was inhabited by various Macedonian tribes" (page 132), while the Greeks lived "to the south of Macedonia" (page 132).

-- Also interesting is their theory about the name of Macedonia. According to the author, "the name of Macedonia comes from the ancient Macedonian words makos, (shiroc in slavonis is "great") and don, zemja (land)... and thus means great land". "The land of the Ancient Macedonians took its name from the name of the region" (page 132). This is obviously an attempt to give the impression that Macedonia is not a Greek word.

-- Although the Macedonians are generally presented as a distinct tribe and completely unrelated to the Greeks, it is in several places stated that "the Macedonian aristocracy and the royal court were influenced by Greek culture" (pages 135 and 158-159) - never however the ordinary people. All the historic figures (Archelaos, Philip, Alexander and the successors) are distinguished from the Greeks and are stated to have been Macedonians. The only exception is Aristotle, who is listed as a Greek philosopher (page 148).

The reader is struck by the extensive treatment given to the history of the ancient Macedonian State (page 48) in comparison to the history of Ancient Greece (page 44) and Ancient Rome (page 44). The aim is obviously to exalt the history of Ancient Macedonia, and to present it as comparable to that of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome, since it purports to be the ancient history of today's modern state (FYROM).

A quick comparison with school textbooks from the Federal period is interesting: it shows that FYROM's new schoolbooks not only give greater emphasis to teaching the history of the Ancient Macedonians, but that they even tend to suppress what was accepted in earlier editions: for example, that while the Ancient Macedonians were not a Greek tribe, they did gradually become Hellenized. This notion is absent from the new books, or at most is limited to the ruling classes. This perception is becoming generalized now in FYROM through children's books written by a well-known politician, considered to be Gligorov's heir apparent.

And, of course, it is in these books that we encounter for the first time the "sun of Vergina", which they call the "typical Macedonian star" .

(b) Now we come to the second critical period of history, that which sets the stage for the appearance of the "Macedonian" people: that is, the Slavonization of Macedonia.

It is a fact that the Slavs appeared in Macedonia in the 6th and 7th centuries A.D. At first the textbooks refer to them as "Macedonian-Slavs", later dropping the "Slav" element and retaining only the "Macedonian". In the twinkling of an eye Macedonia is considered to have become a Slav region, belonging exclusively to the Slavs as their "homeland". There is no reference of any sort to the existence of any Greek element. The same image is cultivated by the maps purporting to show the expansion of the Slav tribes. These maps indicate in a manner completely devoid of scientific basis the territory occupied by the "Macedonian Slavs" (they exclude only the city of Thessaloniki) within the familiar "model" developed at the turn of this century . Despite this, the text describes Thessaloniki, the Byzantine Empire's second city, as under Slav influence. This is evident in the account of the life and work of Cyril and Methodius, who were Greek brothers from Thessaloniki. Both they themselves and their monumental cultural contribution are included within the cultural heritage of "Macedonian Slavs" .

The general picture given these schoolchildren of their "fatherland" at that time is of a target for a variety of foreign attempts from a variety of directions, that it was invaded and occupied by Byzantines, Bulgarians and, for a short period, Serbs.

Nevertheless, the "Macedonian Slavs" did from time to time manage (under "their" Emperor Samuel, for example) to gain their independence, until the day came when Macedonia, along with the rest of the Balkans, fell to the Turks.

(c) The third historical period covers the years of the Turkish occupation and the development of national liberation movements. This was the time when (according to FYROM's historians) the national consciousness of the "Macedonian" people developed.

The History textbook written by A. Trajanovski, Z. Naumovski and S. Mladenovski for use in Grade 8 covers the period of the Ottoman occupation, until the Balkan Wars (1912-1913). As in the treatment of the Byzantine period, here too an attempt is made to appropriate the historical presence and the cultural achievements of neighbouring peoples, that is, the Serbs, the Bulgarians and the Greeks. Serbian insurrections to the north of this province are "Macedonianized": one example is the Karpos revolt in southern Serbia and in the Serbian province of Kumanovo in 1689-1670 (pages 39-41). If it proves completely impossible to appropriate a political event or cultural achievement entirely, then rights "by association" are claimed, on the grounds that "Macedonians" shared in them. One such case is the rising of the Serbs in Kosovo in the 18th century, where, in order to claim that the whole undertaking was a joint Serbo-"Macedonian" affair, it is recorded that "Macedonians" also took part. (This would be compartible to claiming that the American Revolution was a Franco-American enterprize because Lafayette jointed the American revolutioneries!).

The same treatment is given to accounts of the Bulgarian revolutionary movements of the final decades of the 19th century. Wherever these movements spread into areas of the greater Macedonian region (Pirin Macedonia, Vardar Macedonia), they are automatically "Macedonianized". Here there is no question of "rights by association", since it is not admitted that there were any Bulgarians on Macedonian territory.

It is also interesting to see how these schoolbooks endeavour to promote the political line maintaining within the "Macedonian" national family the Moslem Slavs living in Macedonian territory. The same textbook gives a detailed description of the forcible rounding-up of Christian boys and generally of the conversions to Islam that took place in the Balkans. The Slav-speaking Moslems of Macedonia, however, are always called "Moslem Macedonians" - they are attributed a "Macedonian" national identity, in other words - while their co-religionists in Bosnia (formerly Serbian Christians) are merely called "Moslems", in both the national and the religious senses of the term.

As for the Albanians, their presence is attributed by the authors to the importation of Albanian-speaking populations into northwestern Macedonia and Serbia (Kosovo) by the Turkish authorities when these areas had been left empty following the suppression of the Slav insurrections. This is the explanation given of the considerable Albanian community, who of course are presented to the schoolchildren as emigrants, and not as natives as they themselves claim to be.

Where the process of "Macedonianization" reaches its peak, however, is where it must explain the cultural, educational and political presence of Hellenism in Macedonia. In the cultural field, wherever the Greek presence cannot be subsumed within "Macedonian culture", the authors resort to the artifice of the phrase "the culture of Macedonia", without specifying that the people in question were in fact Greeks. The fact that the culture is ascribed to a region, rather than to the people who lived in it, does not seem to trouble the authors particularly. What is important is that the confusion between the phrases "culture of Macedonia" and "Macedonian culture" paves the way for associations which lead the schoolchildren to assimilate both types of "culture" - national and geographical - directly into their own cultural heritage. It is typical that in the second year textbook referred to earlier, even Mt Athos is described as an example of quintessentially Slav - and therefore "Macedonian" - activity. The students are given the definite impression that the Slav-speaking monasteries of Hilandar, Zographou and Panteleimonos were, and probably still are, "Macedonian".

On the other hand, however, the presentation of the preparation and evolution of the 1821 Greek Revolution (pages 110-111) must be considered as satisfactory. Nevertheless, although almost all the areas that rose in revolution are mentioned, Macedonia is not. With regard to the establishment of the Greek state in 1830, moreover, the textbook says that "significant Greek areas still remained outside the boundaries of the Greek state, including Thessaly, Crete and the Islands of the Aegean". Here too there is no mention of Macedonia.

The explanation for this omission is found in the following chapter, on the national liberation movements of the "Macedonians" in the 19th century and up until World War I. The insurrection that took place in Naousa and Vermion in 1822 is described separately from the 1821 Greek Revolution, precisely in order to present it as a forerunner of the "Macedonian" national liberation movements. This is undoubtedly the grossest appropriation of a glorious historical event, which is justifiedly celebrated in Greece as the supreme example of the patriotism and sacrifice of the Macedonians (Greek, of course). The following extracts from the Grade 8 History are illuminating (pages 138-140). There are similar passages in A. Trajanovski's History for Grade 9 (pages 87-79).

"... Spurred on by the initial successes of the Greek Revolution (1821), the Macedonians living in Negush (Naousa) and the surrounding villages, with a sprinkling of Vlachs and Greeks, captured the city of Naousa on March 3, 1822". (The city of Naousa is always called "Negush"). It then mentions a revolutionary force of 5,000 men led by "Anastas Karataso-Stariot ("old" Anastas Karataso), Angel Gatso and Zafirakis Logotet (Logothetis), and goes on to say that volunteers joined the insurrection from the areas of Vodena,Veria, Moglen, Kozani, Florina, Kastoria and other places (all place names are given in their Slav versions).

It eventually puts the national seal on the insurrection:

"... The insurrection of Naousa has an important place in the history of the Macedonian peple. The fact that large numbers of Macedonians took part in the rising along with their Vlach and Greek neighbours symbolizes their common interest in living together in freedom".

The same method is used to try to "Macedonianize" subsequent Greek revolutionary movements in Macedonia, such as that of Tsami Karatasos in 1854 and Leonidas Voulgaris in 1860 (pages 140-142).

The period of the Macedonian Struggle focuses on the Ilinden Uprising in 1903, and is treated in a manner reminiscent of that given the 1821 Revolution in Greek schoolbooks. The problem of "Macedonianizing" this period lies mainly with the Bulgarian historians, whose perception of the national identity of the Revolution and its protagonists is of course diametrically opposed to that of the Slavs. At the same time, all the Slav-speakers in Macedonia's southern and middle zones are transformed into ethnic "Macedonians", and their contribution to the defensive Greek Macedonian Struggle is passed in silence.

In conclusion, what the student of FYROM's new textbooks chiefly gathers from the history of the Turkish occupation is that the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 are not considered as having put an end to 500 years of foreign occupation, nor as having liberated Macedonia. On the contrary, Macedonia was thereby subjugated anew by the three neighbouring states, and its population, the "Macedonian" people, was "dismembered" and divided into three parts. (Two typical illustrations are found in figures 12 and 13). The student who has just followed a glorious historic attempt to liberate his country is thus overwhelmed by unutterable bitterness at the "injustice" suffered by his people. He is thus ready to accept with relief and national pride the description of the events of 1940-1944, when the "Macedonian" people, by its own efforts - he is told - won its independence within the framework of Yugoslavian Macedonia.

(d) The final period covers the historic march to independence. After discussing the period of the Turkish occupation, the authors of FYROM's new school textbooks should logically have continued with matters pertaining solely to that part of Macedonia which had been included in the Serbian (Yugoslav) state, before that area became known as "Vardarska Banovina". This, however, would have cut off the new generation of "Macedonian" children from the rest of the Macedonian area, which by that time had already become part of their neighbour states. Their "irredentist" ideology could never permit this kind of approach. They therefore adopted an unprecedented and revealing method for the presentation of the material on the history of the 20th century. On to each chapter, such as for example "Macedonia between the Wars", "Macedonia in World War II", or "Macedonia after World War II", in which they discussed matters directly related to FYROM, they grafted sub-chapters on "the Aegean part of Macedonia" and "the Pirin sector of Macedonia". These sub-chapters were devoted exclusively to the activity of the "Macedonian population" - as the authors call the Slav-speakers - and the official policies of Greece and Bulgaria towards them. In this way the image of a Macedonia which is geographically and ethnically one but has been politically sub-divided among three contiguous states, is kept constantly before the eyes of the students.

Events from 1944 to 1990 are covered extensively, as they were in the past, because that was the critical historical period in which an official fiat (by Tito) recognized the existence of a "Macedonian" people and assigned it a geographical sector of the Yugoslav Federation bearing the name "People 's -and later Socialist Republic of Macedonia". Unlike what happened during the Tito years, however, the participation of FYROM's Slavo-Macedonians in the 1942-1944 partisan movement is not presented as part of a single resistance movement working for the creation of a post-war communist federal Yugoslavia. A new theory makes its appearance here, presenting the "Macedonian" partisans as fighting for the creation of an independent Macedonian state which adhered of its own volition to the Yugoslav Federation in 1944. This revisionist version of history is an attempt to suppress the events of the critical two-year period from 1943-1944 - at least as far as the younger generation is concerned, for their elders have not forgotten what really happened at that time. In order to detach the Slavs of FYROM from their allegiance, for at that time the overwhelming majority of them identified with the Bulgarian national ideology, Tito recognized a "Macedonian" nation and people solely in order to attach it to the Yugoslav Federation. In other words, it was a case of reaffirming the annexation of 1912-1913, which had been temporarily interrupted by the Bulgarian occupation of 1941-1944, and not of voluntary adhesion to the Federation on the part of the "neo-Macedonians"..

At this point a brief but important parenthesis becomes necessary. It is important because it shows how even recent events, such as those which happened during World War II, are used to foster the students' impression of the singleness of this region and their sense of proprietorship over Macedonian territories beyond the borders of FYROM. The map in the Grade 8 History book (Skopje 1992, page 102) shows the areas occupied by the Partisans in August 1943. According to the interpretation of symbols, these were "free zones". At two points, Prespes and Aridaia, these areas extend for a considerable distance into Greek territory. These were areas where for a short period of time Yugoslav Partisans hunted by the Occupation forces were active. What is striking is that other large areas of Greek Macedonia, which at that time were controlled by ELAS (the Greek People's Liberation Army) are not marked as "free". Apparently, for the editors of these schoolbooks, the areas occupied by German, Italian or Bulgarian forces but under the control of Greek partisan units were considered as still subjugated territory.

Let me now return to the new interpretation of the period 1943-44, as it appears in FYROM's new school textbooks. The political opportunism behind the revision of the events of those two years in Yugoslav Macedonia is blatant. The Act of Constitution of the "Antifascist Assembly of the People's Liberation of Macedonia" (ASNOM) proclaimed in August 1944 the foundation of a federal state of Macedonia and at the same time expressed the intention of unifying (annexing) the "unliberated" areas of Macedonia in Greece and Bulgaria. The same proclamation is repeated in the Preamble to the Constitution of the now independent FYROM, thus perpetuating the 1944 injunction to unify the three sections of Macedonia.

This is precisely what the editors of these school textbooks are trying to make clear: that the declaration of independence by the "Republic of Macedonia" in 1991 was not a self-contained event, but the latest form of two similar but unsuccessful events in the past: the Ilinden Uprising of 1903 and the decisions of the AAPLM in 1944. Both these events, which proclaimed the independence of Macedonia, constituted landmarks towards the unification of the entire geographical area of Macedonia. That is why they receive such special attention in FYROM's new school textbooks.

It was not my intention to address myself to the emotion of readers -particularly the Greeks who are sensitive over such matters- although the subject is certainly one which lends itself to emotional charge. I merely wished to explore with you a question which should be of interest to everybody concerned with peace and stability in this part of the Balkans.

It is hoped that these short observations on FYROM 's new school textbooks would be taken seriously especially across our border. They might awaken certain necessary soul-searchings, and induce responsible leaders to reflect on where such nationalist charges on unsuspecting souls of children might lead.

Hopefully, these observations might help pierce the walls of intrasigence which are growing higher by the day, from every direction. -Greece not excluded- cutting off paths of communication and dialogue, and leaving the area at the mercy of those who take pleasure in shouting slogans. The issue of the education and information of the younger generation, whether through schoolbooks or in the form of student rallies, is too serious to be left in the hands of fanatical noise-makers, wherever they are found.

The French and the Germans have showed us the path to follow forty years ago. The same path was paced out by the efforts made in the Balkans in the second half of the 1980 's. These endeavours must be continued, and they must bear fruit. It is up to the political leaders of the countires of southeastern Europe to master the necessary courage to do so.

Remarks on FYROM 's new school textbooks*
Evangelos Kofos
Thessaloniki 1994
* Lecture Given at the Thessaloniki Chamber of Commerce and Industry Hall (March 23, 1994),
under the auspices of the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle and the Institute for Balkan Studies.


Original source:
http://uranus.eng.auth.gr/new/eng/macedonia/kofos/

[pankration]

A few years ago in this country, Canada, we had an Albertan teacher who systematically taught in his senior history classes that the Holocaust never occurred. He propegated a theory of Jewish domination and purposefully attempted to turn his students against the Jewish people. He was eventually found out, lost his job, criminally charged and convicted. The man who inspired him was deported back to Germany where he is currently facing hate crime charges. Modern societies do not rewrite history so that fanatical minorities or fringe groups can have their way. In Canada and most of Europe prison can be a result of such actions. Yet, somehow, FYROM has not only thumbed its nose at academic tradition and historical evidence but has in effect created primers for the spawning of hatreds that have never existed before. Where is the outcry from the rest of Europe? Where is the protest from Israel, itself a victim of such slander? And where in God's name is Greece, the libelled victim of these intellectual terrorists? As a teacher of history I can unequivocally state that what is happening in these schools today will have dire consequences later on. FYROM is indoctrinating the suicide bombers of tomorrow and everyone sits back. Unbelievable.

[HellenicPride]

Originally Posted by pankration

A few years ago in this country, Canada, we had an Albertan teacher who systematically taught in his senior history classes that the Holocaust never occurred. He propegated a theory of Jewish domination and purposefully attempted to turn his students against the Jewish people. He was eventually found out, lost his job, criminally charged and convicted. The man who inspired him was deported back to Germany where he is currently facing hate crime charges. Modern societies do not rewrite history so that fanatical minorities or fringe groups can have their way. In Canada and most of Europe prison can be a result of such actions. Yet, somehow, FYROM has not only thumbed its nose at academic tradition and historical evidence but has in effect created primers for the spawning of hatreds that have never existed before. Where is the outcry from the rest of Europe? Where is the protest from Israel, itself a victim of such slander? And where in God's name is Greece, the libelled victim of these intellectual terrorists? As a teacher of history I can unequivocally state that what is happening in these schools today will have dire consequences later on. FYROM is indoctrinating the suicide bombers of tomorrow and everyone sits back. Unbelievable.

Yes its a shame, not only that even in colleges the blacks have fabricated Greek history and teach it to their liking. Seems everyone wants a piece of Greece's history. When does this all stop?

[Draco]

Is Kofos still adviser to the Greek government? If there's going to be a European Court of Justice case, he's the one who can best adduce and explain evidence of Skopjian propaganda.

[Andrew]

Τα δικά μας τα σχολεία σήμερα τί διδάσκουν ρε παιδιά ??... έτσι από περιέργεια ρωτάω , γιατί εγώ στο σχολείο (1986-1998) για τους Μακεδόνες άκουγα πάντα μετά τον Αλέξανδρο και λίγα λόγια για το Φίλιππο...
...ενώ με πρίζαν τα αρχίδια με Εβραική μυθολογία από την πρώτη δημοτικού (Αβράαμ , Ισάακ , Σάρα , Μωησής ...) ΠΟΤΕ , κανένας στο σχολείο δεν μου είπε ότι στην ελληνική μυθολογία ο Μακεδών είναι απόγονος του Δευκαλίωνα και αδελφός του Μάγνητα . Το έμαθα μοναχός μου στα 25 μου.

Έτσι ξαναρωτάω αν κάποιος ξέρει στα δικά μας σχολεία σήμερα τί διδάσκουν για την Μακεδονία ??

[zefs]

Reasons why this issue will never end until they are part of Greater Albania.

http://www.bulgarmak.org/makedonia.htm

Please look through the whole thing.:mad:

[MAKEDON01]

Originally Posted by pankration

A few years ago in this country, Canada, we had an Albertan teacher who systematically taught in his senior history classes that the Holocaust never occurred. He propegated a theory of Jewish domination and purposefully attempted to turn his students against the Jewish people. He was eventually found out, lost his job, criminally charged and convicted. The man who inspired him was deported back to Germany where he is currently facing hate crime charges. Modern societies do not rewrite history so that fanatical minorities or fringe groups can have their way. In Canada and most of Europe prison can be a result of such actions. Yet, somehow, FYROM has not only thumbed its nose at academic tradition and historical evidence but has in effect created primers for the spawning of hatreds that have never existed before. Where is the outcry from the rest of Europe? Where is the protest from Israel, itself a victim of such slander? And where in God's name is Greece, the libelled victim of these intellectual terrorists? As a teacher of history I can unequivocally state that what is happening in these schools today will have dire consequences later on. FYROM is indoctrinating the suicide bombers of tomorrow and everyone sits back. Unbelievable.

U are not wrong in some respect. There is some extreme hate and allot of people growing up will focus on putting 100% of there time on these matters. It can't be good for both countries.

[kostas68]

Originally Posted by Andrew

Τα δικά μας τα σχολεία σήμερα τί διδάσκουν ρε παιδιά ??... έτσι από περιέργεια ρωτάω , γιατί εγώ στο σχολείο (1986-1998) για τους Μακεδόνες άκουγα πάντα μετά τον Αλέξανδρο και λίγα λόγια για το Φίλιππο...
...ενώ με πρίζαν τα αρχίδια με Εβραική μυθολογία από την πρώτη δημοτικού (Αβράαμ , Ισάακ , Σάρα , Μωησής ...) ΠΟΤΕ , κανένας στο σχολείο δεν μου είπε ότι στην ελληνική μυθολογία ο Μακεδών είναι απόγονος του Δευκαλίωνα και αδελφός του Μάγνητα . Το έμαθα μοναχός μου στα 25 μου.

Έτσι ξαναρωτάω αν κάποιος ξέρει στα δικά μας σχολεία σήμερα τί διδάσκουν για την Μακεδονία ??

Στην τετάρτη δημοτικού που κάνουν την ιστορία της αρχαίας Ελλάδας νομίζω ότι η κατάσταση είναι ικανοποιητική.Σε λίγο θα ανεβάσω στο imageshack τις σελίδες απ'τα μαθήματα για τη Μακεδονία.Τα'χω σε PDF και αργεί λίγο η επεξεργασία...

[Draco]

Τα ελληνικά σχολεία μια χαρά διδάσκουν την ιστορία. Έχετε δει στην υπόλοιπη Ευρώπη τι ιστορία διδάσκονται τα παιδιά;

[kostas68]

Originally Posted by kostas68

Στην τετάρτη δημοτικού που κάνουν την ιστορία της αρχαίας Ελλάδας νομίζω ότι η κατάσταση είναι ικανοποιητική.Σε λίγο θα ανεβάσω στο imageshack τις σελίδες απ'τα μαθήματα για τη Μακεδονία.Τα'χω σε PDF και αργεί λίγο η επεξεργασία...

It tooks me a little time more than i had estimated,but i've done it.I love the photo on the last page,the entrance of the modern city of Alexandreia in Egypt with the Greek sign <ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΕΙΑ>.
Ηere you are:
http://img329.imageshack.us/my.php?image=46cr9.jpg
http://img329.imageshack.us/my.php?image=47el3.jpg
http://img329.imageshack.us/my.php?image=48iq5.jpg
http://img231.imageshack.us/my.php?image=49jb9.jpg
http://img386.imageshack.us/my.php?image=50wo7.jpg
http://img386.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1bmu7.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=2bcm8.jpg
http://img216.imageshack.us/my.php?image=3bff5.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4bwb6.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=5brp3.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=6but5.jpg
http://img216.imageshack.us/my.php?image=7bgg8.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=8bci8.jpg
http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=9bva7.jpg