Eb Antigonidmacedonian Aartale Successors Of The One Eyed Updated 24122013
My father, the son of Demetrios Poliorketes, son of the founder of the Antigonid line Antigonus Monophthalmus, or one-eyed - was always an absent figure in my life.
My mother, a Thessalian slave girl named Lasthena, would sit by the fireside of her homestead and tell me tales of him oh yes, she had a homestead. Antigonus knew where she was and kept her as comfortable as possible, living in a life of semi-luxury, with a home and slaves all of her own. All he asked of her was that she keep my parentage a secret from others and that I would not grow up to rise against him. Anyway, she would tell me of how handsome he was, smooth-faced and with the body of an Athenian statue, how he glistened in his armour and seemed to her, a smitten maiden of only sixteen, like some God or other come to earth. She was like that, and she always hoped that he would come back to her, foolish woman, but I get ahead of myself.
Antigonus the Second, called by many 'Gonatas' after his place of birth, came to power late in his life but took hold of the flailing reigns as if he were born to power. His own father, the besieger, had left him good holdings before he finally drank himself to death, but little else in the way of family. This abandonment of ones offspring seemed to be a trait amongst the Antigonids, Demetrios having a maniacal sense of self-importance to go with it, building a capital city in Magnesia named of all things 'Demetrias' after himself. Next he warred with Pyrrhos, and after that, attacked by Epiros on one side and Lysimachus on the other, left Greece to attack the Asiatic holdings of the latter. There he died, never coming back to his wife or son, who by this time was fifty years of age and now one of a few claimants to the Makedonian throne.
At this time I was still in Thessaly with my mother, waiting for news of my fathers triumphant victories. I was but a boy then, fourteen years from my mothers womb, and was eager to meet this conqueror, this Titan amongst men, but disappointment is a bitter dish and some would even say poisonous.
Why then, why write a discourse on the life and campaigns of a man that was never closer to me than an ant to the Gods on Olympus?
My mind is not yet sure about this, but perhaps by writing and leaving this to posterity, those many that come after me, I might be able to answer my own question by the closing word.
The first years of this chronicle are as one might expect, more focused on myself than with my father or his ambitions to regain hegemony of all Greece. To drive the barbarians back into the north and to put down the rival claimants to the throne. This is not some puffed-up vanity however, I have never set myself higher than any other and what news I did receive of him was by way of rumour and hearsay and not from my views and experiences. Do not worry, I shall not bore you with accounts of my childhood or my years growing from a young child into an older child, but will tell you only that little which you may need to know about me to make your own decisions about what I write here.
As I look through the notations and scraps of papyri I used to record events beyond my control I can hardly believe that I wrote them.
Now where to begin?
As I have said, I am one maybe one of many of the bastard children of arguably the rightful king of Makedonia. This is my only claim to a noble lineage, and even that is marred by a fathers wish not to see his son when he was born. I come from the womb of a woman who was, for most of her life, worth no more than a hog and would feed me more of the food than she would feed herself, a brave woman and one that taught me my earliest lessons of how to live my life.
I had no Athenian education, no military training with "phalangites" or horsemen, no father that was loved by the Greeks and Makedonians alike. What I learnt was the knowledge of one who comes from the earth, from the sweat and salt of the land, things such as how to honour one who gives you a good turn or how to respect those that are both your superiors and in others ways your equal. With this, perhaps not as my mother intended, came a rebellious streak and a hatred toward those of nobility and high birth. When I was only eight I took a thick stick and thrashed a Boeotian boy nearly to death with it, and when my mother asked why I had done this I replied because I can.
This may seem a rather obscure answer, and obtuse, but it was the only thing I held above him which I could use, as I have always been large for my age and both bigger and stronger than the other boys of my rugged mountain home. We would wrestle, sprint, throw rocks and sticks and pretend to battle and I would always win. My mother called it arrogance, and would have no part of it, I called it a gift from Olympus, getting the strength to wrestle a full-grown man to a standstill but not enough intelligence to outwit anyone! My father need ever have feared me, I have been called too stupid to be a conspirator, and I would not disagree. I could never sit still, never focus, never keep my mind on one thing for too long before it became boring and monotonous, Alkestis, she would say in her disapproving tone, sit still before I cut off your legs and make you a cripple. That was my mother.
By the time my father claimed kingship over Makedonia, both his father and grandfather dead already, I was tall, strong and still not too bright.
Hearsays flew throughout the Hellenic world then, Antigonos seeking shelter in his fathers city and Pyrrhos of Epiros sailing to a place called Italia to strike a blow against a people I had never even heard of, the "Rhomaios", or 'Romans' as they apparently called themselves. It was well known to all, even a backwater peasant, that this Epirote prince was one of the greatest leaders of men since Alexander, some even saying he WAS Alexander in another body or some nonsense like that. Nor were these claims wrong, for at a place called Heraklea he slew seven thousand Romans and sent their shades to Hades, decimating his own ranks in the process but keeping possession of his lands in Meg'al Hell'as, in Sikelia, and in his own lands of Epiros.
This was the enemy that Antigonos feared the most, his forces little more than hard-bitten bands of fighters that still clung loyally to him and his line seeking some hope of victory. Pyrrhos on the other hand, had he chosen to do so, could march through central Greece and wipe Makedonia from the very earth. In the Peloponessos the city-state of Sparta began to once more grow in power, the Aitolians and their League helping little to ease his mind, and always the Thrakians and Illyrians threatened his northern borders. Yet, whatever the faults of my father, he knew what needed to be done, and once he knew that some of his fathers gains were secure he set about reinforcing garrisons, sending coin and men out to claim disparate warriors for himself and making sure his foothold would not crumble beneath him.
Light is fading outside, and I grow weary...and I shall continue my work tomorrow.
Reference: relationships-rescue.blogspot.com
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