Macedonia History

In 1818, a lumber merchant tasked with removing scrap wood from the land which had been the Emperor Hadrian’s villa outside Rome, discovered a wooden crate among the lumber on the estate. The crate was carefully opened. Inside was a broken slate tablet with an overlay of dimly visible colors underneath a thick and dust-encrusted varnish. It was difficult to discern the image, but the 16 pieces fit together like a puzzle. Painters were called in to remove the thick, mottled layers of varnish. Colors with an amazing brilliance and polished finish began to emerge. The astonishing picture slowly revealed a figure of a young, beautiful woman clad in a crimson tunic, with a jeweled golden crown. Matching the crown were a set of earrings, necklace and pendant on her forehead that were inlaid with rubies and emeralds, and the jewelry had fine pearls mounted on the edges. A gold armband with pearls suspended on gold chains and a bracelet of gold were on her right arm. But...

The fame of Alexander the Great changes but grows apace. Google offers a million hits. The 30-ton bronze equestrian statue unveiled at Skopje, Macedonia (Hürriyet Daily News, June 16), shows his power to fascinate and provoke controversy – Greece claims both the name Macedonia and Alexander as a native son. Turkey, where he launched his intercontinental career, is only the latest name and political organization of that land where he leapt ashore in May 334 BCE, at 22 already a proven king, with 160 ships and some 40,000 Macedonian and Greek foot soldiers and cavalry. This was a millennium and a half before the Turks entered Anatolia militarily, 1071, from the other, the eastern end and by land. While his unwieldy force was crossing the Dardanelles, to face the waiting Persian armies on the Asian side, Alexander himself with 60 ships detoured slightly south, in order to land first at Troy, as according to Homer’s epic The Iliad (Ilium the Greek name for Troy) the Achaean Greeks...