Macedon

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For other uses, see Macedon (disambiguation). For the modern history of this area, see Macedonia.

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Macedon (or Macedonia from Greek Μακεδονία; see also List of traditional Greek place names) in Classical Antiquity was the ancient state of Macedonia on the margins of Ancient Greece, bordering with the Greek state of Epirus on the west and with Thrace on the East. Alexander the Great launched his conquest of Persia and his subsequent conquests of the majority of the then civilized western world from Macedon, resulting in the Hellenistic period of Greek history. The Greek (Hellenic) character of the ancient Macedonians is disputed among scholars, a dispute which sometimes takes on polemic and nationalist overtones, and essentially hinges on the exact definition of "Hellene".

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Early kingdom

A historical Macedonian state under the Argead Dynasty emerged around the late 8th or early 7th century BC. The founder of the Macedonian kingdom is refered to as Perdiccas I. Around the time of Alexander I of Macedon, Macedonians started to expand west: into Eordaia, Bottiaea, Pieria, Mygdonia, and Almopia. Near the modern city of Edessa, Perdiccas I (or, more likely, his son, Argaeus I) built his capital, Aigai. After a brief period of Persian overlordship under Darius Hystaspes, the state regained its independence under King Alexander I (495-450 BC). Prior to the 4th century BC, the kingdom covered a region approximately corresponding to the province of Macedonia of modern Greece.

Expansion

Image:Map-alexander-empire.png Under King Philip II of Macedon (359–336 BC), Macedon expanded into lands formerly belonging to Paionians, Thracians, and Illyrians to incorporate an area including what is currently the Monastir (now Bitola) and Gevgelija districts of what is now the Republic of Macedonia. In Philip's time strong contrasts remained between the cattle-rich coastal plain of Macedon and the fierce isolated tribal mountain clans, allied to the king by marriage ties. They controlled the passes through which barbarian invasions came from Illyria to the north and northwest.

In this time, Macedon became more politically involved with the south-central city-states of Ancient Greece, but it also retained more archaic features like the palace-culture, first at Aegae (modern Vergina) then at Pella, resembling Mycenaean culture more than classic Hellenic city-states, and other archaic customs, like Philip's multiple wives in addition to his Epirote queen Olympias, mother of Alexander.

Another archaic remnant was the very persistence of a de jure hereditary monarchy wielding formidable power, which was at times absolute, although variously checked by the landed aristocracy, and often disturbed by power struggles within the royal family itself. This contrasts with: the ubiquitous city-states with their more-or-less democratic institutions; the de facto monarchy of tyrants, in which heredity was usually more of an ambition rather than the accepted rule; and the limited, predominantly military and sacerdotal, power of the twin hereditary Spartan kings. The same might have held true of feudal institutions like serfdom, which may have persisted in Macedon well into historical time, whereas they had been abolished by city-states several centuries ago (most notably by the Athenian legislator Solon's famous seisachtheia laws).

Philip's son Alexander III (the Great) (336–323 BC) managed to briefly extend Macedon power not only over the central Greek city-states, but also to the Persian empire, including Egypt and lands as far east as the fringes of India.

Alexander's adoption of the styles of government of the conquered territories was counterbalanced by the spread of Greek culture and learning through his vast empire: although the empire fell apart shortly after his death, his conquests left a lasting legacy, not least in the new cities founded across Persia's western territories, heralding in the Hellenistic period.

Decline

In 215 BC Macedon became involved in the first of three wars with the rising power of Rome: defeat in the second (197 BC) and third (168 BC) led to the deposition of the Macedonian dynasty and the establishment of Roman client republics. Andriscus' brief success at reestablishing the monachy in 149 BC was quickly followed by his defeat the next year and the establishment of direct Roman rule and the organization of Macedon as the Roman province of Macedonia.

Calendar

The Ancient Macedonian calendar year consisted of 12 synodic Lunar months (i.e. 354 days per year), which needed intercalary months to stay in step with the seasons. By the time the calendar was being used across the Hellenistic world, 7 total embolimoi (intercalary months) were being added in each 19-year Metonic cycle.

Language

See main article: Ancient Macedonian language.

The language spoken by the area's inhabitants prior to the 5th century BC, and continued into the early centuries of the Common Era by the rural population, is attested in some hundred words from coin inscriptions and glosses from Hesychius of Alexandria (5th century), as well as some placenames and personal names. The majority of these words can be confidently identified as Greek, and the language was either closely related to Greek, or perhaps even a dialect of Greek. There are words, however, that are not easily identifiable as Greek, a number of which for example show voiced stops where Greek has voicleless aspirates.

There was probably linguistic contact with speakers of Doric Greek (whom Herodotus considered akin to Macedonians, see also Pella katadesmos), and from the 5th century BC Macedonia was closely associated with Southern Greek cultural and political development, resulting in the adoption of the Attic dialect.

Hellenic controversy

The controversy whether or not ancient Macedonia should be considered a Hellenic state is addressed variously: based on ancient sources, and on linguistic evidence. Neither approach is conclusive, Herodotus seems to assert that the Macedonian aristocracy was of Achaean origin while Macedonian people were of Dorian stock. Linguistics seems to point inconclusively to either Macedonian as an archaic form of Greek, Macedonian as part of a Graeco-Macedonian subfamily of Indo-European, or Macedonian as an independent member of the Paleo-Balkan Sprachbund.

Note that the controversy concerns the early kingdom before the time of Philip II exclusively. It is undisputed that Macedon was heavily Atticized from the time of Alexander the Great (see Hellenism).


Herodotus

Herodotus considers the Macedonians a Hellenic tribe left behind during the Dorian invasion:

for during the reign of Deucalion, Phthiotis was the country in which the Hellenes dwelt, but under Dorus, the son of Hellen, they moved to the tract at the base of Ossa and Olympus, which is called Histiaeotis; forced to retire from that region by the Cadmeians, they settled, under the name of Macedonians, in the chain of Pindus. Hence they once more removed and came to Dryopis; and from Dryopis having entered the Peloponnese in this way, they became known as Dorians. (Histories, 1.53.1)

On the other hand, a series of passages in book five of Herodotus' Histories (5:22) indicate to many classical scholars that the Macedonians were customarily excluded from panhellenic events such as the Olympic Games, entry to which apparently was confined to Greeks. The Macedonian aristocracy, however, clearly saw itself as Greek and Macedonian kings were permitted to participate on that basis. This was evidently somewhat controversial: when Alexander I attempted to compete at Olympia, Herodotus relates:

Now that the men of this family [of Alexander I] are Greeks, sprung from Perdiccas, as they themselves affirm, is a thing which I can declare of my own knowledge, and which I will hereafter make plainly evident. That they are so has been already adjudged by those who manage the Pan-Hellenic contest at Olympia. For when Alexander wished to contend in the games, and had come to Olympia with no other view, the Greeks who were about to run against him would have excluded him from the contest- saying that Greeks only were allowed to contend, and not barbarians. But Alexander proved himself to be an Argive, and was distinctly adjudged a Greek; after which he entered the lists for the foot-race, and was drawn to run in the first pair. Thus was this matter settled. (Histories, 5:22)

In book eight, Herodotus counts the allied Macedonians as part of the Greek fleet. Some view this as proof that the Macedonians were considered Hellenes before Philip's conquests and Macedon's rise to power.

Titus Livius (lived 59BC-14AD) in his Ab urbe condita (31.29) is quoting a Macedonian ambassador from the late 3rd century BC, implying that Macedonians had been a Greek-speaking tribe:

The Aetolians, the Acarnanians, the Macedonians, men of the same language, are united or disunited by trivial causes that arise from time to time; with aliens, with barbarians, all Greeks wage and will wage eternal war; for they are enemies by the will of nature, which is eternal, and not from reasons that change from day to day.---

Linguistics

The classification of the ancient Macedonian language is disputed, but it appears that Macedonian has not participated in at least one sound change common to every other known Greek dialect (the unvoicing of voiced aspirates, leading to *Pherenikē as opposed to Macedonian Berenikē). Eugene Borza (1999) concludes that the Macedonians were "a unique people in antiquity who gradually became Hellenized, and who are unrelated to any modern people".

On the other hand, Olivier Masson in the Oxford Classical Dictionary (1996) saw the phonological peculiarities mentioned above as "local pronunciations" due to Macedon's "marginal position" and concluded that Macedonian is "a dialect related to North-West Greek"[1].

The late Nicholas G. L. Hammond, a classicist, also suggested that Macedonian was a Greek dialect:

"What language did these `Macedones' speak? The name itself is Greek in root and in ethnic termination. It probably means `highlanders', and it is comparable to Greek tribal names such as `Orestai' and `Oreitai', mean­ing 'mountain-men'. A reputedly earlier variant, `Maketai', has the same root, which means `high', as in the Greek adjective makednos or the noun mekos... At the turn of the sixth century the Persians described the tribute-paying peoples of their province in Europe, and one of them was the `yauna takabara', which meant `Greeks wearing the hat'. There were Greeks in Greek city-states here and there in the province, but they were of various origins and not distinguished by a common hat. However, the Macedonians wore a dis­tinctive hat, the kausia. We conclude that the Persians believed the Macedonians to be speakers of Greek. Finally, in the latter part of the fifth century a Greek historian, Hellanicus, visited Macedonia and modi­fied Hesiod's genealogy by making Macedon not a cousin, but a son of Aeolus, thus bringing Macedon and his descendants firmly into the Aeolic branch of the Greek-speaking family. Hesiod, Persia, and Hellanicus had no motive for making a false statement about the language of the Macedonians, who were then an obscure and not a powerful people. Their independent testimonies should be accepted as conclusive."

See also

External links

References

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