Emathia

Emathia (Greek: Ἠμαθία) in ancient times was a geopolitical toponym, although no doubt based on a type of alluvial terrain prevalent in the region at the time. The toponym comprised different territories at different times, expanding from a base in the lower Axios River valley to include all of what was renamed to Macedonia. The details of the initial terrain, being in the delta of a river with a high rate of flow, are subject to rapid geologic change, easily perceptible over historic time.

Ἠμαθία
Emathia
The map shows modern Greek Macedonia, which closely approximates the last independent Kingdom of Macedon, and also Strabo's Emathia at its greatest extent, which was renamed to Macedonia by its kings. What is different today is the "Macedonian Plain." It did not exist when Pella became the capital city of the new kingdom. Pella was situated on an extension of the Thermaic Gulf, which filled in during classical and Hellenistic times to form first a lake and then the plain. The plain is almost entirely modern, currently being part of the Axios Delta National Park. Ancient Pella in ancient Emathia are bronze-age in date. Original Emathia extended up the right bank of the Axios to the highlands. Today's Imathia revitalizes the geopolitical concept.
The map shows modern Greek Macedonia, which closely approximates the last independent Kingdom of Macedon, and also Strabo's Emathia at its greatest extent, which was renamed to Macedonia by its kings. What is different today is the "Macedonian Plain." It did not exist when Pella became the capital city of the new kingdom. Pella was situated on an extension of the Thermaic Gulf, which filled in during classical and Hellenistic times to form first a lake and then the plain. The plain is almost entirely modern, currently being part of the Axios Delta National Park. Ancient Pella in ancient Emathia are bronze-age in date. Original Emathia extended up the right bank of the Axios to the highlands. Today's Imathia revitalizes the geopolitical concept.
This article is about the ancient geopolitical region. For the modern Greek administrative unit, see Imathia. For the town of ancient Thrace, see Emathia (Thrace).

Emathia initially was the region of the Macedonian capital polis, Pella of Meris (subdivision) II, also of the capital of the Macedonian League, Beroia. In portraying these poleis moderns usually use the modern map and base their conclusions upon it. With the advent of core samples and carbon dating in the latter 20th century it was soon discovered that the 19th and early 20th century literary analyses had not taken into consideration the changes made by the Axios River, as well as the latest available archaeological data. Pella was not a late classical or Hellenistic settlement, although rendered into a legitimate polis by Philip II. Mycenaean surface sherds supported at least a Bronze-age provenience.

Moreover, Pella until quite late in the classical period had been a port city of the Thermaic Gulf. Subsequently its estuary became a lake until it was dispensed with by agriculturalists of the 20th century, with a river as a remnant. Consequently the modern rivers there as well as the filled area, called "the Macedonian Plain," are quite late and cannot be used to reconstruct the details presented by the literary sources. Today most of the Macedonian Plain is occupied by the Axios Delta National Park, mainly a collection of wetlands. Modern Imathia, etymologicaLly from the same ancient word, is a new creation of modern Greece, as is modern Macedonia.

Localization

History of the terrain

The Aegean Sea Plate undergoing subsidence because of back-arc extension behind the Hellenic arc, the Aegean Sea is a classic example of drowned terrain: islands fronted by steep cliffs formed from mountain-tops, submergent coastlines with long estuaries formed by flooding from the sea. Acting contrary to the submergence is aggradation. Drowned rivers dump their sediment into their new estuaries creating river deltas. The deltas eventually combine to form alluvuial shelves and valleys, which, in the Aegean, typically became agricultural areas.

Over any period, an aggraded shoreline is the result of an equilibrium between subsidence and aggradation. Subsidnce pushed the coastline inland; aggradation brings it out. The equilibrium may be cyclical, or it may trend in one direction.

Core studies in the Macedonian Plain compared with core studies from the whole Mediterranean have established that throughout the Aegean the rate of subsidence is on the average a little less than a metre per thousand years, which expresses itself as a rise in sea level to an observer at the surface.[1] Beginning 11,000 years ago nearly 11 m of negative terrestrial altitude was created. This 11 m is currently full of aggraded sediment to just above the surface.

The shoreline at any isochron; that is a line on the basin wall every part of which has the same date, obviously depends on the configuration of the surface between the location of the foot of the core and the concurrent shoreline. The more core samples that are available, the better the geologist can detail the surface. All models retain an element of speculation. However, in the case of the Macedonian Plain, Bintliff reports on a number of circumstances recent enough to add new meaning to the historical sources.

Etymology

Emathia was named after the Samothracian king Emathion and not after the local Emathus. The etymology of the name is of Homeric Greek origin - ‘amathos’= sandy soil, opp. to sea-sand (psámathos = ψάμαθος); in plural the links or dunes by the sea, [compare êmathóeis = ἠμαθόεις/ἠμᾰθόεις (masc.), ēmathóessa = ἠμαθόεσσα (fem.), ēmathóen = ἠμαθόεν (neut.) epic for amathóeis/ámathos = ἀμᾰθόεις ἄμαθος[2] and êmathoessa (see above)[3] 'sandy', i. e. the coastal, sandy/swampy land around Axius river, in contrast to mountainous Macedonia, probably also intended as 'laying large land' (cf. PIE *mē-2, *m-e-t- 'to mow, to reap').[4]

Classical sources

Homer,[5] who makes no mention of Macedonia, places Emathia as a region next to Pieria.

but Hera darted down and left the peak of Olympus; on Pieria she stepped and lovely Emathia, and sped over the snowy mountains of the Thracian horsemen, even over their topmost peaks, nor grazed she the ground with her feet; and from Athos she stepped upon the billowy sea, and so came to Lemnos, the city of godlike Thoas

The Homeric name was renewed mainly in Roman times and Ptolemy mentions some cities of Emathia. In Nonnus, Dionysiaca 48.6 Typhoeus having stripped the mountains of Emathia, he cast the rocky missiles at Dionysus. In Ovid, Metamorphoses 5.313 the daughters of Pierus say: "we grant Emathia's plains, to where uprise Paeonia's peaks of snow".[6] The Emathian or Emathius dux is a frequently used name by Latin poets for Alexander the Great, as in Milton, the Emathian conqueror. Strabo relates that "what is now called Macedonia was in earlier times called Emathia"[7] but since Homer, the earliest source considers Emathia only a region next to Pieria, Strabo's reference should be interpreted in the Roman era context of Emathia's name reviving. The same stands for Latin writers[8] who name Thessaly as Emathia; the Roman province of Macedonia included Thessaly. In 12.462 of Metamorphoses, an Emathian named Halesus is killed by the centaur Latreus and in Catullus 64. 324, Peleus is Emathiae tutamen (protector).

Polybius (23.10.4) mentions that Emathia was earliest called Paeonia and Strabo (frg 7.38) that Paeonia was extended to Pieria and Pelagonia. According to N. G. L. Hammond,[9] the references are related to Bronze Age period before the Trojan War.

Towns

The most important towns of Emathia were:

  • Aigai (first capital and holy city of Macedonia)
  • Beria (modern Veria)
  • Kition (modern Naoussa)

Alexander the Great with settlers from this area founded Emathia in Syria.

References

Citations
  1. Bintliff 1976, p. 246, Figure 5a
  2. Liddell–Scott–Jones amathos
  3. Pulon êmathoenta – Odyssey 1.93
  4. Pokorny Pokorny's dictionary
  5. Iliad 14.226
  6. The nine Muses and the nine Magpipes
  7. Strab.Frag.7.11
  8. Lucan (1. 1, 6. 360, 7. 166)
  9. Prehistory of Macedonia, i. 418 n. 2

Source
  • Bintliff, John (1976). "The Plain of Western Macedonia and the Neolithic Site of Nea Nikomedeia". Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society. 42: 241–262.
  • Finkelberg, Margalit (2012). "Emathia". The Homer Encyclopedia. Blackwell. doi:10.1002/9781444350302.wbhe0413. ISBN 978-1-4051-7768-9.
  • Hammond, N GL (1997). "The location of Aegeae". The Journal of Hellenic Studies. 117: 177–179. doi:10.2307/632555. ISSN 0075-4269.
  • Hatzopoulos, M.B. (2004). "Makedonia". In Hansen, M.H.; Nielsen, T.H. (eds.). An Inventory of Archaic and Classical Poleis (PDF). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Smith, William, ed. (1854). "Emathia". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray.

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