Australian Macedonian Advisory Council and the falsification of Ancient Macedonian history Part 1
Risto StefovNovember 01, 2008
This is a response to the Australian Macedonian Advisory Council in regards to the article entitled "Risto Stefov and the falsification of Ancient Macedonian history" published on October 29, 2008 at this link: http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/79306
My reply to you is "Two can play that game!" I too can provide you with just as many arguments that the Ancient Macedonians WERE NOT Greek. BUT!
It is irrelevant, at least to me, if Modern Greeks claim that the Ancient Macedonians were Greeks or not, what is relevant here is that the Modern Greeks are not related to the Ancient Greeks or to the Ancient Macedonians. They call themselves "Greeks" but have nothing to do with the ancient Greeks or Ancient Macedonians because underneath their modern artificial Greek veneer is nothing more than Albanians, Vlachs, Turks and Macedonians, the same variety of Balkanites that exists throughout the entire southern Balkans. But, if they insist on accusing me of falsifying Ancient Macedonian history, then here is my rebuttal:
"The modern Greek claim -- that the ancient Macedonians were Greek -- is politically motivated and is not supported by historical evidence. This political mythology was created in the late 19th century to advance territorial claims against Ottoman Macedonia. In its current incarnation it is used by Greece as an excuse to discriminate against its Macedonian minority." (Gandeto)
"I. What were a people's origins and what language did they speak?
From the surviving literary sources (Hesiod, Herodotus, and Thucydides) there is little information about Macedonian origins, and the archaeological data from the early period is sparse and inconclusive. On the matter of language, and despite attempts to make Macedonian a dialect of Greek, one must accept the conclusion of the linguist R. A. Crossland in the recent CAH, that an insufficient amount of Macedonian has survived to know what language it was. But it is clear from later sources that Macedonian and Greek were mutually unintelligible in the court of Alexander the Great. Moreover, the presence in Macedonia of inscriptions written in Greek is no more proof that the Macedonians were Greek than, e.g., the existence of Greek inscriptions on Thracian vessels and coins proves that the Thracians were Greeks.
II. Self-identity: what did the Macedonians say or think about themselves?
Virtually nothing has survived from the Macedonians themselves (they are among the silent peoples of antiquity), and very little remains in the Classical and Hellenistic non-Macedonian sources about Macedonian attitudes.
III. What did others say about the Macedonians?
Here there is a relative abundance of information from Arrian, Plutarch (Alexander, Eumenes), Diodorus 17-20, Justin, Curtius Rufus, and Nepos (Eumenes), based upon Greek and Greek-derived Latin sources. It is clear that over a five-century span of writing in two languages representing a variety of historiographical and philosophical positions the ancient writers regarded the Greeks and Macedonians as two separate and distinct peoples whose relationship was marked by considerable antipathy, if not outright hostility.
IV. What is the nature of cultural expressions as revealed by archaeology?
As above we are blessed with an increasing amount of physical evidence revealing information about Macedonian tastes in art and decoration, religion, political and economic institutions, architecture and settlement patterns. Clearly the Macedonians were in many respects Hellenized, especially on the upper levels of their society, as demonstrated by the excavations of Greek archaeologists over the past two decades. Yet there is much that is different, e. g., their political institutions, burial practices, and religious monuments.
I will argue that, whoever the Macedonians were, they emerged as a people distinct from the Greeks who lived to the south and east. In time their royal court -- which probably did not have Greek origins (the tradition in Herodotus that the Macedonian kings were descended from Argos is probably a piece of Macedonian royal propaganda) -- became Hellenized in many respects, and I shall review the influence of mainstream Greek culture on architecture, art, and literary preferences.
Finally, a look at contemporary Balkan politics. The Greek government firmly maintains that the ancient Macedonians were ethnic Greeks, and that any claim by the new Republic of Macedonia (The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) to the name "Macedonia" and the symbols of ancient Macedonia is tantamount to an expropriation of Greek history. Moreover, it is claimed that there is no such thing as a distinct Slavic Macedonian identity and language separate from Bulgaria and Serbia.
I shall review the evidence for the existence of a modern Macedonian ethnicity with reference to my recent work in a Macedonian ethnic community in Steelton, Pennsylvania. Both the gravestones in a local cemetery and US census reports from the early twentieth century provide evidence that émigrés from Macedonia who lived and died in Steelton in the early twentieth century considered themselves to be distinct from their Serbian and Bulgarian neighbours." (Eugene Borza)
Speaking of Eugene Borza, the American Philological Association refers to Eugene Borza as the "Macedonian specialist". In the introductory chapter of "Makedonika" by Carol G. Thomas, Eugene Borza is also called "the Macedonian specialist", and his colleague Peter Green describes Eugene's work on Macedonia as "seminal."
Please read what P. Green thinks of Borza's approach to the studies of ancient history, and of his method of abstraction of truth: "Never was a man less given to the kind of mean-spirited odium philologicum that so often marks classical debate. Gene could slice an argument to pieces while still charming its exponents out of the trees."
Ernst Badian from Harvard University writes: "It is chiefly Gene's merit that recognizably historical interpretation of the history of classical Macedonia has not only become possible, but it is now accepted by all historians who have no vested interest in the mythology superseded by Gene's work. Needless to say, I welcome and agree with that approach and have never disagreed with him except on relatively trivial details of interpretation."
Here are some excerpts from Borza's writings regarding the Ancient Macedonians and the Ancient Greeks.
On the matter of distinction between Greeks and Macedonians:
1) "Neither Greeks nor Macedonians considered the Macedonians to be Greeks."
On the composition of Alexander's army:
2) "Thus we look in vain for the evidence that Alexander was heavily dependent upon Greeks either in quantity or quality."
3) "The pattern is clear: the trend toward the end of the king's life was to install Macedonians in key positions at the expense of Asians, and to retain very few Greeks."
4) "The conclusion is inescapable: there was a largely ethnic Macedonian imperial administration from beginning to end. Alexander used Greeks in court for cultural reasons, Greek troops (often under Macedonian commanders) for limited tasks and with some discomfort, and Greek commanders and officials for limited duties. Typically, a Greek will enter Alexander's service from an Aegean or Asian city through the practice of some special activity: he could read and write, keep figures or sail, all of which skills the Macedonians required. Some Greeks may have moved on to military service as well. In other words, the role of Greeks in Alexander's service was not much different from what their role had been in the services of Xerxes and the third Darius."
On the policy of hellenization with Alexander's conquest of Asia and the Greek assertion that he spread Hellenism:
5) "If one wishes to believe that Alexander had a policy of hellenization - as opposed to the incidental and informal spread of Greek culture - the evidence must come from sources other than those presented here. One wonders - archaeology aside - where this evidence would be."
On the issue of whether Alexander and Philip "united" the Greek city-states or conquered them:
6) "In European Greece Alexander continued and reinforced Philip II's policy of rule over the city-states, a rule resulting from conquest."
On the ethnic tension between Macedonians and Greeks:
Referring to the episode of Eumenes of Cardia and his bid to reach the throne: "And if there were any doubt about the status of Greeks among the Macedonians the tragic career of Eumenes in the immediate Wars of succession should put it to rest. The ancient sources are replete with information about the ethnic prejudice Eumenes suffered from Macedonians."
7) "The tension at court between Greeks and Macedonians, tension that the ancient authors clearly recognised as ethnic division."
On Alexander's dismissal of his Greek allies:
8) "A few days later at Ecbatana, Alexander dismissed his Greek allies, and charade with Greece was over."
On the so called Dorian invasion:
9) The theory of the Dorian invasion (based on Hdt. 9.26, followed by Thuc. I.12) is largely an invention of nineteenth-century historography, and is otherwise unsupported by either archaeological or linguistic evidence."
10) "The Dorians are invisible archeologically."
11) "There is no archaeological record of the Dorian movements, and the mythic arguments are largely conjectural, based on folk traditions about the Dorian home originally having been in northwest Greece.
12) "The explanation for the connection between the Dorians and the Macedonians may be more ingenious than convincing, resting uncomfortably on myth and conjecture."
On the Macedonian own tradition and origin:
13) "As the Macedonians settled the region following the expulsion of existing peoples, they probably introduced their own customs and language(s); there is no evidence that they adopted any existing language, even though they were now in contact with neighbouring populations who spoke a variety of Greek and non-Greek tongues."
On the Macedonian language:
14) "The main evidence for Macedonian existing as separate language comes from a handful of late sources describing events in the train of Alexander the Great, where the Macedonian tongue is mentioned specifically."
15) "The evidence suggests that Macedonian was distinct from ordinary Attic Greek used as a language of the court and of diplomacy."
16) "The handful of surviving genuine Macedonian words - not loan words from Greek - do not show the changes expected from Greek dialect."
On the Macedonian material culture being different from the Greek:
17) "The most visible expression of material culture thus far recovered are the fourth - and third-century tombs. The architectural form, decoration, and burial goods of these tombs, which now number between sixty and seventy, are unlike what is found in the Greek south, or even in the neighbouring independent Greek cities of the north Aegean littoral (exception Amphipolis). Macedonian burial habits suggest different view of the afterlife from the Greeks', even while many of the same gods were worshipped."
18) "Many of the public expressions of worship may have been different."
19) "There is an absence of major public religious monuments from Macedonian sites before the end of the fourth century (another difference from the Greeks)."
20). "Must be cautious both in attributing Greek forms of worship to the Macedonians and in using these forms of worship as a means of confirming Hellenic identity."
21) "In brief, one must conclude that the similarities between some Macedonian and Greek customs and objects are not of themselves proof that Macedonians were a Greek tribe, even though it is undeniable that on certain levels Greek cultural influences eventually became pervasive."
22) "Greeks and Macedonians remained steadfastly antipathetic toward one another (with dislike of a different quality than the mutual long-term hostility shared by some Greek city-states) until well into the Hellenic period, when both the culmination of hellenic acculturation in the north and the rise of Rome made it clear that what these peoples shared took precedence over their historical enmities."
23) "They made their mark not as a tribe of Greek or other Balkan peoples, but as 'Macedonians'. This was understood by foreign protagonists from the time of Darius and Xerxes to the age of Roman generals."
24) "It is time to put the matter of the Macedonians' ethnic identity to rest.
No matter how hard Modern Greeks try to prove otherwise, there is always more than one side to their story!
To be continued.
Many thanks to J.S.G. Gandeto for his contribution to this article.
-
Some Greeks believe Macedonia was liberated in 1912, 1913
Risto StefovOctober 31, 2008
"If the Greek State truly valued the thinking and methods of Socrates they would question themselves and their actions" Dedo Kire
Close to a century ago in 1912 under the guise of liberation, Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria invaded Macedonia and with the help of the Macedonian people, evicted the Turks. But instead of helping the Macedonian people create their own independent State, Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria occupied Macedonian territories and fought one another each to gain more land for themselves. Then in 1913 they partitioned Macedonia into three pieces under the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest. After placing artificial borders where such borders never existed before, each State treated its newly acquired territory as its own and began to colonize it. Those inhabitants who refused to recognize their new overlords were exterminated or evicted; those who remained passive were assimilated. This process was halted due to World War I but was resumed after the 1919 Treaty of Versailles when the Great Powers with minor changes sanctioned the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest making the partition permanent.
These are historic facts that cannot be denied. One only needs to examine events during the signing of the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest to understand the conditions under which Macedonia was partitioned.
Some Greeks today, ignoring historical evidence, insist that the 1912, 1913 Balkan conflict was about liberating ancient territories that belonged to Greece some 2, 400 years ago.
If that were true then;
1. Why did Greece agreed to sign the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest allowing Serbia to gain some 38% of Macedonia´s territory and Bulgaria 11%? Why did Greece NOT demand, at least for the record, historical rights while signing the Treaty?
2. On what basis are these claims made? By now it should be well known to every Greek that there was no "Ancient Greece" or "Ancient Hellas". If you don´t believe me then try and find an ancient source or an ancient map that speaks of or shows "Greece" or "Hellas". How can Macedonian territories belong to "Ancient Greece" when such a name did not exist in ancient times?
3. If the word "Greece" or "Hellas" did not exist 2,400 years ago, how then can modern Greeks claim that "Macedonia was Greek"?
Was it not the Macedonians, Philip II and his son Alexander III who conquered the City States during the Battle of Chaeronea in 336 BC? Or do some Greeks still believe Philip II and Alexander III united the Ancient City States?
One more time here is a quote to refresh their memories:
"On his return trip home from a battle with the Scythians Philip´s convoy was attacked and his booty was lost to Thracian Triballians. During the skirmish, Philip suffered a severe leg injury, which left him lame for life. After returning home he spent several months recovering.
While Philip was recovering, the City States to the south were making alliances and amassing a great army to invade Macedonia. On hearing this, Philip decided it was time to meet this aggression head on and end the treachery once and for all. On August 2nd, 338 BC, in the shallow Cephisus River valley near the village of Chaeronea on the road to Thebes, the two opposing armies met face to face. On the north side stood Philip´s Macedonians with 30,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry, the largest Macedonian army ever assembled. Among Philip´s commanding generals was his 18 year-old son, Alexander, in charge of the cavalry. On the south side, stood the allied Athenians, Thebans and Achaeans who assembled 35,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry, the largest army ever assembled since the Persian invasion.
Closely matched, the armies clashed and while the battle ensued the Macedonian right flank fell back and began to retreat. Seeing the Macedonians weakening, the allied City State general gave orders to push on and drive the Macedonians back to Macedonia. As the Macedonians retreated, the allied flanks broke rank and began the pursuit. Not realizing it was a trick, the allies found themselves surrounded and slaughtered by Alexander´s cavalry. When it was over, the majority of the allied army, including the elite Theban Sacred Band lay dead in the fields of Chaeronea. Philip erected a statue of a lion to commemorate the sacrifice of the Theban Sacred Band who upheld their tradition and fought to the last man.
Ancient City State and Roman historians consider the battle of Chaeronea as the end of City State liberty, history and civilization." (1)
After reading the above, do you still believe Philip and Alexander united the Ancient City States? Would it not be more correct to say "the Macedonians by way of war conquered and enslaved the Ancient City States thus making them the property of Macedonia"?
The question still remains; if not by historical rights then by what right does 51% of the present Macedonian territory belong to Greece?
I can understand if a successor of the Roman Empire such as Italy, which held Macedonia for two centuries makes claims that Macedonia is Italian based on the fact that Macedonia once belonged to the Roman Empire or that Macedonia is Ottoman based on the fact that Macedonia for five centuries belonged to the Ottoman Empire, but as God is my witness, I cannot fathom this Greek logic on how Macedonia could possibly be Greek?
"One can fool all of the people some of the time or some of the people all of the time but not all of the people all of the time"
I am not the only one looking at this "Greek Logic" as a bit unusual:
In Plutarch "The Age of Alexander" on page 212 we read: "While Demosthenes was still in exile, Alexander died in Babylon, and the Greek states combined yet again to form a league against Macedon. Demosthenes attached himself to the Athenian convoys, and threw all his energies into helping them incite the various states to attack the Macedonians and drive them out of Greece." Why didn´t Plutarch include Macedonia as part of Greece if Macedonia was Greek?
In M. Cary´s book "The Geographic background of Greek and Roman History" (ISBN 0-313-23187-7) we find the following constituent parts of Greece: Epirus, Acarnania, The Ionian Isles, Aetolia, Thessaly, The Spercheu Valley, Locris, Phocis, Boeotia, Euboea, Attica, Aegina, Corinth, Achaea, Elis, Arcadia, Argolis, Laconia, Messenia, The Greek Archipelago, Crete, The Outer Isles, The Northern Aegean, The East Aegean, Rhodes. It makes one wonder why M. Cary omitted Macedonia from the general description of Greece? Perhaps for the same reason the German classical scholar Bursian failed to include Macedonia in his otherwise comprehensive geographical survey of Greece "Geographie von Griechenland". (2)
On page 91 in "Hellenistic World" by F.W.Walbank we find: "It is necessary, in any assessment of the role of Macedonia in the Hellenistic world to bear in mind that although our sources naturally, being Greek or based on Greek writers, lay their emphasis on Macedonian policy towards Greece, Macedonia was in fact equally a Balkan power for which the northern, western and north-eastern frontiers were always vital and for which strong defenses and periodic punitive expeditions over the border were fundamental policy." (2)
In N. G. L. Hammond's book "The Macedonian State" on page 141 we read: "Philip and Alexander attracted many able foreigners, especially Greeks, to their service, and many of these were made Companions." (2) If Macedonians were Greeks why did Hammond call them foreigners?
In Eugene Borza´s "Makedonika" on page 164 we read: "Alexander seems to have imported troupes of performers from Greece." (2) How does one import Greeks from Greece into Greece?
In Plutarch´s "The Age of Alexander" on page 264 we find: "Thebans countered by demanding the surrender of Philotas and Antipater and appealing to all who wished to liberate Greece to range themselves on their side, and at this Alexander ordered his troops to prepare for battle." (2) Were they also going to liberate Macedonia, i.e. Alexander´s homeland, because according to modern Greek logic "Macedonia is Greek"?
In Quintus Rufus´s "The History of Alexander" on page 50-1 Alexander, in a letter, responds to Darius: "His Majesty Alexander to Darius: Greetings. The Darius whose name you have assumed wrought utter destruction upon the Greek inhabitants of the Hellespontine coast and upon the Greek colonies of Ionia, and then crossed the sea with a mighty army, bringing the war to Macedonia and Greece." (2) Shouldn´t Alexander have said "Greece and Greece"?
In Arrian´s "The Campaigns of Alexander" on page 292 Alexander speaking to his officers: "...But let me remind you: Through your courage and endurance you have gained possession of Ionia, the Hellespont, both Phrygias, Cappadocia, Paphlagonia, Lydia, Caria, Lycia, Pamphylia, Phoenicia and Egypt; the Greek part of Libya is now yours, together with much of Arabia, lowland Syria, Mesopotamia, Babylon, and Susia;..." Point of interest: "The Greek part of Libya is now yours?" How can the Greek part of Libya become Greek again, if it already was in Greek hands to begin with? (2)
"Only in Thessaly and Boetia, and outside Greece, in Macedonia, was there cavalry worthy of the name."
"The Peloponnesian War was a fratricidal war among the Greeks, a fact that was not altered by the intervention of foreign powers, Macedonia, for instance and later the Persian Empire."] (Excerpts taken from The Greeks and Persians, from the sixth to the fourth centuries; edited by Hermann Bengston; published by Delacorte Press, New York.) (2)
In Agnes Savil's book "Alexander the Great and his Time" on page 180 we find: "For a time Hellenism revived when Demetrius of Bactria, half Macedonian, half Greek, tried in 187 B.C. to reclaim the Indian empire of Alexander." Should we assume that there is such a person who is half Greek and half Greek? (2)
In Quintus Rufus´s "The History of Alexander" on page 188 we find: "Accordingly, one festive day, Alexander had a sumptuous banquet organized so that he could invite not only his principle friends among the Macedonians and Greeks but also the enemy nobility." "Macedonians and Greeks"? Not Greeks and Greeks? (2)
In Arrian´s "The Campaigns of Alexander" on page 294 we read: "Gentlemen of Macedon, and you my friends and allies [Greeks], this must not be. Stand firm; for well you know that hardship and danger are the price of glory, and that sweet is the savor of a life of courage and of deathless renown beyond the grave." (2)
In Quintus Curtius Rufus´s "The History of Alexander" on page 195 regarding the trial of Hermolaus we find: "As for you Callisthenes, the only person to think you a man (because you are an assassin), I know why you want him brought forward. It is so that the insult which sometimes uttered against me and sometimes heard from him can be repeated by his lips before this gathering. Were he a Macedonian I would have introduced him here along with you - a teacher truly worth of his pupil. As it is, he is an Olynthian [Greek] and does not enjoy the same rights." (2)
In Robert A. Hudley´s paper "Diodoros 18.60.1-3: "A Case of Remodeled Source Materials" dissects "Eumenes": "We then come upon Eumenes' second observation that, being a foreigner, he has no right to exercise command over Macedonians. At no point, however, in Diodoros' prior narrative does Eumenes' Greek origin excite animosity among the Macedonians. More important, Eumenes does not see his foreign origin as an impediment to accepting the dynasty' offer of a supreme command in 18.58.4 and he proceeds to exercise that authority in 19.13.7 and 15.5 without any qualms on his part that he is not a Macedonian. Eumenes' foreign origin does become an issue at one point among the commanders of the Silver Shields." (2)
If the Ancient Macedonians themselves did not consider themselves to be kin to the people of the Ancient City States why should we?
Again the question still remains; if not by historical rights then by what right does 51% of the present Macedonian territory belongs to Greece?
Allow me to summarize:
1. The name "Greece" or "Hellas" did not exist in ancient times
2. The Ancient Macedonians did not consider themselves in any way, shape or form to be akin to the people from the Ancient City States
3. The Ancient City States were conquered and enslaved by the Macedonians; not united
4. The Ancient City States belonged to the Macedonians for nearly two centuries and not the other way around
5. No "Greek" or "Hellenic" State ever existed before 1829
So, how can Macedonian territories in 1912, 1913 be liberated by Greece when those lands NEVER belonged to Greece?
The truth is Macedonia NEVER belonged to Greece. The 1912, 1913 conflict was simply an imperial land grab perpetrated by Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria and sanctioned by the Great Powers to feed the imperial appetites of those three States. The so called "historical" claims were an afterthought designed to keep the innocent and uninformed tangled in a web of lies.
NO! Macedonia is NOT and NEVER was Greek. Macedonia BELONGS to the Macedonians! In the words of William Gladstone "MACEDONIA FOR THE MACEDONIANS"!
References:
1. Stefou, Chris. History of the Macedonian People from Ancient times to the Present. Toronto: Risto Stefov Publications, 2005, P 67.
2. Quotes provided by Dedo Kire.Leave a comment:
-
Modern Greeks today believe in a 4,000 year existence of a so called "Greek Civilization"
Risto StefovOctober 28, 2008
4,000 year "Greek Civilization"? Very impressive! But, what is a "Greek Civilization"?
According to Oxford a civilization is "an advanced stage of social development" and civilized is "being brought out of barbarism, being made into a fully organized State, enlightened and refined". According to Webster a civilization is "a social organization of high order, marked by the development and use of a written language and by advances in the arts and science, government etc., the total culture of a particular people, nation, period, etc." and civilized is "to bring or come out of primitive or savage conditions and into a state of civilization, to improve in habits or manners."
So "4,000 years of Greek Civilization" must mean "an advanced stage of Greek social development marked by the development and use of a written language and by advances in the arts and sciences, government, etc., the total Greek culture and Greek nation spanning for 4,000 years".
4,000 years of "Greek" civilization? Indeed!
I have been accused (by Greeks of course) of "fabricating information", "not including sources", "telling lies", "speculating", "providing no conclusions", "not making footnotes", etc., etc. In this article I will provide direct quotes from Western authors just to prove to the skeptical reader that I am not the only one challenging Modern Greek claims about Greece and the Greeks.
"Although the Greek-speakers of Constantinople may have been beneficiaries of a rich cultural tradition associated with the Byzantine Empire, a position retained also through the church during Ottoman times, years before the concept of a Greek state (which was a product of Great power politics and a concerted effort to de-stabilize the Ottomans) ever existed, ´the Greeks did not know who they were´". (P. 26, "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers", by Misha Glenny) (1)
"The ethnic mix of the Greek-speakers of the Ottoman empire (Greek was often learned as a second language by wealthier non-Greek people) was as diverse as any in the Ottoman Empire, possibly more. ´The islands and the seafarers from the coastal regions were distinguished by their peculiar ethnicity, many were of mixed Albanian-Greek origin´. (P. 23 "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers" by Misha Glenny) (1)
"The Koundouriotes, for example, the most powerful maritime family on the island of Hydra, who led a substantial faction during the war (of independence), were of Albanian origin´. (P. 25 "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers" by Misha Glenny) (1)
"Although modern day Greek nationalists like to boast about how they never forgot their rich heritage and cultural icons, this next piece contradicts their theories. The 'Klephts' were the Greek equivalent of the Komiti or Hajduci, the warriors who championed the notion of a free nation. ´The 18th century Greek scholar, Koumas, tells of a visit to one of the most influential Klephts, Nikotsaras (possibly of part Slavic descent, Niko-'tsar'-as). In order to show respect, Koumas addressed the Klepht leader as Achilles. Nikotsaras retorted angrily: 'What rubbish are you talking about? Who is this Achilles? Handy with a musket was he?´." (P. 31 "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers" by Misha Glenny) (1)
"The philhellenes of America, Britain and Western Europe had called for a free Greek state in a romantic passionate attempt to bring to life the Hellenic culture of the past. Little did any of them know of what extreme changes had taken place in the region of what was once the Greek City States. ´Naturally, many travelers and philhellenes were shocked at the Greeks´ lack of sophistication, and the ABSENCE OF A PHYSICAL RESEMBLANCE TO THE HELLENES of their classical imagination. All came expecting to find the Peloponnesus filled with Plutarch´s men, and all returned thinking the inhabitants of Newgate more moral´." (P. 33 "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers" by Misha Glenny) (1)
"It was not only the resemblance, or lack of it but also the fact that ´politically speaking the Greeks were Asiatics, and all their oriental ideas, whether social or political, required to be corrected or eradicated, before they could be expected to form a civilized people upon civilized European principals´. (P. 32 "The Balkans, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers" by Misha Glenny)
So much for the cradle of European civilization". (1)
"As it is clearly obvious the Greek nation had many divisions and diversities within that had to be addressed before they could start telling the world that they are the descendents of the ancient Hellenes. Unfortunate though it may be, the modern-day Greek has more in common genetically with the Albanians, the Latin speaking Vlachs and the Turks than with ´Plutarch's men´". (1)
"The inherent instability of the Balkan Peninsula—located as it is at the crossroads of invading Turks, migrating Slavs, and colonizing powers from western or central Europe (Venetians, Austro-Hungarians)—has bequeathed a bewildering amount of cultural confusion to Greece." (Britannica)
"One of the most vexing questions concerning the history of medieval Greece has been that of the extent to which the indigenous "Hellenic" population survived and brings with it the question whether this term can properly be used of anything other than a cultural (as opposed to ethnic or racial) identity. The archaeological data, certainly, can offer answers only in terms of cultural similarities and differences, so that the question, as it has been traditionally expressed, of a Hellenic ethnic survival, cannot be answered. The issue must be explored in the context of the influx of large numbers of Slavs during the later 6th–8th centuries as well as the migration across Greece of nomadic or semi-nomadic pastoral groups such as the Vlachs from the 10th or 11th century and the Albanians from the 13th century. Although the evidence of place-names suggests some lasting Slavic influence in parts of Greece, the evidence is qualified by the fact that the process of re-Hellenization that occurred from the later 8th century seems to have eradicated many traces of Slavic presence. Evidence of tribal names found in both the Peloponnesus and northern Greece suggests that there were probably extensive Slavic-speaking populations in many districts; and from the 10th century to the 15th century Slavic occupants of various parts of the Peloponnesus appear in the sources as brigands or as fiercely independent warriors. Whereas the Slavs of the south appear to have adopted Greek, those of Macedonia and Thessaly retained their original dialects, becoming only partially Hellenophone in certain districts." (Britannica) (1)
"For Christians of the early and middle Byzantine worlds, the terms Hellene and Hellenic generally (although not exclusively, since in certain literary contexts a classicizing style permitted a somewhat different usage) had a pejorative connotation, signifying pagan and non-Christian rather than ´Greek´" (Britannica)
"Canning (a British politician, 1812-1862) had planned to head off Russia's advance, not by direct opposition, but by associating her with England and France in a policy of emancipation, aimed at erecting national States out of the component parts of the Turkish Empire. Such States could be relied upon to withstand Russian encroachment on their independence, if once they were set free from the Turk.. The creation of the Kingdom of Greece was the immediate outcome of Canning´s policy". (P. 372, Trevelyan, British History in the 19th Century). (1)
"To me, philhellenism is a love affair with a dream which envisions 'Greece' and the 'Greeks' not as an actual place or as real people but as symbols of some imagined perfection". (P. 12, Greece without Columns) (1)
"Further back still beyond the War of Independence, when the modern nation-state of Greece came into being for the first time, the whole concept of Greece as a geographical entity that begins to blur before our eyes, so many and various were its shapes and meanings. But if geography can offer us no stable idea of Greece, what can? Not race, certainly; for whatever the Greeks may once have been, ...., they can hardly have had much blood-relationship with the Greeks of the peninsula of today, Serbs and Bulgars, Romans, Franks and Venetians, Turks, Albanians,...,in one invasion after another have made the modern Greeks a decidedly mongrel race. Not politics either; for in spite of that tenacious western legend about Greece as the birthplace and natural home of democracy, the political record of the Greeks is one of a singular instability and confusion in which, throughout history, the poles of anarchy modulated freedom has very rarely appeared. Not religion; for while Byzantium was Christian, ancient Hellas was pagan." (P. 23 Greece without Columns). (1)
"The Greek nation-state was a product of western political intervention-'the fatal idea' as Arnold Toynbee once called it, of exclusive western nationalism impinging upon the multi-national traditions of the eastern world. By extension, therefore, at any rate in theory, it was a child of the Renaissance and of western rationalism..." (P. 28 Greece without Columns) (1)
"Its international use to describe the sovereign state that currently occupies that territory is merely a reflection of the fact that 'Greece' in this modern sense is literally a western invention" (P. 29 Greece without Columns) (1)
"Greek natural identity was not a 'natural development' or the extension of a 'high culture' over the region of Macedonia, although now it is frequently portrayed as so. The ideology of Hellenism imposed a homogeneity on the Macedonian region and its inhabitants". (P. 94, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood) (1)
"Modern Greek identity is based on an unshakable conviction that the Greek State is ethnically homogenous. This belief ... has entailed repeated and official denial of the existence of minorities which are not of 'pure' Hellenic origin. The obsession with Greek racial identity involves the distortion of the history of the thousands of years when there was no such thing as a Greek nation state." (Simon McIllwaine) (1)
"A sharp and brutal revolution altered the whole character of Hellas... It also involved a steep decline of civilized life and an almost total rejection of former values... The most striking change affected the ethnic composition of the people and resulted from the mass migration of Slavs into the Balkans which began in the sixth Century." (N. Cheetham) (1)
"What is the word for this obsessive Greek pseudo-relationship with their country's past (they even have a magazine, Ellenismos, devoted to the subject)? It is not quite pretentiousness. There is too much passion for that. No, the Greeks, the ancient ones, had a word for the modern Greek condition: paranoia. We must accept that Mr. Andreas Papandreou (former Greek prime minister) and the current EC presidency are the sole legitimate heirs of Pericles, Demosthenes and Aristide the Just. The world must nod dumbly at the proposition that in the veins of the modern Greek ... there courses the blood of Achilles. And their paranoid nationalism is heightened by the tenuousness of that claim." (The Sunday Telegraph, London, March 27, 1994) (1)
"The most usual ideological abuse of history is based on anachronism rather than lies. Greek nationalism refused Macedonia even the right to its name on the grounds that all Macedonia is essentially Greek and part of a Greek nation-State, presumably ever since the father of Alexander the Great, king of Macedonia, became ruler of the Greek lands on the Balkan peninsula ... it takes a lot of courage for a Greek intellectual to say that, historically speaking, it is nonsense. There was no Greek nation-State or any other single political entity for the Greeks in the fourth century B.C.; the Macedonian empire was nothing like the Greek or any other modern nation-state, and in any case it is highly probable that the ancient Greeks regarded the Macedonian rulers, as they did their later Roman rulers, as barbarians and not as Greeks, though they were doubtless too polite or cautious to say so". (Eric Hobsbawn) (1)
"It is a striking fact that the leading defenders of Greek liberty at this time were largely Non-Greek. Koundouriotis was descended from the Albanian invaders of Greece in the 14th century, and spoke Greek only with difficulty. His principal colleague was John Kolettis, a Vlach who had been Ali Pasha's court doctor at Ioannina. One of the few leaders who maintained resistance far to the north of the Gulf of Corinth was the Souliote, Marko Botsaris, whose followers were largely Albanian. By a strange chance, it happened that two of the Turkish commanders-in-chief during the war, Khurshid Pasha and Muhammad Rehid Pasha (known to the Greeks as Kiutahi), were by birth Orthodox Christians, who had been converted to Islam for the sake of career in the Sultans service." (C.M. Woodhouse) (1)
"Greece included considerably fewer than half of those who regarded themselves as Greeks by virtue of their language, their religion, and (less plausibly) their race. It was easy to stir up agitation in favour of enlarging Greece's frontiers by a progressive extension of ´enosis´ (union)". (1)
"Greek demographic continuity was brutally interrupted in the late sixth to eighth centuries A.D. by massive influxes of Avar, Slav and later, Albanian immigrants......modern Greeks could hardly count as being of ancient Greek descent, even if this could never be ruled out." (Anthony Smith) (1)
"Basically, the current historical ´narrative´ of modern Greece, removes all diversity from its pages. The young modern Greek State legitimized its existence, at least to the Great-Powers that supported it in the day, by claiming it represented ancient Greece, at a time when there weren't any ´Greeks´ to be found anywhere, and the ´Greek´ language between the Church and anything vaguely resembling it on the ground was unintelligible.
Any opportunity to influence public opinion in modern Greece and abroad, about the Greeks being 'pure' and 'homogenous'...etc is enthusiastically seized upon by the Greek State. It is not hard to work out that this kind of 'lie' would not really be well received if it could be shown that Greece had a lot of diverse ethnic groups still living there. The removal of Latin from the Vlach and Slavic from the Macedonian, among other things, is part in parcel of this censorship. The modern Greek State censors and abuses all its 'minorities'. The Greek historical ´narrative´' prospers only by hijacking different ethnic groups, removing their language, denying the 'differences', and literally inventing a complete new history for them. It´s just plain crazy". (1)
"The Editor of The Sunday Telegraph argues that Greece has been ruthless in erasing traces of ethnic diversity, and suggests that the desperation of its actions, including the Greek claim to a monopoly of the classical past (in which all peoples of European origins have a share) can be explained by the fact that the Greeks today are a mixture of Slavs, Turks, Greeks, Bulgars, Albanians, Vlachs, Jews and Gypsies". (1)
"I watched the Koutsovlachi disappear in Thessaly over a period of twenty years. I remember the first time I went up there in 1957, I was stunned, it was another world--it was Rumania. Blond, blue-eyed women wearing incredibly beautiful costumes: white, with about twelve to fifteen inches of thick fringes at the bottom, in saffron, black, and ocher. And everywhere I went, there were ducks and geese, which I didn't see anywhere else in Greece. Ducks and geese and pigs--standard East and Central European farm culture. But I saw all of that disappear.
It's a pity because Greece has lost the Sarakatsani, it's lost the Vlachi, the Koutsovlachi, the Karagounidhes -- it's lost all these fascinating minority groups, and now people are getting up and trying to stop it, but they're about twenty years too late." (A Point of Contact: An Interview with Nikos Stavroulakis, by Peter Pappas in The Greek American (January 9, 1988)) (1)
"According to anthropologist Roger Just, most of the nineteenth-century "Greeks, ´who had so recently won their independence from the Turks, not only did not call themselves Hellenes (they learned this label later from the intellectual nationalists); they did not even speak Greek by preference, but rather Albanian, Slavonic, or Vlach dialects.´" (1)
"The obsession with Greek racial identity involves the distortion of the history of the thousands of years when there was no such thing as a Greek nation state. The early Slav invasions which reached far into the Peloponnesus and left Slav-speaking settlements well into the fifteenth century are conveniently ignored. So too is the fact that in the early nineteenth century the population of Athens was 24 per cent Albanian, 32 per cent Turkish and only 44 per cent Greek." (Simon Mcllwaine, The Strange Case of the Invisible Minorities, Institutional Racism in the Greek State, International Society for Human Rights, British Section, Dec 1993.) (1)
"No wonder the kodjabashis, the Peloponnesian notables, were disparagingly referred to as ´Christian Turks´. One hero of the war of independence, Photakos Kyrysanthopoulis, said that the only difference was one of names: instead of being called Hasan the Kodijabashi, he would be called Yanni: instead of praying in a mosque he would go to church." (P. 42, "A concise history Of Greece", Richard Clogg) (1)
"The Academy was built with bequest from Simon Sinas, the hugely wealthy son of Georgios Sinas, a Hellenized Vlach whose family came from Moschopolis in Southern Albania, who made his fortune in the Habsburg Empire and was himself the donor of Theophilos Hansen's observatory (1843-6). (P. 79, "A concise history Of Greece", Richard Clogg) (1)
And finally, some haunting final words for the skeptical Greeks:
In the 1830's an Austrian classicist called JJ Fallmereyer made a study of the South Slav migrations and concluded that "not only are the modern Greeks Slavs, but not a drop of pure Greek blood was to be found in the modern Greek State". In Athens needless to say, his name is not much. "Consequently the medieval and modern Greeks are not the descendants of the Greeks of Antiquity, and their Hellenism is artificial". (Robert Browning , Greece Old and New , edited by Tom Winnifrith and Penelope Murray, the Macmillan Press , London 1963.) (1)
"Slavic blood, Albanian heroes, Pontian Orthodox Turks, Latin speaking Vlach politicians, assimilated Macedonians and Albanians not to mention the dozen other ethnicities? Is any one truly Greek today?" (1)
In the presence of company it is not how one sees himself or herself it is how others see them that counts. So, I dedicate this article to those Greeks who love to ridicule Macedonians feeling very smug, secure and confident in their place and proud of their 4,000 years of Greek Civilization. What they really don´t know is that they are standing on a rotten foundation ALL built on Greek lies.
You can believe the myths and fairytales your propagandists and government feed you or you can look at the evidence and start thinking for yourselves. You may be standing on what appear to be a solid foundation on the surface, but in reality you are standing on thin ice which with the slightest shock will crack and crumble before you.
Ask yourselves, why do so many people dispute your past? Are they all propagandists paid by rich Skopjans who have nothing better to do with their money but cause you trouble? Or are they in pursuit of finding the truth and telling you something that you should know? You can´t say ALL these people are Skopjan propagandists or accuse me of "fabricating information". All the quotes given in this piece are written by western authors and I expect you will find them fair and impartial.
So, do you believe modern Greece is a unique nation that belongs to a 4,000 year old "Greek Civilization" like no other or do you believe your Government and benefactors have been feeding you a load of anachronisms (the representation of something as existing or occurring at other than it´s proper time. Webster)?
My conclusion!
The truth is Greece is a modern state created for the first time in 1829. Modern Greece just happens to be located where once upon a time a so called civilization existed for a brief period. The only reason we know about it is because the people preserved their thoughts by writing them on rocks. It would be naïve to think that it was the only civilization in existence or that it miraculously survived for over 4,000 years.
Modern Greece was created for a specific purpose, to act as a barrier to Russia and fulfill the political desires and agendas of the 19th century Western Great Powers. To believe anything different is foolish and to infer that there exists a 4,000 year old Greek Civilization is simply a Greek myth.
NOTES: (1) Many thanks to Paul and SoM for their research for this piece.Leave a comment:
-
Modern Greeks today claim the Macedonian language doesn´t exist
Risto StefovOctober 24, 2008
"If you peel away all that Greece has taken from others, you will find an empty carcass of a people shocked to find that they have been living a lie-a lie that they invented and a lie that will ultimately destroy them." Steve S.
There are some western academics and authors today who believe that the suppression of the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia has arisen out of Greek efforts at nation-building. After Macedonia´s occupation and partition in 1912, 1913, a great effort was made to turn its inhabitants into the citizens of the Greek nation-state. In order to make sure its citizens were loyal to the Greek state, politicians and intellectuals rewrote history, creating a myth that ALL Greek residents were "ethnic Greeks". "Ethnicity" was purposely confused with "nationality" which led directly to the denial of the existence of the Macedonians. Denying the existence of the ethnic Macedonians quickly led to the denial of everything that was Macedonian and for those who insisted otherwise, denigration and human rights abuses followed.
After denying the ethnic existence of an entire nation, it was not difficult for Greece to deny the existence of the Macedonian language. Unfortunately for Greece, it was not as easy to hide a language as it was to hide an entire ethnicity. Ever since Macedonia´s occupation and partition in 1912, 1913, Macedonians living inside Greece or should I say inside Greek occupied Macedonia, continued to speak their language even at the risk of being persecuted. After numerous efforts, on the Greek part, to ban this language and make it illegal, Macedonians continued to speak it. Having to explain themselves why there are so-called "Greeks" speaking a non-Greek language inside Greece, Greek authorities resorted to calling the language "Slav", "Bulgarian", "Serbian" and even an "idiom" but never Macedonian. This idiom, according to some Greek explanations, was some sort of lost Slavic dialect probably a remnant of the "Bulgarian schools" from the Exarchate days when Macedonia was still under Ottoman rule.
"...I asked him what language they spoke, and my Greek interpreter carelessly rendered the answer Bulgare. The man himself had said Makedonski. I drew attention to this word and the witness explained that he did not consider the rural dialect used in Macedonia the same as Bulgarian, and refused to call it by that name. It was Macedonian, a word to which he gave the Slav form of Makedonski, but which I was to hear farther north in the Greek form of Makedonike". Allen Upward, The East End of Europe. London, 1908, pp. 204-205.
The Greeks may have been able to fool their own people and outsiders with no interest in Greek or Macedonian affairs, but they could not fool those people who actually had interest in learning the truth and those who spoke Macedonian and whose mother tongue has been Macedonian for dozens of generations. In fact some believe that Macedonians spoke Macedonian and lived on Macedonian lands before the so-called "Ancient Greeks" were civilized. One thing is certain, Macedonians spoke Macedonian before the Bulgars descended from the Volga.
"The Greeks will not admit the Slav language in Churches or schools; the inhabitants of Macedonia are in the great majority Slavs; they call themselves now Macedonians, and what they desire and what we ardently desire for them is an autonomy under European control. -In whatever way Macedonia might be divided, the people would always be discontented, and would fight again as soon as possible. The only hope I can foresee is in a strong autonomy, which neither Greeks nor Bulgars nor Serbs would dare attack; then the Macedonians, who are really intelligent and docile when they are well treated, would peacefully develop this beautiful fertile country, and might learn to be civilized. -Surely Europe will not leave Macedonia under people whom the Macedonians hate, and whom they will continually fight. As the little Balkan states can never agree, but always fight for Macedonia, let none of them have it. -We might then have peace, the Catholics would again have heart, and all the years of hard work among them would not have been wasted." Catholic Sister of Charity, Augustine Bewicke, January 4th 1919. Letter to Ian Malcolm, a British diplomat. Sister Augustine lived in Macedonia for 33 years.
The Macedonian language is at least three thousand years old and fifteen-hundred years ago formed the basis of what we now call Church Slavonic, the language of Kiril and Metodi from Solun and the language of all Slavonic Churches. There are also people who believe that the Slavic family of languages began in Macedonia and was spread throughout Eastern Europe by Macedonians.
Here is what Christian Voss has to say. "The case of the Slavic-speaking minority, which until today is officially denied in its very existence, in a comparative perspective is very strange, especially in view of their large number. The Slavic dialects in Aegean Macedonia - a territory of about 35,000 square kilometers - have approximately 200,000 potential speakers. Since only one third of them makes active use of the vernacular, which since 30-40 years is not the primary code any more, the term "Slavic-speaker" presents a more or less ethnic category which is supported on the sociological level (cf. Voss 2003: 116-117).
The demographic development in the region is determined by several waves of ethnic cleansing in form of population exchange between Greece and Bulgaria (Neuilly 1919) and Greece and Turkey (Lausanne 1923) as well as in form of expulsion (during the Balkan Wars 1912-1913 and at the end of the Greek Civil War 1948-1949). As a result, the indigenous Slavic-speaking population, which until 1912 constituted the majority in Aegean Macedonia (with 30-40%), became minorised – except the western part, i.e. the prefecture of Florina, where they are still the majority and where many villages had no settlement of Asia Minor and Pontos refugees (Voss 2003a: 62-64).
My survey of 270 villages in Northern Greece, where until today Slavic dialects are spoken, results from fieldwork conducted in the area between 1999 and 2003 (Voss 2003d): 112 of them are in Western Macedonia (i.e. the prefectures Kastoria, Florina, and the northern part of Kozani), 121 of them belong to Central Macedonia (i.e. the prefectures Pella, Kilkis, Thessaloniki and the northern part of Imathia), 38 of them in Eastern Macedonia (i.e. the prefectures Serres and Drama)."
So, without going into details, it is not a case where a Macedonian language never existed or a case where a Macedonian language did exist and became extinct and is no longer in use. It is a case where a Macedonian language existed, exists and is spoken by Macedonians today.
So, the big question here is why is Greece insisting that there is no such thing as a Macedonian language? And why do Greeks insist that the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia are "Slavic Speaking Greeks"?
Yes the Macedonian language is a "Slavic language" but so is Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Serbian, Croatian, Bulgarian, Czech, Slovak, etc. The Greeks have no problem with the Russians calling their language Russian or with the Poles calling theirs Polish. So why do they have a problem with Macedonians calling their language Macedonian?
The Macedonian people living in Macedonia spoke a dialect of the Slavic branch of languages since the days of Kiril and Metodi. If I am not mistaken, by the turn of the 20th century there were at least fifty Macedonian dialects spoken in the territories of Macedonia. The Macedonian language, especially the dialects spoken in Greek occupied Macedonia, is an old and widely used language which took its time to develop and mature into the many dialects of this day. It is an oral and a mother language to all Macedonians and has been for as far back as the collective memory of Macedonians can recall.
Also there are more than four-hundred million people in Europe who speak variants of this language so how can Greece say it doesn´t exist?
Unlike "Greek" which is an imposed language, Macedonian is a natural language that has been orally passed on from generation to generation and has survived and flourished in the hearts and minds of the Macedonian people. I would say it is a precious language facing extinction that must be protected and preserved under all circumstances. Unfortunately Greece is totally ignorant of what a precious jewel it has and instead of cherishing it, it is bent on destroying it, choking the life out of it.
The Macedonian language exists not only in Macedonia but also in Canada, the USA, Australia and the world over. Only the Greek state and some Greeks deny its existence and that makes them conspirators in another Greek fabrication.
And now I leave you with this:
"Being shocked and increasingly concerned, I struck the village mayor when I heard him speak Bulgarian, which he wishes to call Macedonian, and I recommended that in the future he should always and everywhere speak only Greek, and that he should recommend that his villagers do the same." Greek Infantry Lieutenant Dim. Kamburas, Armensko, January 25, 1925.Leave a comment:
-
A vast majority of Modern Greeks today believe they are Hellenes
Risto StefovOctober 22, 2008
According to the Columbia Encyclopedia, Hellenism is "the culture, ideals, and pattern of life of ancient Greece in classical times. It usually means primarily the culture of ATHENS and the related cities in the Age of Pericles [495-429 BC]. The term is also applied to the ideals of later writers and thinkers who draw their inspiration from ancient Greece. Frequently it is contrasted with Hebraism – Hellenism then meaning pagan joy, freedom, and love of life as contrasted with the austere morality and monotheism of the Old Testament. The Hellenic period came to an end with the conquest of Alexander the Great in the 4th century BC. It was succeeded by the Hellenistic civilization." Page 930, Columbia Encyclopedia, Third Edition 1963, New York and London.
If you ask a Modern Greek today to identify his or her "ethnicity" they will say they are "Greek". If you ask them what is that in "Greek"? They will say "Ellinas" or "Ellinida". There is no word for "Greek" in the Greek vocabulary. If there is (Graekos) it is rarely used and unknown to most Greeks.
According to most modern Greeks today, "Greek" and "Ellines" are synonymous. In other words a "Hellene is a native of either ancient or modern Greece; a Greek".
If I am to understand this correctly "a Hellene is a person who shares the culture, ideals, and pattern of life of ancient Greece in classical times" and "who is a native of either ancient or modern Greece". In other words, again if I understand this correctly, any person of any ethnicity who is native of either ancient or modern Greece and who shares the culture, ideals and pattern of life of ancient Greece in classical times qualifies to be a Hellene.
Can a person be a Hellene and something else at the same time? According to Modern Greek standards, NO! One cannot be a Hellene and a Turk at the same time; according to some Greeks, why would they want to? "A Hellene is a superior being!" Also, according to some Greeks, "To be a Hellene one must be a descendant of the ancient Hellenes".
Obviously there are people today who call themselves "Hellenes" or more accurately, "Ellines". My question here is "Who are these people and how did they become the Hellenes?"
Modern Greeks today consider themselves to be the inheritors of the ancient Greek and Byzantine civilizations and cultures. Historically, the self-perception of the Greeks and the definition of Greek-ness have varied, but with the emergence and consolidation of the nation-state, from the late 18th century, Greek-ness was redefined along the lines of what some people call romantic nationalism.
Romantic nationalism is the form of nationalism in which the state derives its political legitimacy as an organic consequence of the unity of those it governs. This includes, depending on the particular manner of practice, the language, race, culture, religion and customs of the "nation" in its primal sense of those who were "born" within its culture. This form of nationalism arose in reaction to dynastic or imperial hegemony, which assessed the legitimacy of the state from the "top down", emanating from a monarch or other authority, which justified its existence. Such downward-radiating power might ultimately derive from God.
Greece accepts all those who agree with this principle and rejects those who disagree.
So what exactly is this principle and what are the criteria for belonging to it? Or, what is this club called "Hellas" and how does one sign up to join it?
Is it ethnicity? Obviously not! Modern Greece is made up of Slav Speakers, Albanians, Vlachs, Turks, Christian Turks, Roma, etc.
Is it the Christian Orthodox Religion? Obviously not, even though most conservative Greeks like it to be! The so-called ancient Hellenes were Pagan.
So what exactly is a "Hellene" then in modern terms?
A Modern Hellene is a person who has rejected his or her real ethnicity, forsaken his or her real culture for the sake of belonging to a "CLUB".
A Modern Hellene or Modern Greek, since Hellene and Greek are synonymous, has abandoned reality and the truth for the sake of living an IDEA.
When Greece was coming together as a country for the first time in the early 1800´s, ethnically it could not hold itself together because of the various ethnicities living together and pulling in different directions. Every Greek should know that the majority of their national heroes of the "Greek uprising" against the Turks were not Greeks. They were Albanians (Arvanites), Vlachs and Slav Speakers (mostly Macedonians).
Even though there were many roads Greece could have taken during its national awakening it chose the road to "Hellenism". Unfortunately, appealing as it might have been to the Greek State it was destructive and devastating to the indigenous people of the region who are reeling from it to this day.
Greece wiped out half a dozen natural cultures and vibrant languages for the sake of resurrecting something that had died two thousand five hundred years ago so that it could re-live the old glory days and satisfy the imperial ambitions of the Great Powers of the day.
The truth is "there are no Hellenes living today", and as per the Columbia Encyclopedia definition, they died, came to an end with the conquest of Alexander the Great in the 4th century BC.
You Greeks can all pretend to be "Hellenes" but the only ones you´re fooling are yourselves, which is fine by me. Unfortunately when you claim that the Macedonians, a real, vibrant living people don´t exist, I take offense to that.
When you adamantly insist that Macedonia belongs to Greece, a group of people who fabricated their own identity, and not to the real Macedonians, I take offence to that.
When Macedonians are murdered, sent to prison, exiled from their homes and lands, forbidden to speak their mother tongue, not being recognized as people in their native lands, for the sake of propagating a Greek myth, I take offence to that.
When Macedonian names and toponyms are erased, Macedonian Bibles and tombstones eradicated, and peoples´ identities stripped from them for the sake of creating "Hellenes" an identity that died many eons ago, I take offense to that too.
So please take a good look at your creation and tell me that "Hellenism" is not another modern Greek invention!Leave a comment:
-
Most Modern Greeks believe that Macedonians do not exist
Risto StefovOctober 08, 2008
What happens when a Modern Greek who believes Macedonians don´t exist, runs into a Macedonian?
Most Greeks, or at least the ones I have run into, are direct and to the point when they face off with a Macedonian. I have to admit I look Mediterranean and when I run into another Mediterranean looking person I am often asked where I am from. The favoured way for a Greek to ask is "Are you Greek?" to which I respond "No I am not!" The next question would then be "What are you?" to which I would respond "Macedonian". Then without any hesitation the Greek will respond with "What is that? There is no such thing!" Now if I persist and say "Yes there is" I will get a string of insults such as "You are a Slav" or "You are Bulgarian" or "You are a Skopjan". This, as unbelievable as it may sound, happens today not inside Greece but outside, in Canada, the USA and Australia. No Macedonians inside Greece have the courage to call themselves Macedonian without believing their lives would be in danger. I came from Greece and am speaking from experience.
Fair enough! If Greeks think Macedonians don´t exist I accept that but let´s look at the facts about Greece and the Greeks in comparison to the Macedonians and Macedonia.
Modern Greece became a country in 1829. There is no historical record prior to that of the existence of such a state. I welcome anyone to show me a map created before 1800 AD that shows a state called Greece encompassing its current borders.
I would also like to know how many people spoke Greek prior to the 1800´s in the region where Greece is today. It is well known that Greece created the 19th century Greeks by Hellenizing and assimilating a variety of other ethnic groups such as Vlahs, Albanians, Turks, Macedonians, Anatolian Turks and more recently Georgians, Russians, more Albanians and others.
Now let´s look at the Macedonians. The Macedonians are a real ethnic group of people that have existed in Macedonia for at least a millennium.
Unlike most of your Modern Greek great grandparents who spoke anything but Greek, our great grandparents all spoke Macedonian.
Our language which we call Macedonian is a living vibrant language, a language we learned from our mothers, unlike your language the ancient dead Koine which your government resurrected and taught you in school. May I also add that in spite of Greek efforts to stop us from speaking Macedonian for almost a century, we still speak it.
Before the Republic of Macedonia codified the modern Macedonian literary language, Macedonians all over geographical Macedonia spoke a variety of beautiful dialects. Macedonians living in Greece and Bulgaria, which those states refuse to recognize, still speak Macedonian in their original dialects.
Unlike the Greek language which is spoken by only about ten million Greeks, Macedonian is a Slavic language which belongs to a large family of languages spoken by about five-hundred million people throughout Eastern Europe. The fact that this language is so widespread shows that it has survived for many millennia and has been passed on orally from generation to generation.
Modern scholars and scientists believe that the Slavic language has its roots in prehistory. A number of ancient inscriptions deemed undecipherable have recently been successfully deciphered by linguists Vasil Iliov, Anthony Ambrozic, Sergei V. Rjabchikov and others by using the Slavic languages, which indicates that these languages have been around a lot longer than previously thought. Even Alexander the Great may have spoken Slavic. It is well known that Alexander spoke at least two languages. We know one was Koine and the other was a language indigenous to Macedonia labeled "unknown" by Greek historians.
Since no Macedonian or foreign archeologist has even been allowed to dig in Greek occupied Macedonia or examine any archeological findings unsupervised, we can´t verify what other language Alexander the Great spoke. Greek archeologists cannot be trusted to factually report findings, especially those findings that don´t agree with the Greek Government´s "politically correct policies".
If Greeks refuse to acknowledge the existence of "living and breathing Macedonians" what makes you think they would acknowledge the existence of artifacts that do not agree with their political ideology?
Aren´t they the same Greeks who destroyed every speck of Cyrillic (Macedonian) inscription from every single gravestone and church icon in Greek occupied Macedonia in order to erase everything that was Macedonian?
Are they not the same Greeks who torched and burned every single Slavonic book and bible and banned the Macedonian language and made it illegal to speak?
The question that begs to be asked is NOT whether Macedonians exist or not but, "Why do Greeks deny the existence of Macedonians?"
I have often asked Greeks that question and to this day I have not been able to get an honest answer. I believe those Greeks who deny our existence genuinely don´t know themselves why they do it. They have been told from a very young age to believe that somehow Macedonians are a threat to their own existence.
I have often heard expressions like, "they will do anything to take our Macedonia away from us" but to this day, I don´t know who "they" are. Sometimes "they" are the "Bulgars", other times "they" are the "Communists", nowadays "they" are the "Skopjans" and sometimes "they" are "the bad people" like me.
I have repeatedly stated that I was born in Greece and am a Greek citizen of Macedonian ethnic descent; yet to this day no Greek has acknowledged that. They keep ignoring what I say and go back to calling me "Skopjan" and treating me as if I was born not in Greece but in a totally different country. (I am using myself as an example but my situation is identical to the tens of thousands of Macedonians who were born in Greece after 1912, after Macedonia was occupied by Greece.)
Why is it so hard for Greeks to accept the fact that Macedonians live in Greece?
It is a well-known fact that Greece occupied about half of Macedonia´s territory in 1912-1913. The other half was occupied by Serbia and Bulgaria.
It is a well-known fact that Macedonia was already fully populated by Macedonians when it was occupied.
It is also a well-known fact that most Macedonians became Greeks by force.
Is it not possible then that some of those Macedonians who were forced into becoming Greeks actually don´t want to be Greeks?
Well my Greek friends, there IS such a thing as a Macedonian. In fact there are many of us living throughout the entire planet. Our history goes back to about 1,000 BC when the word Macedonian was first coined. I can´t say with certainty that we are direct descendants of those early Macedonians but I can say that there is a high probability that we are not only the descendants of those pre-historic Macedonians but also the descendents of all those who overran and conquered our Macedonia.
Before the nineteenth century, most Macedonians lived in geographical Macedonia. Nineteenth and twentieth century turbulence such as the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, a number of uprisings inside Macedonia, the two Balkan wars, the partition of Macedonia, WW I, WW II, the Greek Civil War and Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian and Albanian oppression, have all contributed to the displacement of many Macedonians. Many left their homeland and went wherever they were welcome. More recently displaced Macedonians as well as political refugees and willing immigrants have been concentrating in Canada, Australia, the USA and Europe where they endeavour to preserve their culture and make their revival.
Greeks can deny our Macedonian existence as much as they want, but it doesn´t mean that we Macedonians don´t exist!Leave a comment:
-
Most Modern Greeks believe that Macedonians do not exist
Risto StefovOctober 08, 2008
What happens when a Modern Greek who believes Macedonians don´t exist, runs into a Macedonian?
Most Greeks, or at least the ones I have run into, are direct and to the point when they face off with a Macedonian. I have to admit I look Mediterranean and when I run into another Mediterranean looking person I am often asked where I am from. The favoured way for a Greek to ask is "Are you Greek?" to which I respond "No I am not!" The next question would then be "What are you?" to which I would respond "Macedonian". Then without any hesitation the Greek will respond with "What is that? There is no such thing!" Now if I persist and say "Yes there is" I will get a string of insults such as "You are a Slav" or "You are Bulgarian" or "You are a Skopjan". This, as unbelievable as it may sound, happens today not inside Greece but outside, in Canada, the USA and Australia. No Macedonians inside Greece have the courage to call themselves Macedonian without believing their lives would be in danger. I came from Greece and am speaking from experience.
Fair enough! If Greeks think Macedonians don´t exist I accept that but let´s look at the facts about Greece and the Greeks in comparison to the Macedonians and Macedonia.
Modern Greece became a country in 1829. There is no historical record prior to that of the existence of such a state. I welcome anyone to show me a map created before 1800 AD that shows a state called Greece encompassing its current borders.
I would also like to know how many people spoke Greek prior to the 1800´s in the region where Greece is today. It is well known that Greece created the 19th century Greeks by Hellenizing and assimilating a variety of other ethnic groups such as Vlahs, Albanians, Turks, Macedonians, Anatolian Turks and more recently Georgians, Russians, more Albanians and others.
Now let´s look at the Macedonians. The Macedonians are a real ethnic group of people that have existed in Macedonia for at least a millennium.
Unlike most of your Modern Greek great grandparents who spoke anything but Greek, our great grandparents all spoke Macedonian.
Our language which we call Macedonian is a living vibrant language, a language we learned from our mothers, unlike your language the ancient dead Koine which your government resurrected and taught you in school. May I also add that in spite of Greek efforts to stop us from speaking Macedonian for almost a century, we still speak it.
Before the Republic of Macedonia codified the modern Macedonian literary language, Macedonians all over geographical Macedonia spoke a variety of beautiful dialects. Macedonians living in Greece and Bulgaria, which those states refuse to recognize, still speak Macedonian in their original dialects.
Unlike the Greek language which is spoken by only about ten million Greeks, Macedonian is a Slavic language which belongs to a large family of languages spoken by about five-hundred million people throughout Eastern Europe. The fact that this language is so widespread shows that it has survived for many millennia and has been passed on orally from generation to generation.
Modern scholars and scientists believe that the Slavic language has its roots in prehistory. A number of ancient inscriptions deemed undecipherable have recently been successfully deciphered by linguists Vasil Iliov, Anthony Ambrozic, Sergei V. Rjabchikov and others by using the Slavic languages, which indicates that these languages have been around a lot longer than previously thought. Even Alexander the Great may have spoken Slavic. It is well known that Alexander spoke at least two languages. We know one was Koine and the other was a language indigenous to Macedonia labeled "unknown" by Greek historians.
Since no Macedonian or foreign archeologist has even been allowed to dig in Greek occupied Macedonia or examine any archeological findings unsupervised, we can´t verify what other language Alexander the Great spoke. Greek archeologists cannot be trusted to factually report findings, especially those findings that don´t agree with the Greek Government´s "politically correct policies".
If Greeks refuse to acknowledge the existence of "living and breathing Macedonians" what makes you think they would acknowledge the existence of artifacts that do not agree with their political ideology?
Aren´t they the same Greeks who destroyed every speck of Cyrillic (Macedonian) inscription from every single gravestone and church icon in Greek occupied Macedonia in order to erase everything that was Macedonian?
Are they not the same Greeks who torched and burned every single Slavonic book and bible and banned the Macedonian language and made it illegal to speak?
The question that begs to be asked is NOT whether Macedonians exist or not but, "Why do Greeks deny the existence of Macedonians?"
I have often asked Greeks that question and to this day I have not been able to get an honest answer. I believe those Greeks who deny our existence genuinely don´t know themselves why they do it. They have been told from a very young age to believe that somehow Macedonians are a threat to their own existence.
I have often heard expressions like, "they will do anything to take our Macedonia away from us" but to this day, I don´t know who "they" are. Sometimes "they" are the "Bulgars", other times "they" are the "Communists", nowadays "they" are the "Skopjans" and sometimes "they" are "the bad people" like me.
I have repeatedly stated that I was born in Greece and am a Greek citizen of Macedonian ethnic descent; yet to this day no Greek has acknowledged that. They keep ignoring what I say and go back to calling me "Skopjan" and treating me as if I was born not in Greece but in a totally different country. (I am using myself as an example but my situation is identical to the tens of thousands of Macedonians who were born in Greece after 1912, after Macedonia was occupied by Greece.)
Why is it so hard for Greeks to accept the fact that Macedonians live in Greece?
It is a well-known fact that Greece occupied about half of Macedonia´s territory in 1912-1913. The other half was occupied by Serbia and Bulgaria.
It is a well-known fact that Macedonia was already fully populated by Macedonians when it was occupied.
It is also a well-known fact that most Macedonians became Greeks by force.
Is it not possible then that some of those Macedonians who were forced into becoming Greeks actually don´t want to be Greeks?
Well my Greek friends, there IS such a thing as a Macedonian. In fact there are many of us living throughout the entire planet. Our history goes back to about 1,000 BC when the word Macedonian was first coined. I can´t say with certainty that we are direct descendants of those early Macedonians but I can say that there is a high probability that we are not only the descendants of those pre-historic Macedonians but also the descendents of all those who overran and conquered our Macedonia.
Before the nineteenth century, most Macedonians lived in geographical Macedonia. Nineteenth and twentieth century turbulence such as the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, a number of uprisings inside Macedonia, the two Balkan wars, the partition of Macedonia, WW I, WW II, the Greek Civil War and Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian and Albanian oppression, have all contributed to the displacement of many Macedonians. Many left their homeland and went wherever they were welcome. More recently displaced Macedonians as well as political refugees and willing immigrants have been concentrating in Canada, Australia, the USA and Europe where they endeavour to preserve their culture and make their revival.
Greeks can deny our Macedonian existence as much as they want, but it doesn´t mean that we Macedonians don´t exist!Leave a comment:
-
Where the Ancient "Greek gods" really Greek?
Risto StefovOctober 07, 2008
In the many debates I have entangled myself with Greeks who love to defend the "Greek-ness" of the ancient Macedonians there is one re-occurring theme and that is "the Ancient Macedonians were Greek because they worshipped the Greek gods". This is a natural and automatic response which Greeks constantly use to justify their claims that the "Ancient Macedonians were Greek" so I felt it was worth investigating.
We often read in books, see movies and hear stories about the so called mythical "Greek gods" but have we ever stopped to think what makes these deities Greek? Are they "Greek" because they originated where modern Greece is today? Are they "Greek" in a national sense? Are they Greek because the Ancients that lived in the region where modern Greece is today wrote about them? How are they "Greek"?
The word "Greek" before the word "gods" implies that there is a relationship between "Greek" and "gods" which means that in some way these gods belong to Greece or the "Greeks". Since these "gods" are not associated with other Mediterranean people such as the Macedonians, Paeonians, Illyrians, Thracians, Phrygians, Lydians, Carians, Lycians, Paphlagonians, Cappadocians, Cilicians, Picidians, Pamphylians and others, in a similar manner, who also celebrated and believed in them, then one is led to believe that these gods must be exclusively connected to Greece and the "Greeks"
The question is how are they Greek?
Among several sources we consulted, Microsoft´s Encarta encyclopedia under the heading "Greek Mythology" had an explanation but this explanation did not enforce the idea that the so called "Greek gods" were actually "Greek".
According to Encarta, mythology in written form appeared for the first time in the literary works of Hesiod and Homer around the eighth century BC. Homer, as we know, produced the famous works the "Iliad" and "Odyssey" and Hesiod produced the poems "Theogony". Both authors in their respective works talk about the various tales and legends associated with ancient deities. Hesiod, however, according to Encarta, takes a step further and introduces a larger number of myths that include deities that are not mentioned by Homer. Hesiod, in "Theogony", talks about the creation of the world, the birth of the gods as well as their adventures, but NEVER ONCE mentions "Greek" or any other name derived from this word!
Similarly, Homer in his works the "Iliad" and the "Odyssey", considered to be reliable sources for the so called "Greek Mythology" and the "Greek gods", NEVER ONCE mentions the word "Greek" or any other name derived from this word!
So again, how are these so called "Greek gods" "Greek"? Maybe the authors who wrote about them were from the region where modern Greece is today?
According to Carlos Parada, an internationally recognized researcher and expert on mythology, the following authors have contributed to the so called "Greek mythology";
Author.............% Contribution.......Lived in/Ethnicity...................Year.
Apolodorus................19......Alexandria/Unknown *..........2nd Cent. AD
Paucsanias................12.....Lydia/Lydian............................................ ...
Hyginus......................12.....Rome/Unknown(Spanish?)....1st Cent. AD
Homer.........................8......Asia Minor?/Unknown...........8th Cent. BC?
Ovid............................6.......Rome/Roman.......................43BC-17AD
Nonnus.......................5.......Egypt/Egyptian....................5th Cent. AD
Hesiod.......................4.6.....Boeotia/Boeotian **.............8th Cent. BC?
Diodorus Siculus……4.4.....Sicily/Sicilian........................21 BC
Virgil...........................4.......Mantua Italy/Roman............70 and 19 BC
Quintus Smynaeus…3.3………................................... ...................
Statius.......................2.6.....Rome/Roman......................1st Cent. AD
Antonius Liberalis.......2......Rome/Roman................................
Valerius Flaccus.........2......Rome/Roman.......................1st Cent. AD
Apollonius Rhodius...1.8.....Alexandria ? Unknown.........3rd Cent. BC
Dionysius
of Halicarnassus.......1.5.....Caria/Unknown.....................1st Cent. BC
Euripides..................1.5.....Attica/Athenian **..................480 BC
Plutarch....................1.3.....Boeotia/Boeotian **..............46 AD
Herodotus..................1......Caria/Carian..........................484-425 BC
Pindarus (Pindar)…...1......Thebes/Boeotian...................518-438 BC
Parhenius of Nicaea..1......................................... ..............................
Aeschylus.................0.5..................... ................................................
Aristophanes............0.4....................... ..............................................
Caimachus...............0.4....................... .................................. ………
Cicero.......................0.3.................. ..................................................
(*) Highest probability - Macedonian
(**) From Ancient City States south of Mount Olympus where Modern Greece is located today.
From the table above, we can see that the vast majority of works about the so-called "Greek mythology" and the "Greek gods" were in fact written by NON-GREEKS or by authors of unknown origin/ethnicity.
If the authors who wrote about them were not "Greek" then perhaps the legends of the so called "Greek gods" originated somewhere in the lands of modern Greece?
Unfortunately, that is not true either. According to Herodotus, many of the elements of the so called "Greek myths" associated with the "Greek gods" were borrowed from foreign religions, mainly from the Pelasgi who in turn borrowed them from the Egyptians. (There are some scientists today who believe the Pelasgi lived in the lower Balkans, including Macedonia and were the ancestors of the Slavs).
However, let as not just take Herodotus´s word. Let´s examine the mythological deities themselves starting with the supreme god Zeus.
According to the Grolier Encyclopedia, Zeus is a celestial deity of Indo-European origin symbolically associated with the sky. Poseidon, the elder brother of Zeus, is also a deity of Indo-European origin. Apollo, on the other hand, is an Asian deity from the Asian shaman cults, imported from Siberia.
The following is a list of deities and major mythical figures commonly referred to as "Greek gods" and "Greek mythical figures" that are believed to be of "non-Greek" origins;
Deity/Major Figure……..……..Origin………………… Source……..
Rhigmus………………….…Thracian……………….. Carlos Parada
Diomedes…………………..Thracian…………………Carlos Parada
Phineus……………………..Thracian…………………Carlos Parada
Tereus…………………….…Thracian………….……Carlos Parada
Rhesus……………………...Thracian………….…….Carlos Parada
Alcon………………………...Thracian………….…….Carlos Parada
Memnon…………………….Ethiopian………………..Carlos Parada
Alcyoneus…………………..Ethiopian………….Quintus Smyrnaeus
Alexipus…………………….Ethiopian…………..Quintus Smyrnaeus
Clydon………………………Ethiopian…………..Quintus Smyrnaeus
Laomedon………………….Ethiopian…………Quintus Smyrnaeus
Mmeneclus…………………Ethiopian………...Quintus Smyrnaeus
Nychius……………………..Ethiopian…………Quintus Smyrnaeus
Thalius………………………Ethiopian…………Quintus Smyrnaeus
Andromeda…………………Ethiopian………………Carlos Parada
Cepheus……………………Phoenician…………….Carlos Parada
Europa………………………Phoenician……………Carlos Parada
Pelops………………………Phrygian……………….Carlos Parada
Agenor………………………Egyptian……………….Carlos Parada
Belus………………………..Egyptian………………..Carlos Parada
Midus……………………….Phrygian………………..Carlos Parada
Opis…………………………Phrygian………………..Carlos Parada
Aura…………………………Phrygian………………..Carlos Parada
Proteus……………………..Egyptian…………………Carlos Parada
Egeria……………………….Italian………………………..Ovid
Hora………………………...Roman……………………… Ovid
Janus…………………….…Roman……………………Carlos Parada
Juturna………………….….Roman……………………Carlos Parada
Penates……………….……Roman……………………Carlos Parada
Tantalus……………….…...Paphlagonia………………Carlos Parada
Orchamus…………….……Persia………………..……Carlos Parada
Pyramus……………………Babylon…………………..Carlos Parada
Thisbe………………………Babylon…………………..Carlos Parada
Dido…………………………Cartagenan………………Carlos Parada
Nicea………………………..Indian…………………….Carlos Parada
Phoenix…………………….Arabian……………………Carlos Parada
Hypnos……………………..From the Black Sea region Carlos Parada
Muses (9)………………….Macedonian…………………Carlos Parada
Dionysus…………………..Macedonian (Brygian) Grolier Encyclopedia
For details on the above, see Donski, pages 146 to 173, "The Myth about the so-called ´Greek Mythology´", in his book "The Descendants of Alexander the Great of Macedon".
From the table above, we can see that a large number of deities and important mythical figures have purposely or unwittingly been misrepresented. Clearly they are not of "Greek origins"
And finally, perhaps the so called "Greek gods" were "Greek" because they were exclusively celebrated by the ancient people who lived in the lands south of Mount Olympus where modern Greece is today?
That too, I am afraid is not true. The mythical gods, referred to as the "Greek gods", were common to most ancient Mediterranean nations and cultures. They were as much universal to the ancient world as Christ and Christianity is universal to our modern world.
The truth is the Ancient "Greek gods" were not Greek at all! In fact, referring to them as "Greek gods" would not only be a sin but also a myth in itself.
It is more appropriate, truthful and precise to call them Mediterranean gods than it is to call them "Greek gods". After all, they were celebrated, revered and feared by many more nations and cultures north, east and west of Mount Olympus than they were just south of Mount Olympus. And that is the truth.
If Modern Greeks believe that those in the Ancient world who spoke Greek and believed in the Greek gods were actually Greek then Modern Greeks must also believe that those in our Modern world who speak English and believe in our God Christ MUST be English." Is that a fair statement?
Sources
"Greek Mythology". Microsoft Encarta 98 Encyclopedia, USA, 1998.
Aleksandar Donski, "The Descendants of Alexander the Great of Macedon, The Arguments and Evidence that Today´s Macedonians are Descendants of the Ancient Macedonians". Shtip, 2004.
Carlos Parada, "Geneological Guide to Greek Mythology". Philadelphia: Coronoet Books, 1993.
The Columbia Encyclopedia. Third Edition, New York: Columbia University Press, 1963.
Grolier Encyclopedia. Navato: Grolier Electronic Publishing Inc., 1995.Leave a comment:
-
Is "Ancient Greek" a mother tongue in Modern Greece?
Risto StefovOctober 06, 2008
Frankly I am tired of hearing Greeks boasting of how they can speak, read and write in the language of the so-called Ancient Greeks, but I don´t mind. What I do mind however, is when they call me ignorant for not being able to see the connection that Modern Greeks are related to the so-called Ancient Greeks because they both speak the same language. Almost every e-mail I receive from Greeks makes the statement, "how can I not see that the Greek people today speak the very same language people spoke 2,500 years ago?" Many claim they can understand every word on stone inscriptions made 2,500 years ago. I believe them!
Now suppose I picked up an Egyptian tablet from 5,000 years ago written in hieroglyphs and was able to read and understand every word, would you believe me? Yes you would! But what if I told you because I can speak, read and write Ancient Egyptian I am a direct descendent of the Ancient Egyptians? Would you still believe me? Maybe? What if I told you I learned to speak, read and write Ancient Egyptian in school would you still believe that I am a direct descendant of the Ancient Egyptians? You decide!
Now to respond to statements made by Greeks on "how can I not see that the Greek people today speak the very same language people spoke 2,500 years ago?" Yes I can see! Yes, you do speak, read and write in the language of the Ancients but what you fail to understand is how that came about. What you fail to understand is that not too long ago (early 1800´s) your state made the Ancient language the official language of Greece. Your great-grandparents were educated in school to speak, read and write that language. Your great-grandparents did not learn that language from their parents and grandparents. Also as they were learning that language they were discouraged and prohibited from speaking their own mother tongue, the language of their parents. In time and with every generation, your great-grandparent´s mother tongue was forgotten and that is how you came to speak, read and write this Ancient language.
In the 1820´s, just as Greece was about to become a state for the first time, the most prevalent languages, besides Turkish, spoken on its soil were Albanian, Vlach and Macedonian. The so-called "Greek" language was a derivation of the Ancient Koine, the root language of the Christian Orthodox Church and of the Modern Greek "Dimotiki". Koine was only spoken by educated people and Church Clergy before Greece made it its official language.
Koine is an Ancient language which made its way into Macedonia a little before Philip II´s time (circa 400 BC). Poorly worded and misspelled inscriptions written in Koine were found in the Ancient Macedonian capital which indicates that the language was not well understood and was just making its way there.
The roots of the Koine language may have started in one of the more progressive City States, most probably Athens, but by the time it made its way to the Eastern Mediterranean, it had become the language of administration and commerce, common to all Mediterranean nations.
In Macedonia, Koine was strictly the language of the educated and was used by the court administrators and the international merchants.
By the time Koine arrived in Macedonia it was already the "lingua franca" of administration and commerce in the Eastern Mediterranean world.
Koine in those days was like English is today. In Europe, for example, countries have their own languages which they use to communicate at home, but internationally they use English to communicate with other countries.
Alexander the Great was the first to take Koine out of the Mediterranean world to Asia, Africa and other worlds he conquered.
The real heroes for Koine´s success were Alexander´s successors the Antigonids, Seleucids and the Ptolemies. It is well known that the Ptolemies not only insisted on using Koine but they refused to learn any other language not even the languages of those people they ruled.
Cleopatra VII was the only Macedonian sovereign from the Ptolemaic dynasty who broke the Ptolemaic rule and learned several languages including Egyptian.
The Koine language was so deeply rooted in the old Macedonian empires that even after they were conquered by the Romans it continued to flourish. Koine was spoken by Roman intellectuals even in Rome. Almost all ancient literary works were written in Koine
Let´s not forget that throughout the Macedonian and Roman periods Koine, in spite of its popularity with the educated and elite, remained a language of administration and commerce. Koine was never a language of the common people.
While Koine served its purpose in the administrative and commercial circles, other languages, languages of the people, simultaneously also flourished in parallel but in their oral form until they were later codified by Christianity.
After the Roman Empire split into East and West, Koine again resurfaced and replaced Latin as the administrative language of the Eastern Orthodox (Byzantine) Empire.
Koine remained active and served the administration and commerce of the Byzantine world for over a millennium.
Interestingly, Koine also became the administrative and commercial language of the educated Christians in the Ottoman Empire and continued to exist in a religious, commercial and administrative capacity during Ottoman rule as it did during Byzantine rule.
By Islamic law, Muslims were not allowed to travel outside of their domain, handle public funds, or speak foreign languages. The Ottomans employed Christians to administer foreign affairs, banking and trade with the outside world. And yes, you guessed it; the Christians continued to employ the Koine language throughout Ottoman rule as they did during Byzantine rule.
The keepers of the Ottoman administrative and commercial services as well as the rulers of the Christian world inside the Ottoman Empire were known as the Phanariots.
The Phanariots were a Christian educated and professional middle class or the bourgeoisie of the Ottoman world. They were people from various ethnicities from every corner of the Ottoman world. They were the clerics, the translators (dragoman), the merchants and the captains of ships and of industry and they all spoke Koine. They were called Phanariots because they were based in a district of Constantinople or Istanbul known as the Phanar.
In the 19th century, during the Ottoman decline, the Phanariots were much in favour of toppling the Ottoman administration. The idea was to overthrow the Ottoman Sultan and his Muslim rule and replace it with Christian rule. Unfortunately the Great Powers did not favour the idea and it failed. After that the Phanariots worked closely with the Great Powers to establish the Greek Kingdom, and the Serbian and Bulgarian States.
Even though the people of the newly established Greek Kingdom were of many different ethnicities including Albanians, Vlahs, Macedonians, Turks, etc., each with a unique language and culture, the Great Powers instilled upon them the idea that they were the descendents of the ancient people who lived in that region over two millenniums ago.
After Greece became a country, it contemplated for a decade as to which language to use. Greek authorities finally decided to adopt the Koine language as the language of the people in their new nation. They disregarded all vibrant and living peoples´ languages in favour of the ancient administrative and commercial Koine.
Unfortunately after two millennium of evolution, the modern version of Koine contained many foreign elements and proved distasteful to the Greek purists who wanted a pure language which was close to those of the ancient City States.
After nearly a century of using Koine, the purists finally got their chance to replace it. Their new choice was a dead old Attic language used by the ancient Athenians 2,500 years ago. The Greeks called their new language the "Catharevoussa" for its linguistic purity.
Unfortunately this language had been dead for two thousand years and the Greek literary world, which was used to the bastardized impure Koine called the "Dimotiki", found it very difficult to understand and impossible to express emotion. Its use was finally terminated in the 1970´s in favour of the bastardized Koine (Dimotiki).
For those Greeks who insist that all ancient Greeks spoke a dialect of the same language, here are some simple and common everyday words in English, Ancient Attic and Modern Koine;
English, Catharevoussa(Ancient Attic), Dimotiki(Koine)
Horse, Ipos, Alogo
Donkey,Onos, Gaidaros
Hen, Ornitha, Kota
Goat, Ega, Gida (Katsika)
Kid (baby goat), Erifi,Katsiki
Bread, Artos, Psomi
Just because Greece adopted Koine as the national language for its Modern Greek nation, does not necessarily make it Greek. Koine evolved as the language of administration and commerce in the entire Eastern Mediterranean world and as such it belongs to all the people in the Eastern Mediterranean.
So if someone chose to learn the Koine language and was able to read and understand the writing on Ancient inscriptions would that make them Greek? Can they too claim to be a direct descendent of the so-called "Ancient Greeks"? Think about it!
Modern Greeks are victims of their own making!Leave a comment:
-
Are Modern Greeks direct descendents of the Ancient Greeks?
Risto StefovOctober 04, 2008
It doesn´t matter to me if Modern Greeks claim to be the descendents of the so called "Ancient Greeks" or the descendents of the Greek gods themselves as long as they stay away from interfering in the affairs of the ethnic Macedonians. Unfortunately they can´t help themselves so it leaves me no choice but to respond to their claims.
For those who have repeatedly accused me of saying that Modern Macedonians are the direct descendents of the Ancient Macedonians, here is my answer:
"I have never said that Modern Macedonians are direct descendants of the Ancient Macedonians! All I have said is that modern Macedonians who are indigenous to Macedonia and have lived in Macedonia for over a millennium are a product of the Ancient Macedonians and all invaders and settlers who have ventured in Macedonia and as such are entitled to be called Macedonians. I have also said Macedonia is a multi-ethnic state consisting of a majority of Macedonians both Christian and Muslim and several minorities including Albanians, Vlachs, Turks, Roma and others. I can back my claim with all kinds of demographic statistics from various censuses conducted over the years."
Greeks on the other hand, constantly claim that they have a long lineage, a history and a language that extends back to the so-called ancient Greeks (I have hundreds of e-mails to prove my point). At the same time Greeks also say that Macedonians don´t exist and the Modern Macedonians are nothing more than "Slavs", "Bulgars" and "Skopjans" (a newly coined derogatory reference to the Macedonians in the Republic of Macedonia and to any ethnic Macedonian who dares call him or herself Macedonian). Greeks have also made claims that Modern Macedonians are a product of Yugoslavia and Tito´s imagination.
However it is Greece and not Macedonia that to this day still claims it is populated by 98% pure Greeks and 2% Muslim Greeks and has yet to officially conduct a single observed census!
How can a region in the Balkans where modern Greece is located today, which has been open to a multitude of invasions, conquests and settlements, remain homogeneous and untouched for more that two thousand years? This is a question that every Greek who subscribes to the purity of Greece should be asking.
Ironically, while most Greeks subscribe to the idea that they are pure Greeks, they also subscribe to the idea that Modern Macedonians are "fake".
Something is not right!
Ever since Philip II of Macedonia conquered the Ancient City States at the conclusion of the battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC, the region that is covered by today´s Modern Macedonia and Modern Greece has been without borders and open to all kinds of invasions, conquests and settlements including those of the Romans, Byzantines and Ottomans. Neither country has been spared by conquerors, invaders and settlers over the years.
Greeks like to challenge the Macedonians regarding the name "Macedonia" on account of the Greek claim that Macedonians don´t exist and those people living in Macedonia are not really Macedonians, therefore they can´t use the name "Macedonia" because it doesn´t belong to them.
Fair enough. However Macedonians can make the same claim about Greece and the Greeks. There were no "Ancient Greeks" since the word "Greek" was not coined until after the Roman conquests, approximately 600 years after the establishment of the City States and approximately 150 years after they were conquered by the Macedonians. There were only Ancient City States, but at the time they were not called Greeks! Yet today we have ten million people who do call themselves "Greeks" and do claim they are the descendents of a race of people called "Ancient Greeks" when such a name never existed at the time! Besides, how do we know that those who today call themselves "Greeks" are really "Greeks" and not the product of all the people that settled that region over the years? Is there some sort of test to prove they are pure?
It is also well known that the Ancient City States were never united politically and never established themselves as a single state. In fact they existed politically independent from one another and fought each other for political and economic dominance of the region.
In fact the region where Modern Greece is today was never called Greece until recently (1800´s AD) when Greece became a state for the first time. Only just recently "Greece" was given a Latin name by the Great Powers Britain, France and Russia which is used internationally but Modern Greeks prefer to call themselves Hellenes (Ellines) and their state Hellas (Ellas).
By using the name "Greek" to refer to both the ancient and modern people, the Greek state falsely implies descent of the modern Greeks from the ancients.
By using the name "Greece" to refer to both the ancient and modern states, the Greek State is falsely implying;
(1) Continuity between the ancient City States and modern Greece, and
(2) That there was some sort of political unity between the Ancient City States themselves where one did not exist.
In reality the words "Greece" and "Greek" were popularized by modern 19th century writers. There are no ancient maps created before the 1800´s that refer to that region as "Greece". But there are Ancient maps of that region.
The Romans may have made some references to the ancient people living in Sicily as "Graecos" but they referred to the region where Greece is today as "Achaia". There is a map made of marble in Rome, preserved from Roman times that can attest to that. (See photo)
During the Ottoman era the people now living in Greece called themselves Romeos (Romans).
Greece is a newly created state that never existed before the 19th century. The Kingdom of Greece, occupying the region of Morea, present day Peloponnesus, was created for the first time in 1829. Between 1829 and 1912 the Greeks enlarged their territory to present day Greece, by conquering Crete, Epirus, Thessaly and 51% of Macedonia.
At its inception Greece started out with a small population of less than one million people, most of whom were Albanians, Slavs, Turks and Vlahs with a small minority of other ethnicities. By the time Greece conquered Epirus and Thessaly, its population grew to three times its original size. In 1907 it registered a population of 2,600,000. After it conquered Macedonia and exchanged populations with Bulgaria and Turkey, its population tripled. In 1928 Greece registered 6,200,000 people. One million one hundred thousand of them were Christian Turks, settlers from Asia Minor.
After the Treaty of Lausanne in July 1923, and after the population exchanges with Turkey, Greece declared itself homogenous consisting of 100% pure Greeks with a very small Muslim but ethnically Greek population.
It is estimated that after Macedonia was conquered, occupied and had some of its population evicted, more than one million Macedonians still remained in Greek held Macedonia.
According to Greece however, there were no non-Greeks left in Macedonia after its population exchanges. Also according to Greece, the ancient Macedonians were extinct, killed off by the Slavs during the so called Slav invasions around the 6th century AD.
So the question that begs to be asked here is, "What ethnicity were those more than one million or so people who remained in Macedonia and became part of Greece?" Many Greeks would argue that they were Bulgarians because Macedonians do not exist!
If that were the case, then how can the modern Greeks claim purity and homogeneity if at least 16% of its population in 1928 was non-Greek? What about its Vlah, Slav, Albanian and Turkish elements? Clearly they are not Greeks, let alone being direct descendents of the ancient Greeks?
Even this small argument shows that there is something "really wrong" with these Greek claims.
For over a century and a half, Greek State institutions, organizations and individuals have been making unproven and unfounded allegations that the modern Greeks are direct descendents of the Ancient Greeks. To this day they have shown no evidence to prove their claims. In fact the opposite is true. There is ample evidence that proves that this particular Modern Greek claim is wrong from the outset.
This exact issue was tackled by Historian John Shea in chapter 4 of The Great Ethnic Mix of Greece, pages 77 to 96, in his book "Macedonia and Greece, The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation". Among other things, John Shea proves that even the ancient people were not homogeneous.
"It has been estimated that in classical times the number of slaves in Attica was roughly equal to the number of free inhabitants, or around 100,000. In Sparta there was an even greater proportion of slaves, and most of them, the helots, were Messenians. While the slaves of Athens were a wide racial mix and therefore less likely to unite on the basis of a common language, these Messenian helots of Sparta all spoke Greek, and had a kind of group self-consciousness. Thus they presented ´special problems of security for their Spartan masters, whose numbers were constantly on the decline.´ Changes in the ethnic composition of Greek city-states are illustrated by the comments about the case of Piso. Piso, who had been the recipient of an unhelpful decision by a vote of the Athenian city assembly, ´made a violent speech in which he said that the latter-day Athenians had no right to identify themselves with the great Athenians of the days of Pericles, Demosthenes, Aeschylus, and Plato. The ancient Athenians had been extirpated by repeated wars and massacres and these were mere mongrels, degenerates, and the descendants of slaves. He said that any Roman who flattered them as if they were the legitimate heirs of those ancient heroes was lowering the dignity of the Roman name.´ Such historical ideas make it clear that even two thousand years ago the notion of ethnic purity amongst the Greeks was difficult to sustain. The ethnic mix continued over the next two thousand years. As Nicol has observed, ´The ancient Greeks were, after all, of very mixed ancestry; and there can be no doubt that the Byzantine Greeks, both before and after the Slav occupation, were even more heterogenous´." (Pages 83 and 84, John Shea, Macedonia and Greece, The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation)
The truth is modern Greeks are not only NOT direct descendents of the ancients, but their claims to being "Greek" is dubious at best. It is Greece and the Greeks that are a modern 19th century creation: Not Macedonians. History can prove that!
The greatest victims of Greek "claims" are the Greeks themselves.Leave a comment:
-
Greeks by Birth? - What's that all about?
Risto StefovOctober 03, 2008
Law No. 1540 enacted in 1985 by the Greek government, states that only "Greeks by birth" can claim the right to have their property back, which was illegally taken from them after the Greek Civil War (1946-1949) ended. This not only constitutes discrimination against Macedonians but the regulations in this Law are also contrary to both the Greek Constitution, which upholds respect for persons, and to international engagements.
Since coming to power in 1981 the Pan-Greek Socialist Movement (PASOK), in accordance with its manifesto and pre-election promises, began to solve the problem of repatriating its political refugees exiled since the Greek Civil War. This process was approved by both the democratic and progressive forces in Greece. However the jubilation of the repatriation was short lived. The Greek government made it conditional by law that only "Greeks by birth" may return which meant that a great number of ex Greek citizens and nationals have been deprived of the right to return. Only those acceptable to the Greek State who were also prepared to declare themselves "Greeks" were allowed to return. What kind of democracy is this?
Law No. 1540 states that only "Greeks by birth" can claim the right to have their property returned, while those who do not declare themselves as "Greeks by birth" lose the right to their property.
Is history repeating itself?
This law is reminiscent of the dark period when massive numbers of people, after being declared "Greeks by birth ", were uprooted from their ancestral lands, exchanged and re-settled, many ending up in Greek held Macedonia. This occurred during the Balkan Wars (1912/1913) and during and after the First World War. But lessons had been learned and after the Second World War nations were created based on the needs of the people and not by oppression, assimilation and genocide. A new spirit was born; the spirit of mutual respect and cooperation not only between people but also between nations. How then are we to judge what the Greek State did half a century later? How should we view a law especially designed to discriminate against a people? How far does such a regulation agree with the Constitution of the Republic of Greece, which was passed on July 11, 1975 (one year after the fall of the military junta), where in article 2 paragraph 1 it says "respect and protection of human dignity are the primary obligation of the Greek state"? And continues: "Greece, in accordance with the universal rights accepted by international law, strives to strengthen peace and justice, as well as the development of friendly relations among nations and countries." To what extent does the regulation for the return of political refugees and their rights to their property agree with this Constitution? And what is the purpose of these acts passed by the Greek government?
Law No. 1540 consists of the following main characteristics:
1. Regulations brought in during the Greek Civil War, on which basis the property of political refugees was confiscated, are abolished;
2. Properties will be returned only to those persons who came back to stay and live in Greece;
3. Proprietors can seek the return of their property if it has not been awarded to another person. If so, then proprietors have the right to receive property in other parts of Greece (except Attica) on condition they farm the land;
4. Applicants can be awarded financial damages;
5. The law does not deal with the return of ownership of property to those refugees who continue to live outside of Greece, nor does it deal with the question of their heirs who live outside the borders of Greece.
Excluding the Macedonians
With the formula "Greeks by birth", law No. 1540 discriminates against Greek political refugees of Macedonian descent. Greek refugees of Macedonian descent in practice are deprived of the right to return to Greece, which automatically deprives them of the right to have their own property returned to them. This law is not only an act of economic discrimination, but also a deliberate Greek government policy to "permanently" solve the Macedonian question. This however is in direct contravention of the United Nations General Declaration of Human Rights, especially with Article 13, which states:
(1) "Everyone has the right to leave any country, including their own, as well as to return to their own country". With this law the right of Macedonian political refugees to return to their own country is removed. Moreover, Article 17 of the Declaration states:
(2) "No one can be deprived of their own property against their will".
According to Articles 13 and 17, as stated above, the Greek Civil War refugees of Macedonian descent, including the 28,000 child refugees, became refugees in the chaos of the Greek Civil War. Therefore the Greek government has no right to deprive them of their own property by an unconstitutional law, which is also contrary to international law. Law No. 1540 would only be just and humane if it did not discriminate (1) against non-Greeks who are Greek citizens and (2) gave the right of ownership of property to (a) all refugees regardless of their ethnicity and (b) regardless of where they live. Any limitation is a violation of both property rights and human rights.
This law it would appear was enacted to take revenge on those who participated on the losing side of the Greek Civil War for crimes never proved in a court of law. The two laws (confiscation of property and deprivation of citizenship) enacted by the PASOK government are another means of demeaning the Macedonian national minority living in Greece and justifying the continuation of the denationalization policies perpetrated by the Greek state on its citizens.
This law not only affects ethnic Macedonians from Greece living in European countries, but also those inhabiting countries overseas. The law clearly states that all those who are not "Greeks by birth" are excluded from the right to property, as well as their children who escaped from Greece after January 1, 1945 and their descendants born after the Civil War. In this way the Greek state is attempting to permanently deprive the Macedonian people of the right to their own property. This is contrary to the universal rights accepted by international law, the Declaration of the United Nations on human rights, and the Final Act of Helsinki, signed by Greece, which actually refers to these rights in its own Constitution. In light of this, the law issue here is both against the regulations of the Greek Constitution and international laws and the Declaration of the United Nations, which Greece is obliged to respect in order to prove that it is a practicing democratic country.
Therefore it would be wise and opportune for Greece to annul this law as unconstitutional, as was done with the law for confiscation of properties in 1953. The same property is involved in both cases. In connection with the question of property the Yugoslav side expressed its attitude in 1953 in the following way: "In light of this situation the Yugoslav government can not be expected to be deaf to the request for help and support of the Greek refugees from Aegean Macedonia who now live in Yugoslavia. It is only right that we bring up the question of protection of their legitimate property and the possibility for their return to their homes in Greece."
Obligation according to Greece´s constitution
The question of "returning to Greece" and "awarding of property" to the political refugees is an internal question for the Republic of Greece. However the question of law regulating the "right of return to their birth place" and "the right to their own property", which excludes Macedonians only because they do not wish to change their national identity, goes beyond the limits of Greek internal policy, even more so since Greece, as was mentioned above, is obliged to respect human rights in the spirit of generally accepted international acts, signed by her.
Thus Macedonians, no matter where they live, have the right to seek the return of their own property in Macedonia under Greece and should do so. Without a change in the present Greek discriminatory and assimilatory policy, it is certain that Greece "in accordance with the universal rights accepted by International law", to quote the Greek Constitution, will not be able "to strengthen peace and justice, as well as development of friendly relations among nations and countries". Greece's own Constitution holds it to this.
Since the Republic of Greece is constitutionally obliged to act in accordance with international law, the Greek government has an obligation to its own people and to the international public, as well as to the United Nations, to respect its own Constitution. The universality to which the Greek Constitution aspires includes among other things, respect of the rights of minorities.
NOTE: It is interesting to note that the only demographic statistics that Greece officially holds true are those from 1928 in which Greece declared that its population consists of 98% Greeks and 2% Muslim Greeks which begs the question "who is Greek by birth and who isn´t?"
Is an Asia Minor Christian Turk born in Asia Minor and settled on Greek held Macedonia after the 1920´s a "Greek by birth"?
Of course they are!
What about an indigenous Macedonian born in Macedonia (held by Greece) after Greece´s annexation of Macedonia in 1913? Is that "a Greek by birth"?
Of course not! Because if he or she were "Greek by birth" then Greece would not need Law No. 1540 to discriminate against them!
Source: Pages 6 and 7, Macedonian Magazine # 395, March 1986Leave a comment:
-
00 (AUS Eastern Daylight Time)
Home | Shop | Send Us Info | Subscribe | Advertise | Help |
News
World
National News
State News
Politics
Business (World)
Business (US)
Technology
Industry
Science
Medicine
Sports
Education
Entertainment
Opinion
Latest Articles
View Topics
View Authors
Features
Latest Articles
View Topics
View Authors
Community
Join Our List
Other Sections
Affiliates
Advertise
Video
Greece blocks Macedonia from entering NATO
Risto StefovOctober 01, 2008
It is not new news but here are my two cents worth! It should have become painfully obvious to everyone by now that Greece is interested in one and only one thing and that is to eliminate the Macedonian identity at any cost.
Macedonia can´t negotiate its name because it is tightly connected with its identity and Greece will not accept a name that ties Macedonia with its identity. Is there then any wonder why we have no progress on the name issue after 17 years of negotiations?
Macedonia cannot change its name because it would lose its identity and Greece will not accept the existence of a Macedonian identity because it will then be obliged to recognize the Macedonian minority living inside Greece.
So what are we to do? Well, for one we must stop negotiating something that should not be negotiated. By vetoing Macedonia´s entry into NATO last April, Greece has in effect violated the 1995 interim accord which releases Macedonia from its obligation of having to negotiate with Greece. Macedonia must now seize this opportunity and rid itself of these endless negotiations from which it cannot possibly benefit.
Knowing that neither side is going to move in the negotiations, Greece is secure in the belief that as long as these negotiations continue the issue of human rights for the Macedonians in Greece will remain dormant. So it is to the benefit of Greece to continue to negotiate indefinitely.
From what I understand so far, in view of what transpired in Bucharest, the United States has already offered Macedonia guarantees for its territorial integrity. Turkey and China have warmed up to the idea of offering economic ties so in fact if Macedonia plays its diplomatic cards wisely in the long term it will come up a winner.
I hate to believe that France and its followers risked offending the United States and its other NATO allies by supporting Greece in its aims without a hidden agenda of its own. So I am inclined to believe that there are deeper issues within NATO, which I do not care to know. If that is the case then NATO may not last long enough for Macedonia to join it. Putting it another way, why risk anything to join a failing organization? If this is true and NATO will fail, (NATO functioned successfully in the same way since 1945), history will record Greece as the country that broke NATO.
By the way, if Greece blocks Macedonia from entering the European Union and the EU does nothing to stop it then joining that organization is also not worth it. If International organizations allow their member to place their personal interests ahead of their objectives then they are not worth joining.Leave a comment:
-
0 (AUS Eastern Daylight Time)
Home | Shop | Send Us Info | Subscribe | Advertise | Help |
News
World
National News
State News
Politics
Business (World)
Business (US)
Technology
Industry
Science
Medicine
Sports
Education
Entertainment
Opinion
Latest Articles
View Topics
View Authors
Features
Latest Articles
View Topics
View Authors
Community
Join Our List
Other Sections
Affiliates
Advertise
Video
What Will Happen to the Grkomani and Bulgaromani?
Risto StefovOctober 01, 2008
Let´s face it, some years from now when the whole of Macedonia is free and independent there will be a chapter in its history called "Greek, Serbian and Bulgarian Occupation of Macedonia". There was the "Roman Occupation", the "Byzantine Occupation" and the "Ottoman Occupation" and yes there will be the "Greek, Serbian and Bulgarian Occupation" of Macedonia. How easily we recognize an "Ottoman Occupation" yet we are so blind to see the current "Greek Occupation". "Can´t see the forest for the trees, I guess". Case in point for the skeptics: 1913 "Serbian Occupied Macedonia", 1991 "Free and Independent Republic of Macedonia". Anyone should be able to extrapolate from that! It´s a matter of time before "Greek and Bulgarian Occupied Macedonia" will also be freed! Which brings us to the question: "What will history say about those who side with the occupiers?" Macedonians have a name for them "Grkomani" and "Bulgaromani".
Even though many of them have wished the Macedonians harm and some have committed crimes against the Macedonian people, I have never spoken ill of them. Recently however, I have become their target of hate and ridicule. I have been impersonated on several occasions by some on internet forums, threatened with bodily harm many times and blamed for things that happened to them that were beyond my control. Still I bear no ill will towards them because to me they are Macedonians who have lost their way. I am however concerned about them, as to what will happen to them when Greece and Bulgaria no longer need them. Will they be branded "collaborators" by their overlords? Will they be branded "traitors" by the Macedonian people? Or will they become "more Macedonian" than the Macedonians themselves?
History has many examples of people like them, perhaps history has the answers. They better consult history to see what the future holds for them.
Greece and Bulgaria have a tight grip on their people and not only refuse to recognize that minorities live on their respective soils, but also violently discourage their people from self declaring their true identities. This is a serious problem. Encroachment on people´s rights and oppression creates friction and discontentment and usually results in outbursts of violence. Most uprisings, both violent and peaceful, have started this way when governments ignore reality for some self fulfilling purpose. Oh yes, I forgot, all the people that live in Greece are Greeks and all the people that live in Bulgaria are Bulgarians! This kind of thinking is precisely what is wrong with these two countries!
Ethnically, today´s modern Greeks and Bulgarians are not who they say they are. In other words they bear little or no relation to the people they say they have descended from. Macedonians have no problem with that, in fact, the world has no problem with that. When Greece and Bulgaria were hastily created by the Great Powers in the 19th century, they were given arbitrary identities more suitable to Great Power interests than to the interests of the people in those states. Where the Macedonians do have a problem is with how these states treat Macedonians. Even though everyone in the world knows Macedonians exist, Greece and Bulgaria adamantly cling to the idea that Macedonians don´t exist.
When Macedonia was invaded, occupied and partitioned three ways in 1913, no Macedonian was give the choice to self identify. In fact, the majority of Macedonians were "made" into Greeks, Serbians, or Bulgarians against their will. And thus is the crux of our problems today. The only choice Macedonians were given is to live as Greeks, Serbians, or Bulgarians or die as Macedonians. Some choice!
The Macedonian people were forced to cope with not just being assimilated, but being assimilated three different ways by three diverse and opposing entities who hated one another to no end. This hatred of Greeks for Bulgarians and vice versa was imposed on the Macedonian people where Macedonians living in Greece were "expected" to be enemies with the Macedonians living in Bulgaria and so on. Imagine how that must have felt?
Things went from weird to bizarre when all three sides were enlisting Macedonians to fight against other Macedonians during Macedonia´s partition in 1913, during World War I and II, and so on. Bulgaria fought against Greece in WW I and II where Macedonians were present in both camps and were forced to fight against each other. Closer to home, Macedonians fought against other Macedonians during the Greek Civil War. But that´s not all. All three states have in the past enlisted Macedonians to fight other Macedonians on their own soil. Greeks, Serbians and Bulgarians enlisted fighters from Macedonia to do their dirty work. For example the great Greek Hellenizer Karavangelis enlisted the services of Kote from Rula to do his dirty work in Kostur. Vlado Chernozemski was enlisted by the Bulgarians to assassinate the Macedonian revolutionary and intellectual Dimo Hadzhidimov and so on. These were Macedonians who did these dirty deeds for their benefactors.
To truly understand the "Grkoman" or "Bulgaroman" phenomenon one has to imagine an "occupied" people in a world where the conditions for collaboration are "created" by the "occupier".
In order to maintain control of the occupied the occupier needs to know when and where to act and for that he needs reliable information. This information must come from the inside and must be accurate. So, to gain such information the occupier needs to enlist the services of insiders in the occupied world. Unfortunately, the only insiders who are willing to provide this information are those who are either disgruntled individuals or individuals that can be bought in exchange for something they desire such as sums of money, social status, free education, a better job, power over others, etc. However, to prove his loyalty the insider or collaborator is expected to commit some act, usually a criminal act against his own people. This way the occupier will be assured of the collaborator´s loyalty.
So how will a collaborator react to a situation where the occupier is threatened? In such a situation the collaborator will fight for the occupier in order to maintain the status quo.
I am not implying that all "Grkomani" and "Bulgaromani" are collaborators but I do question their actions. If these people have committed no harm to the Macedonian people then what are their motives for siding with the occupiers? So my hope here is that many of these "Grkomans" and "Bulgaromans" are ignorant of their real identity or are taking advantage of the situation for some small personal gain. Thus, no harm done and there is hope for them yet. But for those who have done serious harm, good luck to them!
To be loyal to family and friends is fine but it should not stop people from thinking for themselves and finding out who they really are. I have been told that loyalty to family comes first and I can´t say that I disagree with that. If your parents or grandparents saw themselves as other than Macedonians, for which I am sure they had a reason, does not change the fact that they have a Macedonian ancestry which, when the time comes, will be recognized as such. So where does that leave you? You can argue with me that, that will never happen just as many in the past have argued that Macedonia will never be free of the Romans, Byzantines, or Turks or you can reconsider where you stand and make the right choice.
The Republic of Macedonia´s independence has created a problem for Greece and Bulgaria. Greece and Bulgarian took the 19th century road but somewhere down the line forgot to take a turn when the whole world was turning.
Yugoslavia was whole at one time populated by "South Slavs". In fact Yugoslavia was touted as the Switzerland of the Balkans. But where is Yugoslavia now? Who would have thought Yugoslavia, the Switzerland of the Balkans, would disintegrate to its elemental level? Who would have thought that Yugoslavia was populated by other than "South Slavs"? Believe me; Greece and Bulgaria are not far behind. Their belligerent behaviour towards their minorities, especially the Macedonians, will not serve them well!
So once again, to the people who support our occupiers (yours and ours), when Greece and Bulgaria no longer need you what will become of you?Leave a comment:
-
s Greece forgetting something?
Risto StefovSeptember 29, 2008
It has been seventeen years now since the Republic of Macedonia declared its independence from Yugoslavia and Greece is still tormenting the Macedonian people over idiotic issues such as ancient symbols, ancient flags and ancient names.
Even though the Republic of Macedonia is part of geographical Macedonia and by international rights has every right to call itself Macedonia, Greece is adamantly against it.
According to Greece, which has chosen to ignore historic evidence, "Macedonia is Greek" and only the part of geographic Macedonia now under Greece can rightfully call itself "Macedonia".
Greece chose to ignore what was real when it went in pursuit of the ancient glory associated with Ancient City States and tried to portray itself as the New Athens, modeled after an Ancient culture that died more than two millennia ago. When Greece became a country for the first time in 1829, the only real and vibrant cultures living on its soil were Albanian, Vlach, Turkish and Macedonian but Greece ignored reality and opted for creating a brand new mythical culture totally alien to the people.
It seems that everyone in Greece today is suffering from mass amnesia and has forgotten how Albanian the Peloponnesus and Epirus were, how Vlach Thessaly was, how Macedonian Macedonia was and how Turkish Thrace was in the beginning of the 19th century when its capital was Naphplion and its parliamentarians required translators to understand one another. Yes, Greece was indeed a multiethnic state in its humble beginnings but today that is forgotten as Greeks clamber to claim descent from the ancient City States from 2,500 years ago.
Today´s Greece was created from the raw materials of the remnants of the Ottoman Empire from a people that were dominated by foreign rule since Macedonia´s rise to power in the fourth century BC. Greece was conquered by Macedonia, invaded and subjugated by Rome, the Byzantines, the Ottomans and every conqueror, invader and settler that set foot on that soil. Yet Greeks today claim that their population is homogeneous consisting of 98% pure Greeks and 2% Muslim Greeks.
The truth is it doesn´t matter to me what they think of themselves. According to international law, every nation has the right to self declare and so do the Greeks. What matters to me is the hypocritical attitude some Greeks, including all Greek Governments have taken and that is "while idealizing their mythical identity" they "ostracize that of the Macedonians" calling it "fake non-existent"!
Which culture is more genuine? The Macedonian or the Greek? Let´s examine some facts!
1. While the Macedonians make an ethnic distinction between the various ethnic groups living in Macedonia such as Macedonians, Albanians, Turks, Roma and others, Greece claims it has no other ethnicities outside of Greeks even though its composition at its inception consisted of Albanians, Vlachs, Macedonians, Turks, Roma and others. What happened to these people? How did they all become Greeks?
2. While the Macedonians make distinctions between traditions, songs, dances and clothing belonging to the various ethnic groups, Greece claims them all to be Greek including those belonging to the Albanians, Vlachs, Macedonians and Turks.
3. While Macedonia has toponymia that have existed for millennia, toponyms in Greece are no older than at most two centuries. Greece began renaming place names in the Macedonian territories it controls in the 1920´s. There is no Greek history for these place names prior to the 1920´s.
4. While Macedonians spoke many dialects of the Macedonian language, the vast majority of Greeks spoke Albanian, Vlach, Turkish and Macedonian as their mother tongue. Koine or Dimotiki as the Greek language is called today was learned in school.
5. While Macedonians created a literary language based on the most dominant Macedonian dialects Greece adopted the Koine (the ancient international language of commerce) for its people and later tried to purify it by adopting an ancient dead Attic language (Katharevousa) and failed.
Comparing the Greek identity with that of the Macedonian, one can easily conclude that Macedonians are a lot closer to who they claim to be than the Greeks.
So really, what justification does Greece have for claiming "Macedonia is Greek" when modern Greeks have no connection to the ancient City States or to the so called "Ancient Greeks" and their Modern Greek-ness is dubious at best?
Can Greece reasonably and rationally explain why should "Macedonia belong to the Greeks" and not to the Macedonians? After all Greeks do live south of Mount Olympus, be it historically or today, and Macedonians live in Macedonia, the very same land they lived on more than a millennium ago. An answer to this question would be appreciated!
If I may add, according to history the vast majority of people who we define to be "Greek" or "Macedonian" today, are indigenous to the Southern Balkans and have lived on those lands without borders from 338 BC to 1912 AD. That is from the time Macedonia conquered the Ancient City States in 338 BC until Greece invaded, occupied and annexed Macedonian lands in 1912 AD.
So why is Greece calling its citizens "pure Greeks" and the Macedonians "fake" and non existent" since it can be proven that both countries have virtually the same ethnic composition of people (in different proportions)? What is Greece´s problem with the name "Macedonia"?
If Macedonia is Greek why didn´t Greece name itself Macedonia or even name its northern province that it occupied and annexed in 1912 Macedonia? Why did Greece call its northern province "New Territories" and later "Northern Greece"? Why did Greece wait until the late 1980´s to name its northern province "Macedonia" precisely when it was inevitable that a new Macedonian State was about to declare its independence from Yugoslavia? These are serious questions that Greece needs to answer. It owes this to the Macedonian people and to the world.
Until Greece answers the above questions we will assume the following:
Ever since Greece occupied Macedonian territories in 1912 by force and without the consent of the Macedonian people, Greece is on the hook for illegal territorial grabs.
Since 1912 Greece has tortured, murdered and exiled Macedonians, including 28,000 Macedonian children, and illegally confiscated their lands. It has changed peoples´ names and toponyms and has banned the Macedonian language in an effort to "Hellenize" Macedonia and the Macedonian people. Simply put, Greece made every effort to extinguish the Macedonian identity on the Macedonian lands it occupied, including the name "Macedonia" and turn it into Greek. Seeing that it was inevitable that a Macedonian State was about to emerge from the remnants of geographical Macedonia, Greece concocted the story that there was only one Macedonia and that Macedonia belonged to Greece.
Ever since the Republic of Macedonia´s emergence, Greece has made every effort to negate it. Why? Because Greece is now afraid that since the Macedonian people created their own state they will start asking for rights of their brethren Macedonians living in Greece and in the Diaspora and will start asking Greece for the return of their lands and citizenships.
It has been almost 100 years since the Macedonian people witnessed their country liberated from the Muslim Ottomans only to be occupied and partitioned by its Christian neighbours the Greeks, Serbians and Bulgarians. In those 100 years Macedonians have witnessed their villages burned; their fellow Macedonians exiled and stripped of their lands. They have witnessed settlers take over their lands and occupy their homes, their language banished and punishments handed out for speaking it. Their names, surnames, names of their villages, mountains and rivers erased and replaced with foreign names. They have seen entire villages humiliated and forced to pledge allegiance to their occupier.
In 1949 a huge mass of the Macedonian population, including 28,000 children fleeing to save themselves from a war, was permanently evicted, their citizenship stripped and their lands confiscated.
In 1982 Greece passed a law (106841) allowing Greeks by birth to return to Greece excluding Macedonians, even though these Macedonians were born in Macedonia after 1912 and in fact were all Greek citizens. While Greece claims there are no non-Greeks living in Greece it does make a distinction between those of its citizens who support its national myth and those who don´t.
With the emergence of the Republic of Macedonia, Greece again chose the path of self-indulgence refusing the Macedonians their due recognition and right to self declare which leads to the following question: "How long do Macedonians have to wait before they get justice and experience freedom in Greece?"
Where does Greece believe its actions will lead the Macedonian people? Will anyone blame the Macedonians if they start taking matters into their own hands and start looking for recognition elsewhere?
Why is Greece so surprised when yet another country recognizes the Republic of Macedonia by its proper name?
How long does Greece think it can push the Macedonian people around without consequences?
To this date Greece has broken every international minority law in the book. Has it not occurred to Greece that it is not above the law and someday soon these violations will catch up to it?
Greece had best soon start re-thinking its strategy towards its treatment of the Macedonian people because frankly, Macedonians have had enough of Greece. If Greece does not change its attitude and soon manage its Macedonian problem in a fair and equitable way, Macedonians will have no choice but to start very loudly calling for the re-unification of all of Macedonia or for the creation of a Kosovo like Macedonian state out of Greece.Leave a comment:
-
What is the Future for the Macedonian People?
Risto StefovSeptember 28, 2008
I have said it before and I will say it again, the Greek dispute with the Republic of Macedonia over the name "Macedonia" is nothing more than a ploy, a con, a ruse, to sidestep the real issues; the status of the Macedonian minority in Greece.
Greece is doing everything it can to take attention away from its dismal human rights record by focusing on something intangible like the name dispute.
The name dispute for Greece is another excuse to avoid coming clean with the Macedonian people.
What will Greece gain if Macedonia is not called Macedonia?
NOTHING!
Greece already has everything that is Macedonian, the Macedonian heritage, Macedonia's history and 51% of Macedonia's territory.
So, why is Greece complaining?
Greece is cleverly down-playing the Greek-Macedonian name dispute and making it look like it is about ancient history.
"Macedonia is Greek from ancient times" is a way of making an issue out of a non-issue. Why should anyone care about such a ridiculous claim?
By doing so Greece is achieving the following objectives:
1. In the eyes of the world, it is down-playing the dispute and making it appear trivial.
2. It is drawing our attention away from the real issues.
3. It is putting Macedonia and the Macedonian people on the defensive and forcing a fight for what appears to be a non-issue.
What in fact we should really be doing is asking the following questions:
1. How did Macedonia REALLY become Greek?
2. How did Greece get the Macedonian heritage?
3. How did Greece get Macedonia's history?
4. How did Greece get 51% of Macedonia's territory"?
Greece is afraid that if the answers to these questions become known, then the truth will come out and there will be hell to pay.
So, what can we do to bring our issues with Greece on track?
It is very important to first recognize Greece's tactics and simply not play their game.
We must also bring attention to the following issues and make them our goals. Before we negotiate the name, we must insist that Greece;
1. Recognize the Macedonian minority inside Greece.
2. Grant human rights with full privileges to all minorities living inside Greece.
3. Allow the exiled Macedonian refugee children to return to Greece.
4. Compensate the families whose properties the Greek State confiscated.
5. Allow all Macedonians who were forcibly evicted by the Greek State to return and reclaim their homes and properties.
6. Take responsibility for the atrocities it committed against the Macedonian people during the Balkan Wars and the Greek Civil War.
It is every Macedonian's responsibility to disassociate himself or herself from debating with the Greeks on non-issues and bring the dispute where it really belongs, to the human rights arena.
Everyone concerned, including the international negotiators and mediators, MUST become familiar with the history of how Macedonia became Greek?
1. It is a well documented fact that Greece, in 1912, 1913 during the two Balkan Wars, entered and forcibly occupied Macedonian territory illegally without the consent of the Macedonian people. It then, along with its partners Bulgaria and Serbia, went on a rampage bombing Macedonian villages and indiscriminately killing and murdering entire populations.
2. It is a well documented fact that as soon as Greece consolidated its hold on Greek held Macedonia, it murdered or forcibly exiled all Macedonians who refused to accept its conditions.
3. It is a well documented fact that after ethnically cleansing the Macedonian population, Greece brought Greek settlers from Asia Minor, Epirus and other regions and settled them on Macedonian territory, mostly on the lands of the exiled Macedonians, without their consent.
4. It is a well documented fact that during the early 1920's Greece began a campaign of denationalization by banning the Macedonian language and making it illegal to speak Macedonian in Macedonia. It then proceeded to forcibly change all peoples' names and toponyms.
5. It is also a well documented fact that during the Greek Civil War, Greece exiled a large part of the Macedonian population, including the 28,000 refugee children, illegally expropriated properties and issued them to new settlers.
The territory which Greece today calls "Greek Macedonia" is in fact "Greek Occupied Macedonia" and has been occupied since 1912. The so-called "Greek Macedonians" are not really ethnic Macedonians at all; in fact they are the "Greek Settlers" who Greece has been depositing on Macedonian lands since the Balkan wars (1912, 1913).
So, what else can we do to progress to the next step?
1. The Macedonian people cannot and must not be content with the status quo. We need to work towards a common strategy that will involve the entire Macedonian nation regardless of where we live, be it in the Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, Canada, Australia, the USA or the world over. We must recognize that we are one and the same people and we must not allow those who benefit from our misfortunes to divide us. We must promote ourselves vigorously as one nation, one people irrespective of religious, political, or ideological interests.
2. We must work within the laws of the states in which we live in order to achieve our goals. We must also use those laws designed to help us by being diligent and not accepting the status quo.
3. Our strategy was to join world institutions, like NATO and the European Union (EU) because they offer security and human rights but Greece´s opposition will delay or even permanently rob us of those choices. The EU constitution however contains human rights provisions which will help the minorities in Greece and Bulgaria when implemented. It is up to us to ensure that those provisions are implemented.
4. When it comes to our interests, we must take action ourselves and not allow Greece, Bulgaria, or any other foreign power to lead us or to interfere in our affairs.
5. We must help the Republic of Macedonia choose its foreign policies wisely so that all Macedonians benefit from them.
6. It would be wise for the Republic of Macedonia to adopt all Macedonian people worldwide and become "the mother country" to all Macedonians by offering them citizenship. Be it political or economic, strength comes in numbers.
I envision a borderless Macedonia in the future where the Macedonian people will once again have the freedom to call themselves Macedonian, speak their Macedonian language, enjoy their Macedonian culture and have the freedom to travel all throughout Macedonia without fear or repercussions.Leave a comment:
Leave a comment: