THE BALKANS AND MACEDONIA
The eastern coast of Asia Minor also belongs to the Aegean culture. This peninsula is an integral part of Western Asia, and is located between four seas: the Black, the Marmara, the Mediterranean and the Aegean, with an area of 506.600 km 2.
The Aegean Migration, also known as the Doric-Hellenic or Pannonian-Balkan Migration, marked major movements of peoples at the end of the 2nd millennium BC in the southern Balkans in the Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean. During these migrations, many cities in Pannonia, Thrace, Macedonia and the Greek mainland were destroyed. In Asia Minor, the powerful Hittite Empire in Anatolia was destroyed, as were several cities on the Aegean coast, then cities on Cyprus and the borders of the Egyptian Empire were encroached upon. These migrations were initiated by Indo-European peoples during the last decades of the 13th-12th centuries BC, namely the Scythians-Illyrians and the Dorians-Hellenic in the Central and Western Balkans, and in the Eastern Balkans by the Thracian tribes.
Asia Minor has long been inhabited. One of the oldest settlements before the Ceramic Neolithic in Anatolia is the site of Asikli Hiyik, dated between 7000-6600 BC. 1 Within the framework of these studies, the western Aegean coast of Asia Minor attracts more attention, where there are numerous archaeological sites related to the Aegean culture. Here, first of all, Blegen's Troy comes into consideration, where a total of nine main settlements have been identified (Troy I-IX). The first seven settlements belong to the Bronze Age 3000-1100 BC. Papastavrou 2 believes that the bearers of that culture were the tribes from Pannonia, creators of the Dimini culture in Thessaly, between the 5th and 4th millennium BC. These were the Aeolians (Minians, Lapiths, Macedonians, Phlegians, etc. from Pannonia). Troy VII, between 1100-700 BC, was an Aeolian city. It was finally destroyed around 1100 BC.
1 Srejović, D. Archaeological lexicon, v. 78, Contemporary Administration, Belgrade, 1997.
2 Papastavrou, I.: Istoria tis Arhaias Ellados , p. 16, Hiotelli, Athens, 1972.
Prehistoric peoples of the Asia Minor coast of the Aegean
Hittites
The Hittites or Hittites (Hettaioi), or Arzawani, about whom little was known until the 19th century, were a mixture of peoples from Asia Minor and are thought to have migrated from the southern Russian steppes and the Caucasus around 2900 BC. 3 The Hittites were industrious pastoralists. They spoke an Indo-European language. Their empire in the 14th and 13th centuries BC was extensive. It encompassed the continental part of Asia Minor, with its capital at Hattusha (Bogaz-kioi) in southwestern Cappadocia, as well as most of Syria. Powerful Hittite kings, such as Mursil II (1345–1315), Suppiluli I (1300–1334), Mursil III (1333–1309 BC), etc., had an international reputation.
3 Cavaignac, 1936; Macqueen, JG: The Hittites and their contemporaries in Asia Minor, p. 27, London, 1986.
The Hittite social order was patriarchal. They were known for their use of cuneiform script and two-wheeled chariots. The Hittites gave the ethnonym Ahiyava to the people of Thessaly Phthia, whom Homer calls the Achaeans. Their empire disappeared around 1200 BC with the invasion of the Brygians into the Balkans. 4
4 Macqueen, JG: The Hittites and their contemporaries in Asia Minor, London, 1986.
Luwians
The Luwians were a people of Indo-European origin. Their state was in Asia Minor, south of the Maeander River, present-day Arzawa. Luwian was conquered by the Hittite king Laburnus, who is considered the founder of the Hittite dynasty in 1600 BC. 5
5 Papastavrou, I.: Istoria tis Arhaias Ellados, p. 162, Hiotelli, Athens, 1972.
Archaeological research in what is now Beyçesultan, Turkey, has revealed the oldest settlements dating back to the beginning of the 5th millennium BC, megarons, as well as a palace that was destroyed in 1700 BC. It is believed that its inhabitants then abandoned their homeland and fled to Crete and other Aegean islands, bringing with them their culture, language and script known in glossology as Linear A / Papastevrou , 1972, 22/. 6
6 Papastavrou, I.: Istoria tis Arhaias Ellados, p. 22, Hiotelli, Athens, 1972.
It is also believed that the Luwian language is one of the substrata of the language of the "Aegean civilization" before the arrival of the Hellenes. 7 In later periods, the Luwians of Crete are referred to as Eteocrates /Eteocrates/, i.e. true Cretans.
7 Macqueen, JG: The Hittites and their contemporaries in Asia Minor, p. 35, London, 1986.
Kartsi (Herodotus, Hippocrates, Mausolus, Artemisia)
In prehistoric times, the Kares or Kari (Kares) were the inhabitants of Caria, a province in the southwestern part of Asia Minor, south of the Maeander River, north of Rhodes. They are often identified with the Leleges. Herodotus 8 considers the Leleges to be one of the Carian tribes and that they were good sailors. They were one of the most important peoples of their time. The Kares inhabited most of the islands in the Aegean: Samos, Chios, Del, Kos, Naxos, the Cyclades, etc., while in the Peloponnese: Epidaurus, Troezen, Ermion, and in Attica – Megara. 9.
9 Thomson, G.: I Arhaia Eilliniki Koinonia-to Proistoriko Algaio , p. 115, Athena, 1954.
Larger cities in Caria were Miles, Pedas, Myunt, Miletus and Halicarnassus. One of the oldest and most important was Miletus, which was inhabited before 1600 BC, and experienced great prosperity between the 8th and 6th centuries BC, when they established trade relations with Egypt and Libya. These connections also contributed to the transfer of knowledge of geometry and astronomy and other sciences from Egypt to Miletus and the creation of the "Miletian school", which produced the philosophers Thales, Anaximenes, Anaximander and others.
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The city of Halicarnassus in Caria, during the migration of the Dorians-Hellenes, became an important colony in which the Carians constituted 50% of the population. 11 The Dorians in this part of Caria and the neighboring islands formed the "Dorian League" consisting of: Halicarnassus, Lindus, Iallis, Camirus, Cos and Cnidus and celebrated the Tropical Sanctuary of Apollo. Due to some desecration of the sanctuary, Halicarnassus was excluded from the society.
11 Papastavrou, I,: Istoria tis Arhaias Ellados, p. 53, Hiotelli, Athens, 1972.
Among the notable figures in this part of Caria are Herodotus, Hippocrates, Mausolus, and Artemisium.
Herodotus (Herodotos), the "father of history", was born around 480 BC and died around 431 BC, in Athens. Thomson 12 believes that Herodotus was of Carthaginian origin, because the onomastics of his father Lyxes and uncle Panuasis are not of Hellenic origin. Herodotus is, of course, one of the greats who belong to the entire cultural world and one of the most interesting and significant world writers, the founder of the entire ancient historical science. Without Herodotus's "Histories" it is not possible to reconstruct prehistory and the ancient world, but Herodotus is also important for the oldest Slavic history, because he left the first data about the ancestral homeland of the Slavs and its then inhabitants, the Scythians, and about Heracles' son Scythus, king of all the Scythians and founder of the Macedonian Argead dynasty, Alexander the Great.
12 Thomson, G.: I Arhaia Eilliniki Koinonia-to Proistoriko Algaio , p. 112, Athena, 1954.
Hippocrates was born in Caria, on the island of Kos, where he spent most of his life (460-377 BC). He traveled a lot, was in Athens, and died in Larissa in Thessaly, near Trikala, where the god Asclepius was born, one of the most famous and important doctors from the Ascepiadi family and is considered the "father of medicine". Hippocrates is the author of the collection Corpus Hippocraticum, which contains more than 100 books, in which he presents diagnoses, treatment and prognosis of diseases. He believed that nature is the best doctor ("the doctor takes care, but nature heals"). He placed great emphasis on the moral and ethical side of the medical profession, and in this regard his oath and aphorism "life is short, but the art of healing is long" are famous.
Mausolus (Mayssollos) belonged to the Sara royal dynasty of Caria. During the reign of Xerxes (485-465 BC), Hecatom was king of Caria, and he was succeeded by Mausolus, around 360 BC, who was satrap of Caria. He was married to his sister Artemisia (Artemisia) with whom he had no children. After his death, his wife succeeded him.
Artemisia erected a tombstone for her husband in Halicarnassus, the "Mausoleum", one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
Herodotus mentions another queen of Caria named Artemisia, daughter of Lygdamis, who fought at Salamis in 480 BC, on the side of Persia, with five ships, and "... she went into war out of rage and heroism, although she did not have to..." After the battle, Xerxes said of her: "men became women, and women men."
Lycia
In prehistory and antiquity, Lycia /Lykia/ was a mountainous region in Asia Minor, west of Caria, between the Mediterranean Sea, Pamphylia and Phrygia. It was formerly called Milias /Milyas/ and Solymi /Solymi/. The ethnonym Lycians /Lykioi/ comes from the Paleo-Balkan word lykos /lykos/ – wolf, a symbol of the Hyperborean goddess Leta and her son Apollo.
Herodotus 13 , however, points out that the ethnonym Lycians and the horonym originate from Lycus of Athens, son of the ancient king Pandion, eighth king of Athens, of Pelasgian origin. He was exiled from his homeland by his brother Aegeus, and hid in Asia, among the Termili, with King Sarpedon, of Phoenician origin from Crete. Later, Sarpedon's subjects the Termili, according to Lycus, were called Lycians. In literature, the names Termili or Tremili are synonymous with Lycia. From the reign of Pharaoh Ramses II (1317-1251 BC), they were called Luki.
13 Herodotus, History , I, 173, Matica Srpska, Belgrade, 1988.
The capital of the Lycians was Xanthos (Hanthos) on the river of the same name, and the community consisted of a union of cities. The Xanthos River flows into the Mediterranean Sea, and is called Sirbes and Sirbios by the surrounding inhabitants. 14 These names Sirb and Sirbos are associated with the Serbian ethnonym and the city of Srb in Lika, Croatia. At the mouth of this river there was a city of the same name, formerly called Arina, as well as numerous archaeological remains of various monuments.
14 Senc. St.: Grčko-Hrvatski rjecčnik , s. 641, Cr. Zemaljaka tiskara, Zagreb, 1910.
Under the name Xant there was also a river near Troy, later named Scamander, now Menderesu. In mythology, there is a river god Xantho. Among the ancient Macedonians, Xant is the god of light, while Xanic was the name of a month in the year. The word 'xant' belongs to Paleobalkansakta glossology, and modern linguists indicate that it is of unknown origin. Its meaning is chestnut, blue, yellow, blond.
In the Trojan War (1193-1183 BC), the Lycians were on the side of the Trojans, along with their relatives the Lydians, Etruscans, Phrygians, Mysians, etc.
The mythological connections of the Lycians with Pannonia, their ancestral homeland, are interesting. Hesiod in the 7th century BC in Theogony 15 states that the Hyperborean Leto, when she conceived the divine twins with the god Zeus, gave birth on the Cycladic island of Del. With the help of the goddess of childbirth Eileia, also a Hyperborean, Leto gave birth to the god Apollo and the goddess Artemis. After giving birth, Leto left the island of Del and went to Lycia. Here she tried to drink water and bathe her children in a spring, but the shepherds chased her away. Then the wolves showed her the way to the Xantho River. Leto dedicated this river to Apollo, who was also the god of light among the Hyperboreans, while she turned the evil shepherds into frogs. After the wolves who showed her the way, she named the whole country Lycia.
15 Hesiodus, Fragmenta & Theogonia, p. 404 and onwards
Leta was an independent deity in Lycia, whose cult is attested in several places in Asia Minor. At the same time, Apollo was a god of the Lycians, as "Lycian Apollo", with numerous sanctuaries.
One of the priests and a famous poet was Olen . He was the first to sing in his hymn "Achaea" the Hyperborean maidens Arga and Ophia, who came with the gods to the island of Del to help the goddess Eileithyia to give birth to Leta more easily. In addition to the goddess Leta, Apollo in Lycia also had the nickname "Hyperborean Apollo". Herodotus 16 points out that from the Hyperborean maidens Arga and Ophia, the women of the island of Del and the Ionians learned to sing the Hyperborean songs with which they glorified the goddess Leta.
16 Herodotus, History, IV, 173, Matica Srpska, Belgrade, 1988.
In the 12th century BC, one of the Lycians, along with the Carians and other peoples, migrated to the areas of Palestine, where they were later known as the Philistines. 17
17 Thomson, G.: I Arhaia Eilliniki Koinonia-to Proistoriko Algalo , p. 110, Athena, 1954
The Lycians, after 549 BC, lived under the rule of the Persians, paid taxes and soldiers, but were fairly independent in their mountains. In the wars of Persia against the Greeks, in 490-479 BC, the Lycians were part of the Persian army. They brought 50 warriors and wore armor and leggings, dogwood bows, reed arrows and throwing spears. They wore goat skins over their shoulders, and on their heads hats with plumes around them, and in addition, they had knives and curved swords. 18 They spoke the Paleo-Balkan language, otherwise in the 7th-6th BC they would not have become kings of the Ionian provinces. They wrote in the Phoenician script. Alexander the Great liberated them only in 334 BC.
18 Herodotus, History, VII, 92, Matica Srpska, Belgrade, 1988.
To be continued
Written by: ACADEMICIAN A. SHKOKLYEV-DONCHO AND SLAVE KATIN
