Helios 70: Summer Edition

[Lord Thesaurian]

The New Acropolis Museum: Selective Memory and Forgetting by Audacia
Impact of the 1453 Fall of Constantinople by Aquila Praefortis
Finally Free: Flamininus and the National Greek Narrative by Audacia

From the Editor:

Thanks again to our readers for joining us again for a another splendid edition. Featured in this issue is a very well done mini-documentary by Audacia on peculiarities in the rendering of Greek history by her more modern denizens. Definitely give it a watch as you peruse the other fantastic articles offered here.

Enjoy!

Letters from the Editor:

Asking the questions you didn't want answered

The Cost of Healthcare is Too Damn High!

The Cost of Healthcare is Too Damn High! As the Baby Boomers begin to retire and to draw from Social Security and Medicare, the fiscal solvency of these programs and of people's plans for retirement seem a prominent fixture of public discussion. This article from November 19, 2013 in The New York Times, detailing several concerns over the rising projections of retirement expenditures, especially with regard to healthcare: “As the American population ages and insurers try to rein in costs, the share of health and medical costs that retirees can expect to shoulder is becoming more formidable. A look at estimates of retiree health costs suggests that, if long-term care costs are included, it is not difficult to come up with a situation in which a couple’s tab for out-of-pocket costs post-retirement could approach — or even exceed — $1 million. (Article 1)“ Similar stories abound: “For many years and in countless articles, physicians have been the scapegoat for rising healthcare costs in the U.S. In fact, they have been blamed by many critics for the U.S. leading the world in healthcare expenditures. A close examination of the data indicates that this blame is misplaced. (Article 2)” “A new study published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association strongly undercuts the assertion that an aging population is primarily to blame for soaring health care costs. Instead, the study concludes, the overwhelming share of increased health expenditures can be traced to the higher prices that hospitals, medical professionals and drug companies charge to treat a wide swath of illnesses, from cancer to depression (Article 3) ” “Costs,” or rather expenditures on healthcare, seem to be rising. Who or what then, is responsible? Or more importantly, why is this happening? What does this have to do with “insurers?” Projections aside, there is perhaps a more central theme to this discussion. What, if any, is the relationship between health insurance and healthcare expenditures? These articles don't seem to consider that question directly. Yet one cannot talk about healthcare expenditures without including such a question in the discussion. The topic is in fact a fairly old one. Healthcare expenditures as a percentage of GDP increased from 5% in 1960 to 14% in 2000 (Source 3, pg 3). Numerous studies of this phenomenon; or rather, healthcare expenditures in general, began to emerge throughout the 1970s. The primary methodology often involved measuring utilization of health services by test groups with access to various levels of cost sharing or complete coverage for care and services. Arguably the most famous and comprehensive of these, conducted by the Rand Corporation in cooperation with government agencies, concluded a modest correlation between full care coverage and increased healthcare utilization as opposed to limited care coverage (Source 1). In aggregate, the study recorded that patients with limited care coverage utilized nearly 20% more hospitalizations and related services than patients who had partial coverage; ie simulated health insurance. (Source 1). Implicit to the Rand study then was the idea that expanding healthcare coverage incentivized utilization of services at the margin. Less certain, however, was the impact of health insurance itself on expenditures. Numerous anecdotal examples bear relevance to that question, such as studies of the implementation of universal health insurance in Taiwan. Upon implementation, members who had not previously had any kind of health insurance showed nearly 100% increases in healthcare consumption to a level equaling those who previously had health insurance (Source 2, pg 1). More importantly, the implementation of universal health insurance correlates with a subsequent and prolonged rise in healthcare expenditures in that country (Source 2, pg 5). In tandem, the spread of health insurance is correlated with increased utilization of healthcare goods and services, and respectively perhaps, with an increase in health expenditures based upon the previous examples. Even still, a comprehensive and more local study exists. In a 2005 study entitled, “The Aggregate Effects of Health Insurance: Evidence from the Introduction of Medicare,” economist Amy Finkelstein delineates the market effects of health insurance and how these impact health expenditures in aggregate. Here she uses the US Medicare system as an archetypal example of this relationship due to the former's role as arguably “the single largest change in health insurance coverage in American history.(Page 1)” Medicare is a national health insurance program that guarantees coverage for American citizens and legal residents of at least 65 years of age, as well as others with certain disabilities. Immediately apparent are the “before and after effects” of Medicare's implementation in 1965. Hospital insurance enrollment for citizens and legal residents aged 65 and older (Medicare Part A) quadrupled (Page 6). Prior to the enactment, annual rates of hospital admissions correlated generally with insurance enrollment, with geographic areas of lower enrollment showing lower rates, and higher enrollment, higher rates (Page 12). Post-enactment, rates of hospitalization grew more quickly in areas where new Medicare enrollment was higher (previously low insurance enrollment), relative to areas where it was lower (Page 13). Increased hospital traffic coincides with increased hospital expenditures (Page 15). This is an important trend in the increase in hospital utilization and expenditures with which Medicare was directly correlated. From 1965-1970, Finkelstein deducts that Medicare was directly responsible for a 34% increase in hospitalizations and 23% increase in spending by hospitals over all ages (Page 16, 20). This is important to note because it differs from the Rand estimates (if only in context), which primarily detected and therefore focused on expenditures and utilization at the margin of universal health coverage versus partial coverage. Here Finkelstein instead examines the effects of health insurance itself on utilization, hospitalization and expenditures. Based on the low-end estimate for Medicare's role in increasing hospital expenditures, Finkelstein then postulates that Medicare was responsible for at least 40% of the increase in aggregate national healthcare expenditures over a period from 1950 to 1990 (Page 27). Medicare's impact serves as an ideal example of the impact of health insurance on healthcare expenditures because the magnitude and scope of Medicare as a form of health insurance allows for the examination of the latter's effects in aggregate. While the focus on healthcare utilization and hospital expenditures may appear a narrower assessment in an ideal sense, I believe that the impact of these factors on total healthcare expenditures easily serves to establish a relationship between the spread of health insurance and healthcare expenditures. Indeed, such was the methodology established in the academic references herein. Thus, the body of evidence suggests that health insurance contributes to a rise in total healthcare expenditures. Bibliography Articles: Ann Carrns, “You Plan Your Retirement, Then You Get the Health Bill,” The New York Times, 11.19.13 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/20/yo...agewanted=all& Louis Goodman and Tim Norbeck, “Who's To Blame For Our Rising Healthcare Costs?” Forbes, 10.03.13 http://www.forbes.com/sites/physicia...lthcare-costs/ Ben Hallman: “Skyrocketing Health Care Costs Aren't Grandma's Fault ,” The Huffington Post, 11.12.13 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/1...n_4256678.html Sources: Rand Corporation, “The Health Insurance Experiment,” Research Brief, 2006, http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand...AND_RB9174.pdf Cheng Shou-Hsia, PhD; Chiang Tung-Liang, ScD, “The Effect of Universal Health Insurance on Health Care Utilization in Taiwan: Results From a Natural Experiment,” The Journal of the American Medical Association, July 9, 1997, Vol 278, No. 2 , http://jama.jamanetwork.com/data/Jou..._278_2_009.pdf Amy Finkelstein, Ph.D, “ The Aggregate Effects of Health Insurance: Evidence from the Introduction of Medicare,” National Bureau of Economic Research, September 2005, http://www.nber.org/papers/w11619

Audacia

The New Acropolis Museum: Selective Memory and Forgetting

The New Acropolis Museum: Selective Memory and Forgetting

The New Acropolis Museum: Selective Memory and Forgetting I wrote this piece while studying abroad in Greece. It discusses the roles selective memory and forgetting play in the New Acropolis Museum at Athens, the new museum constructed to replace the terribly old museum once on the Acropolis itself. The New Acropolis Museum houses the most important material remains from the Acropolis's classical past, including what was left by Lord Elgin after he took many priceless artifacts from the Parthenon from 1801 until 1812. The New Acropolis Museum at Athens offers a quintessential example of how carefully constructed national memories may influence, or perhaps even distort, historical narrative. The New Acropolis Museum, which houses what remains in Greece of the most important material artifacts from the Parthenon and nearby sanctuaries on the Acropolis, presents a warped representation of the Acropolis's millennia old history, primarily due to selective memory and the forgetting of historical elements from the material past. Selective memory on behalf of the modern Greeks influenced their decision that the New Acropolis Museum would primarily house late archaic and classical material remains. Ottoman, Frankish, and other material remains from the Acropolis are not housed in the museum because they were quite literally erased from the archaeological record and subsequently forgotten in the historical narrative. Both of these inextricably connected phenomena, selective memory and forgetting, serve to sanitize the Acropolis from its complex medieval and Ottoman past as part of an effort to stress ancient Greece's classical period, the historical era most critical to Greek nationalism because, due to its association with the foundation of Western European civilization, it provides Greece with a European identity.[1] The museum's splendid display of the Acropolis's classical past underscores the hallowed nature of that classical time period for modern Greeks. Selective memory on behalf of the modern Greeks in the Ministry of Culture certainly influenced their decision that the New Acropolis Museum would chiefly house late archaic and classical pieces, which reflects their intent to stress Greek claims to European identity via their ancient past. As Nora adeptly points out, "memory only accommodates those facts that suit it; it nourishes recollections that may be out of focus" (Nora 8). The carefully constructed Greek national memory stresses the importance of the classical period in Greece, from the fifth to the middle of the fourth centuries BC, when the Greek city states were independent and their citizens prominent cultivators of the arts and sciences (Hamilakis 93). The New Acropolis Museum, then, in accordance with Nora's statement and the national narrative, primarily houses material remains from the citadel's late archaic and classical periods. The museum proudly displays pediments from the Old Temple of Athena Polias, archaic statues buried on the Acropolis after the Persian sack of Athens, the five caryatids that once supported the back porch of the Erectheion, and, of course, what remains of the frieze and metopes that formerly adorned the Parthenon. [2] This representation is "out of focus," for it fails to incorporate nearly two millennia of history, but nonetheless serves the national memory well; the classical period provides modern Greeks with a foundational claim to European identity (Nora 8; Hamilakis 83). The late archaic and, primarily, classical statuary represent what modern Greeks believe is most important for visitors interested in the Acropolis to see; it substantiates Greek claims that their ancestral culture served as the model that modern liberal societies could imitate. Selective memory, however, also played a major role in how the museum's planners chose to display the late archaic and classical exhibits, which, once more, reflects their desire to underscore that Greek civilization influenced Western European societies. The museum features all of the aforementioned artwork, the physical embodiments of ancient Greek civilization, in prominent, easy to spot places. The pediment from the Old Temple of Athena Polias can be seen almost as soon as one enters the museum; the visitor must, by nature of the museum's layout, walk amidst the archaic statuary once buried after the Persian sack; the five caryatids tempt the visitor's eye even as he or she admires the pediment from the Old Temple due to their elevated position above the other artwork; the frieze and metopes from the Parthenon, the most important monument on the Acropolis in antiquity because it housed the Athenian treasury, are on the top floor of the museum (Neer 273). What is more, the museum is not crowded whatsoever; adequate space separates the exhibits, which offers visitors the chance to marvel at what is present, namely, material remains from the late archaic and classical periods. The sole exception to the otherwise vast, expansive nature of the museum—the forest of statues from the archaic period—overwhelms, temporarily placing the visitor in the ancient past atop the Acropolis, surrounded by undeniably Greek statuary. The layout of the museum is carefully planned in accordance with selective memory; the museum may be massive, but its size serves a purpose. Any museum which houses such critical material remains, those most crucial to the historical narrative and, consequentially, Western European civilization, must be immense, vast, and somehow limitless, just like the forest of statues and the Parthenon. The forgetting of considerable periods of the Acropolis's multifaceted history, also evident in the New Acropolis Museum, functions, like selective memory, to stress the importance of the citadel’s classical past in order to substantiate a claim to European identity. This forgetting, or what Renan terms "historical error," manifests itself in the lack of material remains in the museum from most of the Acropolis’s history (Renan 45). Remnants of medieval fortifications or construction are nowhere to be found; the material traces of any Ottoman presence on the Acropolis are nonexistent; Roman statuary in the museum is but an afterthought, delegated to the back corner of the museum's second floor. All of this, however, should not surprise us, for material remains from the time periods listed above—medieval, Ottoman, and Roman—do not constitute an important part of the national narrative (Hamilakis 116). They have been forgotten, excised, and, in some cases, literally erased from the historical record. Take, for example, the demolitions that were carried out on the Acropolis shortly after the independence movement of the middle nineteenth century. The national rhetoric at that time was primarily based on the discourse of purity and pollution; Heinrich von Klenze, who carried out the demolitions, proclaimed "all remnants of barbarism will disappear" before destroying a number of medieval and Ottoman remains in a deliberate attempt to exclusively preserve the Acropolis’s classical past (Hamilakis 89). The reason for Klenze’s “purification” of the material remains on the Acropolis is the same as the Greek Ministry of Culture’s for its exclusion of medieval and Ottoman artifacts from the New Acropolis Museum: every historical period in relation to the Acropolis, save for the classical, have been sufficiently eradicated from the national memory because their material remains do not serve to substantiate Greece’s European identity. Medieval towers or Ottoman mosques do not convey the same notions of civilized society, in the Western European sense, at least, as monuments like the Parthenon and Erectheion. The inextricably connected phenomena of selective memory and forgetting on behalf of modern Greeks ultimately creates a “cleaner,” sanitized version of the Acropolis's past in its new museum, one that is conducive to portray modern Greeks, commonly perceived as the inheritors of their ancestors' sophisticated civilization by Western Europeans, as identifiably European (Hamilakis 21). The museum quite literally evokes an idealized, sterilized version of ancient Greek history to create a past that never was; it completely lacks material remains from almost two millennia of history while it only stresses the importance of those from the sixth and fifth centuries BC. The museum’s modern architecture and stylistic decor reflect this obvious attempt to “clean up” the past, to present with splendor and stateliness only the most "important" remains from the whole of antiquity because they derive from the classical era, when Western civilization was "founded" (Hamilakis 96). The museum’s sleek facade evokes sheer modernity; its sheen juxtaposes that of the shabby, old Acropolis museum. For the Greeks, this is all meant to justify to Western Europe that their new museum is fit to house all of the precious marbles from the Parthenon, that modern Greece is not some backwards, traditionalist society, but liberal, modern, and undeniably European. This would not be possible, however, without the sanitization of the Acropolis's past, which, in turn, is dependent on selective memory and forgetting. The Parthenon is like the “symbolic objects of [society’s] memory” that Pierre Nora describes (Nora 12). It stands as a symbol of Greece’s classical past that plays such a major role in the nation’s historical narrative, the principal expression of civilization, as is often said, that survives from the ancient past (Angelos Papadopoulos). The New Acropolis Museum, then, which houses what remains in Greece of the most important material and artistic remains from the Parthenon and nearby sanctuaries, serves as “an illusion of eternity.” The visitor is not made aware and, perhaps, happily overlooks the period in between the construction of the Parthenon and the rest of the classical Acropolis monuments and when all other traces of medieval and Ottoman presence there were erased in the nineteenth century. This is in no small part due to selective memory and forgetting, "crucial factor[s] in the creation of a nation" (Renan 45). Both phenomena, clearly at play in the New Acropolis Museum, serve to sanitize the Acropolis's extraordinarily complex past. The visitor, then, while made acutely aware of the absence of the Parthenon's lost marbles, may not even realize that the temple once housed an Ottoman mosque. References Hamilakis, Yannis. The Nation and its Ruins. Oxford University Press, 2007. Print. Nora, Pierre. Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Memoire. University of California Press, 2012. Web. Neer, Richard T. Greek Art and Archaeology. Thames and Hudson Inc., 2012. Print. Papadopoulos, Angelos. Lecture on the Acropolis. 2014. Personal Notes. Renan, Ernest. What Is a Nation? Translated by Martin Thomas. Routledge, 1990. [1] By Western European civilization, I mean to define the liberal societies of Great Britain, France, Germany, etc. [2] Thomas Bruce, Seventh Earl of Elgin, removed the sixth caryatid in the early nineteenth century (Hamilakis 71).

Aquila Praefortis

Impact of the 1453 Fall of Constantinople

Impact of the 1453 Fall of Constantinople

Impact of the 1453 Fall of Constantinople The city of Constantinople was the center of its world. For centuries the city was Second Rome, capital of the Greek successor of the Roman Empire, the house of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, as well as the largest and wealthiest city in all of Europe. But no empire lasts forever, and when Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks on May 29, 1453 it would rock the world as one of the impactful events of world history. Due to Constantinople’s importance both politically and religiously, it is practically self-evident that the loss of the city would have a great impact in both of these areas. But perhaps the greatest affects the Fall of Constantinople had in was in economics. One of the remarkable things about the Fall of Constantinople was that it coincided with new shipbuilding designs some 2,000 miles away in Iberia, and the city’s fall triggered these people to utilize their new ships like never before. In previous centuries leading up to these new innovations, the ships primarily used for marine economic transportation in most of Europe were the cog and the hulk. The cog had a flat-bottomed lapstrake build with high sides and a single square sail, which was a decent design for loading and unloading into shallow harbors and were difficult to board in oceanic battles. The second ship was known as the hulk, which was similar to the cog. Later hulks were made partially with the carvel design. Lapstrake, or a clinker-build, is when the boards that make up the ship overlap. This design was famously used by the Norse in the ninth through eleventh centuries, from which lapstrake design came from. This is contrasted from the carvel design, where the boards do not overlap one another. A comparison of clinker and carvel builds, in a diagram at a half a ship’s cross-section (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Clinker-carvel.svg). Prominent new maritime designs in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which were particularly developed in Portugal, would massively improve Western Europe’s sailing capabilities. These shipbuilding improvements were the caravel and the carrack. The early caravels were two or three mast ships with more diverse sail rigging than what was usually employed at the time. The main development for the caravel was the ability to have square or triangle sails, called lanteen sails, either of which could be used depending on the situation. Ships in later centuries such as galleons, frigates, or man-of-wars can be found employing a combination of both square and lanteen sails. Generally speaking, square sails are best for constant wind and lanteen are better used for maneuvers such as tacking (sailing against the wind at an angle). The effect of its light weight and maneuverability meant the caravel was a very fast, low-capacity ship. At a similar time and place as these developments of the new ship design, Prince Henry the Navigator made use of caravels and encouraged further Portuguese exploration along the coast of Africa. Prince Henry’s patronage of dozens of explorations and improvements on cartography and nautical instruments allowed Roman Catholic Portugal to outflank the previously unknown Muslim reach on western Africa, which extended south from overland trade routes in the Sahara Desert. The other new kind of ship, the carrack, had three decks and usually incorporated a combination of square and lanteen sails, and were ideal for longer voyages, which is why later voyages, such as Columbus’ flagship Santa Maria, Vasco de Gama’s Sao Gabriel, Victoria (the first ship to circumnavigate the globe), and other ships used for famous voyages were often carracks. In comparison to their predecessors the carrack and the caravel were ships much more well-equipped for significantly longer voyages. A list of major Portuguese maritime milestones by year under Prince Henry the Navigator prior to 1453 Although Western Europe now had ships that could embark on much longer voyages, the necessity to do so stemmed from the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire and Constantinople itself. War after war left the Eastern Romans nothing but a shell of their already-diminished empire. Once the Empire of Nicaea managed to reclaim Constantinople from the Latin Empire (which was established by the Fourth Crusaders), followed by capturing most of Greece from the Despotate of Epirus in 1261, the freshly restored empire was ill-prepared to defend against its new neighbors. The early fourteenth century was practically the last time the Roman Empire tried to restore at least a portion of its former glory. Numerous conflicts caused the number of the Empire’s people, size of its treasury, and area of its land to dwindle. The same walls of Constantinople that held half a million people in Justinian’s reign held fifty thousand in 1453. The Eastern Roman Empire’s economy was based on commerce, but over the centuries of declining international influence, the Eastern Roman trading, and thus its economy, went with it. The Fourth Crusade ended with favorable commercial terms to Genoa and Venice at Eastern Rome’s expense. The economic situation grew so poor for Eastern Rome that Empress Anne of Savoy had pawned off imperial crown jewels to Venice in 1343. By 1453, Galata, a Genoan district on the north side of the Golden Horn, had made seven times the revenue of the entire Eastern Roman Empire. Despite the increasingly peripheral economic situation the Eastern Roman Empire was facing, the city of Constantinople itself still retained value. Constantinople still acted as a middleman between the dilapidated Silk Road and Europe. So when the city fell in 1453, more was lost than a symbolic center of Christendom and the last buffer state between the Roman Catholic nations in the west and Islamic ones in the east. More was lost than the last miniscule shadow of the Roman Empire founded some two millennia previously. The Ottoman Turks had a much stronger control over what was left of the Silk Road and access to goods such as spices and textiles that were extremely valuable in Europe. Some Italian city-states, such as Genoa, attempted to use the shores of the Black Sea as a replacement to Constantinople. This alternative did not last for long when Mehmed II also conquered the entire northern Anatolian coast by 1461, as well as Crimean commercial towns by 1475. These expansions, along with other later ones, gave the Ottomans a monopoly on practically all Eastern goods traveling along the Silk Road, and the Turks embargoed them from Europe. In Western Europe, this new vacuum of supply for spices and other precious foreign goods caused many more people than before to consider maritime alternatives to reach their former trade connections. The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri reflects common Late Medieval thought that the Southern Hemisphere was largely submerged under the Ocean Sea, and thus would be able to be circumvented. Portuguese explorations of Africa received a more vital and pressing reason to be continued with new vigor. A simple mathematical calculation shows Portuguese explorers averaged extending their southern limit of exploration by about one degree longitude south, roughly seventy miles, each year. By 1456, several Cape Verde Islands were discovered. In 1462, the Portuguese reached Sierra Leone, and Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa in 1488. To combat this effort to reach Asia the Spanish crown hired Christopher Columbus to attempt to reach China by sailing west, and he encountered the Americas, two continents previously unknown to all Europeans, except for perhaps some of the Norse in the Kalmar Union. Finally, Vasco de Gama reached Calicut in India on May 20, 1498 and found a new way to access the sought after goods in southern and eastern Asia. Ultimately, the maritime innovations in the fifteenth century, punctuated by the fall of the last shadow of the Roman Empire in 1453, led to the Age of Discovery and to a more modern time. However, The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks resulted in more than Western Europeans circumnavigating the new threat to their supply of Eastern spices or precious textiles. As a result of the city's fall, recent Iberian maritime developments could be put to a much more practical use, and a brave new world of opportunity and untapped potential was uncovered. The European states would come to harness the riches of the New World and claim vast swaths of land for colonization to their crowns, and such a land of opportunity has been used to describe America ever since. Sources: Alighieri, Dante. "Canto XXXIV." Trans. Mark Musa. Divine Comedy: V.1 Inferno. New York: Penguin, 1984. Print. Durant, Will. The Renaissance: A History of Civilization in Italy from 1304-1576 A.D. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1953. Print. Gordon, John S. An Empire of Wealth: The Epic History of American Economic Power. Harper Perennial (2004). Print McGrail, Sean Rafts, Boats, and Ships from Prehistoric Times to the Medieval Era. London: HMSO (1981). Print Treadgold, Warren T. A History of the Byzantine State and Society. Stanford, Ca: Stanford UP, 1997. Print.

Audacia

Finally Free: Flamininus and the National Greek Narrative

Finally Free: Flamininus and the National Greek Narrative

Once again, I thank my excellent team of writers and artists for their invaluable dedication and effort in this endeavor, and your support as a receptive and interested readership.

After reading this edition, now would be an excellent time to pay a visit to one of the other TWC publications, which can be done by clicking on any of the images below.

[Flinn]

great issue guys, all the articles are really good

I enjoyed particularly the one about the cost of healthcare, because it supports what I'm telling since years about the future of economy of western countries. Furthermore I also liked the one on the new Acropolis museum, definitely a high-quality analysis of an aspect that few would note.

[Hobbes]

Yeah, reading about the Acropolis museum was very interesting. It offered a new perspective even though I've been there a lot of times.

[Mournblade77]

The video, about Flamininus, is totally inaccurate, furthermore it represents the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon within the geographical borders of the Modern Republic of Macedonia, which at the time was known as Paeonia. Every 12 year old knows that Pella was the Capital of Macedon, and Pella is nowhere near the area described as Macedonia in the video. I believe that the video should be removed if you want to keep your credibility, but that's not my call!

[neoptolemos]

I ve been there for about 7 times and although I can understand the point the author is trying to make i would say it neglects some things:
1)The museum itself has a set of models which demonstrate the different phases of the Acropolis :The Archaic one, the classical-Roman and medieval-Ottoman one
2)The display of a short documentary about the history of Acropolis and the Parthenon in within the museum itself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGitmYl6U90
3)The presence of pieces of medieval Parthenon and a visual reconstruction of it in the Byzantine and Christian museum of Athens
4)The "clearance" of medieval and Ottoman buildings and artefacts that happened during the 1830s and onward by the antiquity lovers Bavarians who played a crucial role (along with their contemporary Greek nationalists) in the downplay of Ottoman past and moreover the old reconstruction projects Acropolis ha suffered and the are considered out of date or that they have caused some damage .Therefore the damage that has been done during these years left no significant artefacts that would worth a display in the modern museum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylaea_%28Munich%29

As for the video I think that not only it has inaccuracies in the map (false Macedonia put in modern borders, Elis and Achaea are wrong set in Pelopenese) but neglects the vital role Alexander the Great signifies for the early Greek nationalists.

“What is really genuine and what spurious Hellenism?Through the inscrutable ways of Providence, Alexander carried the flag of Hellenism to the East.”—Konstantinos Paparrigopoulos

[xiosisland]

That video is so wrong. It shows borders that didn't exist at that time. Pella is no where near where the video depicts Macedonia. Obviously the producer of the video is trying to make a political statement and side with the FYROM. This is a very sensitive political issue in Greece today and I strongly suggest forum users here flag this video. Two thumbs down for this issue seriously, it's showing borders of A country that illegally calls itself macedonia north of Greece that was created in 1991, and this video depicts those borders,lol. and claiming it existed in alexanders time.

please remove the video it is grossly inaccurate

The memory of the byzantine empire was very much a driving force in revolutionary Greece(1821). It is even in the preamble of the constitution of the Hellenic Republic! Today it is just as omnipresent in the Greek national conscience.

The GREEK kingdom of Macedon started out as enemies of most Greek city states but ultimately Alexander united all greeks and he was responsible for greek unity and the earliest Greek national conscience. Greeks never were "enslaved" by Macedon as you put it, it was quite the opposite. Furthermore, that was not Alexander's way (see Greek-Persian mass marriages after conquest of Persia). You also used false borders(created in 1991) to depict the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. Pella is 900kilometers south of where your video falsely depicts it to be. All in all this video is a shameful display. I am not trying to be confrontational but this video is presented to us as historical fact but it is very inaccurate and blatanly false and it should be removed

[m_1512]

please remove the video it is grossly inaccurate

Kindly elaborate how it is inaccurate. I am sure there must be some points to back the inaccuracy stance.

[neoptolemos]

Kindly elaborate how it is inaccurate. I am sure there must be some points to back the inaccuracy stance.

see my post above, the map is inaccurate

[xiosisland]

Kindly elaborate how it is inaccurate. I am sure there must be some points to back the inaccuracy stance.

I have but the moderator isn't posting it up despite me typing nothing but historical facts, this forum is so biased

The memory of the byzantine empire was very much a driving force in revolutionary Greece(1821). It is even in the preamble of the constitution of the Hellenic Republic! Today it is just as omnipresent in the Greek national conscience.

The GREEK kingdom of Macedon started out as enemies of most Greek city states but ultimately Alexander united all greeks and he was responsible for greek unity and the earliest Greek national conscience. Greeks never were "enslaved" by Macedon as you put it, it was quite the opposite. Furthermore, that was not Alexander's way (see Greek-Persian mass marriages after conquest of Persia). You also used false borders(created in 1991) to depict the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. Pella is 900kilometers south of where your video falsely depicts it to be. All in all this video is a shameful display. I am not trying to be confrontational but this video is presented to us as historical fact but it is very inaccurate and blatanly false and it should be removed




The producer of the video(audacia) has the right to his opinion of history but the title he has chosen depicts his work as historical fact. He does not have the right to monopolize and distort with the intention to confuse with use of modern borders the Historical Greek national narrative which has been well established by the Hellenic Republic through it's membership of the E.U., NATO, creation of it's constitution, signage of it's Treaties, testaments of it's Church and last but not least It's E.U. and U.N. certified and approved school text books. Greece and it's modern citizens are the sole inheritors of the Ancient Greek Macedonian kingdom just like Brazilian citizens are the inheritors of the Amazon jungle or Americans the inheritors of the Founding Fathers idealism and equal rights for all.(Washington,jefferson,lincoln;etc) The internet has exacerbated a problem that Greece feared with the creation of a state(FYROM) after the dissolution of Yugoslavia, for this you must see Greek-FYROM naming dispute.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/...38277320080402

[Audacia]

That video is so wrong. It shows borders that didn't exist at that time. Pella is no where near where the video depicts Macedonia. Obviously the producer of the video is trying to make a political statement and side with the FYROM. This is a very sensitive political issue in Greece today and I strongly suggest forum users here flag this video. Two thumbs down for this issue seriously, it's showing borders of A country that illegally calls itself macedonia north of Greece that was created in 1991, and this video depicts those borders,lol. and claiming it existed in alexanders time.

please remove the video it is grossly inaccurate

The memory of the byzantine empire was very much a driving force in revolutionary Greece(1821). It is even in the preamble of the constitution of the Hellenic Republic! Today it is just as omnipresent in the Greek national conscience.

The GREEK kingdom of Macedon started out as enemies of most Greek city states but ultimately Alexander united all greeks and he was responsible for greek unity and the earliest Greek national conscience. Greeks never were "enslaved" by Macedon as you put it, it was quite the opposite. Furthermore, that was not Alexander's way (see Greek-Persian mass marriages after conquest of Persia). You also used false borders(created in 1991) to depict the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. Pella is 900kilometers south of where your video falsely depicts it to be. All in all this video is a shameful display. I am not trying to be confrontational but this video is presented to us as historical fact but it is very inaccurate and blatanly false and it should be removed

Obviously I must make a few things clear. First of all, I am in no way attempting to make a political statement. The video was purely made for educational purposes. In fact, it was made for students of my study abroad class in Greece who were not classics majors. Thus, the use of that particular map. I know what the ancient borders of Macedon were; I am a classics major well versed in ancient history. However, I used that map for two reasons: A) Because I did not want to use a map that already had the ancient borders created, colored in, etc. because I wanted to make the map myself. I needed a blank map, and, unfortunately, there are very few blank maps that I thought were suitably zoomed in and appropriate for my purposes. I found a blank map with the modern borders and decided to use it, and B) Because this was aimed at an audience wholly unfamiliar with the ancient area of Macedonia. I thought that drawing attention to the modern borders would peak their interest and familiarity with what I was talking about. What is more, my map of Philip's empire is perfectly accurate and without the modern borders. The map you criticize is shown for but a mere moment at the beginning, and was intended to familiarize my target audience with the region. Remember, this video was not originally made for the Helios; it was made for my classmates. The Helios desperately needed material and so I offered my work. I would appreciate if you could tone down your criticism a bit.

With regards to the Byzantine memory, Alexander the Great, and the enslavement of the Greeks. I tell both of you who have criticized that statement to look into Yannis Hamilakis's well known A Nation and Its Ruins. That is the text I drew upon for my comments about the relative lack of the Byzantine memory in the early national narrative as well as their view toward Alexander the Great. Keep in mind, I am talking about a very specific time period: the early years of the independence movement. I direct you to pages 115 and 116 of that text. Simply because the memory of the Byzantine empire is in the preamble of the modern Greek constitution today does not mean that it was important to early Greek nationalists. It was, in fact, not particularly important to them, because the independence movement first began as a secular, and not religious, movement among Greek intellectuals. Byzantium stood for the Orthodox Church, and while Church was to play a major role in the war and the subsequent formation of the state, it was not something the original Greek nationalists, that is, educated intellectuals, wanted to highlight. What is more, the first Greek nationalists, citing Hamilakis here, did not treat Alexander the Great and the Hellenic League like modern Greeks do today. Philip II's conquest of Greece in the fourth century was, for the early nationalists, equivalent to the enslavement of their ancestors. They admired men like Demosthenes far more than Philip or Alexander. And, they may have been right in feeling that way. Alexander constantly intervened in the politics of the Greek states, and while he never liked to portray himself as a tyrant, he certainly acted like one. See F. W. Walbank and his book The Hellenistic World for an introduction to what I am talking about.

I would like to point out that by the time of the reign of King Otto and the middle of the nineteenth century, the situation had drastically changed. Byzantium was restored around that time and seen as an important part of the national narrative; this obviously has lasted until this day. Also, Greek attitudes toward Alexander and Macedon have also changed. Alexander is now seen as he who spread Hellenistic culture across the entire Eastern half of the known world instead of a conqueror and tyrant. Whatever view is more accurate I do not know; I was merely presenting the situation as it was in 1821.

So please, before you go and rant about my inaccurate maps and politically charged narrative, do a bit more reading, calm yourself down, and draft a cohesive and knowledgeable response.

As for the video I think that not only it has inaccuracies in the map (false Macedonia put in modern borders, Elis and Achaea are wrong set in Pelopenese) but neglects the vital role Alexander the Great signifies for the early Greek nationalists.

Elis and Achaea are not in the wrong places. You are merely reading the map wrong. The red dot indicates the city of Elis, while Achaea is a region, obviously, and perfectly in the correct general vicinity. Could Elis be perhaps be slightly moved west and south? I suppose, but I did not think it was that far off at all.

[xiosisland]

I apologize to you if I came across as harsh and didn't mean for it to sound that way. As I said before the map you used is still the focus of sensitive political issues in Greece and the wider Balkans. You put a lot of effort into your work and you could have gone through with the extra effort and used a more neutral map in your video. And again I apologize to you for being rude before that was not my intention; but your right that it is an emotional issue for many greeks and others today.

[Akrotatos]

Philip II's conquest of Greece in the fourth century was, for the early nationalists, equivalent to the enslavement of their ancestors. They admired men like Demosthenes far more than Philip or Alexander.

Every Greek nationalist I've read said the opposite. Can you provide the sources that Hamilakis cites in his book (at least the names of those early nationalists)

[neoptolemos]

Obviously I must make a few things clear. First of all, I am in no way attempting to make a political statement. The video was purely made for educational purposes. In fact, it was made for students of my study abroad class in Greece who were not classics majors. Thus, the use of that particular map. I know what the ancient borders of Macedon were; I am a classics major well versed in ancient history. However, I used that map for two reasons: A) Because I did not want to use a map that already had the ancient borders created, colored in, etc. because I wanted to make the map myself. I needed a blank map, and, unfortunately, there are very few blank maps that I thought were suitably zoomed in and appropriate for my purposes. I found a blank map with the modern borders and decided to use it, and B) Because this was aimed at an audience wholly unfamiliar with the ancient area of Macedonia. I thought that drawing attention to the modern borders would peak their interest and familiarity with what I was talking about. What is more, my map of Philip's empire is perfectly accurate and without the modern borders. The map you criticize is shown for but a mere moment at the beginning, and was intended to familiarize my target audience with the region. Remember, this video was not originally made for the Helios; it was made for my classmates.

Except that you did made a political statement by using this map where you depicted a modern state which uses the name Macedonia and claims the exclusiveness of ancient Macedonian history in its national myth.Just some notes for your excuses
a)Imho and since you claim to be a classics major, you ought to promote a credible, impartial and accurate representation/depiction of the geography you mention in the video.That is either by choosing an accurate already existing map either by creating your own that do not compromises.That would have kept your credibility intact.
b)I am sorry but this is a lame excuse.Your subject is early Greek nationalism and its narrative not Balkans and moreover why bother locating a country that the majority of your audience ignores ,it has nothing to do with your subject and it wasn't even present when the narrative is taking place?Why then not naming Greece, Bulgaria and Albania as well?
That is intended as a honest critique that will help see other aspects of the subject.If you are seeking an academic career you should always put credibility, impartiality and overall knowledge of the subject as a priority.

With regards to the Byzantine memory, Alexander the Great, and the enslavement of the Greeks. I tell both of you who have criticized that statement to look into Yannis Hamilakis's well known A Nation and Its Ruins. That is the text I drew upon for my comments about the relative lack of the Byzantine memory in the early national narrative as well as their view toward Alexander the Great. Keep in mind, I am talking about a very specific time period: the early years of the independence movement. I direct you to pages 115 and 116 of that text. Simply because the memory of the Byzantine empire is in the preamble of the modern Greek constitution today does not mean that it was important to early Greek nationalists. It was, in fact, not particularly important to them, because the independence movement first began as a secular, and not religious, movement among Greek intellectuals. Byzantium stood for the Orthodox Church, and while Church was to play a major role in the war and the subsequent formation of the state, it was not something the original Greek nationalists, that is, educated intellectuals, wanted to highlight. What is more, the first Greek nationalists, citing Hamilakis here, did not treat Alexander the Great and the Hellenic League like modern Greeks do today. Philip II's conquest of Greece in the fourth century was, for the early nationalists, equivalent to the enslavement of their ancestors. They admired men like Demosthenes far more than Philip or Alexander. And, they may have been right in feeling that way. Alexander constantly intervened in the politics of the Greek states, and while he never liked to portray himself as a tyrant, he certainly acted like one. See F. W. Walbank and his book The Hellenistic World for an introduction to what I am talking about.I would like to point out that by the time of the reign of King Otto and the middle of the nineteenth century, the situation had drastically changed. Byzantium was restored around that time and seen as an important part of the national narrative; this obviously has lasted until this day. Also, Greek attitudes toward Alexander and Macedon have also changed. Alexander is now seen as he who spread Hellenistic culture across the entire Eastern half of the known world instead of a conqueror and tyrant. Whatever view is more accurate I do not know; I was merely presenting the situation as it was in 1821.

Well I am indirectly aware of Hamilakis work since I have read about the history of Greek nationalism, Greek national myth and national historiography. However Hamilakis work is not the only credible source for the matter nor it is the absolute truth as his primary focus is the incorporation of archaeology in Greek national myth and Greek nationalism If I am not mistaken.He do make some interesting and fair remarks nevertheless which can be used in your analysis but they are not the only ones.
Early Greek nationalists were heavily influenced by their contemporary neo-classicism, philellenism and later national romanticism therefore they were subject to the various contemporary historical discourses for Macedonia at that time.And this historical discourse was present among Greek nationalists themselves and it is evident later during the amalgamation and maturation of national historiography under Paparrigopoulos and other early Greek historiographers.I would appreciate if you could elaborate a little bit more about these early Greek nationalists you are referring to specifically their names and views on that matter as I am struggling to remember any more details myself

Elis and Achaea are not in the wrong places. You are merely reading the map wrong. The red dot indicates the city of Elis, while Achaea is a region, obviously, and perfectly in the correct general vicinity. Could Elis be perhaps be slightly moved west and south? I suppose, but I did not think it was that far off at all.

Fair enough but Elis is the name of the region and the city therefore since it is depicted wrong it kinda strikes the eye as misplaced


As you can see Elis is indeed more Southwest as you have put it in Patra's place



I was more interested in your response regarding the points I was making here TBH:

I ve been there for about 7 times and although I can understand the point the author is trying to make i would say it neglects some things:
1)The museum itself has a set of models which demonstrate the different phases of the Acropolis :The Archaic one, the classical-Roman and medieval-Ottoman one
2)The display of a short documentary about the history of Acropolis and the Parthenon in within the museum itself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGitmYl6U90
3)The presence of pieces of medieval Parthenon and a visual reconstruction of it in the Byzantine and Christian museum of Athens
4)The "clearance" of medieval and Ottoman buildings and artefacts that happened during the 1830s and onward by the antiquity lovers Bavarians who played a crucial role (along with their contemporary Greek nationalists) in the downplay of Ottoman past and moreover the old reconstruction projects Acropolis ha suffered and the are considered out of date or that they have caused some damage .Therefore the damage that has been done during these years left no significant artefacts that would worth a display in the modern museum

[Audacia]

Every Greek nationalist I've read said the opposite. Can you provide the sources that Hamilakis cites in his book (at least the names of those early nationalists)

Page 112 of Hamilakis: " '...And a battle in Chaironeia took place, in which Philip won, destroying the Hellenic freedom. But Philip committed something even more disastrous, he fathered Alexander!' " and " 'Byzantine history is...a very long series of foolish deeds and shameful brutalities of the Roman state, transplanted into Byzantium. It is a disgraceful expression of the extreme wretchedness and decline of the Greeks.' " - I. Rizos Neroulos, intellectual, politician, and later president of the Athens Archaeological Society. He spoke those words on the Athenian Acropolis on May 25, 1841 in a speech aimed at outlining the history of the Hellenic nation. If you would like Hamilakis's source for this speech, see Synopsis ton Praktikon tis Arhaiologikis Etaireias ton Athinon, 2nd edition, Athens, 1846, pages 100-104.

Page 113: "In a similar tone, Nikolaos Saripolos, Professor at the University of Athens, noted in his inaugural lesson on October 21, 1848 that 'at the plains of Chaironeia the freedom of Greece died' " (Saripolos 1848:11).

Page 115: "[By the middle of the nineteenth century there was] a need to address the temporal discontinuity in the national narrative, from the 'enslavement' and 'death' of the nation in 338 BC at the Chaironeia battle, to its resurrection in 1821. This gap was to be bridged in the second half of the century, thanks to the work of Konstantinos Paparrigopoulos [whom Neoptolemus aptly cites, though his views reflected attitudes of a later time, not those held in 1821]." So, my viewers need to understand that I am talking about a very, very specific time period, namely, 1821 to around 1841. You are all correct in saying that the memory of Alexander and Macedon in general is currently an integral part of Greek nationalism; it has been since the middle of the nineteenth century. But it was not during the War of Independence and the decade thereafter, and that is the time period I aim to address in my video.

On the memory of Byzantium, see pages 113 and 114 of Hamilakis: "The relationship of modern Hellenes to Byzantium was, of course, mediated by Greek Orthodoxy and its ecclesiastical structures. This relationship was extremely complicated and turbulent. ... When, in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the leading intellectuals and advocates of Hellenic nationalism called for the establishment of a new kind of imagined community of Greek speaking Christians, based not primarily on faith, as before, but on perceived ethnic identification and the common classical heritage...the leaders of Orthodoxy foresaw the danger. ... The Patriarchate of Constantinople condemned [emphasis added] the War of Independence." Again, Byzantium may be important to Greek nationalism now, and has been for the better half of a century and a half, but that was not the case in 1821. I hope I have made myself clear. For the class, the video was restricted to 15 minutes, and the students were already familiar with the early Greek national narrative, given the nature of the class. Thus, I did not feel like I needed to explain the specificity of the time period I am looking at.

If anyone wants my full bibliography, go to YouTube and see the about section. I will just post it here for whoever is interested.

References:

Text References:
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities. London: Verso, 2006. Print.
Hamilakis, Yannis. The Nation and Its Ruins: Antiquity, Archaeology, and National Imagination in Greece. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2007. Print.
Larsen, Jakob A. O. "Was Greece Free between 196 and 146 B. C.?" Classical Philology 30.3 (1935): 193-214. JSTOR. Web. 14 May 2014.
Plutarch, and Bernadotte Perrin. "Life of Flamininus." Plutarch's Lives. Vol. X. Harvard UP, 1921. Print. Loeb Classical Library.
Polybius, and Ian Scott-Kilvert. The Rise of the Roman Empire. London: Penguin, 1979. Print.
Waterfield, Robin. Taken at the Flood: The Roman Conquest of Greece. New York: Oxford UP, 2014. Print.

Video References:
Gladiator. Dir. Ridley Scott. Perf. Russell Crowe. DreamWorks Pictures, 2000. Online.
Rise of the Roman Republic. Great Military Battles. 10 Aug. 2013. Web. 15 May 2014.
Rome. By Bruno Heller, John Milius, and William J. MacDonald. Dir. Michael Apted. Perf. Kevin McKidd, Ray Stevenson, Polly Walker. BBC and HBO, 2005. Online.

Audio References:
Horner, James. Troy: Music From the Motion Picture. David Foster, 2004. MP3.
Zimmer, Hans, and Lisa Gerrard. Gladiator: Music From the Motion Picture. Klaus Badelt, Ridley Scott, Hans Zimmer, 2000. MP3.

[machiavelli00]

Nice!

[Audacia]

I am currently editing the video to fix the Macedonia issue. A new one will be up shortly. It will not depict the modern borders of Macedonia.