Download Will the real Greek please stand up? Philip of Macedon

Will the real Greek
please stand up?
Philip of Macedon
and Greek oratory
Lecture 25
The Athenian orator
Demosthenes
The Athenian orator Demosthenes
on Philip of Macedon:
“Not only is he [King Philip of Macedon]
not a Greek (a Hellene),
he’s not a relative of the Greeks;
he’s not even a barbarian from any
decent place. He is a damn Macedonian
from a country where you could
never even buy a good slave.”
In a famous series of speeches known as the “Philippics,” the Athenian statesman Demosthenes
(d. 322 B.C.) caustically denounced King Philip of Macedon as a “damn Macedonian,” whom no
Greek city should ever trust. The vehemence of D’s attack on Philip’s ethnicity is ironic, given the
fact that most modern Greeks insist that Philip was a true Hellene.
First some context:
Although victorious
in the Peloponnesian
Wars, which ended in
431 B.C., the
Spartans were illsuited to rule over
Greece. The proSpartan oligarchy
imposed on Athens —
the so-called “thirty
tyrants” — was soon
overthrown, and
Athens allied herself
with Thebes, Corinth,
and even Persia to
resist Spartan
hegemony. The King’s
Peace signed in 386
B.C. ended these wars,
but placed the Greek
cities of Ionia, as well
as the island of
Cyprus, back under
direct Persian control.
Theban “Sacred Band:
A highly imaginative reconstruction
During the period after the
King’s Peace, the city of
Thebes became a leading
military force in central
Greece. Its strength partly
depended on an elite infantry
unit known as the Sacred
Band, which was composed of
150 pairs of male lovers.
This experiment lasted only a
few years at most. Here, a
highly imaginative modern
reconstruction (The sources
never claim that the Sacred
Band fought “in the buff”). In
the next generation, however,
innovations in infantry
warfare would set the stage
for the dramatic rise of the
Kingdom of Macedon.
MACEDONIA
The Kingdom of
Macedon was
located at the
northern edge of
the Greek world.
During the GrecoPersian wars,
Macedon yielded
to the advance of
Persian power, but
then harassed the
remnants of
Xerxes’ army as it
retreated after its
losses at Salamis
(480 B.C.) and
Plataea (479 B.C.).
The Macedonian capital was at Pella, in the
lowlands of what is today northern Greece. Its
location gave the Macedonian kings access to the
Aegean (via the Loudias River, which was navigable
to Pella), but also links with the hill country and the
highlands of the southern Balkans.
The Macedonian capital at Pella possessed many of the amenities of
Greek urban life, including an enormous agora. But in contrast to
Greek cities, the most lavish building was not a temple, but rather the
palace. The floors of the Macedonian palace were decorated with
mosaics -- the same art form that would later be used to decorate elite
houses throughout the Roman Empire.
MACEDONIAN PALACE AT PELLA
The Pella mosaics include a few figural scenes that
combine Greek techniques with local artistic tastes.
Here, t wo heroes (hence, their nudity) slay a lion.
View of the mountains of the southern
Balkans. The tribes who inhabited these
highlands were gradually incorporated
into the Macedonian kingdom.
Philip of Macedon
(father of Alexander)
When Philip rose to the Macedonian
throne in 382 B.C. (just four years after
the King’s Peace), he inherited a kingdom
that had nearly been torn apart in the
previous generation by a combination of
civil war and foreign intervention. A
brilliant strategist, Philip bought enough
time through negotiations to recruit and
train a new citizen army, which he then
led in a remarkable series of military
triumphs.
THE MACEDONIAN PHALANX
The key to Philip’s success was his reorganization of the Macedonian phalanx, which he armed
with 16-foot pikes and trained to maneuver in unison. Some scholars believe that Philip’s bold
innovations in infantry warfare were inspired by his time in Thebes, where he spent several years
Philip’s soldiers honed their skills in battles
against various Thracian and Pelagonian
tribes in the southern Balkans. Here, an
artist’s rendering of one such battle described
in Greek literary sources.
This detailed map indicates key stages in
the expansion of the Macedonian
Kingdom under King Philip II. First, he
captured the gold mines near Mt.
Pangaeus, then the Greek cities on the
northern Aegean coast. In the 340s, he
gained control of the narrow straits (the
Dardanelles and the Bosporus),
connecting the Aegean to the Black Sea,
thus threatening the Athenian grain
supply from the Crimea.
Philip of
Macedon’s
southern
campaign
In 338 B.C., Philip’s army made
its most decisive thrust to the
south, winning at Chaeronea a
crucial battle over a coalition of
Greek cities led by Athens and
Thebes. This Macedonian
victory effectively marks the
end of the long-standing
independence of the leading citystates of the Greek heartland.
STONE LION
MARKING
SITE OF
BATTLE OF
CHAERONEA
This giant stone lion marks
the site of the Battle of
Chaeronea. Its precise
significance is uncertain,
though some scholars have
argued that it served as a
burial marker for the Theban
soldiers (members of the
Sacred Band) killed in the
battle. Nearby,
archaeologists excavated 254
skeletons from the period.
OATH OF THE LEAGUE OF CORINTH
After his
victory at
Chaeronea,
Philip
organized the
Greek citystates into a
new league, in
theory to
defend against
Persia. The
oath taken by
each member of
this League
is preserved in
copies that
were car ved in
stone and
displayed in
public.
Members of the
League swore to
remain loyal to
Philip and to
maintain peace
with all other
member-states.
By the end of his
reign, Philip
controlled directly,
or by treaty, the
whole of the
southern Balkans
and began to
prepare for a
major campaign
against Persia. His
plans were cut
short in 336 B.C.,
when Philip was
murdered at a
wedding banquet
(Macedonian kings
were polygamous).
The Macedonian
royal tombs
at Vergina
(in northern
Greece)
Interest in the Kingdom of Macedon has
surged in recent years as a result of a
dramatic archaeological discovery. In 1977,
Greek archaeologists discovered at Vergina
in northern Greece the royal cemetery of
Kingdom of Macedon. Two of three royal
tombs were still intact, 23 centuries after
being sealed in the fourth century B.C.
Inside the tombs at Vergina, archaeologists
found an extraordinary cache of ancient
objects, including this gold-embossed
breastplate and helmet. It is very likely that
both objects once belonged to Philip II.
A gold box from the tomb II at Vergina. Note the
star emblem on the lid, which was apparently a
symbol of the Macedonian monarchy.
Silver vase from
Macedonian royal tomb
at Vergina
Modern politics often influences the
questions scholars ask about even the
distant past. Contemporary debates
about national identity in the Balkans
continue to produce radically different
interpretations of the region’s ancient
and medieval history. With the
breakup of Yugoslavia in the late
1990s, the republic of Macedonia
became an independent country. The
Greeks, however, have vociferously
opposed the new country’s use of the
name Macedonia, which most Greeks
reserve for the territory of
Macedonia INSIDE Greece. This map
shows the Macedonians’ view of the
issue. As you might have guessed, both
sides claim Philip II (and his famous
son, Alexander the Great!) as their
ancestor.
Philip of Macedon
A real Greek?
Depends how you
define Greek
This miniature head, found in tomb II at
Vergina, is the only surviving marble
portrait of King Philip. Was Philip a
Greek? The question hinges on how one
defines “Greekness.” Demosthenes
argued (at least in his political
speeches) for a restrictive view of who
could be a true Greek. His predecessor
Isocrates took a more expansive view.
Philip’s son, Alexander the Great, would
prove that Isocrates was right -- at
least in terms of culture.