Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/29

 SECTIONS OF THE MACEDONIAN NAMR H The inhabitants of this primitive Macedonia doubtless differed much in ancient times, as they do now, according as they dwelt on mountain or plain, and in soil and climate more or less kind ; but all acknowledged a common ethnical name and nationality, and the tribes were in many cases distinguished from each other, not by having substantive names of their own, but merely by local epithets of Grecian origin. Thus we find Elymiotoe Mace- donians, or Macedonians of Elymeia, Lynkestie Macedonians, or Macedonians of Lynkus, etc. Orestae is doubtless an adjunct Skardus, continued by Pindus, sec the valuable chapter of Grisebach's Travels above referred to (Ileisen, vol. ii, ch. xiii, pp. 125-130; c. xiv, p. 175; c. xvi, pp. 214-216; c. xvii, pp. 244-245). Respecting the plains comprised in the ancient Pelagonia, see also the Journal of the younger Pouqueville, in his progress from Travnik in Bos- vria to Janina. He remarks, in the two days' march from Prelepe (Prilip) through Bitolia to Fiorina, " Dans cette route on parcourt des plaines lux- uriantes couvcrtes de moissons, de vastes prairies rcmplies de trefle, des plateaux abondans en pAturages ine'puisables, oil paissent d'innombrables troupeaux de bceufs, de chevres, et de menu be'tail Lc ble', le mais, et les autres grains sont toujours a tres bas prix, a cause de la difficulte des de'bouche's, d'oti Ton exporte une grande quantitie dc laines, de colons, de peaux d'agneaux, de buffles, et de chevaux, qui passent par le moyen des caravancs en Hongrie." (Pouqueville, Voyage dans la Grecc, torn, ii, ch 62, p. 495.) Again, M. Boue remarks upon this same plain, in his Critique des Cartes de la Turquie, Voyage, vol. iv, p. 483, " La plaine immense de Prilip, dc Bitolia, et de Fiorina, n'est pas representee (sur les cartes) de maniere a ce qu'on ait une idee de son e'tendue, et surtout de sa largeur La plaine de Sarigoul est changee en vallee," etc. The basin of the Haliakmon he remarks to be represented equally imperfectly on the maps : compare also his Voyage, i, pp. 211, 299, 300. I notice the more particularly the large proportion of fertile plain and valley in the ancient Macedonia, because it is often represented (and even by O. Miiller, in his Dissertation on the ancient Macedonians, attached to his History of the Dorians) as a cold and nigged land, pursuant to the statement of Livy (xlv, 29), who says, respecting the fourth region of Ma- cedonia as distributed by the Romans, " Frigida hsec omnis, duraque nil t n, et aspera plagacst : cultorum quoque ingenia teme similia habet : ferociorcs eos et accolsD barbari faciunt, mine bello cxcrccntes, nunc in pace misccn 'j^arJtus suos." This is probably true of the mountaineers included in the region, bat it is too much generalized.