✍️ Quote:
The strand in his[Alexander] personality which needs to be emphasised in his religious faith. Since childhood he had worshipped Heracles Patrous, the son of Zeus and a mortal woman and through his mother he was descended from Achilles, son of the goddess Thetis and a mortal Peleus. In his mother’s veins there was also the blood of a son and a daughter of Priam, king of Troy.
To Alexander, Heracles and Achilles were not fantasies of poetic imagination but real people, who expected their descendants to excel as warriors and as benefactors of mankind.
📖“The Genius of Alexander the Great” By Nicholas G Hammond, page 7
✍️ Quote:
There were two parts of the Greek-speaking world at this time which did not suffer from revolution and did not seek to impose rule over the city-states. In Epirus there were three clusters of tribal states, called Molossia, Thesprotia and Chaonia, and although a tribal state might move from one cluster to another cluster, each state remained a tight-knit community (a koinon as it was called).
The strongest cluster in 356 was the Molossian state.
Its monarchy had exceptional prestige because the royal family, it was believed, was descended from Neoptolemus, son of Achilles. These states held the frontier against the Illyrians, whose institutions were fairly similar. In the fourth century down to 360 they were outfought by a cluster of Illyrian states which formed around the Dardanians (in Kosovo and Metohija), whose king Bardylis developed a strong economy. In 385 the Molossians lost 15,000 men in battle and were saved from subjection only by a Spartan army. They suffered losses again in 360.
The other part of the Greek-speaking world extended from Pelagonia in the north to Macedonia in the south. It was occupied by several tribal states, which were constantly at war against Ilyrians, Paeonians and Thracians. Each state had its own monarchy. Special prestige attached to the Lyncestae whose royal family, the Bacchiadaet claimed descent from Heracles, and to the Macedonians, whose royal family had a similar ancestry.
Although these tribal states occasionally fought one another, each was close-knit and free from revolution (stasis). They suffered most from the Dardanians who raided far and wide, even reaching the Thermaic Gulf where they imposed a puppet-king on the Macedonians from 393 to 391. Thereafter Pelagonia and Lyncus were frequently overrun, and in 359 the Macedonian king Perdiccas and 4,000 Macedonians were killed in battle against the Dardanians.
In the opinion of the city-states these tribal states were backward and unworthy of the Greek name,
ALTHOUGH THEY SPOKE DIALECTS OF THE GREEK LANGUAGE.
According to Aristotle, monarchy was the mark of people too stupid to govern themselves. The city-states, on the other hand, with the exception of Sparta, had rid themselves of monarchy centuries ago. They governed themselves democratically or oligarchi-cally, and their citizens were highly individualistic.
There were other great differences. The northern states lived largely by transhumant pastoralism, used barter more than currency, and had no basis of slaves, whereas the citv-state populations lived largely in cities, had capitalist economies and employed very large numbers of slaves, even in agriculture. Northerners herded their flocks, worked the land, and served as soldiers in person, whereas in the fourth century the most sophisticated southerners, the Atheneans, preferred to leave labour to slaves and foreigners and hied mercenaries for wars overseas.
The Balkan tribes beyond the Greek-speaking world were continually at war. For as Herodotus said of the Thracians, to live by war and rapine is the most honourable way oflife, and the agricultural worker is the least esteemed. The well-armed aristocrats of the Thracian tribes engaged in wide-ranging raids, such as that led by Sitalces, the king of the Thracian Odrysae, into Macedonia in 429.
The Paeonians (in south east Yugoslavia) and the Illyrians (in Albania) were equally warlike, and they too engaged in rapine. In the raids they carried off men. women and children as well as goods and livestock. One Illyrian tribal group, the Ardiaei, boasted at this time that it had acquired 300.000 serfs.
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 11
✍️ Quote:
In their place the Macedonians were elected members. The two votes of Phocis on the council were transferred to the Macedonian state.On the advice of Philip the council published regulations for the custody of the oracle and for everything else appertaining to religious practice, to common peace and to concord among the Greeks. Within Boeotia Thebes had a free hand; She destroyed three cities which had been forced to submit to the Phocians and sold their populations into slavery. She would have preferred to treat Phocis similarly.
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 18
✍️ Quote:
He adviced Philip as the ruler of the strongest state in Europe to bring the city-states into concord, lead them against Persia, liberate the Greeks in Asia and found there new cities to absorb the surplus population of the Greek mainland.
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 18-19
✍️ Quote:
Thebes was treated harsly as the violator of its oaths. Athens was treated generously. Alexander led a guard of honour which brought the ashes of Athenian dead to Athens – a unique tribute to a defeated enemy – and the 2,000 Athenian prisoners were liberated without ransom
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 20
✍️ Quote:
The Balkan situation was far from secure, with the Odrysians and Scythians only recently defeated and with the TRiballi still defiant. Yet Philip was confident of success in the interest of the Greek-speaking world and OF MACEDONIA IN PARTICULAR
📖 “The Genius of Alexander the Great” By Nicholas G Hammond, page 21
✍️ Quote:
His remark ‘if i were not Alexander, i would indeed be Diogenes’ carried the meaning ‘if i were not already King of Macedonia, President of Thessaly, the favourite of the Amphictyonic league and Hegemon of the Greek community’.
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 31
✍️ Quote:
Reports came from friends in Athens that Demosthenes was receiving subisdies from Persia and was in correspondece with Attalus, the commander of the Macedonian infantry in Asia, with whom he was very popular.
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 31
✍️ Quote:
In late summer Alexander led his army southwards towards the land of the Agrianians (round Sofia) and the Paeonians (round skopje).
📖 N.G.L Hammond – The Genius of Alexander, Page 36
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου