4 ms·

This alleged historical article calls Alexander the Great Greek. He is Macedonian. Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and d

This alleged historical article calls Alexander the Great Greek. He is Macedonian. Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and different alphabet. Would you take an alleged historical article on Stalin if the article mentioned Stalin to be German or that Cleopatra was Spanish. Macedons invaded and took over the Greek kingdoms: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonia_(ancient_kingdom) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonia_(ancient_kingdom)

varjag 5y ago
This is undermined a lot by sheer will of modern Greeks to fight tooth and nail for the name of Macedonia.
- buescher 5y ago
  It's a controversy that predates Alexander. It won't get settled on HN.
turndown 5y ago
As we are being pedantic, technically Alexander the Great was Greek by standards of his time, since he could trace his lineage back to Alexander I, who had to prove they were a descendant of a Greek man in order to participate in the Olympic Games.
hallarempt 5y ago
Whatever calls itself "macedonian" these days is completely unrelated to what used to live there BC.
phonypc 5y ago
>Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and different alphabet. Sure but... Alexander and his countrymen didn't speak that language or use that alphabet, and were not of that people. You might as well say he was an Ottoman Turk, or a Roman.
mannerheim 5y ago
> different alphabet Where is the source on this? According to this[0]: > The surviving public and private inscriptions found in Macedonia indicate that there was no other written language in ancient Macedonia but Ancient Greek So Macedonia was a kingdom where the aristocracy spoke Attic and later Koine Greek, and the vernacular being either a Greek dialect or other Hellenic language. So the written language would have been Attic/Koine. Alexander, being royalty, would have spoken and written in Attic/Koine Greek. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Macedonian_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Macedonian_language
YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
>> Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and different alphabet. To clarify, are you talking about modern Macedonians, or ancient Macedonians? The modern Macedonians speak a language similar to Bulgarian and use the Cyrilic alphabet, both of which were not around in the time of Alexander.

varjag 5y ago

This is undermined a lot by sheer will of modern Greeks to fight tooth and nail for the name of Macedonia.

buescher 5y ago
It's a controversy that predates Alexander. It won't get settled on HN.

turndown 5y ago

As we are being pedantic, technically Alexander the Great was Greek by standards of his time, since he could trace his lineage back to Alexander I, who had to prove they were a descendant of a Greek man in order to participate in the Olympic Games.

hallarempt 5y ago

Whatever calls itself "macedonian" these days is completely unrelated to what used to live there BC.

phonypc 5y ago

>Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and different alphabet. Sure but... Alexander and his countrymen didn't speak that language or use that alphabet, and were not of that people. You might as well say he was an Ottoman Turk, or a Roman.

mannerheim 5y ago

> different alphabet Where is the source on this? According to this[0]: > The surviving public and private inscriptions found in Macedonia indicate that there was no other written language in ancient Macedonia but Ancient Greek So Macedonia was a kingdom where the aristocracy spoke Attic and later Koine Greek, and the vernacular being either a Greek dialect or other Hellenic language. So the written language would have been Attic/Koine. Alexander, being royalty, would have spoken and written in Attic/Koine Greek. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Macedonian_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Macedonian_language

YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago

>> Macedonians are a completely different people with a different language and different alphabet. To clarify, are you talking about modern Macedonians, or ancient Macedonians? The modern Macedonians speak a language similar to Bulgarian and use the Cyrilic alphabet, both of which were not around in the time of Alexander.