Question:
how can Alexander the Great was Greek, when he was born in Pella, Macedonia?
2008-10-21 03:42:10 UTC
He was Macedonian. NEVER GREEK!!!
25 answers:
plostad
2008-10-21 05:03:59 UTC
Why it's important that today (only 95 years by now) Pella is in Greece? This is not a geographic subject as all the greeks think, it is a history!

That is not changing the fact that Alexander was Macedonian and not a greek.

Since when the greeks are considering Macedonians are not barbarians just like Alexander. Why do you think that modern Greeks know so much about history? Let's see what ancient Greeks felt about Macedonians and Alexander:

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?

Also, 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." Were they also going to liberate Macedonia, i.e. Alexander's homeland, because according to modern Greek logic "Macedonia is Greek"?

The truth is Macedonia NEVER belonged to Greece. Macedonia BELONGS to the Macedonians! In the words of William Gladstone "MACEDONIA FOR THE MACEDONIANS"!
?
2016-05-28 06:24:05 UTC
Pella, the ancient capital of Macedonia.
2008-10-24 14:44:42 UTC
Pella has fallen under Greek occupation after the Balkan wars. Never before, for more than a 4000 years Pella has never been Greek but Macedonian.
2014-10-09 12:33:06 UTC
Alexander of Macedon, hi was Macedonian.
MaCeDonIan PhaLanX
2008-10-22 12:35:57 UTC
Yes, he was born in Pella, Aegaen Macedonia!

And he was Macedonian - a pure one!

Greetings from Macedonia!
emiliosailez
2008-10-21 23:23:02 UTC
Greek or Ellin was he who had common Greek (Elliniki) heritage, culture and education. No one in their right mind can deny that both Athenians and Spartans were Ellinikoi laoi. So were Korinthians and Thebans. They shared language and religion but not common locations. Macedonians spoke a primitive Elliniki-Greek- dialect and believed the same gods, as opposed to the Illyrians and Thracians. The Slavic invasions occurede 1000 years later.

PERIOD.
hello
2008-10-24 17:09:18 UTC
im sorry ... but ur just plain stupid... macedonia is a city state in Greece.. just like Sparta and Thessaly. Ill give you a tip though... open a book not made by un intelligent people from FYROM and read... you will learn alot
AndreasD72
2008-10-21 04:08:26 UTC
Alexander understood himself as Greek and Macedonian, a nation which does not exist anymore. But the majority of Greeks that time called him a Barbarian and they would never say, that he was a real Greek. He was only toughed by Aristoteles, a greek philosopher. Only people from other cultures made no difference between Greeks and the Macedonians.



Today we can not be sure, that the Macedonians in time of Alexander were Greeks or even not. Anyway their language sounded really strange to the fine Greek circles of Athens. But we are sure, that the people called Macedonians of those ancient times have never been Slavs and they are not related with them. The Slavs came to Balkan about thousand years later.



But Alexander and his father they unified the Area of Greece for the first time to one administrative body (country). Before Philip II. and Alexander Greece was a patchwork of small Homelands and independent towns.
Scary Girl
2008-10-22 06:48:55 UTC
See, here's what I think:If in the time he lived Pella was in Macedonia, then he was Macedonian.

And in History, I've learned that he was Macedonian.But I won't judge-maybe they lied to us.

And finally, why does it matter anyway?He lived and died long, long time ago.
Airpole.
2008-10-22 01:16:30 UTC
He was Greek Macedonian both in Heart and in Education.

Pella is and always was a Greek town and all the recent excavations have brought out many factual evidence of the that undeniable fact.

He is referred as leader of all Greeks in all the historical books that are written by unbiased authors and historians.

Finally he was never Slav-Bulgarian-Rom Macedonian like the ones that claim nowadays as being the descendants of his line.

They appeared centuries later in the region and having no history of their own they can claim anything the like. In that liberal sense I can claim to be the Pope.
2008-10-22 13:45:25 UTC
I can see everyone talks about me, Alexander The Great... So i decided to tell you that im Macedonian not Greek.
io
2008-10-21 09:06:34 UTC
yes he was macedonian
2008-10-24 14:51:46 UTC
Pella is there, in Makedonia,so....
Charles_N
2008-10-22 08:55:50 UTC
for the simple reason that ancient macedonia was a part of greece ;-) is somebody from kumanovo not 'makedonski' but ..kumanovian then?
2008-10-21 08:58:06 UTC
Plostad said it all, as always. Of course Alexander was Macedonian, not Greek. There are no proofs that ancient Macedonians were Greeks, whatsoever. It doesn't matter where certain places are today, just because the place is in Greece doesn't make its history Greek. Macedonia is not Greek, it's Macedonian.
cpinatsi
2008-10-21 04:07:04 UTC
Pella, as we all know, is in Greece.

Also, Alexander was proud to be the descendant of the royal dynasty of Argos. So he said himself he was Greek.
Cortophagus
2008-10-21 03:51:40 UTC
Why the Republic of Skopje wants to be named as Macedonia, when it is located in Paeonia (Vardaska Banovina)?



Edit: AndreasD72, some Athenians had also characterized as barbarians, tribes whose Greekness is not disputed such as the Boeotians and the Thessalians.
Trek T
2008-10-22 09:22:39 UTC
- I' d like to make a collect call please...to I C Wiener... ?!?!?!?!?!
greeco
2008-10-22 03:36:40 UTC
because you idiot pella is in greece .macedonia is an area its like saying somebody is not american because he was born in nevada so he is nevadian not american. try learning abit of georgraphy it helps
Solitude
2008-10-21 06:01:40 UTC
it's getting boring you know.

all these questions, i mean.

why don't you people find a hobby or something. i suggest learning latin.
marian
2008-10-21 04:44:46 UTC
pella is in greece.look at a map
2008-10-21 04:06:44 UTC
hahahhah and who told you Macedonia, such as Pella, are not in Greece??
♥ Vasiliki ♥
2008-10-21 05:01:27 UTC
Do they teach you geography in Turkey

https://answersrip.com/question/index?qid=20081014164813AAOK4UF



or while you have geography lesson you were thinking about the Armenian girl who is more popular than you?
dan g
2008-10-22 10:36:07 UTC
Macedonia = Greece / Macedonian = Greek which is why Alexander being born in the Greek city of Pella, Macedonia makes him Greek. ;-p



EUGENE BORZA

Our understanding of the Macedonians' emergence into history is confounded by two events: the establishment of the Macedonians as an identifiable ethnic group, and the foundation of their ruling house. The "highlanders" or "Makedones" of the mountainous regions of western Macedonia are derived from northwest Greek stock; they were akin both to those who at an earlier time may have migrated south to become the historical "Dorians", and to other Pindus tribes who were the ancestors of the Epirotes or Molossians. That is, we may suggest that northwest Greece provided a pool of Indo-European speakers of Proto-Greek from which were drawn the tribes who later were known by different names as they established their regional identities in separate parts of the country... First, the matter of the Hellenic origins of the Macedonians: Nicholas Hammond's general conclusion (though not the details of his arguments) that the origin of the Macedonians lies in the pool of proto-Greek speakers who migrated out of the Pindus mountains during the Iron Age, is acceptable. - * Eugene N. Borza, "Makedonika", Regina Books, Claremont CA



N. G. L. Hammond

At the end of the bronze age a residue of Greek tribes stayed behind in Southern Macedonia [...] one of these, the "Makedones" occupied Aegae and expanded into the coastal plain of lower Macedonia which became the Kingdom of Macedon; their descendants were the Macedonians proper of the classical period and they worshipped Greek gods. The other Greek tribes became intermingled in upper Macedonia with Illyrians, Paeonians and Thracians[...] in the early 5th century the royal house of Macedon, the Temenidae was recognized as Greek by the Presidents of the Olympic Games. Their verdict was and is decisive. It is certain that the Kings considered themselves to be of Greek descent from Heracles son of Zeus. "Macedonian" was a strong dialect of very early Greek which was not intelligible to contemporary Greeks. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "A History of Greece to 323 BC", Cambridge University, 1986 (p 516)



Philip was born a Greek of the most aristocratic, indeed of divine, descent... Philip was both a Greek and a Macedonian, even as Demosthenes was a Greek and an Athenian...The Macedonians over whom Philip was to rule were an outlying family member of the Greek-speaking peoples. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "Philip of Macedon" Duckworth Publishing, February 1998



As subjects of the king the Upper Macedonians were henceforth on the same footing as the original Macedonians, in that they could qualify for service in the King's Forces and thereby obtain the elite citizenship. At one bound the territory, the population and wealth of the kingdom were doubled. Moreover since the great majority of the new subjects were speakers of the West Greek dialect, the enlarged army was Greek-speaking throughout. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "Philip of Macedon" Duckworth Publishing, February 1998



The first sentence of the actual Life of Alexander lives up to Plutarch's warning words.'Alexander's descent, as a Heraclid on his father's side from Caranus, and as an Aeacid on his mother's side from Neoptolemus, is one of the matters which have been completely trusted.' While the Heraclid and Aeacid descent went unquestioned by ancient writers, the citation of Caranus as the founding father in Macedonia and so analogous to Neoptolemus in Molossia was not only controversial but must have been known to be controversial by Plutarch. For he was conversant with the histories of Herodotus and Thucydides. which had looked to Perdiccas as the founding father in Macedonia. Caranus was inserted as a forerunner of Perdiccas in Macedonia only at the turn of the fifth century: he appeared as such in the works of fourth-century writers, such as Marsyas the Macedonian historian (FGrH 135/6 i- 14) who on my analysis was used by Pompeius Trogus (Prologue 7 'origines Macedonicae regesque a conditorc gentis Carano'). Thus the dogmatic statement of Plutarch, that Caranus was the forerunner, should have been qualified, if he had been writing scientific history. But because the statement conveyed a belief which Alexander certainly held in his lifetime it was justified in the eyes of a biographer and in the eyes of those who were more concerned with biographical background than with historical facts. If Plutarch had been challenged, he would no doubt have claimed that his belief was based on his own wide reading of authors who had studied the origins of Macedonia and provided 'completely trusted' data. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "Sources for Alexander the Great: An Analysis of Plutarch's 'Life' and Arrian's 'Anabasis Alexandrou'", p.5, Cambridge Classical Studies



The terms for the Phocians were mild by Greek Standards (one Greek state proposed the execution of all the men) disarmament, division into village-settlements, payment of all indemnity to Apollo and expulsion from the Amphictiony. In their place the Macedonians were elected members. The two votes of Phocis on the council were transferred to the Macedonian state. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "The Genius of Alexander the Great", p.18, Gerald Duckworth & Co Ltd (November 26, 2004)



The Balkan situation was far from secure, with the Odrysians and Scythians only recently defeated and with the Triballi still defiant. Yet Philip was confident of success in the interest of the Greek-speaking world and of Macedonia in particular. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "The Genius of Alexander the Great", p.21, Gerald Duckworth & Co Ltd (November 26, 2004)



What language did these Macedones speak? The name itself is Greek in root and in ethnic termination. It probably means highlanders, and it is comparable to Greek tribal names such as `Orestai' and `Oreitai', meaning 'mountain-men'. A reputedly earlier variant,`Maketai', has the same root, which means `high', as in the Greek adjective makednos or the noun mekos. The genealogy of eponymous ancestors which Hesiod recorded […] has a bearing on the question of Greek speech. First, Hesiod made Macedon a brother of Magnes; as we know from inscriptions that the Magnetes spoke the Aeolic dialect of the Greek language, we have a predisposition to suppose that the Macedones spoke the Aeolic dialect. Secondly, Hesiod made Macedon and Magnes first cousins of Hellen's three sons - Dorus, Xouthus, and Aeolus-who were the founders of three dialects of Greek speech, namely Doric, Ionic, and Aeolic. Hesiod would not have recorded this relationship, unless he had believed, probably in the seventh century, that the Macedones were a Greek speaking people. The next evidence comes from Persia. At the turn of the sixth century the Persians described the tribute-paying peoples of their province in Europe, and one of them was the `yauna takabara', which meant `Greeks wearing the hat'. There were Greeks in Greek city-states here and there in the province, but they were of various origins and not distinguished by a common hat. However, the Macedonians wore a distinctive hat, the kausia. We conclude that the Persians believed the Macedonians to be speakers of Greek. Finally, in the latter part of the fifth century a Greek historian, Hellanicus, visited Macedonia and modified Hesiod's genealogy by making Macedon not a cousin, but a son of Aeolus, thus bringing Macedon and his descendants firmly into the Aeolic branch of the Greek-speaking family. Hesiod, Persia, and Hellanicus had no motive for making a false statement about the language of the Macedonians, who were then an obscure and not a powerful people. Their independent testimonies should be accepted as conclusive. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "The Macedonian State" p.12-13



The toponyms of the Macedonian homeland are the most significant. Nearly all of them are Greek. - *Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "The Macedonian State" (1989)



Hesiod first mentioned 'Makedon', the eponym of the people and the country, as a son of Zeus, a grandson of Deukalion, and so a first cousin of Aeolus, Dorus, and Xuthus; in other words he considered the 'Makedones' to be an outlying branch of the Greek-speaking tribes, with a distinctive dialect of their own, "Macedonian". -*Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, "Oxford Classical Dictionary", 3rd ed.(1996), pp.904,905



DAVID G. HOGARTH

The king [of macedon] was chief in the first instance of a race of plain-dwellers, who held themselves to be, like him, of Hellenic stock. - * David George Hogarth, "Philip and Alexander of Macedon", p.8



From Alexander I, who rode to the Athenian pickets the night before Plataea and proclaimed himself to the generals their friend and a Greek, down to Amyntas, father of Philip, who joined forces with Lacedaemon in 382, the kings of Macedon bid for Greek support by being more Hellenic than the Hellenes[...] Archelaus patronized Athenian poets and Athenian drama and commissioned Euripides to dramatize the deeds of his Argive ancesto[...] "Macedonia" therefore, throughout historical times until the accession of Philip the Second, presents the spectacle of a nation that was no nation, but a group of discordant units, without community of race, religion, speech or sentiment, resultant from half-accomplished conquest and weak as the several sticks of the ****** in the fable. -* David George Hogarth, "Philip and Alexander of Macedon", pp.9-10



Tradition held the other element
2008-10-21 03:50:51 UTC
who said he was greek. everyone knows he was born in macedonia. thats what they teach in school ... who are you listening too


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