Modern Historians about Macedonia – A. B. Bosworth

 

Now preparations for storming the city could be pressed ahead. The siege mound was gradually extended towards the walls and Alexander’s military engineers, notably the brilliant Thessalian Diades, constructed the most formidable offensive arsenal yet seen in Hellenic siege warfare.

 

“Conquest and Empire:The Reign of Alexander the Great”, A.B.Bosworth,page 66

 

Modern Historians about Macedonia – Kathryn A. Bard

 

The Macedonians were originally one of several Greek tribes living on the northern frontier of the Hellenic world.”

 

“The relatively remote geographical situation of the Macedonians contributed to their retention of a social organization different from the rest of Greeks”

 

Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt By Kathryn A. Bard, pages 553-554

Modern Historians about Macedonia – J.D.Fage

 

✍️ Quote:

 

Persian rule in Egypt was not to survive long, but its overthrow was not the work of Egyptians. In 336 BC a Greek army,led by Alexander III (Alexander the Great) king of Macedonia invaded the Persian empire.

 

📖  “The Cambridge History of Africa” edited by J. D. Fage, page 105

 

✍️Quote:

 

It would be easy to see in this, the formal establishment of Greek rule in Egypt, the logical culmination of three centuries of Greek influence and patronage. But, except in so far as the earlier involvement of Greeks in Egyptian affairs prepared the Egyptians psychologically to accept Greek rule...

 

📖 “The Cambridge History of Africa” edited by J. D. Fage, page 106 

Modern historians about Macedonia – Max Cary

 

“The future relations between the two peoples had been irrevocably fixed by Alexander’s Anabasis, which destined them to work together in close co-operation as joint rulers of the East, and eventually to be blended into one Nation.“

Max  Cary, A History of the Greek World from 323-146 B.C. page 10

 

 

In 197 he re-entered Thessaly and forced a battle on the field of Cynoscephalae. In this encounter the Macedonian heavy infantry proved that in a solid front-to-front charge not even the Roman legions could hold, but that, once thrown out of order or taken in flank, it became helpless. While one Macedonian Phalanx charged right home, another broke itself up by its own impetus and became an easy prey to the enemy; and the victorious division, without cavalry support on the flanks, was enfiladed and cut to pieces by the succcessful Roman wing wheeling upon it. This was the first decisive victory of  Romans over Greeks  in a set battle on a large scale; but it sufficed definitely to establish Roman ascendancy in Greece.

Max  Cary, “A History of the Greek World from 323-146 B.C.”, page 191 

A History of the Greek World from 325 to 146 B.C.

by  Cary Max ,publication date:1932

Description

A History of the Greek World from 323 to 146 B.C. (1951) looks at the period of Greek history from the Macedonian to the Roman conquests. It contains a narrative of the political history of the Hellenistic states; a description of their statecraft, war-craft and economic practice; and a summary of later Greek achievement in the fields of art, literature, science, philosophy and religion. 

Routledge 

Modern historians about Macedonia – Mark Grossman

 

“When Alexander was just a child, his father was making Macedon (Now Macedonia in northern Greece) into one of the Greatest Greek city-states, as well as the dominant power in the Balkans.”

 

Mark Grossman,World Military Leaders:A Biographical Dictionary,page 11

“...he was tutored by Aristotle,the great Greek orator and educator,whom Philip called to Pella.”

Mark Grossman,World Military Leaders:A Biographical Dictionary,page 12

Modern historians about Macedonia – J.R. Hamilton

 

“That the Macedonians were of Greek stock seems certain.”

 

“…but Macedonian proper names, such as Ptolemaios or Philippos, are good Greek names, and the names of the Macedonian months, although differed from those of Athens or Sparta, were also Greek.”

 

Alexander the Great,J.R. Hamilton(Hutchinson,London, 1973),page 23

Modern historians about Macedonia – Jerome Jordan Pollitt

 

“The Macedonians were ethnically related to the Greeks and spoke a dialect of Greek, but their loose feudal kingdom on the northern border of the Greek world had always been regarded as culturally backward.”

 

 

Art and Experience in Classical Greece,Jerome Jordan Pollitt,page 138

Modern historians about Macedonia – Nigel Guy Wilson

 

“The latest archaeological findings have confirmed that Macedonia took it’s name from a tribe of tall, Greek-speaking people, the Makednoi ( = lenght )”

 

“Philip II of Macedon was anxious to pacify and unify Greeks at any cost… His dream was fulfilled by his son Alexander III the Great,who in no more than 12 years at the head of a Greek army occupied a major part of then known world from the Aegean Sea to the frontiers of India “

 

Nigel Guy Wilson, Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece,page 439

Modern historians about Macedonia – J.B Bury & Russell Meiggs

 

“The Macedonian people and their kings were of Greek stock,as their traditions and the scanty remains of their language combine to testify.”

“Alexander was chosen supreme general of the Greeks for the invasion of Asia,and it was as head of Hellas,descendant and successor of Achilles...”

J.B.Bury and R. Meiggs:A History of Greece. To the Death of Alexander the Great 

Modern historians about Macedonia – Robert Malcolm Errington

 

"That the Macedonians and their kings did in fact speak a dialect of Greek and bore Greek names may be regarded nowadays as certain."

Malcom Errington, "A History of Macedonia",page 3

“Macedonian horsemen together with those  of their Thessalian neighbours were later regarded  as the best in Greece”

Malcom Errington, "A History of Macedonia",page 7

Modern historians about Macedonia – R. M.Cook

 

Macedonia and Epirus were the buffers of Greece in Europe...

 

The Greeks Until Alexander [Ancient Peoples and Places series],1962  by R. M. Cook,page 23

Modern historians about Macedonia – Walter M. Ellis

 

I fear that I have not been wholly consistent in my use of the term “Macedonian.” For the record, let me state that I believe Macedonians, ancient and modern,are Greeks .

Ptolemy of Egypt,Walter M. Ellis, Routledge, 1994

In less than twelve years Alexander conquered the Persian  empire,a region that included the modern countries of Turkey,Syria,Lebanon,Israel,Egypt,Iraq,Iran,Afghanistan,Pakistan,and parts of former Soviet Turkestan and Uzbekistan.His empire also included a relatively united Greece,the work of his father,Philip II.

Ptolemy of Egypt,Walter M. Ellis, Routledge, 1994,page 1

Ptolemy was the creator of the longest lasting of the Hellenistic kingdoms. He created a state whose cultural importance was unparalleled until the coming of Rome. He encouraged the erection of the Pharos Lighthouse, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, as well as creating a library which eventually contained the greatest collection of books until relatively recent times. Ptolemy's institution of higher learning, the Museum, gave birth to the greatest advancements in science before the seventeenth century of our own era.

In this work, the first biography of Ptolemy in any language, Professor Ellis charts Ptolemy's extraordinary achievements in and beyond Egypt in the context of the fragmentation of Alexander's enormous empire and the creation of the Hellenistic state.

 

From the publisher

Modern historians about Macedonia – David George Hogarth

 

 

Tradition held the other element to be Hellenic, and no one in the fourth century seriously questioned its belief.

 

“Philip and Alexander of Macedon” by David G. Hogarth,page 5

 

 

The king [of macedon] was chief in the first instance of a race of plain-dwellers, who held themselves to be, like him, of Hellenic stock…

 

“Philip and Alexander of Macedon” by David G. Hogarth, page 8

 

From Alexander I, who rode to the Athenian pickets the night before Plataea and proclaimed himself to the generals their friend and a Greek, down to Amyntas, father of Philip, who joined forces with Lacedaemon in 382, the kings of Macedon bid for greek support by being more Hellenic than the Hellenes.

 

“Philip and Alexander of Macedon” by David G. Hogarth, page 9-10

 

 

Archelaus patronized Athenian poets and Athenian drama and commisioned Euripides to dramatize the deeds of his Argive ancestor.

 

 

“Philip and Alexander of Macedon” by David G. Hogarth, page 10

 

 

“Macedonia” therefore, throughout historical times until the accession of Philip the Second, presents the spectacle of a nation that was no nation, but a group of discordant units, without community of race, religion, speech or sentiment, resultant from half-accomplished conquest and weak as the several sticks of the faggot in the fable.

 

“Philip and Alexander of Macedon” by David G. Hogarth, page 10 

Πλούταρχος:Περί Ἀλεξάνδρου τύχης καί ἀρετῆς,6 329Α-D

 

Καί μήν ἡ πολύ θαυμαζομένη πολιτεία τοῦ τήν Στωικῶν αἵρεσιν καταβαλομένου Ζήνωνος εἰς ἓν τοῦτο συντείνει κεφάλαιον, ίνα μή κατά πόλεις μηδέ δήμους οἰκῶμεν ἰδίοις ἕκαστοι διωρισμένοι δικαίοις, ἀλλά πάντας ἀνθρώπους ἡγώμεθα δημότας καί πολίτας, εἷς δέ βίος ᾖ καί κόσμος, ὥσπερ ἀγέλης συννόμου νόμῳ κοινῷ συντρεφομένης. Τοῦτο Ζήνων μέν ἔγραψεν ὥσπερ ὄναρ ἢ εἴδωλον εὐνομίας φιλοσόφου καί πολιτείας ἀνατυπωσάμενος, Ἀλέξανδρος δέ τῷ λόγῳ τό ἔργον παρέσχεν.

 

 Οὐ γάρ, ὡς Ἀριστοτέλης συνεβούλευεν αὐτῷ, τοῖς μέν Ἕλλησιν ἡγεμονικῶς τοῖς δέ βαρβάροις δεσποτικῶς χρώμενος, καί τῶν μέν ὡς φίλων καί οἰκείων ἐπιμελόμενος τοῖς δ’ ὡς ζῴοις ἢ φυτοῖς προσφερόμενος, πολέμων πολλῶν καί φυγῶν ἐνέπλησε καί στάσεων ὑπούλων τήν ἡγεμονίαν, ἀλλά κοινός ἥκειν θεόθεν ἁρμοστής καί διαλλακτής τῶν ὅλων νομίζων, οὓς τῷ λόγῳ μή συνῆγε τοῖς ὅπλοις βιαζόμενος καί εἰς ταὐτό συνενεγκών τά πανταχόθεν, ὥσπερ ἐν κρατῆρι φιλοτησίῳ μίξας τούς βίους καί τά ἤθη καί τούς γάμους καί τάς διαίτας, πατρίδα μέν τήν οἰκουμένην προσέταξεν ἡγεῖσθαι πάντας, ἀκρόπολιν δέ καί φρουράν τό στρατόπεδον, συγγενεῖς δέ τούς ἀγαθούς, ἀλλοφύλους δέ τούς πονηρούς· τό δ’ Ἑλληνικόν καί βαρβαρικόν μή χλαμύδι μηδέ πέλτῃ μηδ’ ἀκινάκῃ μηδέ κάνδυι διορίζειν, ἀλλά τό μέν Ἑλληνικόν ἀρετῇ τό δέ βαρβαρικόν κακίᾳ τεκμαίρεσθαι, κοινάς δ’ ἐσθῆτας ἡγεῖσθαι καίτραπέζας καί γάμους καί διαίτας, δι’ αἵματος καί τέκνων ἀνακεραννυμένους.

Ζήνων ο Κιτιεύς

Εκείνη η πολυθαύμαστη Πολιτεία του Ζήνωνα, που ίδρυσε τη Σχολή των Στωικών, αποβλέπει σε έναν κύριο σκοπό:να μην κατοικούμε χωρισμένοι σε πόλεις ούτε σε δήμους, που έχουν ιδιαίτερους κανόνες δικαίου, αλλά να θεωρούμε όλους τους ανθρώπους συνδημότες και συμπολίτες, και να υπάρχει ένας κοινός τρόπος ζωής και μία τάξη, όπως σε μια αγέλη που βόσκει και τρέφεται μαζί υπό έναν κοινό “νόμο”.

 

Αυτά έγραψε ο Ζήνων, αναπλάθοντάς τα σαν ένα όνειρο ή μια εικόνα του φιλοσόφου για την εύνομη πολιτεία.

 

Αλλά εκείνος που έκανε πράξη τη θεωρία ήταν ο Αλέξανδρος. Γιατί δεν φόρτωσε τη διακυβέρνησή του με πολλούς πολέμους και εξορίες και συνωμοτικές εξεγέρσεις, αντιμετωπίζοντας τους Έλληνες ως ηγέτης και τους βαρβάρους ως δεσπότης, όπως τον είχε συμβουλεύσει ο Αριστοτέλης, και φροντίζοντας τους πρώτους ως φίλους και συγγενείς και τους δεύτερους ως ζώα ή φυτά. Αλλά, πιστεύοντας ότι είχε αποσταλεί από τον θεό ως κοινός ρυθμιστής και συμφιλιωτής όλων, εξαναγκάζοντας με τα όπλα όσους δεν έπειθε με τον λόγο και συνενώνοντας σε ενιαίο σύνολο τα πάντα, αναμειγνύοντας τους τρόπους ζωής και τα ήθη και τους γάμους και τις συνήθειες, όπως σε μια κούπα φιλίας, πρόσταξε πως πρέπει όλοι να θεωρούν πατρίδα τους την οικουμένη, ακρόπολη και φρουρά τους το στρατόπεδο, συγγενείς τούς αγαθούς και ξένους τους τούς φαύλους.

 

Και τον Έλληνα ή τον βάρβαρο να μην τον καθορίζει η χλαμύδα ή η ασπίδα, ούτε το περσικό ξίφος ή ο μανδύας, αλλά να συμπεραίνουν ότι κάποιος είναι Έλληνας από την αρετή του και βάρβαρος από την κακία του. και να θεωρούν κοινά τα ενδύματα και τα φαγητά και τους γάμους και τις συνήθειες, καθώς θα έχουν αναμειχθεί με δεσμούς αίματος και με κοινά παιδιά.