Euripides and Macedonians

Euripides spent many years of his life and finally died in Macedonia. Many of his tragedies were written and played while he was in Macedonia. This would have been impossible, had the Macedonians been ‘barbarians’. This is because in one of these tragedies, ‘Iphigeneia in Aulis’, the Greek superiority over the barbarians is emphasized.

MIT classics is elightening on this subject, where Iphigenia is talking to her mother Clytaemnestra (in Euripides’ Iphigenia at Avlis):

IPHIGENIA: And it is but right, mother, that Hellenes should rule barbarians, but not barbarians Hellenes, those being slaves, while these are free.

http://classics.mit.edu/Euripides/iphi_aul.pl.txt 

For the sake of the argument, it woud have been a great insult for the proud Macedonians if Euripides, in front of the Macedonian King Archelaos and the theater full of Macedonians, would dare to say that Greeks should rule the barbarians, if Macedonians were barbarians themselves

The question is…Did Euripides had a death wish OR he was certain he was adressing Greeks????  

Some more questions would be why did Euripides assumed that these Macedonians knew everything about the Trojan War, Iphigenia, Orestis and the like, as references to these abound in the text?

Why did he assume that the deities, their characteristics and actions were understandable by the Macedonians?

The Answer is easy…Euripides knew Macedonians were Greeks!!!