Paeonia

From Jatland Wiki

Paionia (Greek: Παιονία, pronounced [peoˈnia]) is a municipality in the Kilkis regional unit of Central Macedonia, Greece. The municipality is named after the ancient region of Paeonia.

Jat clan

History

In antiquity, Paeonia was the land and kingdom of the Paeonians (Greek: Παίονες).

In the Iliad the Paeonians are said to have been allies of the Trojans. During the Persian invasion of Greece the conquered Paeonians as far as the Lake Prasias, including the Paeoplae and Siropaiones, were deported from Paeonia to Asia.

In 355-354 BC, Philip II of Macedon took advantage of the death of King Agi of Paeonia and campaigned against them in order to conquer them. So the southern part of ancient Paeonia was annexed by the ancient kingdom of Macedon and was named Macedonian Paeonia; this section included the cities Astraion (later Stromnitsa) Stenae (near modern Demir Kapija), Antigoneia (near modern Negotino) etc.

Some modern scholars consider the Paionians to have been of either Thracian,[1] or of mixed Thraco-Illyrian origins.[2] Some of the names of the Paionians are also definitely Hellenic (Lycceios, Ariston, Audoleon), although relatively little is known about them.[3] Linguistically, the very small number of surviving words in the Paeonian language have been variously connected to its neighboring languages - Illyrian and Thracian; (and every possible Thraco-Illyrian mix in between).[4] Several eastern Paeonian tribes, including the Agrianes, clearly fell within the Thracian sphere of influence. Yet, according to the national legend,[5] they were Teucrian colonists from Troy. Homer [6] speaks of Paeonians from the Axios fighting on the side of the Trojans, but the Iliad does not mention whether the Paeonians were kin to the Trojans. Homer calls the Paeonian leader Pyraechmes (parentage unknown); later on in the Iliad (Book 21), Homer mentions a second leader, Asteropaeus, son of Pelagon.

Before the reign of Darius Hystaspes, they had made their way as far east as Perinthus in Thrace on the Propontis. At one time all Mygdonia, together with Crestonia, was subject to them. When Xerxes crossed Chalcidice on his way to Therma (later renamed Thessalonica), he is said to have marched through Paeonian territory. They occupied the entire valley of the Axios (Vardar) as far inland as Stobi, the valleys to the east of it as far as the Strymon and the country round Astibus and the river of the same name, with the water of which they anointed their kings. Emathia, roughly the district between the Haliacmon and Axios, was once called Paeonia; and Pieria and Pelagonia were inhabited by Paeonians. As a consequence of the growth of Macedonian power, and under pressure from their Thracian neighbors, their territory was considerably diminished, and in historical times was limited to the north of Macedonia from Illyria to the Strymon.

In Greek mythology, the Paeonians were said to have derived their name from Paeon the son of Endymion.[7]

Paeonian kingdom

In early times, the chief town and seat of the Paionian kings was Bylazora (now Veles in Republic of Macedonia) on the Vardar; later, the seat of the kings was moved to Stobi (near modern Gradsko).[8]

Subjugation of the Paeonians happened as a part of Persian military operations initiated by Darius the Great (521-486) in 513 - after immense preparations - a huge Achaemenid army invaded the Balkans and tried to defeat the European Scythians roaming to the north of the Danube river.[9] Darius' army subjugated several Thracian peoples, and virtually all other regions that touch the European part of the Black Sea, such as parts of nowadays Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Russia, before it returned to Asia Minor.[10][11] Darius left in Europe one of his commanders named Megabazus whose task was to accomplish conquests in the Balkans.[12] The Persian troops subjugated gold-rich Thrace, the coastal Greek cities, as well as defeating and conquering the powerful Paeonians.[13][14][15]

At some point after the Greco-Persian Wars, the Paeonian princedoms coalesced into a kingdom centred in the central and upper reaches of the Axios and Strymon rivers, corresponding with today's northern Republic of Macedonia and western Bulgaria. They joined with the Illyrians to attack the northern areas of the kingdom of Macedonia. The Illyrians, who had a culture of piracy, would have been cut off from some trade routes if movement through this land had been blocked. They unsuccessfully attacked the northern defences of Macedonian territory in an attempt to occupy the region. In 360-359 BC, southern Paeonian tribes were launching raids into Macedon, (Diodorus XVI. 2.5) in support of an Illyrian invasion.

The Macedonian Royal House was thrown into a state of uncertainty by the death of Perdiccas III, but his brother Philip II assumed the throne, reformed the army (providing phalanxes), and proceeded to stop both the Illyrian invasion and the Paeonian raids through the boundary of the "Macedonian Frontier", which was the northern perimeter which he intended to defend as an area of his domain. He followed Perdiccas's success in 358 BC with a campaign deep into the north, into Paeonia itself.[16][17] This reduced the Paeonian kingdom (then ruled by Agis) to a semi-autonomous, subordinate status, which led to a process of gradual and formal Hellenization of the Paeonians, who, during the reign of Philip II, began to issue coins with Greek legends like the Macedonian ones. A Paeonian contingent was attached to Alexander the Great's army.[18]

At the time of the Persian invasion, the Paeonians on the lower Strymon had lost, while those in the north maintained, their territorial determination. The daughter of Audoleon, one of these kings, was the wife of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, and Alexander the Great wished to bestow the hand of his sister Cynane upon Langarus, who had shown himself loyal to Philip II. Olympias, Alexander the Great's mother, was a princess of the Molossians, an Epirot tribe. A genial dynasty also continued through the reigns of Paeonian kings.

Jat History

Bhim Singh Dahiya[19] writes that Herodotus mentions a people, Paeonia, a colony of Teucarians. [20] The paeonians were transferred from Hellespont to Asia, under the orders of Darius the Great (521-486 BC). Here we have the Pauniya and Tokhar Jats in Europe in sixth century BC.

Bhim Singh Dahiya[21] writes that the in the period from ninth century B.C. to the fourth century B.C., roughly the time between the Manda and Van empires and Alexander's invasion, we find numerous tribes of the Jats finding a name in the history of Herodotus and others. Among the tribes of the Medians, we find *Busae (the present Bassi)

The ruling people are called Arizanti or Arizatoi. The word Ari is a form of Arya and Zanti/Zatoi are of course the Jats, the Djati of ancient Egypt and the Guti of Sumer and China.

External links

References

  1. ↑ The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome by Susan Wise Bauer (2007), ISBN 0-393-05974-X, page 518: "... Italy); to the north, Thracian tribes known collectively as the Paeonians."
  2. ↑ See: Encyclopædia Britannica - online edition.
  3. ↑ “The Ancient Kingdom of Paionia,” Irwin L. Merker, Balkan Studies 6 (1965) 35)
  4. ↑ Francesco Villari. Gli Indoeuropei e le origini dell'Europa. Il Mulino, 1997. ISBN 88-15-05708-0
  5. ↑ Herodotus v. 13
  6. ↑ Iliad, book II, line 848
  7. ↑ Pausanias, 5.1.5; Smith "Paeon" 3..
  8. ↑ "A Companion to Ancient Macedonia".
  9. ↑ "A Companion to Ancient Macedonia".
  10. ↑ "A Companion to Ancient Macedonia".
  11. ↑ The Oxford Classical Dictionary by Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth,ISBN 0-19-860641-9,"page 1515,"The Thracians were subdued by the Persians by 516"
  12. ↑ "A Companion to Ancient Macedonia".
  13. ↑ "A Companion to Ancient Macedonia".
  14. ↑ Howe, Timothy; Reames, Jeanne (2008). Macedonian Legacies: Studies in Ancient Macedonian History and Culture in Honor of Eugene N. Borza. Regina Books. ISBN 978-1-930-05356-4.p. 239.
  15. ↑ "Persian influence on Greece (2)".
  16. ↑ Raphael Sealey, A History of the Greek City States, 700–338 BC, University of California Press, 1976, p. 442, on Google books
  17. ↑ Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond, Guy Thompson Griffith, A History of Macedonia: 550–336 B.C, Clarendon Press, 1979
  18. ↑ Arrian Anabasis Book/3a,fn. 3(8)
  19. ↑ Bhim Singh Dahiya: Jats the Ancient Rulers (A clan study)/Jat Clan in India, p. 267-268
  20. ↑ Herodotus v, 12-27
  21. ↑ Jats the Ancient Rulers (A clan study)/The Antiquity of the Jats,p.300-301
Retrieved from "https://www.jatland.com/w/index.php?title=Paeonia&oldid=347857"