It\'s all Greek to me (Makedonians included) ...

[Macedon]

To channel Vinnie Barbarino: "I'm so confused..."

What do you mean?

Curtius clearly implies that it was difficult to understand. The fragment of Arrian deals with the battle between Neoptolemus and Eumenes. The relevant lines deal with the approaches made by Eumenes before battle. The last approach, noted above, is to the Macedonian phalanx infantry. Eumenes ensures it is made by a man of the "Macedonian tongue". It is not simply an interpretation nor is it conjecture to see that one very good reason for that officer being chosen is that he would not fail to be understood. Given what we know from the extant sources, he was clearly understood: there was no infantry clash.

Curtius does that in the extract I mentioned. I have no problem offering arguments against my opinions. This is what a good discussion is about. But the incident Arrian describes is very different. The fact that Xenias is a man who speaks Macedonian does not imply anything else than Eumenes considering best to send someone who will make his enemy look past his not being Macedonian. Eumenes lived among Macedonians most of his life and certainly spoke Macedonian very well. He could have talked to the enemy himself, but he chose to send one of "the enemy". Why is this a worse interpretation of the event than your opinion that someone who has been serving with Macedonians all his life does not feel comfortable enough to understand them, especially, since you also believe that it was a different dialect rather than language?

George, where have I claimed "that it was a barbaric language"? I have claimed, based on the few attestations, that it was difficult for southerners to understand. Whether it be this site or another (I'm engaged in a similar discussion elsewhere), my metaphor remains: put an Orkney Islander and a Londoner in a bar and see how they communicate. Some will manage many will have difficulty.

As for the evidence, ancient writers do not bother to fill us in - on a great many things we'd like to know more of - about matters that they considered well understood by those for whom they wrote. There is no need for reporting today to note that sessions of the UN have real time translation for those involved because they all speak differing languages. When, in the ancient sources, such attestations do appear it is instructive how directly and strongly they are attacked or depricated.

You did not Michael, this is why I asked. I didn't know how to address your argument. I agree that sometimes it would be difficult to understand as is the case with all dialects. We know that sometimes it was difficult for a Dorian to understand Ionian... We also have to keep in mind that most possibly, there would have been a number of Macedonian subdialects, exactly as is the case with all other Greek dialects. I would suggest that the Lyncestai would probably have some differences from Macedonian proper. So, we do not really disagree here. The level of difficulty is unknown but in no way stressed by the ancients as a real problem.

As for evidence, I have to say that although you are partly right, we have lots of evidence concerning barbarians among Greeks. Tons of it. Those who propose that Macedonian was not a Greek dialect but a foreign language have to somehow account for the lack of this evidence.

Such fabrications were, as I noted, par for the course in ancient times. When it mattered, the ruling family of Lynkestis called the Argead Temenid hand and attempted to trump them with a royal lineage srpung from Corinth.

An Argive royal lineage - promulgated in the shadows of a Greek victory in the Persian Wars, a conflict in which Macedonia was a Persian "ally" having been a Persian vassal for some decades, cannot help but have political overtones. To say otherwise flies in the face of reason.

I do not think that there was any reason for Alexander I to claim Argead descent, nor would anyone accept such allegations if there was not a well-known story by then. Alexander's Macedonia was no powerhouse of the time, nor did he have anything to gain from such rumors apart from laughter and scorn, had his claims been so absurd. He could have claimed an older descent as most other Greeks did, lost someplace in the obscure past, rather than talk about a time 3-4 centuries back, involving well known figures, probably well documented by the Argives of the time. he could have claimed descent from Macedon, brother of Magnes, also documented at the time and his claim would have been as good, or Hercules or Achilles (the Orestai are also called a Mollosian tribe sometimes) You cannot hold the Greeks to be so naive as to uncritically accept such a claim. Have we any objections to that? Had this story circulated in the times of Herodot only, we would certainly have someone criticizing it. Of course, a story that was already accepted could be used politically as the Macedonians certainly did along with all other Greeks invoking their progenitors in various circumstances, so I agree that it was used politically by him and all other Macedonian rulers.

I don't believe I "criticised" these games. Devil's advocate and all.

You wrote :

More likely, given the institution of Macedonia's "own Olympics" (Dion) around the same time, it was time to refresh and retry a previously successful strategy? Fact is we have no conclusive evidence for any Macedonian king competing at the Olympics between Alexander I and Philip II.

Now, these games instituted by Archelaus had nothing to do with the Olympics. Your argument was used by Badian to question the participation of Macedonians in the Olympics as you did. Your calling them "their own Olympics" added to this idea. You know that the Greeks held many such games and actually this only serves as an argument that the Macedonians of Archelaus had a distinctively Greek culture. Do not forget that his games were attended by Greeks also...

As for Macedonian competitors, although we have only a very small fragment of the names of the contestants, Archelaus I, son of Perdiccas II also took part in the Olympics sometime in the late 5th century. (Solinus, Caii Julii Solini De Mirabilibus Mundi 9.16)

Methinks Macedon protesteth too much....

...So, then... now you got me baffled again... So, do you think they were barbarians after all? And why do you think that they "protesteth too much"? When did they protest except from the incident with Alexander I?