Basic Knowledge for FYROM

[Astoria]

Here is some basic knowledge for every Fyromian that comes here spamming the place with the same old stuff.

I advise every fyromian to review the below stuff and contemplate the depth of the Greekness of Macedonia.

Let's us begin :








Alexander's inscription from Priene, mentioning that he built the temple of Athena Polias. British Museum





Ai Khanoum Afghanistan:
Delphic Maxims from Ai Khanoum L. Robert, CRAI 1968, 422-457, no. 2 Epigram of two verses by Klearchos of Soloi accompanying inscription of Delphic maxims in the temenos of Kineas (the oikistes (founder) of the Greek settlement) at Ai Khanoum.

Date: early 3rd. century BC





More from Ai Khanoum,Afghanistan:
Gymnasium





Solar quadrant, modeled on one at Delphi





Theater at Ephesus





Library of Celsus,Ephesus





Ephesus , Library of Celsus





And here it is boys,the coup de grace:
Dedication by Alexander the Great to Athena Polias

Greek, around 330 BC From Priene, Asia Minor

In 336 BC Alexander the Great embarked on a programme of territorial expansion, which would eventually extend the boundaries of the Greek world to Egypt in the south and to India in the East. In 334 BC Alexander crossed the Hellespont, the narrow strait separating Europe and Asia, and went first to Troy. There he dedicated his armour to Athena and laid a wreath at the tomb of Achilles, the legendary hero and champion of the Greeks in the Trojan War. This act prefigured Alexander's role as a new Achilles liberating the Greek cities of Asia Minor from Asiatic rule.

That same summer of 334 BC, a successful engagement with the Persian army at the river Granicus, east of Troy, opened the gates of Asia Minor, and Alexander proceeded to tour the Greek cities of the west coast, expelling their Persian garrisons.

On reaching Priene, he made a further dedication to Athena. There the townspeople were laying out their new city and building a temple to its patron goddess. Alexander offered funds to complete the temple, and the inscription on this wall block, cut into a block of marble, records his gift. The inscription was found in the nineteenth century by the architect-archaeologist Richard Pullan leading an expedition on behalf of the Society of Dilettanti. It reads: 'King Alexander dedicated the Temple to Athena Polias'





Corinthian pilasters on a Buddhist stupa of green schist at Mingora, in the Upper Swat Valley, Pakistan. These features represent late and indirect Greek influence, dated to the 2nd century AD, but stand near Alexander's route in 327 BCE.





The two arches show Indian influence, while the columns are pure Corinthian
Along the main street of Sirkap, the ancient city, sits the Double-Headed Eagle Shrine. Its original name is lost, but is now referred to as the double-Headed Eagle Shrine because of the bird bas-relief that adorns the arch (images two and three). Of Scythian origin, the double-headed bird motif is common in Eurasia, appearing in Byzantine and European armor crests as well.

The shrine is awash in Bactrian Greek influencess brought to the area by Alexander's army, who unwittingly left a Hellenic cultural imprint. The columns decorating the sides of the shrine are clearly Corinthian and the pediment is classically Greek. This is not to say that the shrine is entirely Greek - far from it. There are also Indian influences, notably in the other niches (image 3). The one on the left is almost an ogee (onion-shaped) arch, while the one on the right is a torina, or ornamented Indian gateway





Honorary inscription to Alexander the Great.The city honours the king Alexander the Great. The invocation of his divine origin (son of Zeus) indicates the existence of Alexander worship during the first half of the 3rd cent. B.C., already known from other epigraphic evidence. The revival of his memory has favoured particularly by the Roman Emperors Karakalas and M. Aurelius who wanted to appear that they kept up his acts in this way. Thessaloniki, Vardaris square, 3rd cent. A.D.





Category: Royal Letter Subject: Letter of Alexander the Great to the Chians concerning the trial of Persian partisans and the restoration of democracy Date: ca. 332 BC Bibliography: W.G. Forrest, Klio 51, 1969, 201-206 A.J. Heisserer, Alexander the Great and the Greeks (Oklahoma, 1980), ch. 4, pp. 96-111 Provenience: Chios Location: Chios Museum





Catalogue Record Category: Royal Letter Subject: Letter of Antiochos VIII (or IX) to Ptolemy XI Alexander granting freedom to Seleukeia in Pieria Date: Sept. 6, 109 BC Provenience: Paphos, Cyprus Location: British Museum, London (Inv. GIBM 970





Decree of Amphipolis Decree of Amphipolis, condemning political opponents of Philip II to exile for life, 357 BC, Athens, Epigraphical Museum





Grave stele from Vergina Painted grave stele from the Great Tumulus of Vergina, bearing the names of the dead, second half of 4th century BC, Thessaloniki, Archaeological Museum






The interaction between Hellenistic Greece and Buddhism started when Alexander the Great conquered the Achaemenid Empire and further regions of Central Asia in 334 BCE, crossing the Indus and Jhelum rivers, and going as far as the Beas, thus establishing direct contact with India, the birthplace of Buddhism.[2]

Alexander founded several cities in his new territories in the areas of the Oxus and Bactria, and Greek settlements further extended to the Khyber Pass, Gandhara (see Taxila) and the Punjab.

Not being bound by any restrictions, and because of their cult of form, the Greeks were the first to attempt a sculptural representation of the Buddha

Herculean depiction of Vajrapani (right), as the protector of the Buddha, 2nd century CE Gandhara, British Museum.



Some links for an extra boost of knowledge
Alexander in the Qur'an
Alexander and the Jews
Alexander's Legacy of Greco-Buhddism
Alexander's Legacy of Greco-Buhdist Art


And last but definetely far from least:
2 university style audio lessons


Take this and cherish it forever. To be Macedonian is to be Greek.

[Astoria]

1. Recorded history refers to an ancient kingdom of Macedonia beginning in the 7th century B.C.E.

2. The name "Macedonia" was given by its people and in Greek it means "Highland".

3. Many ancient sources-historians, the Bible, the Torrah, geographers etc. refer to Macedonia as a
Greek kingdom. It is also mentioned by Homer and by the Historian-geographer Strabo who states:
"Macedonia is Greece as well."

4. 0ver 5,000 excavated relics of the ancient Macedonian kingdom carry only Greek inscriptions.

5. The ancient Macedonians participated in the Olympic Games and only Greeks could do that.
They believed in the same Gods as the rest of the Greeks. Their kingdom's coins carried Greek inscriptions only.
The Palace floor in the ancient Macedonian capital of Pella depicts Greek deities and Greek
mythological figures with Greek language inscriptions.

6. Mt. Olympus, home of the Greek Gods, was located in Macedonia.
At the foot of the mountain, excavations unearthed the ancient Macedonian burial grounds with
Greek inscriptions.

7. The Greeks were the only people in ancient time to build theaters. Four have already been found in Macedonia.

8. Apostle Paul refers to Greeks receiving him when visiting Macedonia.
He was preaching in Greek and his epistles were written in Greek, the language of inhabitants.

9. Alexander the Great-king of Macedonia and leader of the united Greek city-States-disseminated
Greek culture and civilization during his campaign against the Persian Empire as well as in Europe,
Africa and Asia.

10. There never was a "Macedonian language" just as there never was an "Athenian Epirotic",
"Theban" "Boeotian" etc. All city-states of Greece the Greek language with various dialects.
Present day Bulgaria-an idiom Of the Bulgarian language is spoken by the pseudo-Macedonians
recognizes neither a Macedonian language nor a Macedonian ethnicity. Most of the present" day
Slavs in the country of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (F.Y.R.O.M.) are of Bulgarian descent.

11. Demosthenes, the Athenian orator and a fanatic super patriot, never called the Macedonians "barbarians"
only their king, Phillip, and that because he could not stomach the passing of Greek supremacy from Athens
to Macedonia. His Athenian orator rival, Isocrates, sent a letter to King Phillip exhorting and imploring him
to unite all Greeks and seeking vengeance to lead them against Persia, their common enemy.

12. Ilinden, the site of an insurrection of, supposedly, all races residing in the geographic area of ancient
Macedonia against the Ottoman Empire, was planned and instigated by the Bulgarian Government
whose dream it was to annex all of it and gain access to the Aegean Sea. Categorical evidence of this
the many existing reports of European ambassadors and counsels which were dispatched to their
respective Foreign Ministries. The pseudo-Macedonians appropriated this unsuccessful event of Ilinden
most of the victims were Greek-from the Bulgarians and present it as their own heroic attempt to gain
"freedom for Macedonia."

13. There never existed a country called "Macedonia" since the destruction of ancient kingdom by the Romans
in 168 B.C.. Any reference to a division of "Macedonia" between Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria is a false
and ludicrous statement. The geographical area of Macedonia from the advent of the Slavs in the 6th
century A.D. until the First Balkan War of 1912 a period of 1500 years was populated by Greeks,
Serbs, Bulgarians, Albanians, Jews and Gypsies and since the 14th century A.D. by Turks as well.
No census of Roman, Byzantine or Ottoman Empires refers to any "Macedonians". Hence, what
"Macedonia" was divided up?

14. Before it became Yugoslavia, the country was called "KINGDOM OF THE Serbs,
Croats and Slovenes." No mention of Macedonians.

15.0nly the southern part of F.Y.R.O.M. corresponds to the northern border the ancient Macedonian kingdom.

16. No known historic record refers to any total extinction or genocide perpetrated upon the ancient
Macedonian people. What of their descendants? Surely they are not Slavs. What of their rights to their
identity and Heritage?
Are they no longer "Macedonian"? If you ever come across an ancient Macedonian relic with an
inscription Finally, the following question is addressed to all those who dare not admit that the
ancient Macedonians were Greek because it would ruin their concocted Macedonian ethnicity:

" If you ever come across an ancient Macedonian relic with an inscription other than in Greek, you shall
have found the discovery of all ages.
YOU HAVE UNTIL THE COLLAPSE OF OUR SOLAR SYSTEM.

[Astoria]

MACEDONIANS IN THE OLYMPIADS AND THEIR CONTRIBUTIONS

Macedonians, through their agrarian and bucolic lives, their mountainous terrain, their continuous struggles to keep at bay barbarians from raiding the Greek peninsula and their intermittent internal struggles for succession to the Throne of Macedonia, ended up being rather isolated from the rest of the Greeks. They held on to their traditions, but their cultural development was not very significant. The cultural distance between the southern Greek City-States and Macedonia was quite substantial, because Athens did not have to play the protecting role of keeping the northern raiders off the Greek land. Macedonians bore that responsibility. Dr. Apostolos Daskalakis in his book

The Greeks of Ancient Macedonia states: "If the Macedonians had not become the shield, protecting the lands beyond Mount Olympus by the continuous barbarian attacks, the Greek element would not be preserved uninterrupted for so many centuries. Had the Greek City-States in the south not remained for centuries undisturbed by invaders, Hellenism could had never reached the elevated thought about freedom, arts, philosophy and sciences, which were universally inherited by humanity.


The without doubt culturally more advanced academic and artistic world of southern Greece, did not stay indifferent to this new venue towards the land of Macedonian. Thus a multitude of men of letters, arts and sciences found fertile ground amongst Macedonians. By the 4th century BCE this assimilation was complete.
The enormous economic prosperity of the Macedonian State and able leadership of its Kings, became contributing factors towards collective changes, with innovative creations in all aspects of artistic endeavors; especially in metallurgy, painting and architecture. Such Arts became the archetype later on for the Romans, as it is evident even today in the city of Pompey, Italy.


This wide move of the center of Hellenism from the southern to the northern part of the Greek peninsula, began with the emergence of the Macedonian King Philip II. His conquests and at the same time the decline of the Greek City-States in the south, caused a sensation of envy and dissatisfaction to the other Greeks, especially to the citizens of Athens, which formed the hub of public opinion at the time, against the, in some ways, "uncultivated" Greeks of Macedonia. All the insults about "barbarian" Macedonians did not originate by philosophers, poets or other authors, but by political Athenian orators.


The Athenian politician-orator Demosthenes, King Philip's main opponent, speaking to the Athenians, said:
"…aren't all our powerful locations placed in the hands of this man? Will we not suffer the most awful humiliation?
Are we not already at war with him? Isn't he our enemy? Isn't he in possession of our lands?
Isn't he a barbarian? Doesn't he deserve all this name-calling?"
Demosthenes, in his speech, spoke with human anger against an opponent. When he called King Philip "barbarian", he did not mean that Philip was "not Greek". This was taken for granted, since in his Olympian II oration, Demosthenes praises the State of Macedonia. At the same time Demosthenes could not call anyone a "barbarian", given that his own origin was "barbarian". Aeschinus, in his oration against Ktisiphon, calls Demosthenes "libelous", because he is "barbarian" by his Scythe mother and only a "Greek" by language.



Macedonian King Alexander I, lover of Arts and friend of poet Pindar, participated in the 80th Olympiad of 460 BCE.
He competed in the "Stadion" field event and was placed close second to the first runner.
His participation marked not only the beginning of the involvement of Macedonians in the Olympics, but it also constituted the foundation of future Macedonian interaction with the other Greeks and, furthermore, had very far reaching effects on the future of Hellenism.


Macedonians, who participated in the Olympics at Olympia, were as follows:

· King Alexander I, in the 80th Olympics, in 460 BCE. He run the "Stadion" and was placed very close second.

· King Arhelaos Perdikas, competed in the 93rd Olympics, in 408 BCE and won at Delphi the race of the four-horse chariot.

· King Philip II was an Olympic champion three times. In the 106th Olympics, in 356 BCE, he won the race, riding his horse. In the 107th Olympics, in 352 BCE, he won the four-horse chariot race. In the 108th Olympics, in 348 BCE, he was the winner of the two colt chariot.

· Cliton run the Stadion in the 113rd Olympics, in 328 BCE.

· Damasias from Amphipolis won in the Stadion in the 115th Olympics, in 320 BCE.

· Lampos from Philippi, was proclaimed a winner in the four-horse chariot race in the 119th Olympics, in 304 BCE.

· Antigonos won in the Stadion race, in the 122nd Olympics, in 292 BCE and in the 123rd Olympics in 288 BCE.

· Seleucos won in the field-sports competition in the 128th Olympics in 268 BCE.

· During the 128th Olympics, in 268 BCE and in the 129th Olympics, in 264 BCE, a woman from Macedonia won the competition. Pausanias mentions that: "…it is said that the race of the two-colt chariot was won by a woman, named Velestihi from the seashores of Macedonia".


Pausanias mentions the Philippeion in Olympia: "In the grove there is the Records Building and an edifice called Phippeion…Philip built it after the battle at Chaeroneia…there are statues of Philip, of Alexander and Amyntas…there are pieces that were made of ivory and gold carved by Leoharus, just like the statues of Olympia and Euridice". Also Pausanias points out that various statues were made by order as oblations and he mentions that: "representing the Macedonians, the inhabitants of Dion, a city by the Macedonian Pieria mountain range, had a statue made, which portrays Apollo holding a deer".


During the Vergina excavation a tripod was found, which is kept at the Museum of Thessaloniki, and carries the inscription: "I come from the Argos athletic competitions, the Heraia". According to Archeology Professor Andronikos, the tripod belonged to the Macedonian King Alexander I and it was a family heirloom.


King Arhelaos I (413-399 BC) established in Dion magnificent athletic competitions every two years "the Olympian Dion", which lasted nine days, as it corresponded to the nine Pierian Muses, originating from the Macedonian mountain range Pieria. During these events ancient tragedies were presented. Arhelaos I organized the Macedonian Army, structured a transportation system and transferred the Capital from Aiges to Pella. In his court lived the tragic poet Agathon, the epic poet Horilos, the dithyramb writer Timotheos, the tragic poet Melanipidis and the doctor and son of Hippocrates Thessalos. Tragedian Euripides composed his tragedies Arhelaos and Bachae right in Arhelaos's court. Euripides died and was buried in Macedonia.


Three ancient Theaters were discovered in Macedonia; one is at Dion, dating back to the 5th century BCE; the second is at Vergina (Aegai) – 4th century BCE and the third at Philippi. Ancient plays used to be performed in these Theaters. At the Dion Theater, Euripides' Bachae and Arhelaos were introduced for the first time.
Some experts believe that Iphigeneia in Aulis was presented there. The theme of the play Arhelaos is associated with the migration of the Argive Timenidis, Prince of Macedonia and founder of the Royal House of Aegai.
These tragedies, played in these Theaters, were written in the Greek language, since they were intended for Greek audience, the Macedonians.


Dion, the sacred place of Macedonians, is one of the largest (about 4 acres) and most archeologically significant districts of Greece, featuring multifarious bath areas, taking up about 1 acre, with tiled floors, marble bathtubs, complete plumbing system (led and clay pipes) and lavish colonnaded tiled halls. A fact that has been overlooked is that Dion was also the center of intellectual competitions and therefore the birth place of the cultural Olympics.


The "Hellenistic Era" is an enormous issue and it could be appropriately illuminated, only if Universities create chairs and research it fully. We could also become more knowledgeable of the influence King Alexander the Great had on Islam, which according to Dr. Constantine Romanos, is the missing link in the History of Civilization.
All ancient authors refer to the impact of the Hellenistic cultural and intellectual thinking that was passed on by the Macedonians to the peoples of the Far East.


Plutarch mentions that: "All of Asia, civilized by Alexander the Great, was reading Homer and Euripides' as well as Sophocles' tragedies". It is not by coincidence that the Koran refers to Alexander the Great as Prophet. Jews have adopted his name. Buddhists worshipped him as equal to God. Saint Vasileios the Great and Saint Nectarios promote Alexander and his deeds. Diodoros points out:
"…the enemies were compelled by the victor to thrive".

[Astoria]

Bilingual Edict of Ashoka (in Greek and Aramaic), found in Kandahar. Circa 250 BCE, Kabul Museum.





The Greco-Bactrian kings Agathocles and Pantaleon issued bilingual coins in the Indian square standard, with depictions of the Buddhist lion (the other side represents a Lakshmi).






To the north, Euthydemus also ruled Sogdiana and Ferghana, and there are indications that from Alexandria Eschate the Greco-Bactrians may have led expeditions as far as Kashgar and Ürümqi in Chinese Turkestan, leading to the first known contacts between China and the West around 220 BCE. The Greek historian Strabo too writes that:

"they extended their empire even as far as the Seres (Chinese) and the Phryni" (Strabo, XI.XI.I [10]).
Several statuettes and representations of Greek soldiers have been found north of the Tien Shan, on the doorstep to China, and are today on display in the Xinjiang museum at Urumqi


Greek soldier in the Sampul tapestry, woollen wall hanging, 3rd-2nd century BCE, Sampul, Urumqi Xinjiang Museum.





Greek influences on Chinese art have also been acknowledged (Hirth, Rostovtzeff). Designs with rosette flowers, geometric lines, and glass inlays, suggestive of Hellenistic influences [12], can be found on some early Han bronze mirrors, dated between 300-200 BCE


Zhou/ Han bronze mirror with glass inlays, said to incorporate Greco-Bactrian artistic patterns (rosette flowers, geometric lines, and glass inlays). 300-200 BCE. Victoria and Albert Museum.







Furthermore, according to Pali sources, some of Ashoka's emissaries were Greek Buddhist monks, indicating close religious exchanges between the two cultures:



Some of the Greek populations that had remained in northwestern India apparently converted to Buddhism:

"Here in the king's domain among the Greeks, the Kambojas, the Nabhakas, the Nabhapamkits, the Bhojas, the Pitinikas, the Andhras and the Palidas, everywhere people are following Beloved-of-the-Gods' instructions in Dharma. (Edicts of Ashoka, 13th Rock Edict, S. Dhammika).
Furthermore, according to Pali sources, some of Ashoka's emissaries were Greek Buddhist monks, indicating close religious exchanges between the two cultures:

"When the thera (elder) Moggaliputta, the illuminator of the religion of the Conqueror (Ashoka), had brought the (third) council to an end… he sent forth theras, one here and one there: …and to Aparantaka (the "Western countries" corresponding to Gujarat and Sindh) he sent the Greek (Yona) named Dhammarakkhita... and the thera Maharakkhita he sent into the country of the Yona". (Mahavamsa XII).
Greco-Bactrians probably received these Buddhist emissaries (At least Maharakkhita, lit. "The Great Saved One", who was "sent to the country of the Yona") and somehow tolerated the Buddhist faith, although little proof remains. In the 2nd century CE, the Christian dogmatist Clement of Alexandria recognized the existence of Buddhist Sramanas among the Bactrians ("Bactrians" meaning "Oriental Greeks" in that period), and even their influence on Greek thought:

"Thus philosophy, a thing of the highest utility, flourished in antiquity among the barbarians, shedding its light over the nations. And afterwards it came to Greece. First in its ranks were the prophets of the Egyptians; and the Chaldeans among the Assyrians; and the Druids among the Gauls; and the Sramanas among the Bactrians ("Σαρμαναίοι Βάκτρων"); and the philosophers of the Celts; and the Magi of the Persians, who foretold the Saviour's birth, and came into the land of Judaea guided by a star. The Indian gymnosophists are also in the number, and the other barbarian philosophers. And of these there are two classes, some of them called Sramanas ("Σαρμάναι"), and others Brahmins ("Βραφμαναι")." Clement of Alexandria "The Stromata, or Miscellanies" Book I, Chapter XV




depiction of Greek soldier, found in a burial north of the Tian Shan mountains. 4th-3rd century BCE. Bronze, 42cm high, 4 kilograms. Documented in "Cambridge Ancient History" IV. Also in Boardman "The diffusion of Classical Art in Antiquity",

From a burial, said to be of the 4th century BC, just north of the Tien Shan range". Ürümqi Xinjiang Museum.



According to the Han Chronicles, following a crushing defeat in 162 BCE by the Xiongnu (Huns), the nomadic tribes of the Yuezhi fled from the Tarim Basin towards the west, crossed the neighbouring urban civilization of the "Ta-Yuan" (probably the Greek possessions in Ferghana), and re-settled north of the Oxus in modern-day Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, in the northern part of the Greco-Bactrian territory. The Ta-Yuan remained a healthy and powerful urban civilization which had numerous contacts and exchanges with China from 130 BCE.

The Yuezhi apparently occupied the Greco-Bactrian territory north of the Oxus during the reign of Eucratides, who was busy fighting in India against the Indo-Greeks.


The Yuezhi further expanded southward into Bactria around 120 BCE, apparently further pushed out by invasions from the northern Wu-Sun. It seems they also pushed Scythian tribes before them, which continued to India, where they came to be identified as Indo-Scythians.

The invasion is also described in western Classical sources from the 1st century BCE, with different names than those used by the Chinese:

"The best known tribes are those who deprived the Greeks of Bactriana, the Asii, Pasiani, Tochari, and Sacarauli, who came from the country on the other side of the Jaxartes, opposite the Sacae and Sogdiani."
(Strabo, 11-8-1 [27])
Around that time the king Heliocles abandoned Bactria and moved his capital to the Kabul valley, from where he ruled his Indian holdings. Having left the Bactrian territory, he is technically the last Greco-Bactrian king, although several of his descendants, moving beyond the Hindu Kush, would form the western part of the Indo-Greek kingdom. The last of these "western" Indo-Greek kings, Hermaeus, would rule until around 70 BCE, when the Yuezhi again invaded his territory in the Paropamisadae (while the "eastern" Indo-Greek kings would continue to rule until around 10 CE in the area of the Punjab).

Overall, the Yuezhi remained in Bactria for more than a century. They became Hellenized to some degree, as suggested by their adoption of the Greek alphabet to write their Iranian language, and by numerous remaining coins, minted in the style of the Greco-Bactrian kings, with the text in Greek.

Around 12 BCE the Yuezhi were then to move further to northern India where they established the Kushan Empire.


One of the first Yuezhi coins, imitative, in crude style, of the coins of the Greco-Bactrian king Heliocles, circa 120 BCE.
Obv: Bust of a Yuezhi chief with Greek royal headband.
Rev: Zeus with thunderbolt and sceptre. Misspelled Greek legend BASILEO HELIOLEEU "(of) King Heliocles".





As you can clearly see, it was not only the Greeks that recorded history, history was recorded by the egyptians all the way to the chinese who fell in contact with the Greeks.





The last Greco-Bactrian king Heliocles I retreated and moved his capital to the Kabul Valley. The eastern part of Bactria was occupied by Pashtun people.

As they settled in Bactria from around 125 BCE, the Yuezhi became Hellenized to some degree, as suggested by their adoption of the Greek alphabet and by some remaining coins, minted in the style of the Greco-Bactrian kings, with the text in Greek. The area of Bactria they settled came to be known as Tokharistan, since the Yuezhi were called "Tocharians" by the Greeks.



A posthumus, slightly barbarized, coin of Hermaeus, minted in the Paropamisadae between 50 BCE and 25 BCE.
Obv: Bust of Hermaeus. Greek legend BASILEOS SOTIROS ERMAIOU "Saviour King Hermaeus".
Rev: Zeus, non-radiating, making a benediction gesture. Kharoshti legend: MAHARAJASA TRATARASA HERAYAMASA "Saviour King Hermaeus".

The first presumed, and documented, Yuezhi prince is Sapadbizes (probably a yabgu's prince of Yuezhi confederation), who ruled around 20 BCE, and minted in Greek and in the same style as the western Indo-Greek kings.




The unification of the Yuezhi tribes and the rise of the Kushan is documented in the Chinese Historical chronicle Hou Hanshu:

"More than a hundred years later, the xihou (Ch:翖侯, "Allied Prince") of Guishuang (Badakhshan and the adjoining territories north of the Oxus), named Qiujiu Que (Ch: 丘就卻, Kujula Kadphises) attacked and exterminated the four other xihou ("Allied Princes"). He set himself up as king of a kingdom called Guishuang (Kushan). He invaded Anxi (Parthia) and took the Gaofu (Ch:高附, Kabul) region. He also defeated the whole of the kingdoms of Puda and Jibin (Ch: 罽賓, Kapiśa-Gandhāra). Qiujiu Que (Kujula Kadphises) was more than eighty years old when he died.
His son, Yan Gaozhen (Ch:閻高珍) (Vima Takto), became king in his place. He returned and defeated Tianzhu (Northwestern India) and installed a General to supervise and lead it. The Yuezhi then became extremely rich. All the kingdoms call [their king] the Guishuang (Kushan) king, but the Han call them by their original name, Da Yuezhi." (Hou Hanshu, trans. John Hill, [24]).
The Yuezhi/Kushan integrated Buddhism into a pantheon of many deities, became great promoters of Mahayana Buddhism, and their interactions with Greek civilization helped the Gandharan culture and Greco-Buddhism flourish.

Greek Buddhist devotees, holding plantain leaves, in purely Hellenistic style, inside Corinthian columns, Buner relief, Victoria and Albert Museum.




The Greek god Atlas, supporting a Buddhist monument, Hadda



Scene of the life of the Buddha (2nd-3rd century)



Stone palettes, also called Toilet trays, are round trays commonly found in the areas of Bactria and Gandhara,




Indo-Greek stone palette representing an Hellenistic Nereid goddess riding a Ketos sea-monster, 2nd century BCE, Sirkap.





The Greek philosopher Apollonius of Tyana is related by Philostratus in Life of Apollonius Tyana to have visited India, and specifically the city of Taxila around 46 CE. He describes constructions of the Greek type, [3] probably referring to Sirkap, and explains that the Indo-Parthian king of Taxila, named Phraotes, received a Greek education at the court of his farther and spoke Greek fluently:

"Tell me, O King, how you acquired such a command of the Greek tongue, and whence you derived all your philosophical attainments in this place?"[4]
[...]-"My father, after a Greek education, brought me to the sages at an age somewhat too early perhaps, for I was only twelve at the time, but they brought me up like their own son; for any that they admit knowing the Greek tongue they are especially fond of, because they consider that in virtue of the similarity of his disposition he already belongs to themselves."

.
Stupa base at Sirkap, decorated with Hindu, Buddhist, and Greek temple fronts.






Hellenistic culture in the Indian subcontinent: Greek clothes, amphoras, wine and music (Detail of Chakhil-i-Ghoundi stupa, Hadda, Gandhara, 1st century AD





Indo-Greek princess may have been the models for the Bodhisattvas of the Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara..




Numerous Greco-Buddhist sculptures (around 23,000 of them) in clay or plaster were excavated in Hadda during the 1930s and the 1970s. They combine elements of Buddhism and Hellenism, in an almost perfect Hellenistic style.

Although the style itself is typical of the late Hellenistic 2nd or 1st century BCE, the Hadda sculptures are usually dated, with some uncertainty, to the 1st century CE or later. This discrepancy might be explained by a preservation of late Hellenistic styles for a few centuries in this part of the world, or may indicate that the actual dates are the earlier ones.

Given the antiquity of these sculptures and a technical refinement indicative of artists fully conversant with all the aspects of Greek sculpture, it has been suggested that Greek communities were directly involved in these realizations, and that "the area might be the cradle of incipient Buddhist sculpture in Indo-Greek style" (Boardman).

The style of many of the works at Hadda is highly Hellenistic, and can be compared, for examples, to the sculptures found at the Temple of Apollo in Bassae, Greece.









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[MAKEDONELLHNAS]

It does'nt matter whatever you put in front of them they deny it, but whatever they say or do without any proof what so ever is always the truth? Bulgarians are you proud of these ancient Macedonian artifacts?

[Astoria]

Buddhism in the Hellenistic world