Αρχαία ελληνικά αγάλματα έξω από την έδρα της κυβέρνησης στα Σκόπια

*Στην αρχή ήταν τα αεροδρόμια των Σκοπίων και της Αχρίδας, που βαφτίστηκαν «Μέγας Αλέξανδρος» και «Απόστολος Παύλος». Η κυβέρνηση Γκρούεφσκι προχωρεί τώρα ακόμη περισσότερο, σχεδιάζοντας να αποκτήσει τη δική της Αλεξάνδρεια!

Ηδη από το καλοκαίρι διάφορες ΜΚΟ πρότειναν τη μετονομασία μιας πόλης της ΠΓΔΜ σε Αλεξάνδρεια.

Φίλιππος, ο Μακεδών

Ξεκίνησαν μάλιστα και τη συλλογή υπογραφών, ενώ υποψήφια χρίστηκε η μικρή πόλη Σόντσεφ Γκραντ (που σημαίνει πόλη του ήλιου -Ηλιούπολη), που βρίσκεται λίγο έξω από τα Σκόπια.

Oι ταμπέλες αεροδρομίου «Αλέξανδρος ο Μέγας»

*Παράλληλα, ήδη έχουν ληφθεί και κάποιες άλλες αποφάσεις: Αυτές αφορούν τη μετονομασία του σταδίου της πόλης των Σκοπίων σε «Φίλιππος Β’ ο Μακεδών», του αεροδρομίου της πόλης Στιπ επίσης σε «Φίλιππος Β’», αλλά και του οδικού άξονα που συνδέει τις περιοχές Γευγελή και Τομπάνοφτσε σε «Αλέξανδρος, ο Μακεδών».

*Το καλοκαίρι είχαν δει το φως της δημοσιότητας και πληροφορίες ότι σύντομα θα στηθεί στην κεντρική πλατεία των Σκοπίων άγαλμα του Μ. Αλεξάνδρου, το οποίο βρίσκεται στη Φλωρεντία για εργασίες επιχάλκωσης.

*Μέσα στο 2008 πάντως στήθηκαν ακόμη δύο ανδριάντες του στο Πρίλεπ και στο Στιπ.

*Η πρακτική της οικειοποίησης δεν αφορά μόνο ιστορικές προσωπικότητες αλλά και μνημεία ή ευρήματα, τα οποία χρησιμοποιούνται για να αποδείξουν την «αδιάσπαστη συνέχεια του μακεδονικού έθνους από την αρχαιότητα ως σήμερα». Τελευταίο επεισόδιο, μια «ανακάλυψη» του ιστορικού Τόμε Μπότσεφσκι και του ακαδημαϊκού Αριστότελ Τέντοφ. Σε τι συνίσταται;

Στο ότι η μία από τις τρεις γλώσσες που έχουν χαραχθεί στην περίφημη «επιγραφή της Ροζέτας» (βρέθηκε πριν από 207 χρόνια στην Αίγυπτο και έχει ηλικία 2.200 ετών) είναι η «μακεδονική» και ότι έχει ομοιότητα με τη γλώσσα που μιλιέται σήμερα στα Σκόπια.

*Ως γνωστόν, βέβαια, η επιγραφή περιλαμβάνει ιερογλυφικά της Αιγύπτου, απλοποιημένα ιερογλυφικά της ελληνιστικής περιόδου και αρχαία ελληνικά. Τα ΜΜΕ της ΠΓΔΜ, ωστόσο, θεωρούν απολύτως φυσικό η τρίτη γλώσσα να είναι η «μακεδονική», αφού, όπως αναφέρουν, οι Μακεδόνες βασίλεψαν στην Αίγυπτο 302 χρόνια, υπό τον Αλέξανδρο και τον διάδοχό του αντιβασιλέα, Πτολεμαίο.

*Την άποψη για τη «μακεδονική ιστορία» που συνεχίζεται χιλιάδες χρόνια η κυβέρνηση Γκρούεφσκι επιχειρεί να την «πουλήσει» και στο εξωτερικό, με μια καμπάνια για τον τουρισμό, η οποία άρχισε να προβάλλεται από το CNN την περασμένη εβδομάδα.

Σινεμά «η προπαγάνδα»

Το φιλμάκι, γυρισμένο από τον (βραβευμένο με Χρυσό Φοίνικα στο Φεστιβάλ της Βενετίας) Μίλτσο Μάντσεφ-σκι, έχει τίτλο «Αιώνια Μακεδονία» και επαναλαμβάνει τα επιχειρήματα περί «μακεδονικής γλώσσας και εθνότητας», χρηματοδοτούμενο με 200.000 ευρώ από το υπουργείο Πολιτισμού της ΠΓΔΜ.

*Στον δικτυακό αυτόν τόπο υπάρχει και ειδικό τμήμα αφιερωμένο στη «μακεδονική μειονότητα» στη χώρα μας, αλλά και στη Βουλγαρία και τη Σερβία.

Πηγή: Enet.gr

By Samios Makedonas

Nationalists from the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (F.Y.R.O.M) and her diaspora constantly allege that only Greek historians and institutions subscribe to the notion that the ancient Macedonians, including the Hellenistic successors of Alexander, belonged to the sphere of the ancient Greek world. The nationalists from F.Y.R.O.M claim that the notion that the ancient Macedonians were a Greek tribe is an assertion largely motivated by propaganda efforts of the Greek state. According to nationalists from F.Y.R.O.M and her diaspora the ancient Macedonians were a proto-Slavic tribe who spoke a proto-Slavic language and are the ancestors of the Slavic population of F.Y.R.O.M. No credible and objective historian in the world supports this far fetched claim.

A quick survey of international museums, and their descriptions of ancient Macedonia and ancient Macedonian artificats, shows that many of the most reputable and respected international institutions regard the ancient Macedonians as an ancient Greek tribe.

I leave it to the reader to decide who to believe: a group of radical nationalists from F.Y.R.O.M and her diaspora who claim that Alexander the Great was a proto-Slavic speaker (even though there is not one shred of evidence to support this) who belonged to a tribe that are alleged ancestors of the Slavs of F.Y.R.O.M (a population that was almost universally regarded as Bulgarian up to 120 years ago) or the most reputable museums in the world.

[Credit goes to Georox for compiling this information]

1. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York.

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/gkru/hd_gkru.htm#mace

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/tacg/hd_tacg.htm

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/alex/ho_52.127.4.htm

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/angk/hd_angk.htm

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/haht/ho_2002.66.htm

2. The British Museum. London.

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/world_cultures/europe/ancient_greece.aspx

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/m/portrait_alexander_the_great.aspx

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/d/dedication_by_alexander.aspx

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/b/bronze_mask_of_dionysos.aspx

3. The Louvre. Paris.

4. The Getty. Los Angeles.

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=8128

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=8239

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=35555

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=109801

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=35552

http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=248738

5. The Hermitage. St. Petersburg Russia

http://hermitagemuseum.org/html_En/03/hm3_7_1_1b.html

6. The Fitzwilliam Museum. Cambridge

http://www-cm.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/gallery/east-west/

7. The Philadelphia Museum of Art.

http://www.philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/40363.html?mulR=4756

By Chris Philipou

Source: http://maktruth.blogspot.com/2008/12/world-museums.html

Patriarch Euthymius of Turnovo (Patriarch of Bulgaria between 1375 and 1393) in his “Hagiography of St. Ilarion Maglenski” wrote about the Bulgarian Char Kaloyan:

Translation in English:

“He was very brave, then, conquered a large part of the Greek land, namely Thrace and Macedonia, the Tribalia and Dalmatia, in those added Neada (sic) and Ellada and still Aitolia.”

From the above it is clear that the Patriarch Euthymius, reflecting a general perception, recognizes Macedonia as part of Greek land.

Source:  E. Kaluzniacki, Werke Des Patriachen von Bulgarien Euthymius (1375-1393),. Nach den besten Handschriften, Wien 1901.

In an Anonymous Bulgarian Chronicle of early 15th century, we have the description of the Turkish invation in Balkans. There we read:

Translation in English:

”

Then Katakouzinos came to agreement with Mourat and they gave oaths and exchanged written agreements which apply even today that Turks wont harm the Greeks, neither in Romania, nor in Macedonia in the century, and when Turks promised things will be like that, Kantakozinos left to the Turks the passage from Kallipolis.”

Source: J. Bogdan, “Ein Beitrag zur Bulgarischen und Serbischen Geschichtscheribung”, Archiv fur Slavische Plilologie, v. 13 (1891), 527

So even in Medieval Bulgarian sources it was well known in Macedonia were living Greeks.  However Turks didnt keep their promises for long.

Translation in English:

When Kaloyan was a king at that time, in Constantinople, Palaiologos, then Turks broke the oaths which they had agreed with the Greeks, and conquered the city of Kallipolis and the surrounding villages, took Macedonia and they started conflicts everywhere, and in the passage they look to exist their own ships in order to guard it, after they pushed and sent away the Greeks from the area.”

From the old-Bulgarian translation of Manasses Chronicle, a translation dating back in the first years of the Ivan Alexander’s reign (1331-1340) we find:

Translation in English:

During the reign of Anastasius, Bulgarians started to conquer this land, they passed to Bidynio and firstly begun to conquer the Lower land of Ochrid and later all of it.

Source: Die Slavische Manasses-Chronik. Ach der Ausgabe von oan Bogdan. Muncen, Wilhelm Fink Verlag 1966, page 115.

The Bulgarian character of Samuil’s state, contrary to the illusions of t FYROM’s pseudohistorians  is proved undoubtedly here. Similarly we can find again in the same source a little later:

Translation in English:

“This King Vasileios crashed Samouil, Char of Bulgars, twice and conquered Bidynio and PLiska, and the Great Preslava and the Small one, and many other cities [..]“

Similar references can be also found in Serbian Medieval Sources:

From the “Bios of St Savva“  written by Teodosie Hilandara (mid 13th cent)

Translation in English:

“This Kaloyan, Czar of Zagorion moved and destroyed many Greek cities in the entire Thrace and in the entire Macedonia [..]“

Source: Teodosije Hilandarac, Zivot Svetoga Save.Izdanje Dure Danicica priredio i predgovor napisao Dorde Trifunovic, Beograd, 1973 (first publ. 1860), p. 103

Therefore we learn that even Serbs knew Macedonia and Thrace consisted of  Greek cities.

By Nicholas M.

Bibliography: “Makedonikes Tautotites ston Hrono”,  Aggeliki Delikari, ‘ Η εικόνα της Μακεδονίας και η εννοια της “Μακεδονικότητας” στους Σλαβικούς λαούς της Βαλκανικής κατά την Βυζαντινή περίοδο”

A Bulgarian Intellectual had once stated about Skopjans: “Among them, the lie is something customary, it is not considered a vice, but as a sign of wit. The one among them who is caught lying does not feel remorse or embarrassment, but only a sorrow because he wasn’t clever enough when constructing the lie“.

The Bulgarian intellectual couldnt be more right. After we witnessed a long list of Greek and other famous heroes, comically claimed by the Propaganda machine of FYROM, it was time now for Skopjans to move on and claim even…more Famous persons, in their desperate struggle to “invent” some history through lies and manipulations while they try to support their fictitious Nationality. The latest victim of Skopjan propaganda is now…Markos Botsaris!!!

We are reading in the latest article by the infamous Risto Stefov titled “Part 12 - Turn of the 19th Century and the Negush Uprise” the following absurb claims:

—————————————

—————————————-

After reading this how could anyone ever take seriously these people?? At least they contribute highly to the amusement of the people around the globe. We have to admit it. Notice the characteristical inability of the author even to support with a single argument his ridiculous claims. We sympathise though with these people’s total inability to write anything sensible, since otherwise if they didnt exist to contribute with such astonishing “inventions”, we wouldnt have anyone to laugh!!!

Just a couple of sources taken from Google Books.

Quote:

“History of the Greek Revolution: and of the wars and campaigns arising from the struggles of the Greek Patriots in amancipating their country from the turkish yoke” By Thomas Gordon, page 42

The United States Speaker… By John Epy Lovell, page 316 published in 1844

“Modern Greece: a narrative of a residence and travels in that country..” By Henry Martyn Baird, page 369, published 1856

“History of the Greek Revolution: and of the wars and campaigns arising from the struggles of the Greek Patriots in amancipating their country from the turkish yoke” By Thomas Gordon, page 283

The book of recitations, page 90 by charles william smith

American literary autographs from Washington Irving to Henry James By Herbert Cahoon, Thomas V. Lange, Charles Ryskamp, Pierpont Morgan Library, page 13

Sent By Jason

The nominally “Macedonian” nation of FYROM emerged as a byproduct of Yugoslavia’s dissolution in the 1990’s and suffered a major transformation of the internal relationships after the US-supported uprising of its Albanian population in 2001 which led to a de facto confederalization of the country. As of late 2008, it is led by the charismatic ex-boxer Nikola Gruevski surrounded by a clique of young politicians. Plagued by chronic unemployment standing at the rate of 35%, with economy characterized by collapsing light industry based on primitive technologies and decaying public infrastructure, the nationalistic government of VMRO-DPMNE failed to attract any substantial foreign investments. Most of its economic policies failed to raise the public standard based on average salary of barely 300 USD. At the same time analysts predict that the consequences of the Global financial crisis are yet to strike FYROM, raising the issue of further deterioration of the prospects for decent livelihood.

The main-although progressively marginalized ethnic group-in FYROM are the “Macedonians”, a nation postulated by the Communist internationale in 1934 and created by policies of Josip Broz, Communist’s Yugoslavia strongman after 1944. A basic historical review of their ethnicity reveals that prior to 1941, when the Bulgarian army, invading the remains of royalist Yugoslavia, was greeted euphorically by the local population, this population considered itself Bulgarian and led a combined struggle of civil disobedience and guerrilla warfare against Belgrade in order to achieve either annexation to Bulgaria or a transitional autonomous state with Bulgarian preeminence. Further exploration of the past reveals an ubiquitously attested in historical sources Bulgarian character, an impression complemented with the peculiar character of the local Slavic language which shares features with standard and dialectal forms of the Bulgarian language proper which set it quite radically apart from all Slavic languages. While this ethnic group to a various degrees assimilated in the last two centuries a certain number of Serbs and Vlach/Aromanians (the latter having historically a Greek consciousness), this is almost irrelevant to its ethnological and linguistic qualities which are almost identical as the Bulgarian vernacular.

The other large population in FYROM is the Albanian. Compromised from descendants of the Paleobalkan ethnic group of Dardanians which was to a certain extent influenced by Roman culture and Latin language and which took refuge in the mountains of present-day north Albania (”Ghegnia”) in late antiquity/early middle ages, the Albanians which converted to Islam under Ottoman rule spread to Kosovo and western FYROM in 17th and 18th centuries. Today, in FYROM, they number near 600. 000, with a compact presence in the towns of Tetovo, Gostivar and Debar and representing a significant population in Skoplje, Kumanovo, Kičevo and Struga. Cherishing an archaic formalized code of conduct based on family and clan loyalty, ethos of reciprocity and obligation, Albanians have been historically more successful than the Bulgarians/”Macedonians” in preservation of means of private entrepreneurship and achieving a more vertical socio-economic stratification coupled with elaborated social network designed to minimize contact with the “Macedonian” non-Muslim population.

Among both the “Macedonians” and the Albanians, collectivist, anti-individualist attitude is deep-seated. Within the daily affairs of both ethnic groups there is a strong reverence for authority and hierarchy. The notion of “state”, a concept held identical with the actual government, which has to be obeyed and respected and which represent the supreme reality in which any individuality is lost is particularity prominent among the “Macedonians” having its root in their quite recent and long-lasting premodern feudal historical phase. It is no wonder that having realized that after the 2001 conflict and the subsequent signing of the Ohrid Agreement they lost the privileged status and that both factually and symbolically they cannot cherish the FYROMian state as their own, the elite of the “Macedonians”, realizing that any confrontation with the Albanian factor would be too dangerous, designed a national idea with the purpose of keeping the wider “Macedonian” public mobilized against non-issues. This recent idea is composed of the recycled concept of “Macedonian autonomism”-Bulgarian idea that that any initiative of the Slavs of Geographic Macedonia has to be labeled “Macedonian” in order to gain sympathies by deciding external political factors and the concept of “Ancient Macedonism”, the idea that the Slavs of FYROM are direct descendants of Ancient Macedonians.

The idea of “Macedonian autonomism” needs no further explanation of its perfidiousness and absurdity. Regardless of the trick character of the concept it still remains a doctrine of the Bulgarian nationalist originating from FYROM: The Bulgarians of Geographic Macedonia should claim that although their singular ethnic identity is the Bulgarian one they are, nevertheless, the exclusive Macedonians. As late as 1960’s this doctrine was restated by the leader of VMRO Ivan Mihailoff with the words “the name Macedonia should be preserved because it is a thorn in the eyes of Greeks and Serbs”.

The enormous success of the idea of “Ancient Macedonian continuity”, which originated among the most primitive sections of FYRO Macedonian emigration in 1970’s (in Sweden, Australia and Canada) needs careful analysis. Although the fallacy of the crude ethnogenetic theory which claims that the “Macedonians” of FYROM and elsewhere speak the tongue of Phillip II and Alexander the Great and that their customs, folklore and other aspects of the culture are either intact or evolved form of the civilization of Ancient Macedon is quite easy refutable, this is not the case in the current conditions under which the national discourse articulates itself in FYROM.

Briefly, Ancient Macedonians were a Greek entity with Greek ethnic name, using exclusively a Greek Doric dialect and later Koine Greek and practicing the same Olympian religion with the rest of the Greek. Ancient Macedonians participated at the Olympic Games, where only Greek were allowed to compete and had theaters on the soil of Macedon, an uniquely Greek concept. All names of Macedonians (with several exceptions) are Greek as confirmed by their Greek etymology. Conclusive to 2008, no scholar outside FYROM has even remotely claimed that the language and culture of Ancient Macedonians are an ancestral type of the present-day FYRO Macedonians, which are descendants of Slavs, an ethnic group originating from North-East Europe. Slavs settled the Balkans from 5th to 7th century and the FYRO Macedonian tribes were homogenized under the rule of the Turkic horsemen tribe of Bulgarians. These Slavs never called themselves “Macedonians”, while Byzantine, Bulgarian, Serbian, Ottoman sources as well as western travelers and others failed to furnish any reference to a “Macedonian” ethnic group prior to late 19th century.

The issue of the ethnic, cultural and linguistic nature of the Ancient Macedonians deserves a wider and detailed expose, referenced and structured according to the scientific method. However, in light of the present state of knowledge, based on the enormous archaeological wealth and a plethora of historic sources, modern historiography universally accepts the conclusion that Ancient Macedonians were Greeks. The key issue with regard to the “Macedonian” nationalism is how the opposite and improbable conclusion could became a “valid” and all-pervading form of public discourse and the root of national self-identification.

The problems arouse with the way in which the totalitarian VMRO-DPMNE government energized the masses among which the national confusion brought by media exposure of contradictory data grew. Firstly, it reactivated the conflict with Greece by multitude of irredentist moves. Secondly, within FYROM it carried massive policy of introduction of Ancient Macedonian symbols (names of institutions, statues) after the expected and natural Greek negative reaction. The population, feeling threatened, mistook the attitude of aggressive “Macedonization” sponsored by the government as “defiance” against a hostile state (the hostility of which was precisely provoked by FYROM’s initial provocations). Capitalizing on the fact that the vast majority of the general population does not have neither a capability nor a will for sustained scientific research regarding ethnology, history and linguistics, the government managed to capture attention of the whole body of citizens. One can presume that the sheer authority the organized government yields in a conformist society where libertarian principles of critical thinking and individual self-reliance regarding the process of opinion-forming are practically absent is sufficient to impose an entirely absurd idea of identity. In FYROM it is unchallenged by organized bodies from which a better knowledge of the true state of affairs might be expected, including universities, institutes, museums etc. With the sole exception of Internet, all electronic and printed media are participants in government’s monopoly over identity dogmas. Only few individual voices of distaste and revolt against the lies have insofar voiced their concerns (Denko Maleski, Petar Hr. Ilievski) but they got a hostile, unsympathetic public response.

While the prospect of organized challenge of the pro-governmental stances regarding the identity issues is something expected given the conventional political dynamics within pluralist societies, this is not quite a case. Nikola Gruevski achieved dominance of his party by calling premature elections in 2008 at the time of peak in the approval rating of his first mandate caused by populist measures. That gave him an unprecedented might against which FYROM has no institutionalized mechanisms of control. Furthermore, in a state of affairs whereby the larger part of the Slavs have abandoned their Bulgarian and Serbian culture in belief that they represent a separate ancient ethnicity in a category of its own, creators of the policy of the opposition (led by the leftist SDSM party) must carefully measure their words of opposition to the lavish Pseudomacedonian rhetorics, since they may be branded as “traitors” given the appropriate circumstances. Consequently, in such occasion they would find themselves ostracized from the ongoing debate.

This leads to the conclusion that the solution to the Pseudomacedonian hysteria which totally dominates public life in FYROM is not only confined to the change in the internal situation which may come as a result of economic collapse or a full-scale civil war, but also from strong pressure from outside which would enable FYROM to conform itself to reality and to rational way of conducting cultural policy. The reign of VMRO-DPMNE, characterized by collectivist, group-centered policies, extensive role of the police in society, new legislature sponsoring religious education, subsidizing biological procreation with wealth redistribution, enforcing ethics of service to the “common good”, emphasizing the feral, folklorist and medieval aspects of local national culture in opposition to modern as well as apolitical high culture, is the greatest political catastrophe FYROM faces in early 21st century. A hope remains that the Slavs of FYROM will reject the artificial and overbearing attempts to instill a connection with chronologically and ethnically distant Greek kingdom as well as to make history the most important aspect of their everyday lives. Only through enduring action from within and from abroad the local state-worshiping, centrally-planned tribal way of life may be liquidated and replaced with a political system based on freedom, a change which will forever put the era of Pseudomacedonism behind, as a doomed ideology based on lies.

Μετά την ιστορία με την Τουρκοσκοπιανή Αεροπορική εταιρία, οι Σκοπιανοί της διασποράς και συγκεκριμένα του “UMD”  έφτασαν να εκδίδουν πιστωτικές κάρτες VISA με…τον δεκαεξάκτινο ήλιο της Βεργίνας και τον Μέγα Αλέξανδρο!!!!

Υπενθυμίζουμε ο δεκαεξάκτινος, Δωδεκακτινος και οκτάκτινος Ήλιος της Βεργίνας έχει Κατοχυρωθεί σαν Πανελλήνιο σύμβολο απο το World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). 

Για ακόμα περισσότερες λεπτομέρειες διαβάστε και το σχετικό άρθρο του Ακρίτα.

Australian Macedonian Advisory Council
November 21, 2008

In the following text I shall present the whole Herodotean testimony on the ancient Macedonian history. But before proceeding with the presentation I must clarify the four separate components of the ancient Macedonian history. These components can be seen as distinctions between the Macedonian Royal House and the Macedonian population and between Macedonia proper and the land over which the Macedonian king’s authority extended in various periods. Not all the king’s subjects were Macedonians and not all the king’s dominion was Macedonia.

Let’s start with the Macedonian Royal House. From antiquity it is known and well accepted as the Temenid Royal house because it’s founder Perdikkas I claimed Argive descent from Temenos, the Dorian conquer of the Peloponnesian Argos. Herodotus informs us in many passages about that.

In [V.22] he states: “And that these descendants of Perdikkas are Hellenes, as they themselves say, I happen to know myself, and not only so, but I will prove in the succeeding history that they are Hellenes. Moreover the Hellanodicai, who manage the games at Olympia, decided that they were so: for when Alexander wished to contend in the games and had descended for this purpose into the arena, the Hellenes who were to run against him tried to exclude him, saying that the contest was not for Barbarians to contend in but for Hellenes: since however Alexander proved that he was of Argos, he was judged to be a Hellene, and when he entered the contest of the foot-race his lot came out with that of the first.”

Also in [VIII.137] he writes about the Macedonian tradition about the arrival of Perdikkas I and his brothers from the Peloponnesian Argos to Western Pieria, and this is a text that we shall analyse later. Finally, the other important passage is the one in [IX.45] here he quotes the words of Alexander I saying:

“…for I should not utter them if I did not care greatly for the general safety of Hellas, seeing that I AM A HELLENE MYSELF BY ANCIENT DESCENT and I should not wish to see Hellas enslaved instead of free.”

So Herodotus, who almost certainly has visited the Macedonian palace and met in person Alexander I, states that he personally knows and the Macedonian kings themselves admit that they are of Hellenic Argive descent, and that although some Greeks have questioned their Hellenism the Hellanodicai finally have recognized them as Greeks, after Alexander I proved his Hellenism. Herodotus´s statement - “I happen to know myself” - has a particular meaning here because Herodotus was himself from Halicarnassus, an Argive-Doric colony and so was familiar with the specific Doric dialect of Argos. NGL Hammond is considered “the patriarch of Macedonian history” and has always considered the Temenid-Argive descent as true. In “History of Macedonia” (volume II, “the language of the Macedonians”) he states that while the general Macedonian population spoke the distinctive and conservative Macedonian dialect of Greek, the Royal family inside the palace spoke Argive Doric. So Herodotus could easily identify by first hand a speaker of Argive Doric - the dialect of his city’s metropolis - and that is why he “happens to know himself” that the Macedonian kings were Temenids from Argos.

Now let’s consider the most specific event, that is Alexander’s I participation in the Olympics. When did this happen? Why Alexander I was the first KNOWN Macedonian to do that? Why did some Greeks question his Hellenism? To understand all that we must consider the Macedonian history under the first Temenids. Perdikkas I became king of Macedonia around 700 BC. He found the Macedonians as transhumant pastoralists in mountainous west Pieria. With the Temenids starts the Macedonian expansion. In their first expansionary phase, they drove away the Thracians from coastal Pieria and the Bottians from south Bottia and founded the capital of their new kingdom in Aegai. In a second expansionary phase later they drove away the remaining Bottians from northern Bottia - conquering the whole central Macedonian plain - and continued by eliminating the Almopians and the Eordeans and adding the territories of Almopia and Eordea into their kingdom. In that way, they formed the so-called Old Macedonian Kingdom, who’s borders were the river Axius in the east, Mt Barnous in the north, Mt Vitsi in the West and the Penius river in the south. If to all this we add Polyaenus’ testimony (a Macedonian himself) in his “Stratagems” (IV.1) where he informs us about a Macedonian-Illyrian conflict during the times of the second Temenid king (Argaeus, around 650 BC), during which Argaeus, due to a lack of male warriors, was compelled to resort in his famous stratagem to a force consisting of young women “dressed as male warriors” (Mimallones and the cult of Dionysus Pseudanor), and we also consider that the neighbouring Paeonians were at the summit of their strength during the period 550-511 BC, when they stretched their military operations from Northern Bottia (which they took from the Macedonians) to Propontis (they sieged the city of Perinthus), then we can make a solid conclusion: From 700 BC till 511 BC the Macedonians were in constant warfare in order to expand or defend their kingdom and the male manpower for these operations was at the limits of sufficiency.

The Rosetta Stone written in Hieroglyphic,Demotic Egyptian and Koine Greek

What does all this have to do with Alexander’s I participation in the Olympics? Well we know that the Olympics were held each summer every four years from 776 BC onwards. In a Olympian summer all the Greeks observed the Olympic ceasefire (the so called Olympiake Ekekheiria) in order to permit the most physically qualified men from every Greek state to participate in the Olympics. Now the problem with the Macedonians was that from 700 BC till 511 BC their major threats weren’t other Greek tribes, but non-Greeks such as Paeonians, Illyrians and Thracians. This means that these non-Greek tribes had no reason to observe the ceasefire relating to the Olympics, and so the Macedonians needed every physically qualified male in order to defend and expand their kingdom through military operations that generally occurred during summer. This explains why no Macedonian may have participated in the Olympics during the period 700-511 BC (though we do not know for sure whether Macedonians participated in the Olympics prior to this time, as the extant records only list Olympic victors, not participants).

What happened immediately after? In 511 BC the Persians managed to subdue the Paeonians ending in this way their period of strength. The Macedonians capitalising on the Paeonian impotence regained northern Bottia and brought again their eastern borders to the river Axius. This is definitely the time frame of the destruction of the Paeonian city Amydon on the eastern bank of the Axius by the Argeads that Stabo refers to in [VII.20] (”Amydon a city of Paeonians. The place was destroyed by the Argeads”). After that the Macedonians offered “earth and water” to the Persians - that is, voluntarily subdued themselves to the Persian king. By doing so they solidified their new re-acquisitions and further more the Persians rewarded them by appointing Amyntas I and his son Alexander later as general supervisors of a region - for the first time - much wider than the Old Macedonian Kingdom. So for the first time, the Macedonian kings expanded their control over non-Macedonian populations, that is, Paeonians, Thracians, Pelasgian Krestonians and the Greek Epeirotan tribes (or “Molossian” tribes as Hecataeus names them back in ca. 515 BC) of the later Upper Macedonia, that is, Elimeians, Tymphaeans, Orestae, Lynkestae and Pelagonians. This new situation explains perfectly the known Herodotean testimony of Alexander I´s speech to the Persians [V.20]: “report to the king who sent you that a Hellene, ruler under him of the Macedonians”. Many use this phrase in order to prove that while the Royal family was of Greek descent the Macedonians weren’t. Note that Alexander I was hereditary king of the original Macedonians and “ruler under the Persian king” of the new dominion that the Persian king rewarded him with. That means that the “Macedonians” in the above phrase are not the original Macedonians of the Old Kingdom - who considered Alexander king (βασιλεύς) and not “ruler under a king” (ὕπαρχος) - but the whole new heterogeneous population posted under Alexander’s authority by the Persians.

So after the Macedonian vassalisation to the Persians, the two centuries long warfare of the Macedonians finally ended and FOR THE FIRST TIME the physically qualified Macedonian men could afford to participate in the Olympics. That is why Alexander I chose to compete to the Olympics immediately after the Macedonian annexation to the Persians in 511 BC. Herodotus informs us in [V.20] that in 511 BC when the Persians arrived in Macedonia and king Amyntas I offered them a welcome-meal, and when Amyntas retired from the table “Alexander took his place” as a host. This means that Alexander I back in 511 BC was at least 12 years old and this can help us calculate the date of his participation in the Olympics. Since he contested in running - a tough sport - his participation age ranged most probably between 18-30 years of age, and so the most probable Olympiads he would have participated in are the ones that occurred in either 504 BC (19 years old), 500 BC (23 years old), 496 BC (27 years old) and 492 BC (31 years old). Alexander’s age clearly excludes any participation after the Greco-Persian wars, that is, after 478 BC. In 478 BC he was around 45 years old, an improper age for Olympian competitor. So, considering only Alexander’s age, we can easily reject the theories that make him “a non-Greek that was granted permission to participate in the Olympics AFTER the Greco-Persian wars as a reward for his assistance to the Greeks during the wars”.

Shield with Star of Vergina on it

What about the Greeks that questioned his participation right? The fact that probably no Macedonian before Alexander could have participated in the Olympics only due to the constant two centuries long warfare with various non-Greek tribes, made Alexander’s participation look odd and unparalleled. After all, the Olympics were one of these events that reminded and renewed the bond between the various Greek tribes and so it is more than obvious that some Greeks were surprised when they saw a participant from a region that never before gave another Olympic athlete. After all, as the Italian Indro Montanelli brilliantly states in his book “Storia dei Greci” (page 281) about the Macedonians: “a big part of the Greeks simply ignored even the existence of their northern most kingdom named Macedonia”. We can easily reject also the theories that the Alexander had to invent his “Argive descent” around 500 BC in order to compete. If a Macedonian in general wanted to prove himself as a Greek around 500 BC the only thing that he had to do was remind the other Greeks of the ALREADY EXISTING two-century old Hesiodic tradition in which Macedon was “brother” of Magnes and a Deucalionid by ancient descent. Only that was enough to guarantee him equal rights to those of the Magnetes and the right to participate in the Olympics. So Alexander I had no need to invent a Greek genealogy in order to participate in the Olympics and this only strengthens the originality of his Argive descent.

Before closing with the Royal House and passing on to the Macedonian population there’s one thing left to clarify. Many modern scholars have rejected the Argive descent of the Temenids and considered it “Royal House propaganda”. At this point I would like to point out what the eminent British scholar Andrew Robert Burn says about the large number of examples of Royal Houses with different origin than that of the tribes that they control. In his book “A Traveller´s History of Greece” written in Oxford in 1984, in the chapter “people, idioms and the coming of the Greeks” he states:

“The expansion of the Hellenes (as the descendants of the proto-Greeks used to refer to themselves) wasn’t always the result of direct conquests. Sometimes they were invited, AS THE GREEK LEGENDS NARRATE, by the local kings in order to help them against their enemies; For Thucydides, this was the mode that the “sons of Hellen” managed to expand from Thessaly. In the legends, the hero arrives alone or followed by a few faithful companions. This is of course a poetic convention. After liberating the territory from enemies or “monsters”, the hero takes for bride the king’s daughter, “the prefixed price for the job”, to use the phrase of a modern scholar. Sometimes the hero inherits the Kingdom. IT IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE THAT SIMILAR THINGS OCCURED IN REALITY, BECAUSE IN THE PREHISTORICAL AEGEAN (AND IN HISTORICAL TIMES IN SOME TERRITORIES WITH ARCHAIC CUSTOMS *like Macedonia, personal note*) PARENTAGE WAS DETERMINED AND THE PROPERTY INHERITED PROBABLY THROUGH THE FEMALE LINE. IN HOMER, MENELAUS (A MYCENAEAN, BROTHER OF THE POWERFUL MYCENAEAN KING AGAMEMNON) BECOMES KING OF SPARTA AFTER TAKING FOR BRIDE HELEN, THE DAUGHTER OF THE OLD KING TYNDAREUS, ALTHOUGH TYNDAREUS HAD LIVING SONS (AS HELEN NARRATES IN THE ILIAD), THE DIOSCURIDS (KASTOR AND POLYDEYKES)”.

Ruins of ancient Pella in Greece

This pattern of a “Hero” invited to fight the old king’s enemies fits perfectly with the Temenids, because immediately after Perdiccas’ I accession to the Macedonian throne we have the Macedonian expansion through warfare. Anyway, Herodotus provides us another example of a king belonging to a different Greek tribe from the one that he controls. In [V.72] he reminds us that the Spartan king Cleomenes was an Achaean ruling over Dorians:

” …but the priestess stood up from her seat before he had passed through the door, and said, “Lacedemonian stranger, go back and enter not into the temple, for it is not lawful for Dorians to pass in hither.” He said: “WOMAN, I AM NOT A DORIAN, BUT AN ACHAEAN”.”

Other examples of the genre are the Phtiotid Aeakid Royal house of the Molossians, the Corinthean Bakkhiad Royal house of the Lynkestians, the Pylean “Nestorid” descent of the Peisistratids and Alcmeonids in Athens and the more historical examples of Gelon from Gela and the Rhegian Agathocles becoming respectively successful tyrant and chief-general of the Syracusans in Sicily. In this frame there is nothing “suspicious” in a Doric-Argive family ruling over the Macedonians. After all, Thucydides, a more “standard” historian than Herodotus who rarely concords with the later, in this particular theme is in accord with him about the Argive descent of the Temenid kings of Macedonia (II,98).

The next component of the ancient Macedonian history is the general population. We’ve already seen that we must make a distinction between the “Eteomacedonians” (that is the original Macedonians of the Old Kingdom) and the “Macedonians” who the Temenids finished up ruling under the Persian kings - that is after the submission to the Persians the Temenid dominion expanded outside the Eteomacedonians and the Old Kingdom. Intermarriages with the neighbouring Royal houses took place in order to solidify the expanded dominion and there is no doubt that non-Greek populations were eventually assimilated into the Macedonian stock. This can explain the minority of non-Greek names found in Macedonia (less than 5% of all the attested names). But if we must speak on the “origin of the ancient Macedonians”, then the focal point are the “Eteomacedonians”, just like any research on the early Roman History must be limited to the original Latins of Latium. NGL Hammond underlines this distinction clearly in his book “The Macedonian State: Origins, Institutions and History” where in chapter VI in a discussion about the earliest Macedonian institutions he states: “at this point we must focus on the real Macedonians and not on the “Molossian” tribes of Upper Macedonia and the populations east of the river Axius that the Macedonians managed to subdue”.

So what does Herodotus’ testimony has to offer for these “Eteomacedonians”?

In two different and independent passages he equates the Macedonians and the Dorians:

In [I.56] he states:

“for in the reign of Deucalion this race dwelt in Pthiotis, and in the time of Doros the son of Hellen in the land lying below Ossa and Olympus, which is called Histiaiotis; and when it was driven from Histiaiotis by the sons of Cadmos, it dwelt in Pindos and was called Makednian; and thence it moved afterwards to Dryopis, and from Dryopis it came finally to Peloponnesus, and began to be called Dorian.”

It is clear that in Herodotus’ opinion - a man descended from a Doric colony in Asia minor - the Dorians used to be called Makednians when they inhabited northern Pindus. In other words, the Dorians were Makednians that migrated southwards.

Later in [VIII.43] when he’s presenting the Peloponnesian contribution to the Greek fleet opposing the Persians he states:

“From Peloponnese the Lacedemonians furnishing sixteen ships, the Corinthians furnishing the same complement as at Artemision, the Sikyonians furnishing fifteen ships, the Epidaurians ten, the Troizenians five, the men of Hermion three, THESE ALL, except the Hermionians, BEING OF THE RACE CALLED DORIC AND/OR MAKEDNIAN and having made their last migration from Erineos and Pindos and the land of Dryopis.”

Again the Macedonians and the Dorians are being equalised in Herodotus’ opinion. What does this mean? Instead of equalising the two Greek tribes it would be better if we considered them as “brother” tribes originating from the same North-Western Greek stock that used to inhabit the Boion range in northern Pindus. Boion is a focal point for all the tribes belonging to the so-called Northern Greek group. The eminent German linguists Porzig & Risch based on the various isoglosses of the various Greek dialects have proven that Mycenaean Greek was already a south Greek dialect and wasn’t the precursor of all the historical Greek dialects, but only of the Attic-Ionic and the Arkado-Cypriot ones. Aeolic and North-Western Greek on the other hand form a northern Greek group, and both derived from a common “undifferentiated” precursor. So far we know that the Dorians and Macedonians originate from the Boion range, the Aeolophon Boetians took their name from this mountain, meanwhile the Aeolophon Perrhaebians’ ethnonym literally means “from the source of the Aias/Aous” (Πέρρας ΑἴFου) situated immediately west of the Boion range.

‘Yauna Takabara’,(Greeks with sun hats)the Persian name of the Macedonians

Furthermore we have Hesiod’s account that the Macedonians were “brother” tribes with the Aelophon Magnetes (mythological sons of Zeus and Thyia and by the last Deucalionids, that is, descendants of Deucalion, the genarch of all Greeks). Some have questioned the Macedonians´ Hellenicity because of their “co-laterality” to the mythological Hellen - that is, Thyia was Hellen’s sister and so her children were not Hellenes. This argument - at the degree that we can argue over mythology - is definitely shallow because there are other Greek-speaking tribes that do not descent from Hellen directly, but do descent from Deucalion. In the myth Deucalion had three children: Hellen, Thyia and Pandora junior. From Hellen derived Dorus, Aeolus and Xouthus, and from Xouthus Ion and Achaean. From Thyia and Zeus originated the two brothers “Magnes and Macedon rejoicing in horses and dwelling in Pieria around Olympus”, while from Zeus and Pandora originated Graecus, the genarch of the Epeirotans and the other north-western Greeks except the Dorians. Since no historian ever rejected the Greekness of the Magnetes, and since the vast majority of historians accept the Greekness of the Epeirotans, it is logical to include the Macedonians also in the bulk of the Greek-speaking population. After all, independently of the Hesiodic myth, and based on historical conclusions, the vast majority of the modern NON-GREEK scholars like Hammond, Burn, Bengtson, Brixhe, Masson - to mention some of them - accept the Greekness of the Macedonians. Furthermore, there are some important common usances specifically between Macedonians and Magnetes that seem to enhance the Hesiodic myth. Both (and only the Macedonians and Magnetes) had the cult of Zeus Akraeus and the festival of the Heretideia (although the Magnetes had for a very long time ceased to have a king and hetairoi), and both of them and the Aenians had a dance simulating livestock theft that the Macedonians named “Karpea”, and the Magnetes and Aenians “Karpaea”, from the Greek verb “karpeuein”, meaning “to gain”.

Now lets to return to the Boion and the bulk of the northern Greeks. It was the Phrygian descent into the region at the beginning of the Early Iron Age or the end of the Late Bronze Age that prompted the so called “Great Aegean Migration” that we know better as the “Dorian Descent”. The Phrygians pushed out this northern-Greek bulk and caused it’s dispersion and fragmentation into smaller tribes. The Dorians and Epeans ended up in the Peloponnese, the Thessalians moved to “Pelasgian Argos” and renamed it Thessaly, the majority of the Epeirotans moved south of the Aous and the Macedonians, the Magnetes and the Perrhaebians ended up around mount Olympus in Pieria and Perrhaebia.

What caused the migration of the Magnetes south of the river Penius in historical Magnesia? Herodotus gives us the answer in [VII.20.2] “…nor that of the Mysians and Teucrians, before the Trojan war, who passed over into Europe by the Bosphorus and not only subdued all the Thracians, but came down also as far as the Ionian Sea and marched southwards to the river Peneios.”

He informs us that Teucrians (Trojans) and their allies (Thracians, Paeonians, Mysians, Luwians, etc) had undertaken a vast military operation in the Balkans that reached to the Ionian Sea and the river Penius. This is definitely the best known reason for the departure of the Magnetes from Pieria southwards, for the isolation of the Macedonians in mountainous Western Pieria and for the arrival of the Thracian Cicones in coastal Pieria. Do we have any proof that this operation indeed occurred? Of course! During the Late Helladic IIIB period (ca. 1250 BC) we have massive fortifications constructed in the Mycenaean centres of Gla, Orkhomenos, Athens, Mycenae and Tiryns, but not in Messenia and Laconia. What does this mean? It means that the feared enemy of the Mycenaeans at that time was coming from the North-north East and it wasn’t only a naval force, but a terrestrial one also since Orkhomenos, far from the Aegean coast, was fortified also in this period.

Lets return now to the Macedonians gathered in western Pieria. We have a Mycenaean Greek presence archaeologically documented in this area with the necropolis near the modern village of Agios Demetrios. Being a necropolis - that is, a cemetery - one can exclude immediately influence from the south since the burial modalities of all cultures tend to remain conservative and adhering to the proper tradition. As NGL Hammond has argued many times, ALL THE TOPONYMS AND HYDRONYMS IN WESTERN PIERIA ARE OF GREEK ETYMOLOGY. IF THE MACEDONIANS DID NOT SPEAK GREEK FROM THE BEGINNING, THEN THEIR EARLY HOMELAND SHOULD HAVE CONTAINED NON-GREEK NAMES. Pieria, Leibethron, Lebaea, Aison, Aigai, Aegidion, Pimpleia, Haliakmon, Balla, Phylake, Akasamenae are examples of some of these topyonyms and hydronyms, and all have a purely Greek etymology. A classical example is that of the Thracians, who although massively Hellenized in late antiquity, kept toponyms and hydronyms indicating their early non-Greek background. Cities ending in “-bria” (Thracian word for “city”), “-diza” (Thracian word for “walls”, that is, walled city), and “-para” (Thracian word for “village”) can be found till today, while Hadrianople’s Thracian name “Uscudama” had survived until the Roman Emperor Hadrian changed it in the 2nd AD century.

ANCIENT RUINS ARGOS ORESTIKON GREECE

Gathered in mountainous Pieria, from ca. 1200 BC until 700 BC when the Temenids arrived, the Macedonians practiced transhumant pastoralism between the southern part of the Emathian plain in the winter (another Greek word meaning “sandy place” and used many times by Homer in the form “emathoen” = sandy) and the Pierian highlands in the summer. During this period they came into strong contact with the Phrygians who were living in the central Macedonian plain and having their capital in Edessa, the town where later the Macedonians founded Aegai in modern Vergina. The name Edessa and the nearby river Ascordus are the only non-Greek toponyms in northern Pieria-South Emathia and are unquestionably of Phrygian origin (”Vedy” in Phrygian means “water”). The Phrygian presence in the area is archaeologically documented by their characteristic “Lausitz” culture that the Phrygians brought with them from the north.

Around 700 BC as we have seen, Perdikkas I becomes king and the Macedonian expansion begins. What does Herodotus have to say about the Macedonians living in Western Pieria and their contact with the Phrygians?

In [VII.127] he states that the northern limit of Macedonia was the union of the rivers Haliakmon and Ludias, north of which started Bottia:

“as far as the river Lydias and the Haliacmon, which form the boundary between the lands of Bottiaia and Macedonia, mingling their waters together in one and the same stream”.

Herodotus wrote his histories around 450 BC, and so Hammond is convinced that Herodotus has borrowed this quote from the Milesian geographer Hecataeus who wrote around 515 BC, a time when indeed - as we have seen above - Ludias was the northern limit of Macedonia.

In [7.131] he names the Pierian mountains the “Macedonian mountain”, and that is in agreement with the fact that Western Pieria was the homeland of the Macedonians:

“…in the region of Pieria many days, for the road over the Macedonian mountain…”

In [VIII.137] He says that Perdikkas I found the Macedonians in Lebaea in Upper Macedonia.

“Now of this Alexander the seventh ancestor was that Perdikkas who first became despot of the Macedonians, and that in the manner which here follows: From Argos there fled to the Illyrians three brothers of the descendents of Temenos, Gauanes, Aëropos, and Perdiccas; and passing over from the Illyrians into the upper parts of Macedonia they came to the city of Lebaia”.

Where was Lebaea? Before presenting Hammond’s conclusions based on later epigraphy let’s try to find out for ourselves. Herodotus says in Upper Macedonia near Illyria, so one´s mind goes to the LATER Upper Macedonia which bordered the HISTORICAL Illyria. But Perdikkas was the first king, the one who started the expansion so it is impossible to find Macedonians in Upper Macedonia (which Greek Molossian tribes inhabited) near historical Illyria. Where was this Illyria and where was this “Upper Macedonia” in Pediccas’ times? Herodotus helps us find the second one, since in [VII.128] he makes reference to Xerxes’ army having passed from the pass of Petra in western mountainous Pieria “from the Macedonians who dwell in the highland”:

“because he was meaning to march by the upper road, through the land of the Macedonians who dwell in the highland, until he came to the Perraibians, passing by the city of Gonnos.”

The Star of Vergina the symbol of Greek Macedonia

So Perdikkas’ “Upper Macedonia” is nothing else but the Macedonian homeland in western Pieria. What about Illyria? When Perdikkas became king around 700 BC the central plain was still under Illyrian control. One must consider that the Illyrian expansion lasted from ca.1000 BC to 650 BC and was the basic reason that caused the Phrygian migration in Asia minor sometime around 900-800 BC. Professor Andronikos in Vergina (Aegai) has found three different and independent cemeteries: the oldest was Phrygian (Lausitz culture) dating from ca.1100 BC to 900 BC, the second one was Illyrian (Glasinac culture) dating from ca. 900 BC to 700 BC, and the last one was Macedonian, in which in historical times the inscriptions survived and the discovered graves have Greek names and patronymics dating from ca. 480 BC. If to all that we add Polyaenus’ testimony about an early Macedonian-Illyrian conflict around king Argaeus’ times (ca. 650 BC), then it becomes clear that Illyria in Herodotus’ [VIII.137] is nothing else but the Central Plain and it’s western highlands under Illyrian control. This “Illyria” is indeed bordering “Upper Macedonia” as we defined it from [VII.128], that is, Western Pieria.

So we can be pretty sure that Perdikkas had found the Macedonians grazing their stock in the highland of Pieria near the city of Lebaea. And finally, here is what Hammond has to say about Lebaea on page 5 of “The Macedonian State”:

“Where was Lebaea? An answer was provided recently by the discovery of an inscription which recorded the dedication of a liberated slave to “The autochthonous Mother of the Gods at Alebea, a village (attached) to Elimea”, a city of which we know the location. If Lebaea and Alebea are the same place, which is probable, we can put Lebaea in the western part of Pieria. This is consistent with our knowledge that the early home of the Macedonians was around Pieria and Olympus.”

It is more than obvious that Lebaea was a pre-Temenid settlement somewhere in the Pierian mountains. But where? In the archaeological site of Paleogratsiano in the southwestern slopes of the Pierian mountains, archaeologists have found an ancient settlement dating from the Early Iron Age which satisfies all the above pre-requirements and additionally explains the name Lebaea. Immediately west of the Pierian mountains today, the Haliakmon forms an artificial lake due to the presence of a dam. Immediately after the dam, the river enters Emathia and in the border between the modern provinces of Kozani and Emathia it forms a number of little natural lakes. It is more than probable that before the construction of the dam this pattern of small lakes created by the river was present in all its Pierian course. Now Lebaea in Greek literally means “water deposit”, hence both ancient and modern Greek word “Lebetas” meaning the same thing. All this indicates that the Macedonians spoke Greek long before the Temenids arrived and that is why all the Pierian toponyms and hydronyms are of Greek etymology. After all, the Temenids had nothing to do with the name of Lebaea as they had nothing to do with the Mycenaean findings near Agios Demetrios.

Returning to Herodotus, what has he to say about the relation of the Phrygians and the Macedonians? In [VII.73] he states:

“Now the Phrygians, as the Macedonians say, used to be called Brigians during the time that they were natives of Europe and dwelt with the Macedonians; but after they had changed into Asia, with their country they changed also their name and were called Phrygians”.

He reminds us that the Macedonians had lived nearby the Phrygians. This is definitely the period when the Phrygians were inhabiting the central Macedonian plain and the Macedonians the Pierian Highland. Furthermore, the fact that they had inhabited nearby helps us to verify the arrival of the Macedonians in Pieria. We know that the Phrygians had migrated to Asia Minor sometime between 900 and 800 BC due to Illyrian harassment. We also know that the Macedonians were heavily influenced by the Phrygians in both tradition, religion, and language. The eminent linguist Claude Brixhe (and an expert in the Phrygian language) in his model of “phonological osmosis” has argued that the Macedonian dialect is nothing else than a north-western Greek dialect heavily influenced phonologically by the Phrygians and that explains perfectly it’s “unorthodoxies” in respect to the other Greek dialects. The same tendencies of voicing and deaspiration of the standard Greek unvoiced aspirates are not only found in the Macedonian dialect, but also in some rare dialectic forms of the Dorian and Aeolic dialects (which descent from the same northern-Greek precursor as the Macedonian) and also in the Pamphylian Greek dialect in southern Anatolia where the Pamphylians were neighboring the Luwian speakers of Lycia and Cilicia. Even there the same unorthodoxies can be found (Aspendos and andropos instead of “standard” Greek Aspenthos and anthropos) and that means that what happened to the Macedonians is nothing more than what has happened in every Greek dialect spoken in the borders of the Greek-speaking world.

The fact that the Macedonians were heavily influenced in both culture and language by the Phrygians means that they had inhabited nearby for a very long time. The Phrygians stayed in Macedonia from ca 1150 BC to ca 850 BC and since an influence of that measure needs at least two centuries of neighbouring, this means that the Macedonians were in the Pierian mountains all the time that the Phrygians were in the plain. After all, it was the Phrygian descent in the first place around 1200 BC that prompted the whole “migrating” phenomenon that caused the dispersion of the Northern Greek tribes from the Boion range to the rest of the peninsula, bringing the Dorians in the Peloponnese and the Macedonians in Pieria. In this time frame the Mycenaean findings in Western Pieria dated around 1200 -1100 BC (that is, after the so called “Trojan Balkanian Operation” that Herodotus mentions, which caused the migration of the Magnetes south of the Penius and the massive fortifications of the south Greek Mycenaean centres around 1250 BC (LH IIIB)) must be attributed to the Macedon