Reacting to Alexander the Great (Part 1) | Epic History TV 

I know this is already early but after this you should check the diadochi wars by kings and generals. Its the sequel to alexander the great its like game of thrones but real life

About the hat maby use the Alexander the Greats helmet, its prety nice loking.

The warships, TRIREME's, were the fastest, most advanced and most agile ship of the time, equivalent to the Napoleonic ships of the line. They got their name from the three rows of oars with one man per oar. Oarsmen were free men that were paid to row (approx 170 oarsmen)

Before you get stuck with the pronunciation, Alexander's famous horse is pronounced .Bew-sef-a -lus LOL

The game of chess is designed on antiquity warfare basics. Developed in India. The Rooks on the flanks represent Elephants. Elephants would be brought in from the side and typically charge straight ahead. The bishops represent Chariots. Chariots can fly diagonally firing arrows. The horse obviously represents cavalry. The horses in chess make the L shape. So like SoGal noticed, they rush in and then sort of stop, make their line, and battle. Thus the L. Pawns obviously your infantry who are vulnerable from flanking (can only take a piece diagonally) and so on.

I'm Greek but born and live in Australia. According to DNA tests, North Macedonians (FYROM) and Greeks are both genetically related to the ancient Greeks. DNA studies show that North Macedonians (FYROM) interbred with the Greeks that were living on the lands that the southern Slavic tribe's settle on during the Slavic migration into Europe. Ancient Macedonians we're not Slavic, but North Macedonians (FYROM) are not entirely Slavic, they have Greek ancestors due to interbreeding with the local inhabitants on the lands that they settled on. Edit: You being from Greece does suggest you are more genetically related to the ancient Greeks than a North Macedonians (FYROM) is, but North Macedonians (FYROM) certainly do have Greek ancestry. North Macedonians (FYROM) are most closely genetically related to their fellow Southern Slavic nations, Serbs, Bosnians, Croatians and ext, but they certainly do have Greek ancestry.

@@johntom5049 Actually that is not accurate at all. Only the southern border population of North Macedonia has Greek DNA. That's because Ancient Macedonians did not live in most of North Macedonia. The area of modern-day North Macedonia was mostly populated by Thraco-Illyrian tribes.

@@johntom5049 ​ Then they should Hellenize and become true Macedonians like the rest of us ;) However it is not that simple i'm afraid, for example. Modern day Turkish people, same say they have a great amount of greek genetics in them, due to the fact that greeks were the majority in Anatolia, even after the ottomans took over. But does it matter to them ? I doubt it. Should it matter to Greeks ? Only if they wish to find their ancestral roots without violating the "tree" of Hellenism. The residents of North-macedonia are trying to do just that, may or may not share genetics with ancient people who inhabited the land(greeks included) , today, they share Zero linguistic and cultural ties with these ancient groups, nor with the macedonians, instead they embraced a slavic language and culture. On the other hand, modern greeks, do share linguistic and cultural ties with the ancient greeks and despite being conquered by others "cultures" over the ages they maintained Hellenism alive, unlike other greeks who lived in Anatolia, Balkans, south italy, etc. Hellenism is not the genetics, but the culture and the language, if these 2 die, Hellenism dies, so far Hellenism has proven to be hard to kill indeed. Let's keep it that way. We are the representatives of that culture today, either we like/want it or not.

@@johntom5049 Actually you are mistaken. The people of the Former Yugoslav Republic of North Macedonia are in the majority slavs related to Bulgarians whilst 30% of the population are Albanians. The autosomal DNA of the Slav population of the Republic of North macedonia is the same as that of the Bulgarians of bulgaria and indeed they speak a dialect of Bulgarian. The DNA of the 30% Albanian population of the Republic of North macedonia is related to Greek however because Greeks and Albanians have the same Proto-Balkanic (Pelasgian) roots going back to 10,000 BC. That is both are related to the neolithic farmers who were a pre-Greek people of the Balkans.

Hey bro, do they talk about Porus there? the indian one who end the conquest of Alexander the great

Macedonia is where Greek people start to blend with Illyrians and Thracians. Typically the cities would be Greeks or mixed people living the Greek culture. Outside the cities would be Thracians and others. This was necessary for economic reasons. Greek cities demanded a lot of resources that places like Macedonia and Thrace would supply. But as Macedonia develops and build more and more cities mostly from timber sale$$$ it becomes more and more Greek.

Although you could argue that Byzantium, espiecially in the later periods was a Greek state

@@tusidex5228 While heavily Greek ethnically, I would maintain that the Byzantine state was survival of the Roman Empire in it's eastern form

@@Cteabis I agree but in the later periods of the empire they pointed out their greekness more and more

@@tusidex5228 this is true, however the people still called themselves Romanoi so they believed they were Roman. The word Byzantine was made by a historian in the 16th or 17th century, and Byzantium was renamed in the 4th century AD by Constantine I to Nova Roma then coming to be called Constantinopolis/Constantinople. I’d consider the east pretty romanised

And are larger that you think, for sure...

One of those islands is called Lesbos. And a male living there is one of the few men in the world who can say he's a Lesbian.

@@afpwebworks True... XD

the difference between Macedonian and Greek did not become an issue until after Alexander. The term Greek was a way to unify this army, bring everyone together. Thru their shared Greek culture, religion etc. After Alexander dies. This is where suddenly being Macedonian became important. If you were just a Greek you were shunned from power. You had to be Macedonian. Was like that for quite some time, then later the situation calmed down again.

@@MarkVrem It was an issue *before* Alexander as well. It was an open question among Greeks regarding the status of the Macedonians, Herodutus claimed to have evidence that the Macedonian royal house was Greek, but nevertheless records a story where Alexander I had to prove his Greek lineage so that he could compete in the Olympics. During the reign of Phillip II, Demosthenes believed Phillip II was a barbarian, whereas Isokrates accepted the Macedonian claim that the royal house was descended from Greeks.

@@ArdensSedVirens1 Right it mattered for the opposite reasons almost. Before Alexander the legitimacy of Macedons as greeks was questioned. ... After Alexander, it flips on its head, suddenly the legitimacy of non-Macedon Greeks in high ranking leadership roles is questioned within the empire that Alexander built.

@@MarkVrem Well no, even Plutarch, a Greek who greatly admires Alexander, still makes a hard distinction between Greeks and Macedonians.

@@ArdensSedVirens1 Makes sense - for context anyone reading this Plutarch came way later during Roman Empire times. --- Even 150-200? years before Plutarch when the Roman Republic is battling Macedon I believe their reason for doing so was to come to the aid of some smaller Greek kingdoms. ---------------- The line gets blurry again when talking about Ptolemaic Egypt, as we refer to them as Greeks, but in Plutarchs mind would they have then been Macedon. No idea lol.

Today Hellespont is called Dardanelles straights.

Yes, the “sophisticated” greeks. Always looking down on us SMH lol

Current day Macedonia tho is not greek at all.

@@user-cr4cj1fl8z half of historical Macedonia is still greek. Including place where Pella (capital of the kingdom and birthplace of Alexander) was.

@@user-cr4cj1fl8z Of cause. It's 2300 years later and the modern Macedonia ist post osmanic.

Confirming that yes, Ancient Greece was more a culture than a unified political entity. Similar to describing "Feudal Europe" or "Western Civilization" as even within the "same" culture of Ancient Greece there were wildly different political and social organization (Sparta and Athens being the most well known examples).

The Romans adopted Greek aspects, but don't fool yourself into thinking that it contributed to Roman power amplification. The things that allowed Rome to expand so effectively were distinctly Roman.

Thanks for this I was curious aswell.

Indeed. As a medieval re-enactor, mainly an archer, I often tell people that my weapon is an example of the oldest stored-energy weapon in the world.

I believe we do have a long gap in our discoveries of arrow-heads, so it's also possible the bow has been invented multiple times in multiple places. I mean we have cases of _evolution_ doing that, nevermind technology.

yes, althought we must point who at the time of Darius III, Persia was already a declining power, it surely have got back with Artaxerxes III, but after his death and assasination of Artaxerxes IV, Bagoas, and his corrupt goverment officials made Darius, the king, despite his incompetence on many affairs

@@omarbradley6807 well, Darius didn't get a lot of time to prove himself. From what is written, i get the impression he was kind of joe biden - a safe guy that can be expected to not change much.

@@Ikit1Claw Yes this is a good way to put it, He was there basically to protect the ruling elites, thus he left the satraps, and ministers to do what they wanted, there was no authority, the corruption went rampage. It is intresting who this fact is barely mentioned in history, but Memmnon of Rhodes defeated Parmenion at Magnesia, and force him back to Europe, before Alexander launched his campaign against Persia. Yet not only the empire was unprepared, they dismissed Memmnon, the armies where disbanded. So we already have a kind of knowledge of how was going his reign, then Alexander happened, and well, it's history

The sacking of Thebes was primarily done as an example to show other Greek city states what happens to them if they dare to revolt. He could have ordered Thebes just to hand luxuries and money after he defeated them, you know. But he wanted to punish them and make it an example for every city state that thought about betraying or oposing him. He was a young king who needed to secure his position.

@@Raymoiful These are not mutually exclusive though I must disagree.Alexander's financial situation was more dire than it might seem now and thebes were one of major city-states in Greece, a former hegemon. It is unlikely that Alexander would make such decision were it just about the rebellion. I dont think that ever happened before, a major greek city completely destroyed by other greek power. Just look to his treatment of Athens shortly after, who not just encouraged rebellion (and even were expected to join thebans) but also secretly tried to persuade Parmenion to rebel aganist Alexander.

Same language culture religion and blood

Right, in fact, Alexander's mother was Illyrian. The XENA character from that TV series I believe was actually based on Alexander's sister. Cause she left Macedonia for Illyria after Alexander's death. Like the warrior princess of Illyria lol.

Very well written.

Fr. It's like germany before unification. The people there were divided by many different countries. But they were still "German" as there was no single german state until later

@@johnnyjoestar5193 Yup pretty much with Macedonia basically being Prussia. Where half of it is kinda mixed and is somehow a vassal to both HRE and Poland lol. .. But makes the best of its resources and gets the job done.

@@johnnyjoestar5193 Well, sort of. Greece becomes a bit more complicated due to the whole Roman conquest. Because at that point all of Greece gets conquered by Rome, and through centuries of integration, Greeks begin to *universally* refer to themselves as Romans, in Greek. Until Greece became a country in 1821, all Greeks referred to themselves as Romans, and viewed themselves as having a Roman identity. Even the Greek language became known as "Romeika" (I.e "The Roman Language"). Even after 1821, Greeks still part of the Ottoman Empire saw themselves as Romans, this didn't stop until all Greeks in Turkey were deported after WWI.

Remains and wrecks have been founded alongside the Mediterranean... the salted water preseved the wood/structures very well... Also we have descriptions (text) and paintings

They rebuilt one in Athens - The big challenge with those ships was making them as long as possible, while as light as possible while still being stable and not roll over. They ended up inventing this rope tension system that ran thru the ship and would pull the front and the back of the ship together. This tension and pulling off the front of the ship into the back of it. I guess made them into nice tight packages that deliver death on the seas.

I wouldnt say that the roman legion evolved from phalanx. May be i just cant recall the early ears while Rome was forming but i doubt they ever used phalanx as an unit type. Correct me if im wrong , may be they had them while still a forming kingom before they expanded.

@@user-cr4cj1fl8z The Romans did use phalanx/spear formations in their early years.

Well you said it quite bluntly. Perhaps it's more fair to say that the history of the european settlers in the america is not quite ancient, but we cant just forget that the natives lived there for thousands of years. And besides, what about the band of vikings, who 500 years before Columbus, had visited america

Just got to the end of the video and seen that you've suggested exactly that.

A Phrygian or Corintian helmet will be much better and related to the subject (war, not peace): War was forbidden during the "Olympic days"...

Hammer and Anvil strategy coming from him of course

I think she is more shocked by the business end of ancient warfare. No matter the brilliant strategy and tactics it always comes down to stabbing another man face to face.

@@voice0074 my archers disagree with you lol

I think Alexander's victories at Gaugamela and the Jaxartes battle against the Scythians were quite sophisticated. the half fake attack on the Persian left, the split of the enemy army and the sudden attack on the Persian centre is a manoeuvre rarely done in military history. Usually a flank attack is performed after the destruction or disbanding of the enemy flank, but in front of a so superior enemy foe, he pinned down the enemy flank and destroyed the enemy cohesion by putting down the command centre, annihilating the enemy in flee, not by encircling or by pure pressure. You must be a genius if you achieve this, a master of maneouvering.

I could be completely wrong but i've also heard they tried ramming eachother with their ships, though i'm not sure how this worked or where I originally heard it from

I just found this on wikipedia in reference to the Battle of Salamis (480BC) "These battles involved triremes or biremes as the standard fighting platform, and the focus of the battle was to ram the opponent's vessel using the boat's reinforced prow. The opponent would try to maneuver and avoid contact, or alternately rush all the marines to the side about to be hit, thus tilting the boat."

Also just remebered 'greek fire' incendiary weapons, used by the byzantine empire (little later in history, i know)

@@michael_177 Yes they also rammed each other. But greek fire was much later. Mainly sea battles meant that ships transported soldiers to enemy ships to fight them.

@@michael_177 , I don't think they actually tried to sink the enemy ships by ramming it. By ramming they only tried to break the paddles and make it immobile. Then they would storm all the ships one by one with overwhelming numbers.

I prefer the wars of the gods mod 😊

Disagree. This erra was filled brilliant stratagists Napolion idolised the tactics used by greats such as Hannibal.

@@markmorris7123 the tactics were still basically the same, flank them then spank them, attack them in the rear, maneuver Cavalry, organised lines, etc.

600 hours on record, could absolutely destroy my enemies on any difficulty..... Installed devide et impera. Spend 30 turns defending one captured City. Apparently supply lines play a big part if they are not connected to you 😅. Had a grand old time, would recommend!

@@elinator600gaming3 yo i came back on Rome 2 vanilla version, after 50 turns i was bored, it's so easy lol

Correct. The Greek language is the only reference you need :) Even in modern greek the words are the same. Most ancient Greek names had interesting meanings in fact. That included the name of Philip's dnasty. The Argead dynasty. It literally translated to "from Argos" which is a city in the Peloponnese(south greece). (the story goes that the founder of Macedon came from there, hence the name Argead) I don't know why the lady on the video claims ancient Macedonians are not greeks when everything points to the opposite. I hope she is doing it out of ignorance and not deceit

Well they are to the north of Macedonia soo the name it's fine, a more fitting name could be "paeonia" or Western Bulgaria

@@felicepompa1702 they are Bulgarians that communist propaganda made them believe they are accident Macedonians even if they came 900 years after Alexander but all universities of the world know the truth if you want truth this is it you can believe what ever you want

@@alphaomega9236 i believe macedonians were greek, i said that the name is fine tho because north Macedonia is in fact in north Macedonia. In italy we have South Tirol, but north Tirol is in Austria, South Tirol is italian and german while northern Tirol is only german. Same thing Macedonia is greek north Macedonia is slav and albanian, i don't get why the greek government hate their name

@@felicepompa1702 Greece hate the name because they teach in their schools that they are Ancient Macedonians and they say Greek Macedonia should be theirs If Austria Tirol would say south Tirol should be ours Italy would have a problem too,

@@alphaomega9236 well the locals germans would like to be part of Austria but the Austrian government doesn't want them

I'd assume it's because they look tiny on that small map; little more than rocks. In reality, of course, they're of a perfectly habitable size.

Darius is the Latinisation of a Greek version - Dareios - of the older Persian name Darayavahush. As Darius is the Latin form of the name, the "i" isn't a diphthong (the Romans would have written it something like "Daraius" or "Daraeus" otherwise), so the narrator's "dar-EYE-us" is inaccurate.

"Πας μη Έλλην βάρβαρος" - An ancient saying, using modern day Greek. You need not go very further from it to gain some form of understanding as to why things were considered this way. I'm going to do something that is anathemae to History, that is using a modern day term to explain past civilizations. The term is "cultural appropriation". But bear with me, I'll try to make it make sense. Ancient Athens was in it's pinnacle during those times, Sparta as well, so were a lot of other city states like Korinthos, Argos etc. Amazing monuments were being built, Mathematics, Philosophy, Navigation, Theater etc etc - Everything was carried forward and there should be no surprise that 5th century was dubbed the "Golden Age of Pericles". Democracy was birthed during that age. Now, imagine your neighbors looking at it and saying "I wanna be part of that, I wanna contribute to it". It was all part of the politics and status quo of that age. When Athens needed help from its' far away colonies/settlements , suddenly they were "Hellenes" or "Greeks" so they should assist. When others requested assistance from Athens (or other city-states) suddenly you were a barbarian (unless direct monetary/trade/political interests were involved). In a sense, it was the ancient way of people saying "Oh, you want to be part of US now, you better prove it through your culture/way of life". Call it "ancient pride" or "heritage pride" if you will, you'll be on point. I'm not sure about the proper words or vocabulary in English. Everybody wanted to be like the Athenians. And Athens' last bastion was : "Were you born within our walls? If no, then you're not one of us." This also applied to other, equally "prideful" (use a more appropriate word if you have one) city-states, like Sparta. Now, apply this way of thinking more "globally" - unless there's an outside threat imminent. Then suddenly, we got a common enemy on "our" borders, so we're all in the same boat. There's no merit in arguing "Ancient Macedonia wasn't Greek" , as the term "Greek" has taken on different meanings though out the ages, and there was no "Greece" as a country we know now. Its like arguing "Ancient Romans were not Italians". I agree with you with the cultural statement, it's how I view it as well. If, when you were born, you were taught X language, worshiped X gods, lived in X buildings, had X tutors, dressed like X, behaved like X, ate and breathed X - then you're X (where X can be Egyptian, Hellenic, Roman, Maya, Inkas etc etc) regardless if your name is "Alexander" or "Cleopatra" and you were destined for greatness or "Ephialtes".

I will correct you by saying that there was never a United Greek Empire. The Macedonian Empire and the Diadochi were Greek Empires. Why they were Greek? Because they had a Greek aristocracy and had ancient Greek as their Official language of administration. That also the reason why the late Byzantine Empire was considered a Greek Empire. Now about if Macedonia was Greek or not I have to say that it was Greek. Same Gods, Same culture (with some regional differences), and a language that is considered by most historians as either dialect of Doric Greek or a different branch of Hellenic (either way Greek). And I don't think that we should take what same ancient Greek leaders believed about the Macedonians into consideration because of their political bias.

@@starman1144 You: "I will correct you by saying that there was never a United Greek Empire." Also you: "So anyway, here are a bunch of different Hellenistic Kingdoms, proving there was a united Greek empire." "That also the reason why the late Byzantine Empire was considered a Greek Empire." That, as well as Western bias and Greek nationalism, is why the Byzantines *today* are viewed as a Greek empire. They, obviously, did not conceive of themselves as being Greeks. The Byzantines conceived of their ethnos and sometimes their genos as being... Roman. "or a different branch of Hellenic (either way Greek)" no, that isn't what that means. If Macedonian is a different language, but very similar, that means it is a different subdivision of Hellenic distinct from Greek. I think you are misunderstanding what 'Hellenic' means as a name for a branch of Indo-European, because it doesn't mean 'either way Greek'. "And I don't think that we should take what same ancient Greek leaders believed about the Macedonians into consideration because of their political bias." It isn't just those mean, biased Athenians though. Macedonians would also sometimes see themselves as different from Greeks, or at least they certainly were not fond of the other Greeks, and other times would see themselves as also being Greeks. It depends on the context.

@@ArdensSedVirens1 1. There was Never a United Greek empire because none of them considered all of the Greeks. The Macedonians didn't control southern Italy which was majority Greek at the time. And the Diadochi were a divided Macedonian empire so neither did they control all of the Greeks. 2. I didn't say that the Byzantine Empire was Greek. I said that it's considered a Greek Empire. Byzantium is Roman nation with a majority Greek population. The people of the Byzantine Empire called themselves Romans because the word Hellenic (or Greek) was also the name of the pegan Olympian religion and because they were Christians didn't want to associate with that. Even modern Greeks called themselves Romans until they became independent from the Ottomans and re-adopt their old name that now wasn't associated with peganism. 3. I said that Macedonian either spoke the Doric or their own Macedonian Greek. When I said that I mean Dialects, not languages. Dialects are not languages. Also what is the name of the Greek language (Modern and Ancient) in Greek?? Is it maybe HELLENIC. 4. All ancient Greek states had a sense of superiority against other Greeks. Athenians called themselves first Athenians and second Greeks. That doesn't change that they were Greek.

@@starman1144 1. yes. i know. that is my point. lol. 2. ok 3. okay, so you're not going to admit you might not know what 'Hellenic' means in the context of it being a branch of Indo-European. lol. that also isn't what you said. 4. i want you to re-read what i said so you can then understand how this response doesn't make sense.

That might be so but the fact that she has been through school without knowing about this and other things around the world is slightly worrying to me. I assume she's above 16 years old and I thought you had to already know about basic history around the world by that age. We at least had to have a basic understanding about the world history in the early teens. I'm glad she's eager to learn though, which is making me happy. I just mention this because of what I've seen on other channels in the past and it's repeating itself. Not only that but education overall seems to get worse and worse.

@@Doorsofprcptn we should not be high and mighty and thinking we know it all, most of the living world probably doesnt know about ancient history. It's not their fault. I'm sure most people in history do not know about history, because to them it is history and always will be. 21st century is probably a phenomenon in the fact we have all this information at our fingertips, it's only really just starting

Not really, just some Athenian orators and demagogues used the term barbarian to slander their political opponents whether they were non Athenians or even other Athenians. The common people saw them as just another northern Greek tribe with a rural lifestyle and a strange accent.

Exactly, war horse breeds were fearsome!

I think that SoGal didn't know that this weapon was so "old" and also that his use was so wolrdwide spreaded...

"Except you are Octavian Augustus" also Mike Duncan ))

I mean that does include "dying" so I'm OK with not being Alexander.

Available in English and Greek, search for these separately

@@williambranch4283 thanks William

After Alexandros dies. Athens rises up against Macedon. But I can't remember if Sparta took part in this battle. I just remember that Macedon got lucky and got reinforcements from Asia just in time to beat the Athenians. If they hadn't all heck would have broken loose back in Greece.

@@MarkVrem Sparta "revolted" while Alexander was still out Alexandering, they did have like 20k men which is pretty sizable, but I believe the army was mostly made up of slaves and mercenaries (Presia sponsored them iirc) but they were annihilated by Antipiter after like 3 seconds

Don’t know; it’s really old. It’s a Thomas Kincade painting, so maybe search for Kincade mugs :)

@@SoGal_YT I will try(: its really pretty

No other Greek states also used the phalanx (such as at the battle of Marathon) it's just that Phillip invented the Sarissa phalanx

@@apostolispouliakis7401 About that i was refering, maybe not in those terms, but as i said, the Phalanx was *normally* refered to that compact *spear* formation. The *phalanx in question* however was a pure Macedonian thing, as the greeks could only rely on their *hoplite wall* (spear phalanx)