Map 22.1 Key sites mentioned in this essay.
The theme of this volume is the role of sport and spectacle in society, and, in the case of Macedonia, these topics are intertwined from the beginning, as well as inexorably connected with Macedonians’ ethnic identity. Although sources for early Macedonian history, beyond foundation legends, are sketchy, they deal primarily with the light thrown on the subject by the Persian interest in and invasions of Greece at the end of the Archaic period (700–480 BCE1). The key figure is King Alexander I “Philhellenos” (reigned c.495–c.450), who played a complex political game that included shifting alliances and allegiances with both Persians and Greeks. Alexander I used sport, and specifically the Olympics, to identify with the Greeks (or more importantly to permit them to identify with him). In a story recounted by Herodotus (5.22), which Herodotus claims to have heard personally from Alexander himself, Alexander had wanted to compete in the stadion race at the Olympics, but was challenged by the other Greek athletes on the grounds that he was not a Greek, but a barbaros.2 Alexander then claimed descent from the royal family (the Temenids) that in mythical times ruled the Greek city of Argos, and this was accepted by the Hellanodikai (the officials who presided over the Olympic Games, see Chapters 8 and 17). He was allowed to compete, but the race ended in a dead heat, and Alexander declined a rematch, giving up any chance of the victory. The fact that Alexander chose competing at Olympia as the method of declaring his own and his dynasty’s Greek ethnicity shows that sport and ethnicity were tied together from the start in Macedonia. Also, this challenge to the Greek ethnicity of both the Argead House and the Macedonians remained a leitmotif throughout the Classical period (480–323), and sport was one of the means by which Macedonia answered that ethnic question.
The history of sport, spectacle, and society in Macedonia started at the top and largely remained tied to the Argead House through the rest of the Classical period. The key figures, as with all else in this period, are Philip II (reigned 359–336) and Alexander the Great (reigned 336–323), and by extension the sources connected to them are also pivotal. In the Hellenistic period (323–31), although the number and breadth of extant literary sources drops off, the archaeological remains, inscriptions, and variety of sources grow remarkably and expand to include some of the best evidence that we have for community and sport in Greek history.
The majority of the sources for Macedonia, and for sport in Macedonia, down to the reign of Philip II are familiar to most students of Greek history. The historical narratives of Herodotus and Thucydides, both written in the fifth century, are important, though references to Macedonia are ancillary to their main themes. Xenophon’s Hellenika and the work of Athenian orators such as Demosthenes, Isocrates, and Aeschines, all produced in the fourth century, are useful, though they must be employed with caution. The Parallel Lives and the Moralia of Plutarch, who wrote in the latter part of the first and early part of the second centuries CE, are both valuable. Another important source, especially dealing with Olympia, is the Description of Greece written by Pausanias in the second half of the second century CE.
Some other important sources are less well known outside of specialists in Greek and Macedonian history. The Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus was written in the first century and is the only complete history of Greece to survive from the ancient world, but does so through a fourth century CE abridgement (the Epitome of Pompeius Trogus by Justin). Philip, Alexander, and Macedonia featured prominently in Trogus, and hence in Justin as well. Diodorus Siculus’s Library of History, also written in the first century, recounted events in both Greek and Roman history from the earliest periods to Diodorus’s own lifetime, but less than half of the work survives in complete form. Fortunately, this includes the events in Greece for the fifth and fourth centuries down to 301. Diodorus drew extensively on the work of contemporary historians and documents that are now lost to us. Justin and Diodorus, along with Plutarch, represent three of the five major sources for Alexander the Great. The other two are important texts that focus solely on Alexander’s reign. The first of those is Arrian, a second century CE Roman politician, general, and author, who wrote the Anabasis of Alexander and the Indica, which provide vital information on Alexander. Arrian also gives particularly important insights into Alexander’s interest in sport and spectacle. Finally, Quintus Curtius Rufus, a first century CE Roman politician and historian, wrote a History of Alexander that contains a good deal of useful material, especially on Macedonian customs, though the first two books of his account have not survived.
Finally, there is a remarkable (and growing) amount of archaeological evidence from excavated sites in Macedonia such as Vergina (ancient Aigai, the ancestral capital of Macedonia); Pella (the administrative capital of Macedonia from the late fifth century onwards); Dion (an important Macedonian religious site at the foot of Mt Olympos); Amphipolis (an important city on the border between Macedonia and Thrace that was incorporated into the Macedonian state by Philip II); and Demetrias (a large city and naval base near Thessaloniki) (see Map 22.1 for the locations of key sites mentioned in this essay). Among the numerous relevant inscriptions resulting from the archaeological finds, one stands out as overwhelmingly important: the Gymnasiarchal Decree from Beroia, a relatively small city in Macedonia. This inscription dates to the second century BCE and contains a virtually complete set of regulations for the operation of Beroia’s gymnasion. From all of these sources a remarkable amount of material on sport and spectacle can be retrieved, and it equally demonstrates the vital role these played in Macedonian society and its Greek ethnic self-identification.
Map 22.1 Key sites mentioned in this essay.
The sports program in Macedonia falls into two unequal categories: sports that reflect a Greek, indeed specifically Olympic program, and sporting events that were almost uniquely northern pastimes not reflected in the Olympic Games themselves. The first category has two elements: participation by Macedonians in the Olympics and other Panhellenic athletic contests held in central and southern Greece and Olympic style events held in Macedonia itself. Here the pattern is familiar, as it initially reflects the role of the kings. This begins with Alexander I and the stadion story found in Herodotus, mentioned earlier, but Justin also mentions that Alexander participated in “various Olympic events,” not just the stadion (7.2.14). Moreover, the poet Pindar, writing in the early fifth century and hence during Alexander’s lifetime, refers to an athletic victory by a son of Amyntas (“pai . . . Amynta”), which in this context can only be Alexander I (Fragments 120–1 Snell).3 Given the occasions for which Pindar’s poetry was written, it is probable that the victory in question was won at one of the major Panhellenic athletic festivals.
The next certain reference to this kind of participation involves King Archelaos (reigned 412–399). Solinus (9.16), a Latin grammarian of the third century CE, refers to Archelaos winning the tethrippon (the four-horse chariot race) at both the Olympic and the Pythian Games, which expands the royal sports program to include chariot racing.4 As we will see, Archelaos also had a considerable role in fostering Olympic-style sport inside Macedonia.
After Archelaos’s assassination in 399 Macedonia suffered a long period of serious political instability, and there is no record of any victories by Macedonians at the major Panhellenic festivals until the reign of Philip II, from which point we are on much stronger ground. Philip won victories in the equestrian events at Olympia on three separate occasions: in the horse race in 356 and in the four-horse chariot race in 352 and 348 (Plutarch Alexander 3.5 and 4.5; Moretti 1957: nos. 434, 438, and 445). According to Plutarch, Alexander the Great was a talented runner and was encouraged by both his friends and his father to compete in the Olympic Games (Alexander 4.5; Moralia 179b and 331b; see also Adams 2007: 125–6). Alexander did not run at Olympia, though he did sponsor a number of athletic competitions.
During the Hellenistic period Macedonian Olympic victors began to come from outside the royal family. After Alexander’s death Macedonians won the stadion at the Olympic Games on multiple occasions. A Macedonian named Antiochos won the event in 292 and 288, and another, Seleukos, did the same in 268 (Moretti 1957: nos. 527, 533, 543). This is an important point, as it means that acceptance of the Macedonians themselves, not just their kings, as Greeks was now sanctioned by the officials in charge of the Olympic Games. Macedonians from outside the royal family also began to compete in the equestrian events at Olympia. Lampos, from the town of Philippi, won the four-horse chariot race in 304 (Pausanias 6.4.10 and Moretti 1957: no. 498). A Macedonian woman, Belistiche, won the four-colt chariot race in 268 and the two-colt chariot race in 264 (Pausanias 5.8.11 and Moretti 1957: nos. 549, 552; see also Chapter 16 in this volume).
There is clear evidence, then, of Macedonians competing outside the kingdom in premier running events (the stadion), possibly the pentathlon, and in various equestrian events, but what of sport within the kingdom? Here we go back to Archelaos, who founded a festival in honor of Zeus and the Nine Muses at Dion. Arrian says that this festival included both musical and athletic contests, the latter designed specifically along the lines of the Olympic program (ta agones . . . ta Olympika) (Anabasis of Alexander 1.11.1).5 Unfortunately there is no record of whether all, or, alternatively, which part, of the Olympic program was held, but there may be some clues in the sources about other forms of athletic competitions that Macedonians seem to have particularly enjoyed.
Some insight on the range of sports played in Macedonia can be gleaned from an incident reported by Polyaenus, who in the second century CE produced a handbook that collected successful military stratagems employed in a variety of times and places. According to Polyaenus, Philip II was accosted by his soldiers regarding overdue pay while he was wrestling in the palaistra (wrestling compound) at Pella with one Menagetes, a famous pankratiast and boxer (Stratagems 4.2.6; on palaistrai, which frequently formed part of gymnasia, see Chapter 19). Philip avoided them by continuing his exercises and then jumping into a pool and swimming around until the soldiers tired and left. A palaistra and pool have been found next to one another in the royal quarters at Pella (Siganidou and Lilimpaki-Akamati 1997: 14–17), confirming the setting for the story and possibly its veracity.6 This would establish that all three disciplines (wrestling, boxing, and the pankration) were practiced in Macedonia.
Accounts of the military campaigns of Alexander the Great also provide relevant information. Athenaeus (12.539c) reports that two of Alexander’s generals, Perdikkas and Krateros, “being lovers of sport, always had in their baggage piles of goatskins that would cover a stadion . . . under cover of which they would exercise” (539c, trans. C. Gulick, slightly modified). The use of the term stadion, employed both as a unit of distance (600 feet) and a label for an athletic space of that size, to describe the exercise area used by Perdikkas and Krateros suggests that they were practicing track and field events such as running or throwing the javelin. Plutarch claims that Leonnatos, another of Alexander’s generals, transported on camels from Egypt special dust that he used while exercising (Alexander 40.1). Greek males typically stripped and applied a light coating of olive oil to their skin before exercise. Men who were going to wrestle or compete in the pankration (something akin to modern-day ultimate fighting) frequently sprinkled dust on top of the olive oil (see Chapter 13, which includes an excursus on athletic nudity). This story suggests that Leonnatos was fond of at least one of these sports. Evidence that this love of sports was widespread in the army comes from Strabo (15.1.67), who states that while Alexander’s army was in India large numbers of local craftsmen devoted themselves to making strigils (used to scrape oil off after exercise) and flasks for olive oil.
Similar evidence comes from archaeological sites in Macedonia. The palaistra at Pella has already been mentioned. Though no stadia have as yet been found at Pella, Aigai, or Dion, theaters, used for the musical contests that accompanied the athletic events at the festival for Zeus and the Nine Muses, have been excavated at Aigai and Dion (Andronikos 1984: 98; Borza 1990: 173–4, respectively). Excavations at Demetrias, a city founded by Demetrios Poliorketes when he was king of Macedonia in the early third century, have revealed a theater and one end of a stadium, which matches literary descriptions of the intermingling of athletic and dramatic contests at Dion (Batziou-Efstathiou 2002: 16 (overall plan), 25–6 (stadium), 33–6 (theater)).
The best physical evidence comes from Amphipolis, a city founded by Athens in 437 and incorporated into Macedonia by Philip II in the mid-fourth century. On the southern side of the acropolis there is an extensive athletic area, referred to by modern-day local residents as “the Steps,” where excavations have revealed a massive complex. This encompassed several structures including a palaistra, a paradromis (a covered track), and a sophisticated bath complex, in addition to the Steps themselves, which are part of a stadium or theater (Lazarides 1997: 14–20 and Winter 2006: 124–5).
The single most important piece of evidence for sport in Macedonia is an inscription, typically known as the Gymnasiarchal Decree of Beroia, that dates to c.180.7 This decree’s name is a modern appellation that reflects its contents, which include a number of provisions regarding Beroia’s gymnasiarch, a public official who was responsible for running a gymnasion (on gymnasiarchs, see Chapter 6). The decree, inscribed on two sides of a marble slab, states the reasons for (and proposal of) a law to govern community sponsorship of athletic training in an existing gymnasion. It lays out how to sponsor athletic training and choose officials who would manage the gymnasion (on Side A). On the reverse side it gives the regulations for dealing with paides (boys), neaniskoi (youths), and epheboi (young men in military training) who used the gymnasion;8 detailed provisions for the celebration at the gymnasion of an annual religious festival (the Hermaia) and accompanying athletic contests; and rules regarding the punishment of thefts committed at the gymnasion and the disposition of fines collected there.
The point was to display these regulations publicly and provide transparency for finances and fines as was done in other cities (Side A, ll. 5–9). The emphasis is mine, and there is every reason to assume that the “other cities” mentioned in the decree included communities in both Macedonia and the rest of the Greek mainland. There are references not only to Beroia’s gymnasion, but also to other palaistrai (alla palaistrai) not sponsored by public funds (Side B, l. 4). That points to the existence of sports complexes supported by the city, as well as private establishments. It also implies training for both running and wrestling events (and logically as well for boxing and the pankration). In terms of special activities, the decree refers to practice at the javelin and archery for the epheboi (Side B, ll. 10–11).
A special section deals with the festival of the Hermaia, in honor of Hermes (probably the patron deity of the city). This festival included contests in physique (euexia), discipline (eutaxia), and endurance (philoponia) (Side B, ll. 47–8).9 The most elaborate part of the decree deals with the lampadedromeia, a series of torch relay races for the paides and neaniskoi. The decree specifies prizes as well as procedures for choosing judges for the event and three leaders (lampadarchontes) for each team, with the leaders being responsible for supplying members of their team with oil for 10 days (Side B, ll. 59–84). Clearly this was the most important aspect of the Hermaia, probably the culminating events. Torch relay races, in which the winning team was the first to get a runner to the finish line (frequently an altar) with a lit torch, were not part of the Olympic program, but do show up in other Greek cities such as Athens (Kyle 1987: 190–3).10
The form and function of Beroia’s gymnasion and of the Hermaia are typically Greek, and the fact that the residents of Beroia sought to arrange athletic activities “as other cities do” indicates that this was not coincidental. In fact, the form sport took in Beroia in the second century shows every sign of having been typical of the Hellenistic world as a whole, including not only places such as Athens, but also Ai Khanum (Afghanistan) at the other end of the Hellenistic Greek world.11 Sport clearly was part of Greek ethnic “branding” both inside and outside of Macedonia.
This brings us to the subject of sporting events that were almost uniquely northern pastimes not reflected in the Olympic Games themselves. Plutarch states that Alexander liked to fight with staves (Alexander 4.11), which may have been a northern pastime perhaps fitting into the eutaxia exercises. Torch relay races, and especially the mounted versions, would fit this category. These were a feature of the contests staged by Alexander, and involving the army, during the campaigns in the East. Altogether Alexander put on some 15 of these sets of games (not counting the funeral games for Philip, his impromptu race around Troy in honor of Achilles, or his own funeral games). Usually these were intended to help the army to relax, though there were a number of occasions on which they served propaganda purposes and fit into the category of spectacle. Down to the point the army actually entered Persia proper, these contests usually involved horseback torch relays. After that these were replaced with agones hippika, equestrian contests without the torches, probably out of regard to Persian religious practice (Adams 2007: 135–7 and passim). There may have been other sports that were closely linked to Macedonia, as many regions had their own unique versions of sporting events, such as the Sicilian love of the apene (mule-cart races) and the kalpe (the dismount race, in which the rider ran alongside the horse for the last leg of the race) (see Chapter 12). By and large, however, the sports enjoyed by the Macedonians would have been much the same as those practiced among and within other parts of the Greek world.
To discuss “spectacle” properly in the Macedonian context, a definition is in order. In the Macedonian case, “spectacle” would probably involve (1) an occasion conceived on a grand scale and carried out in a proper setting, (2) the breadth of the elements involved, and (3) a deliberate purpose. The history of Macedonia provides many celebrations that fit this definition, and almost invariably sport was part of those celebrations.
Archelaos established the first and most enduring of these celebrations in the “Olympia,” a nine-day festival in honor of Zeus and the Muses. These festivities involved both athletic and dramatic contests (Anabasis of Alexander 1.11.1), but Arrian stresses that the athletic games were conducted in Olympic fashion (ton agona en Aigeis dietheke ta Olympia).12 Arrian describes Alexander the Great’s celebrations as coming at the end of the Balkan campaigns of 335, though these games were also intended to raise his men’s spirits “for the agones that lay ahead” in the Persian campaigns (Diodorus Siculus 17.16.3). Dio Chrysostom (Peri Basileia 2.2) sets a (fictional) dialogue between Philip and Alexander at Dion where they were “sacrificing to the Muses and celebrating the Olympic festival,” which “was an ancient institution in that country.” The timing and reasons for the celebration, even the descriptions, are similar, but the sites are different. The two separate locations present some difficulties, unless the dramatic competitions were held on one site (say Aigai) and the religious and athletic ones at the other (Dion). It is possible that they may have alternated sites, or that it was the presence of the king that mattered wherever it was held. Regardless, the “Olympic festival” provided the model for other spectacles, and the sources bear this out.
Another example of Macedonian spectacle is the marriage of Philip’s daughter, Cleopatra, in the spring of 336, and this time not in the context of the end of the campaigning season, but a prelude to one: Philip’s imminent invasion of the Persian Empire. Diodorus (16.91.5) states that Philip invited dignitaries from all over the Greek world to the lavish wedding celebrations, for which Philip planned fabulous dramatic contests (euchias agonas te mousikous). Diodorus also refers simply to “the games” (ton agonon, 16.92.1 and 5), which could easily denote athletic contests. But Philip had much more in mind: a grand parade of statues of the 12 Olympian deities, elaborately displayed, and followed by a thirteenth statue of Philip himself “enthroned among” them (16.93.5). The theater was packed, and Philip instructed his bodyguards to draw away as he came into the theater. As Philip entered, one of his bodyguards attacked and killed him. Not the spectacle Philip had in mind, but nevertheless revealing. It was meant as a grand gesture, mounted for the crowds, filled with feasting, wine and song, and games, all of which were done in the Greek fashion. Perhaps Alexander’s games at Aigai a year later were, in part, designed to erase the picture of Philip’s death, but regardless were equally designed as spectacle and a symbol of Macedonia’s Greek connections.
Alexander found many more occasions for spectacle. As mentioned, Alexander the Great put on games throughout his campaigns in the East. If one looks to the analogy of a Greek army as a mobile city, this was a Macedonian one, and the frequency with which games were mounted (15 times in 11 years) show that they were more than annual. Further, these games always involved sport, and frequently dramatic contests as well, fitting the Macedonian pattern. But on a number of occasions they went far beyond that. Following the long-drawn-out siege of Tyre in 332, Alexander sacrificed to Herakles and conducted a parade of his forces under arms. This was accompanied by a naval review in honor of Herakles, athletic games in the temple enclosure of Herakles, and a relay torch race (Arrian Anabasis of Alexander 2.24.6; cf. Diodorus Siculus 17.46.6). The point was to drive home Macedonian supremacy, for both the army in terms of its achievements and for the local population that had opposed it. Clearly, Philip’s festival at Aigai had its political point, and Alexander had learned the lesson.
Nor did it end there. When Alexander entered Egypt (still in 332), he sacrificed to the gods at Memphis and “held athletic and musical games” (Arrian Anabasis of Alexander 3.1.4). Arrian adds that “the most famous performers in both athletics and music came to him there from Greece.” In terms of spectacle, Alexander was raising the stakes, but also making it unmistakably Greek. The previous games had only involved the army as contestants. Now Alexander was using games as a display of Greek civilization. The next year, Alexander topped even this, once more at Tyre. He summoned ambassadors to him, and held athletic and dramatic contests, including dithyrambic choruses and whole tragedies (Plutarch Alexander 29.1) in a clear attempt not only to demonstrate Greek culture to those ambassadors, but arguably also to remind his army of who they were as they set out on what was hoped to be the final confrontation with Darius III. Plutarch states that these were performed brilliantly and that an Athenian actor, Athenodoros, was fined by Athens for missing the main Athenian dramatic festival, the Dionysia, which he had done deliberately in order to perform in Tyre. Alexander, therefore, chose this spectacle to set the scene for his campaign to defeat Darius, which he did later that summer of 331, and to make that effort clearly Greek.
Plutarch’s claim that Alexander had a dislike of the “race of athletes” (Alexander 4.11), is clearly dispelled by Alexander’s staging of games and his use of professional athletes in them. Indeed, there were a number of famous athletes on his staff (Adams 2007: 125). A famous incident that took place during Alexander’s eastern campaigns provided a spectacle (albeit restricted to the army) and involved a professional athlete, an Athenian named Dioxippos, who won an uncontested victory (akoniti) in pankration at the Olympics, probably in 336 (Moretti 1957: no. 458). Following an incident at a court function during the Indian campaign, one of Alexander’s hetairoi (companions – elite cavalry), Korrhagos, challenged Dioxippos to a duel (Quintus Curtius Rufus 9.7.16–22; Diodorus Siculus 17.100–1; see also Adams 2007: 127–9). Korrhagos was in full Macedonian panoply, while Dioxippos chose to fight naked, armed only with a club. The contest was short: Dioxippos ducked a thrown javelin, then knocked aside Korrhagos’s spear and broke the shaft, and as Korrhagos went for his sword, Dioxippos tripped him up and stepped on his neck. The Macedonians, including Alexander, went away angry, while the Greeks cheered.
The incident is frequently cited as an example of bad blood and ill feeling between Macedonians and Greeks in Alexander’s army, though as Dioxippos was an Athenian, one could argue equally it was bad will between Athens and Macedonia or (more plausibly) a personal animus between Dioxippos and some of Alexander’s hetairoi. Subsequently a plot by the losers brought a false charge of stealing against Dioxippos, and he took his own life. But Curtius notes that up to this point Dioxippos had been a favorite (gratus) of Alexander (9.7.16) and Alexander later regretted the death of an honorable man falsely accused. But the point here is that it was a staged event, a spectacle, with both contestants playing to the crowd for entertainment – although with unexpected results all around.
Though games were held through the rest of the campaign (three in India and one in Carmania), there were no more spectacles until the return to Persia proper from the Indian campaign. An elaborate set of games held at Ecbatana in 324 began with the usual sacrifices and involved both athletic and dramatic competitions, interspersed with feasting and drinking bouts (Arrian Anabasis of Alexander 7.14.1–2). During the course of these games Alexander’s friend and chiliarch (second in command), Hephaistion, took ill. On the seventh day of the competitions, while Alexander was attending the boys’ footrace, he was informed that Hephaistion was dying. That death provided what would be the last opportunity Alexander had to put on a spectacle: Hephaistion’s funeral games. Alexander intended them as a contemporary rival to the funeral games for Patroklos in the Iliad (on which see Chapter 3). Some three thousand professional competitors and artistic performers were summoned to put these on, again clearly on the familiar model of athletic and dramatic agones (Arrian Anabasis of Alexander 7.14.10) and again clearly Greek. Ironically, these professionals would also perform at Alexander’s own funeral games the next year.
The sources for the Hellenistic period do not yield the same kind of evidence for spectacles put on solely by Macedonian kings, and certainly not from within the kingdom. But Macedonian kings had taken advantage of the Panhellenic athletic festivals to provide a similar result before Alexander the Great. Alexander I Philhellenos’s Olympic story has already been told. Philip II presided at least twice over the Pythian Games, once represented by a delegate in 342, but in person in 338 (Adams 2008: 61–2). Alexander used the Olympics of 324 to issue a crucial decree requiring that all Greek cities receive back citizens who had been exiled, as well as his decree calling for divine honors for himself (Quintus Curtius Rufus 10.2.4–8; Diodorus Siculus 18.8.3–5). Cassander (reigned c.317–297) presided over the Nemean Games in 315, in order to demonstrate his mastery of Greece (Diodorus Siculus 19.64.1). Demetrios Poliorketes used the Isthmian Games of 301 to reestablish the Hellenic League founded by Philip in 338, and Demetrios’s grandson, Antigonos III Doson (reigned 229–221) refounded the Nemean Games in 222 following his victory at Sellasia (Polybius 2.70.4). These Panhellenic athletic festivals were established spectacles, which the Macedonian kings obviously used to make political points.
One last “spectacular” example to add to our list, though not itself an athletic event, was the circular structure, the Philippeion, constructed by Philip II just inside the entry to the main sanctuary at Olympia (Pausanias 5.20.10). This building was erected in the wake of the Battle of Chaironeia that gave Philip hegemony over most of mainland Greece. It contained statues of Philip and his family and was no doubt intended to make an enduring political point, perpetually connecting him and his family with Greece’s most important Panhellenic site. Spectacles and grand gestures, in the context of sport, were a mainstay of the Macedonian monarchy.
Our narrative of sport and spectacle in Macedonia started with the kings and royal family, simply because our first examples are from then and thus represent a logical place to start. But it is equally clear that the connection between the Macedonian kings, sport, and spectacle became a reflection of Macedonian society itself. Archelaos launched a broad Hellenizing program largely based on Athenian culture. Attic Greek was adopted as the language used at court and for decrees, as was Attic commercial law and ultimately standards of weights and measures. During the Peloponnesian War, Archelaos’s Macedonia became a refuge for Athenian artists, poets, and playwrights such as Agathon and Euripides (Borza 1993; Edson 1970: 39–42). And it was Archelaos who founded the “Olympia,” probably on the model of the Athenian Panathenaia. As such, sport became as much a vehicle for Hellenization as Attic language and Attic law.
The use of sport by the Argead royal house as a means of self-identification as Greeks, and to project this image of the royal house and the Macedonians to Greeks as Greeks, is clear and was ongoing. But the real success can be seen in the reign of Alexander the Great. The use of sport for his army on the march through Asia Minor and the Near East was not forced, but natural; it was their means of relaxation. Alexander did use it as spectacle as well, for propaganda purposes, but it was much more frequently used for the army’s own recreation and entertainment. It was even a means, once in Persia, of incorporating the Persians into the army, through the addition of gymkhana events (something for which the Macedonians and Persians shared a love).
One can argue that following Alexander there really is no question of Macedonia not being considered ethnically Greek, by themselves and by everyone else. Certainly the Near Eastern ethnic communities within the Hellenistic monarchies made no distinction, for them it would be the same as separating the Medes from the Persians would be for the Greeks. Nor did the Romans in the third and second centuries (the same time period as the Gymnasiarchal Decree) treat Macedonia as anything other than simply another Greek polity, just as they did Epirus, the Aitolian and Achaean Leagues, or the poleis of Athens and Sparta. This would lead Strabo (7.9) in the first century to state that “Macedonia, indeed, is part of Greece” (esti men ouv Hellas kai Makedonia).13
The final proofs of the socializing role of sport in Macedonia can be seen in the Macedonian athletes who competed and won at the Olympic Games. Even more telling is the Gymnasiarchal Decree of Beroia, a small town trying to be like the other towns in Macedonia and southern Greece by establishing an officially sanctioned, financed, and publicly governed athletic program, dating most likely from the period just after the dissolution of the Macedonian monarchy. As a result it can be taken as something they themselves wanted to do, not coming from any outside governing authority. The festival of the Hermaia was their own attempt at both sport and spectacle, and was part of the Macedonian social fabric, one that was Greek. The role of sport and spectacle in Macedonian society and ethnicity was a defining one.
NOTES
1 All dates are BCE unless stated otherwise.
2 Participation in the contests at ancient Olympia was limited to Greeks (see Chapter 8 in this volume). There has been considerable modern scholarly discussion about the story of Alexander competing at Olympia, not least stemming from the fact that no victor is named in the story (and hence it cannot be connected with any particular Olympiad). Since Alexander did not win, there was no record of his participation. For a full discussion, see Adams 2003: 205–6, and notes 5–12. The point here is that Alexander, regardless of the veracity of the tale, used sport to “brand” himself as a Greek.
3 Hammond 1979: 60 makes the case that this probably refers to a victory in the pentathlon, which fits nicely with Justin’s reference to Alexander competing in “various events” (Olympio certamine vario ludicorum genere contenderet). See also Kertész 2005: 123.
4 This reference has generated considerable controversy. For a discussion and references, see Adams 2008: 59–60. Among the treasures from the royal burials at Aigai is a bronze tripod, which bears the inscription “I am from the Games of Hera Argaia.” This prize from the athletic contests held at Argos has been dated to the reign of Perdikkas II (ruled 454–412), and may possibly have been won by him and passed down as an heirloom (Andronikos 1984: 164–6 and fig. 133). However, Perdikkas for most of his reign was preoccupied with struggles for survival against internal rivals and against the external powers of Sparta and Athens, so it is far from certain that he had the time or energy for sport. If the story about Alexander I and the Hellanodikai is not true, then some Macedonian king had to win recognition of the Argeads’s right to compete at Olympia. If there is no story of a challenge to Philip II as a competitor at Olympia (and given the context of his career and Demosthenes’ hostility to Philip there would have been), then Archelaos is the one most likely to have established the Argead claim.
5 For a complete discussion as to whether these were a “Counter Olympics” or just a representation and celebration of Greek sport inside Macedonia, see Adams 2003: 206–7 and 209–10. The former seems unlikely as musical competitions were not held at the Olympic Games, but they did form part of the Pythian and Isthmian Games as well as the Panathenaic Games in Athens. Given Archelaos’s interest in adopting both the Athenian dialect as the official language of the Macedonian court and parts of the Athenian law code, he may well have looked to the Panathenaic Games as a model. On the Panathenaic Games, see Chapter 10 and Kyle 1987: 33–9.
6 For a further reference to Philip II and a fondness for wrestling, see Plutarch Moralia 602d.
7 The authoritative publication of this inscription can be found in Gauthier and Hatzopoulos 1993, though see also Adams 1995; Cormack 1977: 139–50 and passim; and Potter 2012: 127–36. An English translation (and notes on the text) can be found in Lupu 2005: 249–68. Beroia was not a major town, comparable to Pella, Aigai, or Amphipolis, but that makes the decree even more valuable as evidence of a typical Macedonian community and therefore the ethnic identification by residents as being Greek.
8 On age-classes in Greek physical education, see Chapter 14.
9 On these contests, see Crowther 2004: 333–9.
10 The mounted torch relay race in honor of the Thracian Goddess Bendis, the event to which Socrates is hurrying in the opening lines of the Republic, demonstrates the importation of a northern Aegean practice into Athens.
11 Potter 2012 dedicates an entire chapter to Beroia (chapter 12, pp. 127–36) and opens with a description of the gymnasion at Ai Khanum in Bactria, clearly identifying the Beroia Decree with a broader Hellenistic phenomenon.
12 Arrian places Alexander’s games at Aigai, Diodorus at Dion.
13 See Adams 1995: 205–22 and passim and Adams 2005: 1–21. Strabo is making the statement to reinforce Macedonian Greek ethnicity because he is separating his discussion of Macedonia from Greece topographically.
REFERENCES
Adams, W. L. 1995. “Historical Perceptions of Greco-Macedonian Ethnicity in the Hellenistic Age.” Balkan Studies 36: 205–22.
Adams, W. L. 2003. “Other People’s Games: The Olympics, Macedonia, and Greek Athletics.” Journal of Sport History 30: 205–17.
Adams, W. L. 2005. Alexander the Great: Legacy of a Conqueror. New York.
Adams, W. L. 2007. “The Games of Alexander the Great.” In W. Heckel, L. Tritle, and P. Wheatley, eds., 125–38.
Adams, W. L. 2008. “Sport and Ethnicity in Ancient Macedonia.” In T. Howe and J. Reames, eds., 57–78.
Andronikos, M. 1984. Vergina: The Royal Tombs and the Ancient City. Athens.
Badian, E. 1994. “Herodotus on Alexander I of Macedon: A Study in Some Subtle Silences.” In S. Hornblower, ed., 107–30.
Batziou-Efstathiou, A. 2002. Demetrias. Athens.
Bloedow, E. 1998. “The Significance of the Greek Athletes and Artists at Memphis in Alexander’s Strategy after the Battle of Issus.” Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura Classica 59: 129–42.
Borza, E. 1990. In the Shadow of Olympus: The Emergence of Macedon. Princeton.
Borza, E. 1993. “The Philhellenism of Archelaus.” Archaia Makedonia 6: 237–44.
Borza, E. 1999. Before Alexander: Constructing Early Macedonia. Claremont, CA.
Brown, T. S. 1977. “Alexander and Greek Athletics, in Fact and Fiction.” In F. Schachermeyr and K. Kinzl, eds., 76–88.
Bugh, G., ed. 2006. The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World. Cambridge.
Carney, E. and D. Ogden, eds. 2010. Philip II and Alexander the Great: Father and Son, Lives and Afterlives. Oxford.
Cawkwell, G. 1978. Philip of Macedon. London.
Cormack, J. M. R. 1977. “The Gymnasiarchal Decree of Beroea.” Archaia Makedonia 2: 139–50.
Crowther, N. 2004. Athletika: Studies on the Olympic Games and Greek Athletics. Hildesheim.
Danien, E., ed. 1990. The World of Philip and Alexander: A Symposium on Greek Life and Times. Philadelphia.
Edson, C. 1970. “Early Macedonia.” Archaia Makedonia 1: 17–44.
Gauthier, P. and M. B. Hatzopoulos. 1993. La loi gymnasiarchique de Beroia. Athens.
Green, P. 1991a. Alexander of Macedon, 356–323 b.c.: A Historical Biography. Reprint of 1974 edition. Berkeley.
Green, P. 1991b. Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age. Berkeley.
Hammond, N. G. L. 1972–88. A History of Macedonia. 3 vols. Oxford.
Hammond, N. G. L. 1979. A History of Macedonia: 500–336 b.c. Vol. 2. Oxford
Hammond, N. G. L. 1994. Philip of Macedon. London.
Hatzopoulos, M. and L. Loukopoulou. 1980. Philip of Macedon. Athens.
Heckel, W. and L. Tritle, eds. 2009. Alexander the Great: A New History. Malden, MA.
Heckel, W., L. Tritle, and P. Wheatley, eds. 2007. Alexander’s Empire: Formulation to Decay. Claremont, CA.
Hornblower, S., ed. 1994. Greek Historiography. Oxford.
Howe, T. and J. Reames, eds. 2008. Macedonian Legacies: Studies in Ancient Macedonian History and Culture in Honor of Eugene N. Borza. Claremont, CA.
Jensen, J., G. Hinge, P. Schultz, et al., eds. 2009. Aspects of Ancient Greek Cult: Context, Ritual and Iconography. Aarhus.
Kertész, I. 1999. “New Aspects in the Connections between Macedonia and the Ancient Olympic Games.” Archaia Makedonia 6: 579–85.
Kertész, I. 2005. “When Did Alexander I Visit Olympia?” Nikephoros 18: 115–26.
Kertész, I. 2010. “Some Considerations on the Historical Background of the Olympic Games in 300 BC.” Nikephoros 23: 163–70.
Kyle, D. 1987. Athletics in Ancient Athens. Leiden.
Lazarides, D. 1997. Amphipolis. Athens.
Lupu, E. 2005. Greek Sacred Law: A Collection of New Documents. Leiden.
Miller, S. 2004. Arete: Greek Sports from Ancient Sources. 3rd ed. Berkeley.
Moretti, L. 1957. Olympionikai: i vincitori negli antichi agoni olimpici. Rome.
Potter, D. 2012. The Victor’s Crown: Greek and Roman Sport from Homer to Byzantium. Oxford.
Rhodes, P. J. 2010. “The Literary and Epigraphic Evidence to the Roman Conquest.” In J. Roisman and I. Worthington, eds., 23–40.
Roisman, J. and I. Worthington, eds. 2010. A Companion to Ancient Macedonia. Malden, MA.
Romano, D. 1990. “Philip of Macedon, Alexander the Great, and the Ancient Olympic Games.” In E. Danien, ed., 63–79.
Schachermeyr, F. and K. Kinzl, eds. 1977. Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean in Ancient History and Prehistory: Studies Presented to Fritz Schachermeyr on the Occasion of his Eightieth Birthday. Berlin.
Schultz, P. 2009. “Divine Images and Royal Ideology in the Philippeion.” In J. Jensen, G. Hinge, P. Schultz, et al., eds., 205–33.
Scott, M. 2010. Delphi and Olympia: The Spatial Politics of Panhellenism in the Archaic and Classical Periods. Cambridge.
Siganidou, M. and M. Lilimpaki-Akamati. 1997. Pella: Capital of Macedonians. 2nd ed. Athens.
Winter, F. 2006. Studies in Hellenistic Architecture. Toronto.
Worthington, I. 2008. Philip II of Macedonia. New Haven.
GUIDE TO FURTHER READING
The seminal work for ancient Macedonian history can be found in Hammond 1972–88. Two good recent volumes contain an array of articles on various aspects of ancient Macedonia and the Hellenistic world: Roisman and Worthington 2010 and Bugh 2006.
For the period down through Philip II, Borza 1990 and 1999 are the best introductions to the subject, especially in terms of the archaeology. On Alexander I, see Borza 1993 and Badian 1994. On Philip, Cawkwell 1978 and Hammond 1994 remain essential, and Hatzopoulos and Loukopoulou 1980 offer an excellent collection of articles by outstanding scholars on various aspects of Philip’s career and life. Much interesting work on Philip continues to appear; see, for instance, Carney and Ogden 2010 and Worthington 2008, and the bibliography cited therein. The already prodigious body of scholarship on Alexander continues to grow each year. Green 1991a is arguably still the best single volume work on Alexander, and his magisterial Alexander to Actium (1991b) is equally invaluable. See also now, for example, the articles in Heckel and Tritle 2009.
On the sources for Macedonian history, see Rhodes 2010.
Potter 2012 is an excellent introduction to ancient sport in general, and covers specific Macedonian and Hellenistic topics. Miller 2004 is the single best sourcebook, and includes a complete translation of the Gymnasiarchal Decree of Beroia. There are no book-length studies of Macedonian sport, but there has been considerable discussion of this topic in shorter works, including Adams 2003, 2007, 2008; Bloedow 1998; Brown 1977; Kertész 1999, 2005, 2010; and Romano 1990. The gymnasiarchal law from Beroia has attracted a good deal of attention. The authoritative publication can be found in Gauthier and Hatzopoulos 1993, but see also Cormack 1977 and Lupu 2005: 249–68. Lupu provides a list of the relevant bibliography up through 2005. See now also Potter 2012: 127–36. On the Philippeion at Olympia, see Scott 2010: 210–14 and Schultz 2009 and the bibliography cited therein.