Modern historians about ancient Macedonia - Richard Billows

Macedon was a region which had lagged behind the rest of the Greek world socially, economically, and culturally, failing to develop the polis or city-state institutions characteristic of the most advanced regions of Greece, but remaining instead a tribal society ruled by kings and dominated by a land-owning aristocracy.Indeed,there is some question as to whether Macedon should at this time be counted as part of the Greek world at all, for it has been doubted whether the Macedonians were a Greek-speaking people, on the basis of a few passages in ancient sources that appear to speak of a Macedonian “language”.These passages can equally well be understood to refer to a Macedonian “dialect,” however, and though it cannot at present be formally proved that the Macedonians were Hellenic in race and language, I think it highly likely that they were, for three reasons: the overwhelming majority of personal names known to have been used by Macedonians were good Greek names; the names of the months in the Macedonian calendar were basically Greek in form; and the religion of the Macedonians was largely the same as that of the Greeks, with Zeus, Herakles, and Dionysos being particularly prominent.

The Macedonians, then, were probably a Greek people (though certainly with an admixture of Illyrians and Thracians) akin in language and culture to their neighbors to the south and west, the Thessalians and Epeirots.Like the Epeirots, they were divided into several tribes and ruled over by a tribal monarchy. The main division in Macedon was between the lowland Macedonians, living in the plains of Pieria, Bottiaia, and the Amphaxitis, and the highland Macedonians, who were themselves divided into a number of “cantons”: from south to north, Tymphaia, Elimiotis, Orestis, Eordaia, Lynkos, and Pelagonia .The kings came from a royal family known as the Argeadai, who claimed descent from Herakles, but the Argead house was rooted in lower Macedon and the cantons of upper Macedon had dynastic families of their own who frequently claimed to rule as independent kings over their own regions.Like the Thessalians, the Macedonians never developed beyond the aristocratic form of society typical of early Greece and probably depicted in Homer’s epics.

The Homeric appearance of certain elements of Macedonian society has been widely noted; the chief of these elements is the so-called hetaireia, an institution which bound together the king and the nobility: it was the privilege and duty of the nobles to attend the king as his hetairoi (companions) both in war and peace, as cavalry fighters and officers, or as councillors and boon companions.That this institution was deeply rooted in Macedon is shown by the existence of a religious festival named the Hetairidia, and it is clear that the hetairoi formed a noble class of major importance in the state.Although as chief priest, chief judge, commander in chief, and political leader, the king embodied the state, he was constrained in practice to function in consultation with his hetairoi.

 

 Thus the chief organ of state policy was the synedrion or council of the king and his friends, in which the king took the lead and made the decisions, but would find it hard to decide against a consensus of his nobles.In particular, actions against the lives of leading members of the hetairos class could normally be risked by a king only with strong backing from his friends, and at times the king might prefer to hand over the decision on a capital charge against a great noble to the synedrion of his friends.The basis of the social and economic standing of the hetairos class was clearly landed wealth: Theopompos tells us that the 800 hetairoi of Philip II, for example, owned as much land as the 10,000 wealthiest men of the rest of Greece put together (FGrH, no. 115 F 225b). Being proprietors of great estates gave them an inherited status within their regions, and hence in the kingdom as a whole. In particular,like the Thessalian nobility, the Macedonian hetairoi raised horses on their estates, and provided the cavalry forces of the Macedonian state, riding in to support the king in time of war, each noble with a mounted following of his own.

Since Macedon before the time of Philip II had no significant infantry force, but relied almost exclusively on cavalry for its defense, their domination of the cavalry gave the Macedonian nobility great political influence.This was especially true when a weak king was on the throne, when factions of nobles often coalesced around other members of the royal house claiming the throne and reduced the state to near anarchy.

 

“Antigonus the One-Eyed” By Richard Billows,pages 18-20

Μακεδονικός τάφος στον Φοίνικα - Macedonian tomb at Phoinikas

 

Από τους πιο σημαντικούς και εντυπωσιακούς μακεδονικούς τάφους στην ευρύτερη περιφέρεια της Θεσσαλονίκης είναι αυτός στο Φοίνικα, νοτιοανατολικά της πόλης. Πρόκειται για το αρχαιότερο δείγμα μακεδονικού τάφου στην περιοχή της Θεσσαλονίκης, αλλά και για ένα από τα αρχαιότερα μνημεία αυτού του τύπου, όπου ο δωρικός ρυθμός βρίσκει την πληρέστερη έκφρασή του. Παρά το γεγονός ότι ο τάφος βρέθηκε συλημένος, η μορφή του και τα ανασκαφικά δεδομένα δείχνουν ότι ετοιμάσθηκε με ιδιαίτερη φροντίδα μέσα στο τελευταίο τέταρτο του 4ου αι. π.Χ. για να δεχθεί έναν αναμφίβολα επιφανή νεκρό, πιθανότατα ανώτατο στέλεχος του μακεδονικού στρατού, και τη γυναίκα του.

 

Πρόκειται για επιβλητικό μονοθάλαμο οικοδόμημα, κατασκευασμένο από πωρόλιθο και επιχρισμένο με ασβεστοκονίαμα. Ένας βαθμιδωτός δρόμος, που έχει λαξευθεί στο φυσικό βράχο, οδηγεί στη θύρα του τάφου, που ήταν φραγμένη με έξι επάλληλους ογκόλιθους. Εσωτερικά ο τάφος έκλεινε με ξύλινη δίφυλλη πόρτα. Η πρόσοψη του μνημείου, που σώζεται σχεδόν ακέραια, είναι ιδιαίτερα εντυπωσιακή. Έχει πλάτος 4,96 μ. και ύψος 5,68 μ. και είναι επιχρισμένη με λευκό μαρμαροκονίαμα. Ο δωρικός ρυθμός εδώ αναδεικνύεται σε όλη του τη μεγαλοπρέπεια, καθώς οι αρχιτεκτονικές λεπτομέρειες της ανωδομής τονίζονται με πολύχρωμα κονιάματα. Βαθυκύανα τρίγλυφα πλαισιώνουν τις λευκές μετόπες, όπου με χρυσαφιές πινελιές επαναλαμβάνεται η εικόνα μιας μεταλλικής φιάλης. Το διάκοσμο της πρόσοψης ολοκλήρωνε η ζωγραφική παράσταση του αετώματος, που είχε, δυστυχώς, φθαρεί σε μεγάλο βαθμό λόγω της καταστροφής του επαέτιου γείσου από τους αρχαιοκάπηλους. Η εσωτερική διαμόρφωση του θαλάμου, όπου δεσπόζουν δύο βωμόσχημα βάθρα επάνω σε ορθογώνιες βάσεις, είναι πραγματικά μοναδική. Τα εντυπωσιακά βάθρα, με πολύχρωμο γραμμικό διάκοσμο σε μαύρο φόντο, είχαν επίσης υποστεί μεγάλη φθορά από τους αρχαιοκάπηλους, που αφαίρεσαν τα τεφροδόχα σκεύη και διασκόρπισαν τα καμένα οστά των νεκρών. Την εικόνα του χώρου συμπληρώνουν δύο κτιστά θρανία, για την εναπόθεση προσφορών προς τους νεκρούς.

 

Το μνημείο ήλθε στο φως την άνοιξη του 1987, ακριβώς πίσω από το Νοσοκομείο Άγιος Παύλος, στο χώρο απ' όπου θα περνούσε τμήμα της ανατολικής περιφερειακής οδού. Μετά την ανασκαφή η κατασκευή του δρόμου ολοκληρώθηκε, ενώ μια ελαφρά υπερυψωμένη γέφυρα στέγασε τον τάφο. Σήμερα, ο ειδικά διαμορφωμένος υπόγειος χώρος περιλαμβάνει επίσης έκθεση εποπτικού υλικού σχετικά με την ανασκαφή του μνημείου αλλά και με την ευρύτερη περιοχή, καθώς και παρουσίαση των γνωστών και άγνωστων μακεδονικών τάφων στην περιφέρεια της Θεσσαλονίκης ώστε ο επισκέπτης να αποκομίσει ολοκληρωμένη εικόνα για το θέμα. Σε απόσταση λίγων μέτρων νοτιοανατολικά του τάφου ορθωνόταν ένας ταφικός τύμβος, παλαιότερα γνωστός ως «Τούμπα Κις», ενώ όλη η περιοχή εντάσσεται σε νεκροταφείο κλασικών και πρώιμων ελληνιστικών χρόνων, που καταστράφηκε από αυθαίρετες αμμοληψίες στις προηγούμενες δεκαετίες. Παρά την καταστροφή, οι σωστικές ενέργειες τις ΙΣΤ΄ Εφορείας Προϊστορικών και Κλασικών Αρχαιοτήτων απέδωσαν αρκετούς ασύλητους τάφους του 4ου και 3ου αι. π.Χ. 

 

One of the significant and most impressive Macedonian tombs in the Thessaloniki metropolitan area is situated in Phinikas settlement, to the southeast of the town. This is the oldest tomb in Thessaloniki and the surroundings, one of the earliest of its type, giving full expression to the Doric order. Despite the lootings, both its form and the excavation evidence prove that it was prepared with great care during the last quarter of the fourth century BC to host an undoubtedly renowned defunct, probably a senior official of the Macedonian army and his wife.

 

This is an impressive single-chambered building of poros stone plastered with lime mortar. A stepped way hewn into the rock leads to the tomb entrance, sealed with six successive blocks. Internally it closed by a wooden double-leaf door. The fa?ade, almost entirely preserved, is very impressive: 4.96m wide and 5.68m high, it is covered with white stucco. The Doric order is sumptuously emerging as the architectural elements of the superstructure are highlighted with colourful mortars. Dark-blue triglyphs flank white metopes ornate with the repeated motif of a metallic gold-painted phiale. The decoration of the fa?ade was brought to completion through the painted representation on the pediment; unfortunately, the latter was largely worn out due to the destruction of the gabled cornice by antiquities looters. The internal shape of the burial chamber, dominated by two altar-like pedestals on rectangular bases, is truly unmatched. The impressive pedestals of multicolour linear decoration upon black background had been also damaged by illicit antiquities traders, who removed the burial urns and dispersed the ashes of the deceased. The picture also captures two stone-built benches for the placement of offerings to the defunct.

 

The monument was uncovered in the spring of 1987, right behind the Agios Pavlos (St. Paul) Hospital, where the east ring road would pass according to schedule. After the excavation, the road was completed and the tomb was sheltered under a slightly elevated bridge. Today, the accordingly arranged subterranean space includes an exhibition of visual material about the excavation of the monument and the wider area, and a presentation of known and unknown Macedonian tombs located within Thessaloniki prefecture, in order to provide a complete picture to the visitor. A few metres to the southeast of the tomb stood a burial tumulus earlier known as ‘’Toumba Kis’’: it makes part of the surrounding cemetery dated to the Classical and Early Hellenistic periods, which was destroyed by arbitrary earth clearings in previous decades. Despite the destruction, the preservation efforts made by the sixteenth Ephorate for Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities bore fruits, i.e. uncovered several non-looted tombs of the fourth and third century BC.

Professor Valerie French for the Greekness of ancient Macedonians

 

Professor Valerie French educating caller that Macedonians spoke Greek 

Modern Historians about Macedonia – Carl J. Richard

 

1. Homer: Founder of Western Literature

2. Thales: Founder of Western Science

3. Themistocles: Defender of Greek civilization

4. Pericles: Democratic Reformer

5. Plato: Founder of Western Philosophy

6.Alexander the Great:Disseminator of Greek culture

“Twelve Greeks and Romans Who Changed the World” By Carl J. Richard 

Modern historians about Macedonia – George Cawkwell

 

Quote:

“The Macedonians were Greeks. Their language was Greek, to judge by their personal names and by the names of the months of the calendar; Macedonian ambassadors could appear before the Athenian assembly without needing interpreters; in all Demosthenes sneers about their civilization there is no hint that Macedonians spoke other than Greek. But it was a distinct dialect not readily intelligible to other Greeks; linguistically as geographically, Macedonia was remote from the main stream of Greek life. 

King Alexander “the Philhellene” had been allowed to compete in the Olympic Games only after his claim to being Greek had been fortified by the claim that the Macedonian ruling house had originated in Argos in the Peloponnese, which really conceded that those who sneered at Macedonia as “barbarian”  were right. The sneers went on.

The sophist Thrasymachus at the end of the fifth century referred even to king Archelaus as a “barbarian.” Isocrates in the fourth no less than Demosthenes spoke of the Macedonians as “barbarians.” The truth was that Macedon was as culturally backward as it was liguistically remote, and even the exact Thucydides classed it as “barbarian.”

 

Archelaus began to change all this and to make clear the Greeknes of his country. It wasunder him that the city of Pella began to be not only the ‘greatest city in Macedonia but also a show-place which Greeks desired to visit, a centre of Greek culture. Archelaus was a generous patron of the arts,and the leading literary figures of the age were happy to reside at his court. Euripides spent his last years in Macedon, and wrote there the Bacchae and the Archelaus. At Dium in the foothills of Mount Olympus a Macedonian Olympic Festival was instituted which included a drama competition. There must have been as appreciateive audience.Under Archelaus, Macedon had ceased to be a cultural backwater.”

George Cawkwell’s (Fellow of the University College,Oxford)

Philip of Macedon, Faber & Faber, London, 1978, pg. 22-23

Prof. Jodi Magness: Alexander the Great a Greek King

 

Professor Dr. Edward Anson explores the character of Alexander the Great

 

Alexander the Great created one of the largest empires of the ancient world. He was undefeated in battle and is considered one of history's most successful commanders. While much is written about what Alexander did, there has been little exploration into who he was. UALR(University of Arkansas at Little Rock)  Professor Dr. Edward Anson explores the character of Alexander the Great.  

ualr tv

Prof. Nataliya Basovskaya:Greece,Motherland of Alexander the Great

 

Professor John R. Hale for the Greekness of Macedonians

 

Dr. John R. Hale is the Director of Liberal Studies at the University of Louisville in Kentucky. He earned his B.A. at Yale University and his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge in England. Professor Hale teaches introductory courses on archaeology, as well as more specialized courses on the Bronze Age, the ancient Greeks, the Roman world, Celtic cultures, the Vikings, and nautical and underwater archaeology.

An accomplished instructor, Professor Hale is also an archaeologist with more than 30 years of fieldwork experience. He has excavated at a Romano-British town in Lincolnshire, England, and at the Roman Villa of Torre de Palma in Portugal. Among other places, he has carried out interdisciplinary studies of ancient oracle sites in Greece and Turkey, including the famous Delphic oracle, and participated in an undersea search in Greek waters for lost fleets from the time of the Persian Wars.

 Professor Hale has received many awards for distinguished teaching, including the Panhellenic Teacher of the Year Award and the Delphi Center Award. His writing has been published in the journals Antiquity, The Classical Bulletin, the Journal of Roman Archaeology, and Scientific American.

Modern Historians about Macedonia – Hermann Bengtson

 

 In the cultural gulf between Greeks and Macedonians the question of Macedonian national origin was never more than of secondary importance in antiquity. For modern scholars the evidence from names – there is not a single sentence extant from the language of the Old Macedonians – tilts the scales in favour of the view that includes the Macedonians among the Greeks. The theory, therefore, advocated by the student of Indo-European linguistics, P.Kretschner,that the Macedonians were of Graeco-Illyrian hybrid stock, is not to be regarded as very probable. So the majority of modern historians, admittedly with the noteworthy exception of Julius Kaerst , have argued  correctly for the Hellenic origin of the Macedonians. They should be included in the group of the North-West Greek tribes .

Griechische Geschichte-Hermann Bengtson 

 

This does not, however, discount the statement of Thucydides (II 99) that the Macedonians were related to the Epirotes from possibly having an element of truth. From the point of view of history it is more important that a century of isolation in the country which bears their name moulded the Macedonians into a distinctive social, political and anthropological unit, developing their essential features from within, and without domination by Hellenic influence. Thus the character of the Macedonian people had long since been moulded when, in the great power struggle between Athens and Philip, the hate-filled orations of Demosthenes repeatedly emphasised the divisive features between Greeks and Macedonians.”

 

Chapter 10, Philip of Macedonia, pgs. 185-186

Hermann Bengtson, ‘History of Greece’

Translated and updated by Edmund F. Bloedow,University of Ottawa Press,1988

 

 

 

 

 

Modern Linguists about Macedonia – Olivier Masson

 

 

For a long while Macedonian onomastics, which we know relatively well thanks to history, literary authors, and epigraphy, has played a considerable role in the discussion. In our view the Greek character of most names is obvious and it is difficult to think of a Hellenization due to wholesale borrowing. ‘Ptolemaios’ is attested as early as Homer, ‘Αλέξανδρος’ occurs next to Mycenaean feminine a-re-ka-sa-da-ra- (‘Alexandra’), ‘Λάαγος’, then ‘Λαγος’, matches the Cyprian ‘Lawagos’, etc. The small minority of names which do not look Greek, like ‘Αρριδαιος’ or ‘Σαββατάρας’, may be due to a substratum or adstatum influences (as elsewhere in Greece). Macedonian may then be seen as a Greek dialect, characterised by its marginal position and by local pronunciations (like ‘Βερενίκα’ for ‘Φερενίκα’, etc.).

 

 Yet in contrast with earlier views which made of it an Aeolic dialect (O.Hoffmann compared Thessalian) we must by now think of a link with North-West Greek (Locrian, Aetolian, Phocidian, Epirote). This view is supported by the recent discovery at Pella of a curse tablet (4th cent. BC) which may well be the first ‘Macedonian’ text attested (provisional publication by E.Voutyras; cf. the Bulletin Epigraphique in Rev.Et.Grec.1994, no.413); the text includes an adverb ‘οπποκα’ which is not Thessalian. We must wait for new discoveries, but we may tentatively conclude that Macedonian is a dialect related to North-West Greek.

 

Olivier Masson,French linguist,“Oxford Classical Dictionary:Macedonian Language” page.906, 1996

Modern historians about Macedonia – Richard Stoneman

 

Alexander the Great (Routledge: Lancaster Pamphlet, 1997; second edition 2004. There is also a Portuguese edition and editions in both standard and simplified Chinese) 

Quote:

The world he [Alexander] left behind him, split as it quickly was between several successor-kings, retained the Greek language as its medium of communication and Greek culture as its frame of reference.

“Alexander the Great” By Richard Stoneman,page 1

 

Quote:

When, as a young, ambitious and romantic youth with a genius for military strategy and tactics, he embarked on the conquest of the Persian empire, he may have had no more in mid than the setting to rights of the perceived age-old wrong inflicted by the Persians on the Greeks.

“Alexander the Great” By Richard Stoneman, page 2

 

Quote

In favour of the Greek identity of the Macedonians is what we know of their language: the place-names, names of the months and many of the personal names, especially royal names, which are Greek in roots and form.This suggests that they did not merely use Greek as a lingua franca, but spoke it as natives (though with a local accent which turned Philip into Bilip, for example).

The Macedonians’ own traditions derived their royal house from one Argeas, son of Macedon, son of Zeus, and asserted that a new dynasty, the Temenids, had its origin in the sixth century from emigrants from Argos in Greece, the first of these kings being Perdiccas. This tradition became a most important part of the cultural identity of Macedon.

It enabled Alexander I (d.452) to compete at the Olympic Games (which only true Hellenes were allowed to do); and it was embedded in the policy of Archelaus (d.399) who invited Euripides from Athens to his court, where Euripides wrote not only the Bacchae but also a lost play called Archelaus. (Socrates was also invited, but declined.)

 

“Alexander the Great” By Richard Stoneman, page 14

 

 

 

Modern historians about Macedonia – Mary Elsie Thalheimer

 

✍️ Quote:

In 334 B.C. Alexander with his 35.000 Greeks crossed the strait which had been passed by Xerxes, with his five millions, less than 150 years before. The Greek army was scarcely more inferior to the Persian in number than superior in efficiency. It was composed of veteran troops in the highest possible state of equipment and discipline, and every man was filled with enthusiastic devotion to his leader and confidence of success.

“A manual of ancient history” By M. E. Thalheimer, page 99

 

✍️ Quote:

With fresh reinforcements from Greece, he [Alexander] commenced his second campaign, in the spring of 333, by marching through Cappadocia and Cilicia to the gates of Syria.

“A manual of ancient history” By M. E. Thalheimer, page 100

 

✍️ Quote:

 

Alexander was compelled to turn back. His fleet was now ready, and he descended the Hydaspes to the Indus, in the autumn and winter of 327 B. C. His army marched in two columns along the banks, the entire valley submitting with little resistance. Two more cities were founded, and left with Greek garrisons and governors.

“A manual of ancient history” By M. E. Thalheimer, page 205

 

✍️ Quote:

 

The Greek language and literature were planted every-where: every new exploration added to the treasures of science and the enlightenment of the human race.

“A manual of ancient history” By M. E. Thalheimer, page 206 

📖 A manual of ancient history

by Thalheimer,M.E.

Modern Historians about Macedonia:Ernst Curtius

 

✍️ Quote:

Amyntas belonged to a collateral branch of the Temenidæ of Argos. During the disturbances which interrupted the legitimate succession of the Argive kings (vol. i. p. 271), about the middle of the ninth century B. C., Caranus had come into Macedonia and had obtained royal power among the mountain tribes; and this royal power became hereditary in his house. 

Their power was not that of despotic princes, but one regulated from the first by laws and mutual agreement. The whole history of the empire connects itself with the dynasty of the Temenidæ, and commences with Perdiccas, who pushed his conquering march forward from the mountain fastness of Ægæ into lower Macedonia, the ancient Emathia, by the conquest of which the Macedonian Temenidæ established their imperial power.

📖 The History of Greece Vol. 2

Book by Ernst Curtius, Adolphus William Ward; Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1871, page 188

✍️ Quote:

In the house of Amyntas Greek culture reigned and his son Alexander had adopted it with his whole heart and soul. Alexander was a thorough Greek, and recognized the future of Macedonia as depending on her intimate connection with the Hellenic states.

✍️ Quote:

The whole Alpine country of Northern Greece was now under vassals of the Achæmenidæ; and as formerly the Dorians had advanced from Macedonia to the south, so the Barbarians now wished at the opportune moment to penetrate into the lower country, in order to surround the sea on the west side also with their power.

📖 The History of Greece Vol. 2

Book by Ernst Curtius, Adolphus William Ward; Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1871, page 189

✍️ Quote:

On the present occasion Mount Athos protected the western Greeks.

📖 The History of Greece Vol. 2

Book by Ernst Curtius, Adolphus William Ward; Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1871, page 216

National Geographic Education:Philip II of Macedon

 

 Before the reign of Alexander the Great, his father, Phillip II of Macedonia, ruled the Macedonian state and became one of the ancient world’s most accomplished generals. 

 

Philip II of Macedon was born in 382 B.C.E. in Aegae. He was the son of King Amyntas III. He was the 18th king of Macedonia and ruled from 359 to 336 B.C.E.

 

Macedon was unstable during Philip II’s youth. During an invasion by the Greek city-state of Thebes, Philip himself was even taken hostage. He remained in Thebes for three years and learned military strategies from Epaminondas, the great Theban general. Upon returning to Macedon, Philip was able to help his brother, Perdiccas III, rule and succeeded him as king after Perdicass died.

 

King Philip II is credited with restoring internal peace to his country. Philip used his military knowledge to strengthen the Macedonian army. His soldiers were trained to fight as a phalanx. A phalanx was a large group of foot soldiers armed with shields and spears. Soldiers moved closely together in a rectangular formation as if they were one giant soldier. One phalanx could contain 265 soldiers.

 

King Philip’s military battles and diplomatic tactics resulted in the expansion of his empire and domination over all of Greece. After he conquered Greece, he planned to conquer the Persian Empire, but he would never achieve this goal. Philip II was assassinated in 336 B.C.E., and was succeeded by his son, Alexander III, later known as Alexander the Great. While Philip II did not fulfill his plans to expand his empire through Persian territory, he is often credited with paving the way for his son to be one of the greatest military leaders in history. 

National Geographic Education

Macedonia:Thessaloniki (the Capital City)

 

Alexander the Great

μετά τόν Ἀξιόν ποταμόν ἡ Θεσσαλονίκη ἐστί πόλις, ἥ πρότερον Θέρμη ἐκαλεῖτο• κτίσμα δ’ ἐστί Κασάνδρου , ὅς ἐπι τῷ ὀνόματι τῆς εαυτοῦ γυναικός , παιδός δε Φιλίππου τοῦ Ἀμῦντου, ὠνόμασε•

Γεωγραφικά του Στράβωνα  7, 24

 

 

Philip II of Macedon 

After the Axius River comes Thessalonica, a city which in earlier times was called Therma.It was founded by Cassander, who named it after his wife, the daughter of Philip the son of Amyntas.

 

Strabo,Geography 7, 24