Hellenic Migrations and Katadesmos:

A Paradigm of Macedonian Speech

Marcus Alexander Templar

Remarks on katadesmos

• The language of the scroll maintains the original long ᾱ instead of η which is a very Attic and characteristically Ionic.  Although it bears Northwest distinctiveness, it is syntactically influenced by Aeolic and Attic dialects, as does the Thessalian. 
• Psilosis on glosses ΟΠΟΚΑ, ΟΠΩΣ, ΙΚΕΤΙΣ, ΥΜΩN, because they lack the prevocalic presence of  .
• The syntax of the gloss ΟΠΩΣ with subjunctive is common in the early times ending in the beginning of fifth century BC in favor of INA with subjunctive.
• The time of the scroll’s text is about the end of the fifth and beginning of the fourth century BC.
• The lexical, grammatical, and syntactical intricacies of the text indicate that the author is local and the textual form is supported by other inscriptions found in Macedonia. 

The syntax of the conjunction of manner ΟΠΩΣ with subjunctive instead of ΙΝΑ with subjunctive denotes syntax of earlier period.         

The presence of the Attic syntax in the scroll demonstrates the influence of the Attic dialect.  Athens, due to its political and military superiority over other Greek states forced linguistic dominance over all dialects.  Attic had already become in the very early years of the fifth century BC the kultursprache of the Macedonian nobility.  

The migration of the Dorian Thesprotians to the Aeolic speaking Thessaly helps us realize that not all Macedonians had passed to the Peloponnese where they received the exonym Dorians.  Had all Macedonians passed on to Peloponnese leaving no elements on the continental Greece, the Macedonian/Dorian Thesprotians would not have existed in Epirus.

The Phoenician     ₍zayin) rendering Z (zeta) brings the date of the script to the end of the last half of the fifth century BC.  One could even argue that the inscription’s zayin resembles   as in Boeotian  or in Theran  rendering ZEYΣ or Zeus.  Boeotia used the zeta by 424 BC while we know that Corinth used it in the fifth century, as well.  What we do not know about the Corinthian dialect is the time of conversion from zayin to zeta due to lack of examples.[121]

[121] Lillian H. Jeffery, B001KJ5O1A The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece: A Study of the Origin of the Greek Alphabet and Its Development from the Eighth to the Fifth Centuries BC, edited by A. W. Johnston  (Oxford University Press) 1961, 89.

Conclusion

The Arcadians had migrated to Cyprus in the Bronze Age a few centuries before the Macedonians who migrated north during the Iron Age, and thus any assumption that the Macedonians were not Greeks par excellence is baseless and this small inscription written in Northwest Doric by a simple woman, not a member of nobility from Macedonia attests to it. 

Historical and archeological evidence reveals that the Macedonians (under the eponym Hellenes) left the Aeolic speaking area of south Thessaly, roved near the west foot hills of Mt. Olympus, wandered to the Pindus Mountain range through the habitats of Northwest Doric speaking Epirotans, went to Lebaea  and ended up in the Aeolic speaking Perrhaebia and then to  Mt. Pieria.  Considering the above route of the Macedonians that lasted a few centuries it is natural that their speech would include elements of both Aeolic and Northwest Doric dialects. 

The combination of Northwest Doric with Aeolic elements and the lexical and grammatical intricacies of the text make this dialect similar to Thessalian of Thessaliotis, but we do not know the degree of Aeolic influence on the Northwest dialect and whether the Macedonian was more Aeolic or more Doric than the Thessalian.  What we now know is that this is the language which Plutarch (Alexander V, 51.6) invoked in his statement ἀνεβόα Μακεδονιστί (he called out in Macedonian).

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