Gandeto
November 30, 2008
Re: The article Gettysburg and the unification of ancient Greece by Philip II of Macedonia from Nov. 28, 2008
By Australian Macedonian Advisory Council
AMAC's (Australian Macedonian Advisory Council) role is to promote the truth concerning the Macedonian issues in Australian and international fora.
From the onset, it must be emphasized that this so-called AWAC council neither promotes the truth, (cannot recognize it if they see it) nor have any advisory capacity to dispense it. Their only purpose is to mute the real truth about the ethnic Macedonians in Greece and deflect attention from human rights issues. What they do professionally though, is to distort the truth and propagate/regurgitate warn-out fabrications.
This response will testify to both their propagation of lies and for their capacity to distort the truth. I would like to ask the interested readers to compare and contrast their statements with the text that I´ll present. Whenever possible I shall endeavor to bring forth the source of my claims for I, myself, am subordinate to those authors such as Justin, Rufus, Diodorus, Plutarch, Arian, Herodotus and others, whose knowledge of ancient history is far superior to mine and whose analytical skills far surpass anything I have to offer. My interest in ancient history, thanks to these Greeks on the internet, is purely accidental; they, the Greeks with their incessant fabrications and their selective appetite for appropriation of Ancient Macedonians´ historical greatness, have awaken my latent desires to learn and understand the truth about our past.
In the above article the Greek fellow attempts to present Philip´s conquest of Greece as unification and grouping of Greek city-states as one and the same with Macedonia. While the attempt is quite acceptable, after all losing one´s freedom is a very bitter pill to swallow and the subsequent enslavement by the Macedonian Ares is indeed difficult to take, the distortion of historical facts and misrepresentation of events is surely not an option to be taken lightly.
As a matter of fact he not only tries to distort the events that took place in antiquity but goes as far as to assign a new meaning to the episodes he invents. His convoluted thinking lacks both cohesive validity and moral integrity.
Consider the following passage:
"
So in Greece we had a similiar outlook where Philip II of Macedon made alliances against the imminent threat of a unison between Thebes and Athens.We want to show you here contrary to Fyrom propaganda(Stefov,Gandeto,Donski etc etc) that it wasn't just Philip against the whole of Greece but a collection of states that joined him,against him or just stayed neutral"
The fact that some Greek states abstained from the fight at Chaeronea in 338, cannot be attributed for lack of cohesion among the Greek city-states; Athenians, Thebans, Phocians, Spartans and the rest of the city-states were, indeed, in constant squabbles among themselves but were, more or less, united against the enemies of Hellas. There are numerous examples of it: The Xerxes invasion of Greece in 480-79 (Herodotus 7.130) where Athenians respond to Sparta´s concerns (Hdt. 8.142), the Lamian War, the erected monument for the fallen Hellenes at Chaeronea and many others will testify to the unity of the Hellenes in the face of danger. The attributes of common blood, common religion and common language were always used to remind the parties of their shared ethnic characteristics. (Hdt. 8.144). (BTW these characteristics were denied the Macedonians.)
Philip´s involvement into their affairs was a fortunate opportunity. While they were fighting against each other he, Philip, the king of Macedon "was scheming against the liberty of them all (Justin book 8.1) Thebes defeated Sparta and Phocis. Phocian, being defeated, stood to be deprived of their land and other worldly possessions, elected boldly to seize the temple of Appolo at Delphi. Enriched with gold, they bought mercenaries and attacked Thebes. Athens and Sparta sided with the Phocian. In turn, Thebans sought help from Philip. So far these lines are in accord with his position but in order to simplify things for our readers, we should bring forward the following passage from Justin (Book 8.1-2)
"Against Onomarchus, the Thebans and the Thessalians chose as general not one of their own citizen—they were afraid that the power victory gave such a man would be more than they could put up with—but Philip, king of Macedonia, and they freely submitted to a foreigner´s exercise of such power as they feared to use in the hands of their own people."
To stress the importance of this passage is not that Philip was regarded as a foreigner but his desire to ´scheme the liberty of them all´.
Furthermore, as Philip advanced against the Phocians and defeated them, the Athenians upon learning the results of the battle, "seized the pass at Thermopylae in order to block Philip´s advance into Greece, just as they had done in earlier days when the Persians were coming." (Justin 8.1-8)
Let us retrace some of these points:
(a) Philip´s foreign origin is emphasized
(b) Macedon is not regarded as one of the Greek city-states
(c) Macedonian territory is not seen, mentioned or thought of as Greek territory. On the contrary, this is a clear example that Macedonia was not part of Greece as these Greek propagandist want to portray to the general readership of this paper.
(d) Thermopylae was the entry point into Greece; Macedonia is north of this historic entrance to Greece. And finally
(e) If Macedonia was a Greek land, the Persian army would have been attested to have been in Greece proper before entering Thermopylae. As a matter of fact, the Persians were in Macedonia for 12 long years before they attempted entry into Greece. (492-479 B.C.)
"What had incited Philip to come to Greece was the prospect of looting a few cities; but when, on his arrival, he calculated the collective wealth of all of the cities from the plunder taken from some small ones, he decided to make war on Greece as a whole." (Justin 9.1)
This does not smell like unification to me.
Also, it needs to be pointed out that, aside from Isocrates, many in Greece failed to realize that Philip was not interested in them. Greece was too poor of anything to lure him south of the border. In fact, he viewed Greece as a stepping stone to Asia. If Philip had allies in Greece, he got them either because they feared him or because of their hatred for the other city-state. Once he had the city-states where he wanted them, under his control,
"he overran and pillage the states whose leader he had been a short while before, he auctioned off the women and children from each and spared neither the temples of the immortal gods, nor holy shrines, nor even the guardian deities, public and private, into whose presence he had recently come as a guest" (Justin 8.3)
One point of interest: If Philip, the "unifier of Greece" was indeed Greek; would he do all these terrible things to the holy sites in Greece? One cannot reconcile with statements of this magnitude.
The AWAC writer states:
"In 338 BCE near Chaeronea, in Boeotia (Central Greece), Philip II – King of Macedonia - accompanied by allied contigents from Thessaly, Epirus, Aetolia, Northern Phocis and Epicnemidian Locrian, defeated the combined forces of Athens and Thebes and initiated the unity of ancient Greece."
This, my friend is your wishful thinking!!
It was Macedonian forces, the phalanx and the Macedonian Cavalry that did it.
With the death at Chaeronea was buried the freedom of Greece, said Lycurgus.
Another wishful passage states:
"The aim of Philip and his Macedonians was not to destroy their fellow Greeks – but to unite them. Following his victory at Chaeronea, Philip did not destroy Athens, Thebes or their allies – but offered them peace. But it needed to be a binding peace – a binding union. To do this he created the Corinthian League, which was also sometimes referred to as Hellenic League (Hellenes - 'The Greeks')."
The euphemism used by Isocrates was much easier to swallow than the brute honesty by Demosthenes. Athens and Thebes, the most bitter of enemies were united against Philip because they knew that slavery inflicted by Greeks on Greeks is much easier to take than the slavery by a foreigner from the north – the Macedonian Ares.
"If Philip met with success at the start he would not stop short of bringing all Greece under his yoke." (Justin 9.3-8)
Chaeronea spelled the end of Greece´s supremacy and of its ancient independence. (Justin 8.3-11)
These are powerful quotes from someone close to the actual events. He should know. Your wishful thinking has clouded your critical judgment.
Philip did not unite the Greeks at Corinth. He had the Greeks summoned to Corinth and therein lies the big difference. They were ordered to go to Corinth.
"There he laid down the conditions for peace for all Greeks." (Justin 9.5-2)
Greeks were to join into a league, The Corinthian League of the Hellenes in which Macedonia was not a member. (Check this info with neutral sources if you´d like).
"At the meeting the Spartans abstained, snubbing the king and his terms, and thinking that what was not agreed upon by the states was imposed by a conqueror and was not peace but servitude. (Justin 9.5-3)
When one unites there is no conquered party, is there? Where there is union, there is no servitude.
The Greek states were supposed to supply 7000 soldiers for the Asian campaign which Peter Green refers to as being "scraped from the bottom of the barrel." They were taken by Alexander to serve as hostages for the good behavior of the Greeks on the mainland. Think, why did Alexander dismiss them?
When one unifies there are no garrisons installed in the cities. Garrisons were set up in the main towns in Greece, the so-called "fetters of Greece" and they represent a conquered territory: a sure sign of servitude.
Until next time…
November 30, 2008
Re: The article Gettysburg and the unification of ancient Greece by Philip II of Macedonia from Nov. 28, 2008
By Australian Macedonian Advisory Council
AMAC's (Australian Macedonian Advisory Council) role is to promote the truth concerning the Macedonian issues in Australian and international fora.
From the onset, it must be emphasized that this so-called AWAC council neither promotes the truth, (cannot recognize it if they see it) nor have any advisory capacity to dispense it. Their only purpose is to mute the real truth about the ethnic Macedonians in Greece and deflect attention from human rights issues. What they do professionally though, is to distort the truth and propagate/regurgitate warn-out fabrications.
This response will testify to both their propagation of lies and for their capacity to distort the truth. I would like to ask the interested readers to compare and contrast their statements with the text that I´ll present. Whenever possible I shall endeavor to bring forth the source of my claims for I, myself, am subordinate to those authors such as Justin, Rufus, Diodorus, Plutarch, Arian, Herodotus and others, whose knowledge of ancient history is far superior to mine and whose analytical skills far surpass anything I have to offer. My interest in ancient history, thanks to these Greeks on the internet, is purely accidental; they, the Greeks with their incessant fabrications and their selective appetite for appropriation of Ancient Macedonians´ historical greatness, have awaken my latent desires to learn and understand the truth about our past.
In the above article the Greek fellow attempts to present Philip´s conquest of Greece as unification and grouping of Greek city-states as one and the same with Macedonia. While the attempt is quite acceptable, after all losing one´s freedom is a very bitter pill to swallow and the subsequent enslavement by the Macedonian Ares is indeed difficult to take, the distortion of historical facts and misrepresentation of events is surely not an option to be taken lightly.
As a matter of fact he not only tries to distort the events that took place in antiquity but goes as far as to assign a new meaning to the episodes he invents. His convoluted thinking lacks both cohesive validity and moral integrity.
Consider the following passage:
"
So in Greece we had a similiar outlook where Philip II of Macedon made alliances against the imminent threat of a unison between Thebes and Athens.We want to show you here contrary to Fyrom propaganda(Stefov,Gandeto,Donski etc etc) that it wasn't just Philip against the whole of Greece but a collection of states that joined him,against him or just stayed neutral"
The fact that some Greek states abstained from the fight at Chaeronea in 338, cannot be attributed for lack of cohesion among the Greek city-states; Athenians, Thebans, Phocians, Spartans and the rest of the city-states were, indeed, in constant squabbles among themselves but were, more or less, united against the enemies of Hellas. There are numerous examples of it: The Xerxes invasion of Greece in 480-79 (Herodotus 7.130) where Athenians respond to Sparta´s concerns (Hdt. 8.142), the Lamian War, the erected monument for the fallen Hellenes at Chaeronea and many others will testify to the unity of the Hellenes in the face of danger. The attributes of common blood, common religion and common language were always used to remind the parties of their shared ethnic characteristics. (Hdt. 8.144). (BTW these characteristics were denied the Macedonians.)
Philip´s involvement into their affairs was a fortunate opportunity. While they were fighting against each other he, Philip, the king of Macedon "was scheming against the liberty of them all (Justin book 8.1) Thebes defeated Sparta and Phocis. Phocian, being defeated, stood to be deprived of their land and other worldly possessions, elected boldly to seize the temple of Appolo at Delphi. Enriched with gold, they bought mercenaries and attacked Thebes. Athens and Sparta sided with the Phocian. In turn, Thebans sought help from Philip. So far these lines are in accord with his position but in order to simplify things for our readers, we should bring forward the following passage from Justin (Book 8.1-2)
"Against Onomarchus, the Thebans and the Thessalians chose as general not one of their own citizen—they were afraid that the power victory gave such a man would be more than they could put up with—but Philip, king of Macedonia, and they freely submitted to a foreigner´s exercise of such power as they feared to use in the hands of their own people."
To stress the importance of this passage is not that Philip was regarded as a foreigner but his desire to ´scheme the liberty of them all´.
Furthermore, as Philip advanced against the Phocians and defeated them, the Athenians upon learning the results of the battle, "seized the pass at Thermopylae in order to block Philip´s advance into Greece, just as they had done in earlier days when the Persians were coming." (Justin 8.1-8)
Let us retrace some of these points:
(a) Philip´s foreign origin is emphasized
(b) Macedon is not regarded as one of the Greek city-states
(c) Macedonian territory is not seen, mentioned or thought of as Greek territory. On the contrary, this is a clear example that Macedonia was not part of Greece as these Greek propagandist want to portray to the general readership of this paper.
(d) Thermopylae was the entry point into Greece; Macedonia is north of this historic entrance to Greece. And finally
(e) If Macedonia was a Greek land, the Persian army would have been attested to have been in Greece proper before entering Thermopylae. As a matter of fact, the Persians were in Macedonia for 12 long years before they attempted entry into Greece. (492-479 B.C.)
"What had incited Philip to come to Greece was the prospect of looting a few cities; but when, on his arrival, he calculated the collective wealth of all of the cities from the plunder taken from some small ones, he decided to make war on Greece as a whole." (Justin 9.1)
This does not smell like unification to me.
Also, it needs to be pointed out that, aside from Isocrates, many in Greece failed to realize that Philip was not interested in them. Greece was too poor of anything to lure him south of the border. In fact, he viewed Greece as a stepping stone to Asia. If Philip had allies in Greece, he got them either because they feared him or because of their hatred for the other city-state. Once he had the city-states where he wanted them, under his control,
"he overran and pillage the states whose leader he had been a short while before, he auctioned off the women and children from each and spared neither the temples of the immortal gods, nor holy shrines, nor even the guardian deities, public and private, into whose presence he had recently come as a guest" (Justin 8.3)
One point of interest: If Philip, the "unifier of Greece" was indeed Greek; would he do all these terrible things to the holy sites in Greece? One cannot reconcile with statements of this magnitude.
The AWAC writer states:
"In 338 BCE near Chaeronea, in Boeotia (Central Greece), Philip II – King of Macedonia - accompanied by allied contigents from Thessaly, Epirus, Aetolia, Northern Phocis and Epicnemidian Locrian, defeated the combined forces of Athens and Thebes and initiated the unity of ancient Greece."
This, my friend is your wishful thinking!!
It was Macedonian forces, the phalanx and the Macedonian Cavalry that did it.
With the death at Chaeronea was buried the freedom of Greece, said Lycurgus.
Another wishful passage states:
"The aim of Philip and his Macedonians was not to destroy their fellow Greeks – but to unite them. Following his victory at Chaeronea, Philip did not destroy Athens, Thebes or their allies – but offered them peace. But it needed to be a binding peace – a binding union. To do this he created the Corinthian League, which was also sometimes referred to as Hellenic League (Hellenes - 'The Greeks')."
The euphemism used by Isocrates was much easier to swallow than the brute honesty by Demosthenes. Athens and Thebes, the most bitter of enemies were united against Philip because they knew that slavery inflicted by Greeks on Greeks is much easier to take than the slavery by a foreigner from the north – the Macedonian Ares.
"If Philip met with success at the start he would not stop short of bringing all Greece under his yoke." (Justin 9.3-8)
Chaeronea spelled the end of Greece´s supremacy and of its ancient independence. (Justin 8.3-11)
These are powerful quotes from someone close to the actual events. He should know. Your wishful thinking has clouded your critical judgment.
Philip did not unite the Greeks at Corinth. He had the Greeks summoned to Corinth and therein lies the big difference. They were ordered to go to Corinth.
"There he laid down the conditions for peace for all Greeks." (Justin 9.5-2)
Greeks were to join into a league, The Corinthian League of the Hellenes in which Macedonia was not a member. (Check this info with neutral sources if you´d like).
"At the meeting the Spartans abstained, snubbing the king and his terms, and thinking that what was not agreed upon by the states was imposed by a conqueror and was not peace but servitude. (Justin 9.5-3)
When one unites there is no conquered party, is there? Where there is union, there is no servitude.
The Greek states were supposed to supply 7000 soldiers for the Asian campaign which Peter Green refers to as being "scraped from the bottom of the barrel." They were taken by Alexander to serve as hostages for the good behavior of the Greeks on the mainland. Think, why did Alexander dismiss them?
When one unifies there are no garrisons installed in the cities. Garrisons were set up in the main towns in Greece, the so-called "fetters of Greece" and they represent a conquered territory: a sure sign of servitude.
Until next time…
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