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Bosnians are Illyrians
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Message 1.Β
Posted by piramidosta (U9587840) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Bosnians are Illyrians
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PROFESOR JOHN WILKES OF UNIVERSITY OF LONDON HAS RECENTLY ESTABLISHED THAT BOSNIANS ARE ILLYRIANS - AN ANCIENT EUROPEAN PEOPLE. IT WAS PREVIOUSLY BELIEVED THAT ALBANIANS ARE ILLYRIANS. HOWEVER, HE FOUND OUT THAT ROMANIZATION, HELLENIZATION OR SLAVENIZATION OF THE ILLYRIANS HAS NEVER TAKEN PLACE
Amazon comment:
"Wilkes is the foremost LIVING authority on the Illyrians. His is the LATEST comprehensive work on the Illyrian people. In his book, "The Illyrians", John Wilkes states on pg: 219:
"NOT MUCH RELIANCE SHOULD PERHAPS BE PLACED ON ATTEMPTS TO IDENTIFY AN ILLYRIAN ANTHROPOLOGICAL TYPE AS SHORT AND DARK SKINNED SIMMILAR TO MODERN ALBANIANS."
Wilkes has been proven CORRECT by science when the Human Genome Project's Y-chromosome study of European populations, confirmed that the vast majority of contemporary Albanians do not share an Illyrian or any Indo-European linneage - they are mostly a pre-IE Mediterranean population.
John Wilkes correctly puts Illyrian descendants among contemporary ex-Yugoslavs, centered around Montenegro and Bosnia and branching out into Dalmatia and south-western Serbia. Wilkes hints that ex-Yugoslavs are slavicized Illyrians and he leans on C.S Coon who insists that Albanians are of mixed Slavic, Thracian, Turkish, Armenoid and Illyrian origin.
This work was published in 1991 and based on the newest excavations undertaken in ex-Illyria. Wilkes brings out plenty of the most recent archaeological and anthropological evidence which other's in his field did not have access to.
Ten years after he published this work, the Human Genome Project's Y-chromosome study proved him correct. Modern science has dealt a huge blow to Albanian attempts to usurpe the Illyrian legacy. He was a decade ahead of his time. Because of his work, many academics within Albania have also come out in favour of accepting the new findings; namely: Kaplan Resuli, Fatos Lubonja, Ardian Qosi and Ardian Vebiu. They are joined by many international critics of the now debunked Albanian-Illyrian theory: Paul, Hirt, Weigand, Tomashek, Georgiev, Pushcariu and many others.
Read this book. Keep in mind that it is based on evidence older works did not have access to and keep in mind that science has proven Wilkes correct ten years after he published this long-overdue honest and objective, thorough analysis of the legacy of one of Europe's oldest civilizations. The Albanians can no longer unjustly monopolise a whole people as they have done in the past."
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BUT THE STORY IS GETTING A NEW TWIST: THE SO-CALLED "BOSNIAN PYRAMIDS" THAT RECENTLY (2006-2007) CAUGHT ATTENTION OF THE WORLD MEDIA (CNN, MSNBC, FOX, REUTERS, AP) ARE ACTUALLY A WORK BY THE ILLYRIANS AND THE ROMANS ACCORDING TO DR. MENSUR OMERBASHICH OF BERKELEY:
"Two great misconceptions, mostly malicious (nationalist-chauvinist-driven), reign the historical sciences in the western-Balkans for the last two and a half centuries. The first misconception concerns the never-ending disputation between the Albanian and the Serbian school. While the former school claims Albanians to be the last (only authentic?) surviving Illyrians, the latter claims not only that Albanians are Thracians (i.e., not Illyrians) but it also says that no such people as Illyrians has ever existed, instead contending that the locals were all Slav/Serb because ancient sources are filled with references to "sclavs" and "serfs"... The second misconception is related to the first, and it concerns the issue of who the Slavs were (or weren't) in the Balkans before the national awakening of the 18th century...
The reason for the two schools being so unapologetic lies in the possible answers to the crucial question they thus pose: Whose is the western Balkans? But being so extreme, neither of those two views seems very authentic; besides, no other interested parties living in the area have ever been asked for their opinion on the above two fundamental disputes that can (and do - as we speak) have great repercussions on lives of millions. At the same time, both schools oppose wholeheartedly and fight fiercely any idea of Bosnia-centered Illyria, even though the idea is supported by a world's leading authority on Illyrians, Professor of Roman and Greek archaeology John Wilkes (the author of "The Illyrians", Oxford Press 2000).
The first dispute is dealt with easily just by stacking ancient maps in time. Thus by looking at the Ptolemy's Map [on the left] one can see that (province of) Illyria was alive and well just around year 100 AD, i.e. about the time the legend of Christ took roots. Following the situation as it developed, some centuries later there it is yet again [on the right] - amongst other Roman provinces including the conquered Dacia (today's Romania). What's curious about this however is that of all the provinces shown on the maps, only the detailed records on how Illyria was conquered are missing, unlike say the well-documented conquest of Dacia (see article of 26 August). However, it's not just that military papers are mysteriously lost, but according to Wilkes "even today Illyrians barely make the footnotes in most versions of ancient history" as well. Indeed, with exception of a partly preserved appendix on Illyrian wars, by Appian of Alexandria (95-165 AD), there is virtually no complete account available on (the conquest of) Illyria!
Wilkes supports the concept of a Bosnia-centered Illyria, proposing that it's actually Bosnia, not Albania, which was (the center of) Illyria. This is also obvious from the maps shown here. It's rather a mystery how Bosnia, so prominent and nearby the Rome itself, could have gotten omitted from most texts from/on the Roman Empire. He writes of Illyrians:
(1) "...A separate group of Illyrians identified by renowned historian Geza Alfoldy: he identifies 'Pannonian peoples' in Bosnia, northern Montenegro [around Pljevlja and Prijepolje, p.84] and western Serbia [SandΕΎak]". p.75
(2) "Not much reliance should perhaps be placed on attempts to identify an Illyrian anthropological type as short and dark-skinned similar to modern Albanians." p.219
(3) "...a documented description of Illyrians, Pannonian family: -Pannonians are tall and strong, always ready for a fight and to face dangeour but slow-witted." p.219
(4) "Life has always been hard in the Illyrian lands and countless wars of resistance against invaders are testimony to the durability of their populations." p.220
(5) "In sum, the destructive impact [of Bosnia-centred theory] on the earlier generalizations regarding Illyrians should be regarded as a step forward." p.40.
The Illyrians-Bogomils-Bosniaks continuity is self-evident as the above finds coincide with the settlements of today's Bosniaks (the Muslims of the Balkans). Note ancient maps [above] corroborating the early Antiquity-Ottoman Empire continuity too: there [left] you can see that, of the entire western Balkans, only Bosnia was called Illyria (proper) with own Sea called Illyricum Mare (part of a larger, Adriatic - Emperor Hadrian's Sea). It can be also seen that during the whole time of their independence, Illyrians had a coast from today's Dubrovnik to Ε ibenik. This simply continued (wasn't given to Bosnia by anyone!) during the entire period of Middle Ages [right], after the Holy Sea helped establish Kingdom of Bosnia just like many other European kingdoms that Vatican designed so to replace the fallen Roman Empire with a kingdoms-padded geopolitical shield protecting Rome for millennia to come - if you can't have one huge empire any more, then have a number of loyal and small nonetheless resilient states instead. Given that there are more than 200 scholastic theories on why the Empire fell (meaning no one has a slightest clue as to why it happened), it could also be that it never has fallen but was transformed (in the above described manner) instead.
Contrary to common belief, for the most part of their long history Illyrians/Bosnians had a strong fleet, brave infantry, and able generals. As immediate neighbors of the Romans and Greeks, they were enormously envied however. Therefore no Roman or Greek record referred to the Illyrians in any other way except as "pirates", "thieves", "barbarians", "rebels" or even "sclavs" and "serfs" (Lat. sclavo = Slav; serf = servus = slave, later on 'exiled Russian slave'), both terms used by the Romans as insult only, i.e., long before the 6th century when real Slav hordes began attacking and committing mass murder of thousands of Illyrians at a time, always careful not to encounter the Roman legions but only unarmed
civilians (thus "softening" the Roman defenses that semi-relied on non-Italian recruits in Illyria and Thracia; before moving the border of civilizations westward to Drina River and on). Probably, the insults were part of the first geopolitical game ever played in the Antiquity, where both Rome and Greece played on the card of a well-known geopolitical fact that your immediate neighbor is your enemy, and that your immediate neighbor's neighbor is your natural ally. Similarly, later on, in the 18th century, Serbian nationalists will claim that all "sclav" and "serf" ever mentioned in the Antiquity were actually Serbs. (In the same grabbing manner they simplistically and systematically translated all appearances of 'Sclavoniae' in Latin texts, as 'Serbia(n)'.) Thus it's Serbian relentless nationalism that makes it important to set the record straight - today more than ever. Hence etymology of the word 'sclav' is completely unrelated to what's contended, so Serbia's historians cannot claim Slavic heritage from the ancient times for any of the peoples westward from the Drina, just like Albanians cannot claim their exclusive, pure-Illyrian heritage either. The real (and the only statistically significant) Slavs that exist in Bosnia nowadays are the Bosnian Orthodox (self-styled "Bosnian Serbs" although most are born in Bosnia) whose immediate ancestors (up to third knee) largely moved in from Serbia and Croatia during the last ninety years or so, thanks to Austria's and Serbia's administrations trying to Christianize the domestic Illyrian population.
No wonder both (and only) the Serbian and Albanian schools largely dismiss Wilkes (thus giving him an enormous credibility), for Wilkes says it's hard to believe Bosnian-Illyrian tribes were "Romanized", "Hellenized", etc. This however is what the Serbian school needs desperately so that they too can claim that the same tribes had been also "Slavicized" after the fall of the Western Roman Empire and into the Mid Ages. Everyday experience however teaches us that assimilation of entire peoples/tribes under occupation is practically impossible, and can instead be expected to occur only in individuals moving to a foreign land. The maximum extent to which assimilation is able to get is already known from everyday life, the best example being our present-day diaspora: our refugees who got entirely surrounded by foreign language adopt that language as quickly as by 2nd generation. On the other hand, an occupation is an occupation is... then as nowadays - take for instance the Ottoman occupation of Bosnia (1453-1878) during which time Bosnians acquired only religion from their occupationists, but not their culture, tradition, or language for that matter. It has been suggested that Bosnians had attained language from the Slavs, and religion from the Turks, but it's a fact that they had never adopted both from the both. This arbitrariness is an important circumstantial evidence that "Romanization", "Hellenization", "Slavization", "Turkization", or "Germanization" were all practically impossible in Bosnia! Finally, if such "izations" were at all possible, why is it that the Bosnians adopted neither religion nor language from the Austrian occupationists too? The relatively shorter duration of that occupation compared to the other two occupations cannot be the answer because say the Roman occupation had lasted much longer than any other, yet most of the Illyrians-Bosnians had adopted neither Latin language nor Catholic religion, not to mention Roman culture, art or tradition.
Also, as Wilkes suggests, given the military mindedness of the Illyrians [royal armor shown above, soldier's armor on the left], as well as their vigilance and resistance to numerous conquerors through ages, it can be said with high certainty that today's Bosnians [Bosnian Muslims and Catholics] are direct descendants of the Illyrians who never "disappeared" or "got assimilated". Add to this the non-stop putting-down of Bosnians (via jokes akin of those on "slow-witted" Illyrians) that continues to this day and is mostly favored in Serbia and Croatia (same as in Greece and Rome a few millennia ago). Namely, this is an anecdotal evidence for validity of the Bosnia-centered theory of Illyria. Be it noted at the end that authenticity of many intermediate maps (produced in times before or after the maps showed above) can also be questioned, as such maps mostly come from Serbian (and to a lesser extent Croatian, albeit not less confused and not less nationalist-chauvinist) sources. Therefore it'd be useful to deliberately dispute all Serbian and Croatian historical references (sources, maps, analyses) on ancient and medieval Bosnia, at least until the time tells the true science from nationalist-driven (geo)politics. Unfortunately, history of Europe is history of war, even more so in case of the Balkans, and even more so still in case of Bosnia. Therefore, most of the grand events/undertakings in the area can probably be explained by geopolitical motives and related military activities. I don't need to remind the reader that the same overlaying set of rules applies to Bosnia even today, as it did in her recent past (Dayton Accord 1995, Teheran Conference 1943, Berlin Congress 1878), the most recent Kosovo-Bosnia connection - including the 1992-1995 aggression - being its latest manifestation as we speak... This is also why in the above I use geopolitical maps only (to show that most of the intermediate maps are unreliable), for geopolitics is "oberpolitics", with everything else (including history) from Antiquity till today being nothing more than its byproduct."
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PROFESSOR ENVER IMAMOVIC OF UNIVERSITY OF SARAJEVO ALSO CLAIMS THAT BOSNIANS ARE ILLYRIANS. HE PROVED THIS BASED ON ANTHROPOLOGY, BUT HE WAS LAUGHED AT BY SERB AND CROAT HISTORIANS. NOW IT TURNS OUT HE WAS RIGHT ALL ALONG.
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CONSLUSIONS:
1. LEADING WORLD EXPERTS SAY BOSNIANS ARE ILLYRIANS (NOT SLAVS - MEANING SERBS CANNOT CLAIM A SINGLE INCH OF THE BOSNIAN TERRITORY ANY MORE),
2. LEADING DOMESTIC SCIENTISTS SAY BOSNIANS ARE ILLYRIANS,
3. HARD-LINE RELIGIOUS MUSLIM CLERIC MUSTAFA CERIC SAYS BOSNIANS ARE TURKS, BUT IT IS SUSPECTED FOR SOME TIME THAT HE "COOPERATES" WITH UDBA (SERBIAN SECRET SERVICE). -
Message 2
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
piramidosta,
another Hindu or Black Athena thread?
What have present-day borders to do with ancient civilisations? We, especially I and others as Nikolaos tried to convince on these boards once Alexandar that you couldn't transpose ancient borders, civilisations, peoples to nowadays borders, cultures, peoples as in the case of FYROM (Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia). It took more than three hundred messages and he was still not convinced. I think he needed some support in ancient history as a backbone for the nowadays new republic of Macedonia? To construct some new national "identity"? I gave him the example of the nowadays Belgium: nothing to do with "people" in the anthropological sense, only some cultural indentity from the last five hunderd years. As for the German "people": one "people" (Volk), one "nation" (Reich), one...:All balderdash to mistify some people that, as from 1933 on, had nevertheless some sad consequenses...
IMO, it is not because the Albanians and the Serbs spring into a pit, that the others have to do the same?
Do I see some agenda in your message?
Warm regards,
Paul.
PS: I agree: some 19th and 20th century historians had also some "agendas" to prove "this or that". But luckily modern western history on university level has lost these "tricks"? Or at least I thought s
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Message 3
Posted by Richie (U1238064) on Thursday, 6th September 2007
this reads like the worst of nationalist history designed for purely political means.
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Message 4
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Friday, 7th September 2007
It is also a direct cut and paste from one of several sources - all of which have nationalism as a theme. Whatever about using the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ site to push a political agenda, the extreme discourtesy shown to the rest of us by simply regaling us with a piece of someone else's (turgid) writing and passing it off as original comment makes me like Bosnians, Albanians, Serbs and the whole lot of bickering fanatics in that corner of Europe even less, at least when it comes to their political expression and messageboard behaviour!
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Message 5
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Friday, 7th September 2007
The Balkans (a name I generally avoid to use since it was arbitrarily given by mostly irrelevant people and a name completely irrelevant to the history of all of the peoples habitating S.E. Europe) are really not much more complex as the rest of Europe.
However, since in that locality of Europe it was not so much some noble families that inlfuenced who would be in what state but it was largely the religion, language and above all the national consciousness then it is arguably the hotspot of Europe in terms of politico-historical propaganda. Often I am entangled myself into this trap and I earn the remarks of people here in the forums.
Now how cold can I treat this issue between Albanians and Bosnians and Croatians and Serbs. As a Greek I theoretically supposed to be against Albanians and their expansionism (we do not have borders with the rest), but then as a Greek I am theoretically more inclined to support Serbians (orthodox) against Bosnians (mostly muslims) and Croatians (catholics) but then see I am not very religious so for me Croatians, Bosnians and Serbians are part of the very same group (of slavic ancestry - at least cultural and linguistic) albeit with a few local variations. FYROMians of course are nothing else than Bulgarians (and that is actually against the profit of Greece as a state since it aids but then I cannot turn the blind eye to the fact that FYROM was the central part of medieval Bulgarians (they were not so much on the black sea back then) with their capital on lake Ochrid. As much for Serbians you might have noticed if you are watching basketball how "real" is the friendship between Greeks and Serbians (orthodox have no particularly strong friendship with each other - Serbians Bulgarians and FYROMians are orthodox also but none is friend with each other).
What does all that mean? That here in a history forum I will not so much care of what each of them is about but will comment only on history and whatever points we can make about.
In this area there is one certain thing: the Greeks. We know their history (more or less) and it is actually the nation whose fate is the best monitored for the last 3 millenia in the world.
Now the other two main groups of the area where the Illyrians and the Thraecians. Unsurprisingly two modern countries try to monopolise their history and capitalise on them: Bulgaria and Albania. Bulgaria is not our issue here so I will talk about Albania on the following message. -
Message 6
Posted by Richie (U1238064) on Friday, 7th September 2007
i suppose when you get into this sort of almost mythological ancestry it can get very silly.
here in Britain we often have the celts, britons, english/anglo-saxons etc
in france i suppose you can ask who are the french, are they franks, gauls, provencals, basques, bretons, normans, burgundians
and now this fella trying to say that the muslim population of bosnia are the original illyrians
its a funny old world -
Message 7
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Friday, 7th September 2007
So I will tell you why I agree on many points with Piramidosta.
For many decades many historians went for the "easy solution". Illyrians lived on western side of the peninsula north of Greeks (kingdom of Macedonians and kingdom of Epirotes). Now most of their place was taken by Slavic tribes that later gave the duo Serbians and Croacians that early on (and initially due to christianic sects that later paved the way for easier rmuslimification) became a trio with the Bosnians trying to assert themselves between their brothers. Then you had Albanians seemingly surviving alone in their mountainous area that should be roughly the southern lands of ancient Illyrians. Therefore what more logical than suggesting that Albanians are descendants of ancient Ullyrians. In any way even anthropologically Albanians are members of the greater dinaric anthropologic race the same that Illyrians are believed to have belonged.
All seem logical but then there are many traps. First, the easy ones. Only north Albania actually coincides with historic south Illyrian lands since the south was actually a part of the Epirot kingdmo (and still even today a 300,000 Greek community lives in Albania - though most of course work nowadays in Greece). Ok that is not a big problem sicne one may imagine that Slavs might had pushed the remaining Illyrians a bit to the south, then we know that Albanians during the Ottoman Empire were highly mobile being mostly members of the Ottoman army or sometimes in guerilla raiding troops fighting against them (as well against others also). We know that Albanian talking populations (perceived to be of mixed race) went as far as south Greece.
So, we know that the heartland of ancient Illyrians had been really what is nowadays Montenegro, Bosnia and Croacia (and a bit of Serbia). Ok, so what one will say. Afterall the biggest concentration of Greek populations was in South Italy not in the Greek mainland in those ancient times! So such arguments are not valid at all.
But then why would I doubt about Albanians? It is this: we need some connecting link between Albanians and Illyrians and until now there is little or I would say nothing at all! Illyrians fought hard against the southern greek kingdoms of Epirus and Macedonia, then they became allies of Rome againt the Macedonia (that was a picotal point of Roman politics enterring into the east together with their alliance with Pergamus in Minor Asia). Of course Romans turned easily allies to conquests then Illyrians fought against them, lost but in the course of time their area, by then heavily latinised like Dacia (modern Roumania), provided important ressources to the Empire and hosted large cities to the point of giving emperors (the Illyrian emperors) and administative cities.
Now by late 6th century, at a time Illyrians were still freshly latinised (200-300 years is jut never enough for 100% change of culture), the Slavs were descending and thus altering the cutlure of an area that was not anymore so much important to the empire (that was looking mostly to the east). Hence most of them just intergrated with the slavic ethnic groups to render the later slavic nations of the area. In a parallel process northern Thraecians integrated with the Goths and soon after that with the Avaro-Bulgarians (southern Thraecians integrated of course with Greeks - and that is why Bulgaria cannot monopolise their history, afterall the affinity of Greeks and Thraecians is naturally greater than the one of Thraecians and slavic tribes).
So Albanians must be the Illyrians that avoided Slavification being cornered between Slavic populations and Greek ones in their mountainous area. The first reference to Albanians comes from two 15th century texts, one Italian and one Greek. The former talks about a guy who talked "albaneze" and the other refers to them as Illyrians obviously simply because at those times it was not strange to call anyone on that side of the peninsula Illyrian (Slavic people alike) - Byzantines often called Slavs Scyths just because they came from Ukraine. Afterall the term Illyrian was often used by Slavic people themselves on various occasions.
So there is a huge gap of 1000 years where none has ever referred to Illyrians, no trace of any Illyrian language surviving and such.
What is the strange thing? Illyrians were suposedly largely latinised (they hosted great administrative cities and gave emperors) and these though an important culture they were no Greeks with a huge civilisation and a written history of 1000s of years before that to be able to withstand and retain most of their language. The problem is that if Albanian is an Illyrian survigin language it really shows absolutely no signs of having "suffered" extensive latinisation. Connection of Albanian to Latin is as obvious as German or Slavic for example.
Another much more obvious argument comes from a similar observation: Proto-Illyrians are thought to have enterred and established in the area at the latest in Mycenean times (very possibly even earlier than that). They lived just next to Greeks, just north of the kingdoms of Epirus and Macedonia while there where numerous colonies all over the Dalmatian coast (it seems that even from Mycenean times!).
Hence, like Thraecians, Illyrians "either they wanted either they did not want so" they had really heavy interraction with Greeks. However, all that should leave heavy traces in a hypothetic surviving Illyrian language but then Albanian shows as much connection to Greek as English (e-imi sounds like I-am anyway isn't it? such baic relations you find 1000s between languages). However really Albanian lacks all that "close" relation it should have with Greeks (and later with Romans). Any loans from these two languages are really obvious and occured during the Ottoman conquests (while for example Bulgarians possibly via Thraecians saved certain late-ancient proto-medieval Greek words).
Ok, one may say that these remaining Illyrians were just really isolated in the mountains and had no contact with anyone else and thus gave Albanians (hmm... possibly?). That also explains the largely different anthropologic characteristics with neighbouring nations and of cuorse especially with the Greeks. The Albanians cannot be mistaken for a tribe that lived long in the Mediterranean. In fact Croacians have a higher Mediterranean affinity than Albanians. Anthropologically the Albanians present "fresh" Dinaric influence while Croacians and Bosnians present an "older" Dinaric influence possibly though due to mix with the various descending tribes mainly of slavic origins.
If you see an Albanian you may mix him easily with anyone from Caucasus albeit without a pronounced caucasian nose. Their looks are still a mystery. It is true that southern Albanians unavoidably saw some mix with the very northern Greek Epirots and thus their Toska tribes are quite different to Gegki tribes (out of which a brand are Kosovars) often showing more mediterranean looks but these are obviously products of the Ottoman period - afterall many of Toska albanians are Orthodox so the mix was easened. Still there is a visible difference even of Toskas with their southern neighbours. So one cannot imagine that these tribes lived for more than 3000 years next to Greeks and still look 1000s of kms apart. It is true that the mysterious Pomak tribes living in the mountainous areas between Greece and Bulgaria retained much of their proto-slavic (and even avaro-mongolic) looks but these were really few villages really isolated up in the mountains (villages that did not communicate often with each other!) but then at the end of the day these tribes really adopted the neighbouring Bulgarian language with lots of Greek words that often originate from the 6th A.D. century showing the dated of their coming down. One could imagine the very same for Albanians in their mountainous area but given the fact that Albanians are not a mere tribe but a nation, small but still important in the area means that this is not easily established.
For me the most possible explanation is that Albanians are a more recent tribe in the area. They might had been a non-slavic group that was pushed out of north-west Caucasus around the 9th A.D. century and descended to the Balkans at a time Byzantines had lots of troubles with Bulgarians to care of who crossed the Slavic northern lands, or the earliest they could be in would be a non-slavic Dinaric tribe living in central-east Europe and being pushed down by the descending Slavs in the 6th century A.D.
In any case it is natural to imagine that an important part of Albanians derive from ancient Illyrians but that at the end of the day cannot certainly mean that they can monopolise the Illyrians, often to use that in modern day propagandas, in the same way that Bulgaria cannot monopolise the Thraecians.
I believe that Montenegro, Bosnia, Croacia and partially western Serbia have an equal right to regard Illyrians as their predecessors as Albania and to be honest if I ever searched for modern-day paradigms of how ancient Illyrians looked like I would mostly visit these countries rather than Albania. Afterall, all these countries are Slavic but share not always close anthropologic characteristics with other slavic countries such as Poland (supposedly where they came from) or Russia! Hence, it must had been the ones who lived before the descend of the Slavs that give these looks. -
Message 8
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Friday, 7th September 2007
Of course from my above attempt on the issue, it is obvious that I think that Bosnians alone cannot either monopolise the Illyrian "heritage" (that of course exists mostly in theory) for any reason of national establishment (that is what Albanians were accused by Piramidosta isn't it?). Bosnians, Croatians and Serbians to large extend derived from the same mixed of people (Dinaro-slavic), mainly Illyrians and Serbo-croatians. Even between themselves they cannot easily distinguish each other and passions arise mainly via religious divisions (though indeed in the middle ages there was some vague feeling of division between the three areas shown for example by the ease of Bosnian chieftains to follow heresis (as a contre with Serbian orthodox, like Bulgarians followed massivily the Bogomils as a contre with orthodox Greeks) and insistence of Serbs to follow the orthodox (while initially before the Schism when Rome was part of the Eastern Empire, Croacians and Serbians alike were meant to fall within the Pope's ecclesiastical jurisdiction.
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Message 9
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Wednesday, 12th September 2007
Re: Message 8 and 5 and 7.
Nikolaos,
I am glad that you mentioned:
"and I earn the remarks of people here in the forums"
I am also glad that you added your message 8 with which I fully agree as a further explanation of your message 7.
Nikolaos, I know you now already many years and I have to say that I, apart from the controversies where we stood each on our point of view, I learned a lot from your interesting contributions.
Warm regards,
Paul. -
Message 10
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Thursday, 13th September 2007
Paul, cheers, you know it is reciprocal - I have to say that during this time of my involvement in these forums I have learnt a lot (especially from you and several other well known collaborators) and have repeatedly re-questioned my knowledge and perception on many issues (and not only in history). Not rarely I have to do self-critiscism for erroneus views of mine - afterall I come from a different educational background than history or anthropology (who I prefer to keep them as areas of interest), hence sometimes I have to use common sense that of course all alone is not always the best guarantee for results.
In this subject, I am really using the language as an example (and it sounded quite logical) while in other cases I would not (based again on common sense), hence my approach is not 100% water-proof or something!
What I would like to say is that the issue of both Illyrians and Thraecians resembles - there is some trouble to define who they were exactly and from where up to where they spanned. Hence, this vagueness can be easily used by anyone in the area -
Message 11
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Friday, 14th September 2007
Re: Message 10.
Nikolaos,
thank you very much for your reply.
Warm regards and with esteem,
Paul. -
Message 12
Posted by villamarce (U9034231) on Friday, 16th November 2007
All history has an agenda ,particularly where one power has ruled or been exploited. Hence all Roman/Greek enemies are recorded as "barbarians" for instance, to the British all black peoples are recorded as "savages" etc. to have any sense of history one must be aware of the backgroung prejudices of the writer and also one must try to hear /access the voice of the "other side" or the "conquered people".
This is what happened with the Great Zimbabwe,The Sphinx , The Pyramids etc... -
Message 13
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Friday, 16th November 2007
Mind you villamarce, the word barbaros in Greek meant simply te one who talks "bar-bar" (i.e. words that are not understood). There was not necessatily a meaning of the axe-wielding warriors you see in games since Greeks used the term for all foreigners irrespective of their cultural backgrounds! Greeks did not consider Carthagenians or Persians or Egyptians underdeveloped but called all of them barbarians. However, from the 6th century (thus a century before Persian Wars) or even earlier, the term barbarian was used derogatory since for Greeks the customs of others were weird and sometimes horrible (and indeed many cultures and even the very civilised ones had some generally acknowledged as horrible practices) - or minor practices were inflated in their own minds. Hence, the term barbarian took a more derogatory meaning and was so often used among Greeks themselves for swearing at each other - so often Greeks called each other names such as "you are a barbarian", Demosthenis a political enemy of king Philip swore him like "Philip if not a barbarian what is he? Well, no, actually he is worse than barbarian!". (obvously only from that even we did not know who was Philip we could tell he was Greek!). But watch out, the term barbarian remained in use for both meanings, describing foreigners and being a derogatory term especially when used among Greeks (and not so much from a Greek to a foreigner). The term took its modern form during Roman times that applied it mainly to the seemingly uncivilised foreigners (they would not apply it so often for Syrians or the enemy Persians for example though Lucianus the writer who was Syrian in origins described himself as a barbaros to emphasise his non-Greek, non-Roman origins). Greeks ceased to apply the term "barbaros" for Romans quite early as most of their aristocracies allied with Rome and largely benefited from the Empire (and that is why Rome established power so easily in their lands).
However, if not in Roman times, in earlier Hellenistic and Classical ones, the term barbaros had not a specific agenda as Greeks rarely cared to dominate over foreign people, giving focus in the fight for domination among each other.
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