Is it true blacks were in ancient greece
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Category: Regional History or Period History
Forum Name: Ancient Mediterranean and Europe
Forum Discription: Greece, Macedon, Rome and other cultures such as Celtic and Germanic tribes
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Topic: Is it true blacks were in ancient greece
Posted By: Surmount
Subject: Is it true blacks were in ancient greece
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 00:50
I'm not sure about this topic. Please someone who has knowledge of this topic give feedback on whether this is true or not. I found this Ancient Greek Antique online. But Who really knows.  
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Replies:
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 02:01
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Your posts smack of confusion, and a tad bit of black supermacism... ------------- |
Posted By: sunnyspot
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 02:24
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As opposed to white?
Ofcourse there were blacks in ancient Greece, why not? Since when was ancient Greece a society of 'white, pure Arrians'? That's the kind of garbage movies like '300' promote. I can't say I know anything about the subject. sheez* Can you do better than that? I can't stand the problems people have with black/white - ofcourse its loaded with hiearchy and inferiority and all that - which is a load of bull. So why can't there be blacks in Athens BC?
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Posted By: Maharbbal
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 03:50
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The question is not were they around at one point? As we can safely assume some black person went to Athens at one point or the other. Some explicit evidence may be required but it remains very likely. What really matters is: have black African people been important at one point or the other in the history of the Greek city states? There one can just as safely assume that the answer is no. ------------- I am a free donkey! |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 04:31
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I would agree with Marharbal - almost all the major figures in Greek history have been Roman, Hellenic, Dorian or some other related race. The question of this thread, however was "were there blacks in ancient Greece?" when we consider how much trade Greece had with Egypt and Meroe, and how much slavery played a part in Greek life, it wouldn't be suprising if there was the occasional black slave in Greece. Traders from Nubia and Egypt could also have been black - we can't rule it out. ------------- |
Posted By: Desperado
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 11:27
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And the answer is: probably yes. Yes, but not in the way Afrocentrists try to present it. Or atleast they were well known to the Balkan population during Antiquity. In the Thracian art people with negroid features appear quite frequently. Here's an object from the Panagyurishte Gold Treasure: http://img403.imageshack.us/my.php?image=panagyrishtephialegoldrl0.jpg"> 
http://img168.imageshack.us/my.php?image=thracian01vq9.jpg"> 
http://img168.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fialaoutva3.jpg"> 
The circle closest to the center consists of acorns and the rest three circles represent Negroid heads. In most of the thracian art (gold and silver objects, wall paintings), usually in the tombs of the nobility, the people with negroid features are represented however, like exotic slaves, rather than local population, demonstrating the wealth and the prestige of the burried person. The most frequent scene is a young negroid man or a boy holding the bridle of the master's horse, or dogs during hunting. It's certain that these people, were brought in Thrace by the greek sea traders, so for sure they existed in the greek cities and colonies too. P.S. I completely agree with the last two replies. |
Posted By: Zagros
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 11:56
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About as likely as there having been Ancient Greeks in Zulu land or the Niger Delta etc. ------------- |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 14:07
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...To which the answer would probably be OBVIOUSLY yes. Initially, Egypt was traveled in by a few Greeks, and probably a few traders did dock at Thebes (and later...) Alexandria. Besides, we know that Herodotus and Strabo traveled around Egypt, so that's a yes for 2 people in the early stages. Also, remember Cimon raided Egypt in the Persian wars to strike at the shores of the Persian empire - so at that stage, hundereds of Greeks. Then, obviously, there's Alexander and his Diodachi in that region, the Ptolemaics. It's not comprable to the idea of blacks being in Greece - the Hellenic influence in Egypt was much larger. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 14:39
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Black Greeks? Nope, not true. Only in the dreams of Clyde Winters------------- |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 14:58
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Pinguin, as many people ask you to do, will you please give a reason "why" it's not true... ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 15:31
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Will be a hard job, indeed. First one has to define who is Black and who is not. Then one has to resort to ancient sources, genetical evidence, etc. What I know is that Greeks are of Mediterranean stock, and they were that way in the past as well. Now, it is possible that there were some Egyptian and Ethiopian minorities all over the mediterranean, particularly traders, and that makes sense and I won't argue about it. But the idea that Greece looked like the U.S. South during the 19th century is what I don't accept. Pinguin
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 15:34
Some have argued that a tribe close to the Great Zimbabwe (and that is believe they build it) is descendent of ancient Hebrews that made the journey up to Southern Africa! Close to Zulu land.
I saw a report on TV that showed the result of genetical studies that proved those fellows have ancient mediteranean ancestry
 So, you'll never be completely sure. ------------- |
Posted By: elenos
Date Posted: 11-Aug-2007 at 20:16
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How can one put this nicely? The ancient Greeks became obsessed with physical perfection, as shown in their sculpture and buildings.
------------- elenos |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 02:40
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The debate in this thread is if there were ANY blacks in ancient Greece - probably, at one time, an African chap did toddle into that area in that era. ------------- |
Posted By: akritas
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 04:42
Archaeology does not provide any support for an invasion of Greece by Egyptians in the second millennium. Such information as we have suggests instead that settlers came to Egypt from Greece. A thousand fragments of frescoes in the Minoan Greek style have been found in the last several years at Avaris in the Nile Delta, dating from the seventeenth century, during the period when the Semitic (probably Canaanite) people known as the Hyksos ruled Egypt ( 1674-1566 B.C.). In 1991, a fragment of a painted Minoan floor, dating from the sixteenth century, was discovered in Tell Kabri in Israel. These findings seem to suggest that an "invasion," whatever form it may have taken, went from Greece to Egypt, rather than in the other direction. Perhaps the story of Io's journey to the Nile Delta is a distant reflection of this cultural influence from the north, as Egyptologist Donald Redford has suggested. But the myth need not reflect history at all, since the Greeks used myths to account for all kinds of different phenomena. Here it may simply have been a means of explaining why Io resembled the Egyptian goddess Isis, who was often represented with cow's horns on her head. Herodotus, who had visited Egypt, remarks on the resemblance. Whatever the origin of the story of Io's journey, the myths of the origins of Argos and Athens, as the Greeks knew them, before they were revised by the Egyptian priests in the first century, provide no indications of African roots or an Egyptian invasion. Professor Maria Lefkowitz in hers book Not out of Africa remarked as about the supposing Egyptian presence in Greece…… no substantial arguments can be made for an African invasion of Greece in prehistoric times. The absence of evidence for such an invasion seriously undermines the Afrocentric argument that there was a significant African element in the population in Greece in the second millennium. Without such a presence in Greece, it is more difficult to argue that historical Greeks could have had African ancestors. As it is, such claims must rest on independent evidence. But this evidence also will prove to be both weak and circumstantial. The above answers taken from
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Posted By: akritas
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 05:12
Frank M. Snowden is a known Afrocentrist writer that follow the known line and arguments like:
and more.....!!! -------------
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 06:06
...Akritas, if you had read my posts more throughly, you would realise that I was arguing that there was, in the first place, more Greek influence in Egypt that the other way around. I think you've got the wrong end of the stick-
...These midsunderstandings happen so much...
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Posted By: omshanti
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 06:28
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Posted By: akritas
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 06:30
Yes I read your answer
 I am just fill in the blanks of your answering post to the question-thesis of Surmount.  -------------
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Posted By: Suren
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 09:07
Yes, I saw them in 300 Spartans movie. Persians were all blacks when they attacked greece later day lost their color and became white.  !!! lol |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 16:33
...Yes, well - that's Hollywood for you  . The directors always dress up such crap, like for the 300. The producers said that it was trying to deeply emphasise how reality becomes myth, or words to that effect. I think that they're just over-intellectualising it and trying to cover up the fact that they just want a movie with blood.
...Anyway, enough of my trolling - back to the question at hand.
This question is two vauge - "Is it true there were blacks in ancient greece?". We have all agreed here that probably some Nubian trader or someone did toddle into Greece (which also covers Sicily, parts of Italy, North Africa, Spain and Asia minor...), but does the person who started the thread want POLITICAL evidence of Africans in Greece? Because certainly nobody here is statisfied with the obvious small-scale answer. ------------- |
Posted By: elenos
Date Posted: 12-Aug-2007 at 20:03
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Didn't the people of Ancient Greece vote for who they wanted and those voted against had to move out out of town? Before the advent of modern medicine people of various areas were suspicious of strangers with different complexions. The various communities tended to blame any outbreak of diseases, even crop failure, upon immigrants. ------------- elenos |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 04:35
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Yes, that was a practice called "ostrocization" institated by one of the Athenian tyrants (I can't remember who...) which supposedly ensured that a dangerous party leader could be removed. The citizens of the city in question (Not only Athens used it) would have to write on a piece of pot-shard or "Osthros" who they wanted to leave. If over 6000 people wanted one man to leave, he had to clear out for a decade - no questions asked.
Firstly, this system was instated at a time at which the Greeks had so much to do with other nations who were different in skin colour (Cimon in Egypt, Cyrus II's revolt etc) that apparently that wasn't much of an issue. Also, the ruling classes got the vote, so any of the helots or farmers that you are talking about wouldn't have been able to voice any xenophobic superstitions that they had. And the ruling classes' vote in such an action wouldn't have been influenced by agriculture. ------------- |
Posted By: elenos
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 05:47
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So the common working class didn't have a voice over those who put themselves above their own countrymen? Isn't that an answer in itself? ------------- elenos |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 09:30
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Yes, because there were financial barriers which you had to pass in order to become a citizen, and other obvious ones (Not a previous enemy of the state, not a women, not a slave, etc...). I don't really see how the structure of Athenian democracy really matters when concerning this issue, though, interesting though it is. ------------- |
Posted By: HEROI
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 10:17
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i dont like the idea that everybody try to portaray Black people in antiquity as slaves,slavery of black people is not an ancient fenomen is quite modern,slavery in antiquity was not racist.There were whites,blacks and all colors slaves in antiquity,as were aristocrats. ------------- Me pune,me perpjekje. |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 11:43
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...None of us are, and I think that all of us here realise that. We are speaking about black presence in Ancient Greece - two of the possible notions are traders and perhaps the odd black slave or two (as I actually said earlier on). Although most slaves would have been white, there could have been a few black slaves - it's not undeniable. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 12:17
Yes, it is also possible there were some Inuit, Japanese and Indonesian slaves in Greece as well
 I believe the problem is that people projects the present to the past... that's all.
Pinguin
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 12:31
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Pinguin...that...wasn't what I was saying at all. You are twisting my words to breaking point. Read the rest of the thread before you post, there's a good boy .
What I was saying was that there were slaves in Ancient Greek society - they formed an integral part. Greece had many connections with Egypt and thus, it's possible that there were some black slaves. There could have been black traders as well, but since Greece and Egypt traded, it's possible that there could have been some black slaves amongst that trade.
...Actually, the people who have accused me of "projecting the present to the past" are the ones who have shown themselves to be ignorant - not me. The people who posted those messages evidently don't know that Greece and many other nations monopolised on slavery long before the British empire and others did, which is something which they are evidently not aware of. The fact that they can't seem to think of slavery without thinking of the infamous Atlantic slave trade of the 17th - 19th Centuries shows them to be ignorant more than anything. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 14:51
| Yes there were many, many, many black slaves in Greece, that is not to say that all slaves there were black. Slavery was big in greece, especially Athens(birthplace of democracy, go figure) This is evident in lots of art depicting blacks and literature. There is ancient Greek poetry especially about Nubians who were held in high regard and considered very beautiful and exotic. The Africans as well as other foreigners being in Greece is one of the reasons Greeks such as myself look the way we do today. The ancient greeks were considered to be the lightest haired and most fair skinned of the then known world. Even by the before the ottoman occupation their appearence had changed as you can tell by art from the Byzantine period. Theres a really really detailed site out there with serious genetic data about all types of ancient and modern ethnicities, I will try to find and post. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 14:59
Oh Yes!
According to Diop and other billiant minds all Greeks were Blacks. Others go beyond that, like Clyde Winters that said Vikings were also Blacks.
Certainty,
Pinguin ------------- |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 15:00
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Pinguin - don't be pathetic. That's not what he was saying. We said the occasional one or two may have been black - we don't think that. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 15:00
Nobody denies some Egyptians lived in Greece, as some Greeks lived in India. That's part of history.
Pinguin
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 15:02
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I wasn't saying that nobody was denying it - you keep getting the wrong end of the stick - I was saying that their connections in Egypt - long before the time of Alexander - could be a suitable reason to explain if they had any black slaves, if any. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 16:43
All I said was that there were black slaves, not brilliant minds.
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 16:44
All I was saying was that there were black slaves, not brilliant minds, and most certainly not vikings, a group of people the ancient Greeks would call Barbarians
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Posted By: Decebal
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 16:49
No, he was saying that greeks were very fair-skinned, but now they are darker and have curly hair because of a significant african component. Which is rubbish... Based on this type of argument, I have heard Afrocentrists argue that the Scottish and Irish were black! ------------- What is history but a fable agreed upon? Napoleon Bonaparte Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.- Mohandas Gandhi 
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 17:03
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I see Decebal - but look at modern day Turks - you can get Ginger ones (quite rare) or very dark ones I guess it's the same with Greeks.
There can't have been many slaves who were black for obvious reasons, but even less, because actually (not many people actually know this) slavery wasn't an integral part of the culture of a Greek polis. There were expections - in some of the Dorian states such as the Spartans/Lacedemonians, Phocian and Locrians, slavery was. But one examines Athens, Attic states and Ionian states, slavery did help, but only to make the lives of those who were comfortable a little more comfortable. Since large scale agriculture hadn't been utlized on poor Greek soil (Sparta is an exception, for their land was pretty good for Greece...), one man could roughly farm enough food for himself. An agricultural slave was a burden, and for the average citizen, who had to go to work, attend the citizen's assembly and do his own things, keeping an industry of slaves was too much work. The average Greek polis was based on collaboration of ALL the citizens - government on a scale comprehensable to the people - every Greek citizen was expected to turn up - not enforced, just because the polis and their participation was the Greek way of life. So he just didn't have time to organise the buerocracy needed to have an army of slaves. Remember that Cleon (that's right, the famous Cleon) was a leather-worker, and Solon was origionally a simple trader, so not all Greek citizens were that rich. ...So as for African slaves, there can't have been that many ordinary slaves to begin with, LET ALONE African ones. Although we can't dispute the fact that once, in one Greek polis, somewhere, there was a black slave - or even citizen. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 17:28
Let me ask you how many Greeks were living in Nubia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa at that time.
I bet the numbers were similars from Subsaharians living in Greece.
Just common sense and logic, I guess.
Pinguin
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 17:34
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...What are you on about? I never said that there were loads of Greeks living in those nations! Seriously buddy, read the bl**dy thread! You keep getting the wrong end of the stick and angering me in the process! If you want to debate, that's great, but it's impossible to do so with someone who seems to twist your words. The quote of mine in your post has nothing to do with whatever you've written at the bottom. Of course there were no Greeks living in those areas (possibly apart from Nubia)- all I'm saying is that one time in ancient history, there probably was a Nubian, Numidian or black Egyptian who went to a Greek city. ------------- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 18:16
Yes, I agree... merchant usually move more freely than anyone else.
I only dissagre with the idea that because some Greek merchants were living for a while in Nubia or even in Ethiopia , we should assume that the Greek influence in those lands was huge... which clearly wasn't the case.
If we assume that, it is also clear that the influence of Nubians, Numidians or "Black" Egyptians was not demographically significant at all.
Pinguin ------------- |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 19:08
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A - I never said that the influence of Nudians and suchlike on Greece was large at all
B - I also never said that we should assume that the Greek influence in Numdia and Egypt was large
...Perhaps not demographically, but enough to make a dynasty in Egypt, create a people large enough to repel Egypt and large & rich enough to form a considerable empire. ------------- |
Posted By: Surmount
Date Posted: 13-Aug-2007 at 23:24
| I feel you |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 14-Aug-2007 at 02:29
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... ------------- |
Posted By: calvo
Date Posted: 14-Aug-2007 at 06:21
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This is the first thread I've read after taking a 5-day break from the internet.... Here are the points I have to make:
1. The Greek city states DID engage in considerable commerce with other civilizations such as Phoenecians, Etruscans, Hitties, Egyptians etc., and as a fact "citizens" only formed a minority of the total residents of the city states, with the rest composed of "foreigners" or slaves.
So Ｉwouldn't be surprised that there would have been Nubians and other sub-saharan Africans living on their soil, but they would have been a minority without leaving much legacy.
2. Ancient Egyptians were NOT BLACK, and Ancient Greeks and Italians WERE NOT BLOND. The texts written by contemporary scholars demonstrate that they had been Mediterranean as their modern descendants. These racialist ideas have been propagated by Afrocentrists and white supremacists.
3. Both the Greek and Roman economy depended to a large extent on slavery, but back in those days slavery had no colour. The idea relating dark skin to slavery is a post-1500 phenomenon. The idea of a "white race" with everything else being inferior or "alien" is a post-1800 phenomenon.
4. I cannot say much about Ancient Greece, but Alexandria under the Plotemy dynasty was indeed a melting pot between Greeks from all city states, Egyptians, Mauritanians, Thracians, Indians... and busts of heads with African features have been erected. However, sub-saharan Africans would not have formed a significant percentage.
.... one thing we have to liberate our minds of is that "colour" racism as we know of it today did not exist until the 1500s, and to be more precisely, the 1800s.
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Posted By: akritas
Date Posted: 14-Aug-2007 at 07:55
Excellent points calvo
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 14-Aug-2007 at 08:17
...That's a complete cliche, for the obvious points that I stated above -
...Unlike the Roman republic, the Polis did not want to grow (generally) territorially, and thus didn't develop a buerocracy because their government was comprehensable and "personal" - comprehensable to its citizens. They never developed the Buerocracy needed to manage huge amounts of slaves on large farms etc. like the Romans did.
That's also a falsehood - although citizens were smaller in number than the average farmer, slaves didn't make up as huge a part of the population as they did in ancient Rome. The citizens of a Greek city-state weren't all the plutocrats - they were the moderatately well off and the "middle-class" (if such a term can be applied...). Society in ancient Greece wasn't complex enough to create such a huge class divide as that, and apart from a few Dorian states like the Spartans, the divide wasn't that huge (It was a common Spartan saying that one "Couldn't tell the difference between a slave and a citizen in Attica").
...Also, the dates of trade with the Hittite empire aren't contempary with "Classical Greece". The Hittite empire of fame was a runt by around 1200 BC, and at it's heyday, it was the Achean, Minoan and Mycenean cultures in Greece that were making the progress. These were generally the "Homeric" times. At the time of "Classical" Greece, the most powerful states in the near east were Neo-Assyria, Neo (Chaldean) Babylon, Egypt and Urartu. There were some small neo-Hittite states, but these were in the east and were just a few in number near Syria and Northern Iraq. The peoples who were inhabiting Anatolia at this time that you are speaking about were the Phygrians, Cimmerianians, Lydians, Lycians, Ionians and Carians.
...Besides, even the Hittite empire didn't get as far to Ionia proper, and only Lycia. The Hittites had no navy to speak of, and it was the "Lukka" (Ancient Lycians) and the "Que" (Ancient Cilicians) who traded as the Hittite empire via proxy with Cyprus with a small fleet of vessels. There may have been trade and political influences between Crete (Minos) and Cyprus, meaning via Proxy trade with the Hittites, but not directly. The only link that Greece proper had was that the sea peoples both attacked Hatti and Mycenae and Troy is mentioned in Hittite texts. Anyway, the main eastern trade in Ancient Greece was between Phonecia and Egypt - the Levant and North Africa, not really the near east proper.
Yes, the Nazi and Italian fascist regimes have done untold damage to the general genetic ideas about these peoples. The ancient Egyptians did in fact have a Nubian dynasty, and if we define Ancient Egypt as a singular ancient state without reference to modern Egypt, many of the residents in areas such as Punt would have been black. Also, the Kush*tes really were black, and they traded via the red sea and Sinai. We tend to define nationalites these days by colours, and thus transfer that idea to ancient history, without realising that it's not colour that defines a people, it's ethno-linguistic differences. People often seem to try and apply such modernist ideas to the ancient world, which unsuprisingally doesn't work. ------------- |
Posted By: elenos
Date Posted: 14-Aug-2007 at 18:19
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Ethnicity is determined by environment! In the ancient world moving too
far away from an ethnic area could mean a death sentence. Move far
north and southern ethnic types would die of influenza, too far south
and northern types would die of malaria. In this case a study of equatorial zones and their effects on all life forms, not just humans, is needed and is essential to understanding
the whole subject. They had no such thing as modern medicine or
treatment and no idea about germs. To say what there is of the medical
records of the past are untrue is the ultimate in transferring the
present back to the past.
------------- elenos |
Posted By: calvo
Date Posted: 15-Aug-2007 at 02:24
When you said "ethnic types" you probably meant "racial" types.
In anthropological terms, the word "ethnicity" usually refers to a linguistic-cultural-tribal identity, while "race" refers purely to biological.
When you said is true, and that many travellers perished of indigenous diseases when they ventured too far from their homeland. However, this did not prevent long-distance commercial and military expeditions when the profits were high enough.
Alexander the Great's army reached as far as India, Ghengis Khan rode as far as the frontiers of Hungary, not the mention the numerous migration waves from Mongolia and Central Asia into Europe, starting with the Huns.
Commerce between the Romans, India and China was in fact, well established via the "spice route" and the "silk road".
Returning to the subject, Nubians did not really have to travel too far to reach the Mediterranean, and for the frequent comercial contact they had with the Egyptians, they probably shared very much similar immune systems.
At least in Plotemy and Roman times, Mediterranean traders founded their own quarter in the Nubian capital of Meroe; and Nubians were seen in Roman provinces as far north as Britain.
As with the Classic-era Greeks, less records have been kept. Therefore, we could conclude that even if some did make their way and settle in the Balkans, they were probably few in number and did not cause any significant impact.
For example, today there is a Persian community in the UK, but not large enough to exert a "Persian" influence on British society and politics.
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Posted By: calvo
Date Posted: 15-Aug-2007 at 02:35
You're right that slaves probably did not make up the majority of the population of most ancient Greek city states except the Spartans, but "foreigners" did.
A "foreigner" could be someone born and raised for generations in the city state but lacked the papers for full legal rights.
As a fact, at the time of Pericles one of the heated debates in Athens was over the citizenship of half-breeds: offspring of citizens and foreigners.
What was the ethnic composition of foreigners?
There are too few records on the subject to form a genuine conclusion.
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 15-Aug-2007 at 04:35
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Yes - you mean people like ordinary farmers, women and others who couldn't claim citizenship. It irritates me how people trasfer Roman ideas of society on to Greece. A citizen in Greece was not generally very rich and slavery did not make up a large part of society. ------------- |
Posted By: calvo
Date Posted: 16-Aug-2007 at 10:46
Citizens in neither Greece nor Rome had to be rich, although most of them were better-off than non-citizens. It is more of a legal status than an economic social class. A wealthy "foreigner" could easily be richer than a poor citizen, although many city states would grant rich foreigners citizenship.
I read a book about the Greek hoplite system, it is said that there was a citizen class in Athens known as the proletarian who were exempt from military conscription, because they were too poor to afford to equip themselves; otherwise, all citizens had the obligation to undergo military service.
The same thing happened in Rome, especially in the late republic when the bulk of the peasantry declined into an urban proletariat, although they were still fully-fledged Roman citizens.
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Posted By: HEROI
Date Posted: 20-Aug-2007 at 06:20
Ok.Agree with you,i had to make a point thou concerning black slaves because you conected the presence of Blacks in Greece with slavery,before conecting it with merchants and traders,which is the most likely rather then the black slaves,which is unlikely.My point was that people should not automaticaly link blacks and ancient europian civilisations with slavery,in Rome and Greece there were more slaves proportionaly white then black.In Hollywood we see blacks as slaves in Rome and never as sucsesfull generals or emperors,and unfortunately this has become part of the mentality in Europe and the white-world.Race-based slavery was a particularly short period of time in history of humanity. ------------- Me pune,me perpjekje. |
Posted By: Surmount
Date Posted: 20-Aug-2007 at 18:28
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Wow! Heroi you seem very open minded and receptive. You know one of the reasons blacks are portrayed like that is because what people have to understand is that a lot of the history we know of today has been taught written and recorded, and then rewritten by not all but some Europeans who concentrate on racial pride and racial purity which was taught extensively in the 18th and 19th century. That is why so many people are brainwashed. The people who rule most of the world will control the history most people learn. |
Posted By: Rakasnumberone
Date Posted: 29-Aug-2007 at 20:26
IS it possible for anyone to post any thread concerning blacks and Africans outside of the accepted stereotypical frame without 10 people jumping on their backs raising accusations of Afrocentrism and black supremacy? Were there any blacks in Greece, not WERE THE GRREKS BLACK, or did the Blacks conquer Greece.
There is nothing confusing here. It is a simple and valid question. Basically, what he wants to know is if there was any contact between these two people? To answer the question without the emotional psychobabel, YES! The Greeks were not living under a rock. They were in conctact with people from all over the known world in many capacities and these also included people we would recognize as Blacks from various locations in Africa. Some of them would have been slaves, as the Greeks bouth slaves from all over the world, Arabs, Europeans, Berbers and Blacks from various countries. They also had people who came there as traders and mercinaries as well. There are many depictions in Greek art from paintings to sculptures that show this. A casual walk through the Metropolitain Muesum will tell you that. |
Posted By: jdalton
Date Posted: 29-Aug-2007 at 21:22
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Did Nubia have slavery? If so it's entirely possible that there may have been a few Greek slaves in Nubia at one time or another. Immigration as we know it today did not exist in classical times. A large percentage of any "foreigners" of any sort living permanently in a classical state would have got there via the slave trade... at least in countries that had slavery.
------------- http://www.jonathondalton.com/mycomics.html - Lords of Death and Life (a Mesoamerican webcomic) |
Posted By: Rakasnumberone
Date Posted: 30-Aug-2007 at 00:58
That's was not always the case. There were exceptions. Many times people migrated in for one reason or another. This happened frequently in Egypt. As for Nubia. Since it never received the same amount of attention Egypt has and a significantly historically important section of it is now under water, who knows? Also the fact that we haven't been able to decipher their script yet. Rome and its Empire was a totally different situation altogether. People did immigrate there for economic opportunity. There were Abysinians, Celts, Indians, Persians,Egyptians, Palestinians, Berebers and many more living not only in Rome, but all of its provences. |
Posted By: Flipper
Date Posted: 30-Aug-2007 at 02:52
BRAVO!!!  That was what i was going to write. Especially the belief that some Nubians made their way to Greece for either trade or mercenary reasons. Furthermore, I'm not suprised that we might find black figures in Greek art (i'm not talking about the black/red ceramic) since an artist back then, like nowadays may have wanted to potray something different. -------------  
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Posted By: Periander
Date Posted: 07-Sep-2007 at 01:58
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Just for contemporary "pictorial" contemplation. I have found the following picture in the book by Nicos Papahatzis, Ancient Corinth: The Museums of Corinth, Isthmia and Sicyon, Athens, Ekdotike Athenon S.A., 1998, p. 108. It is from the Sicyon Museum (which is west from Corinth, just south of Kiato).  Caption reads as follows: Mosaic floor depicting a naked Aethiopian, stretching his hands before him. 4th century B.C.
(P.S. I hope the picture is not too big, and I apologise for the scan quality)
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 15-Sep-2007 at 00:41
Mediterranean and Alpine, with a small mixed Dinaric element. There was some diversity among the ancient Greeks; they weren't all Mediterraneans. There probably were some lighter-pigmented Greeks, but few or none were of the Nordic variety, who were idealized by the Nazis. One does not need to consider ancient Greek phenotypes to know that blond Nordic types did not exist in ancient Greece. One only needs to know a modicum of history to know that there was no sophisticated civilization in northern ancient Europe from which Nordic types emigrated and settled in Greece to form the advanced civilization.
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Posted By: Flipper
Date Posted: 16-Sep-2007 at 11:19
This Nordic theory is an ideal that was presented by authors like Karl Earlson and Arthur Kemp. Both are characterized as racists. Arthur Kemp presented in his work artworks from the Aegean Islands where he had changed the hair colour of the people depicted to blonde in order to claim a connection. -------------
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 16-Sep-2007 at 11:24
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Pretty clear. Aryanism and Afrocentrism are racist theories that put the dogma before the fact.
What were Greeks? Just Greeks, like you hear. That's the point. They were not the Aryans of Earlson and Kemp and not the Nigerians of Diop or Sertima either. They were a mediterranean people called the Greeks since the beginning of recorded history, and they are still called Greeks.
Pinguin
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Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 18-Sep-2007 at 07:35
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I agree, Pinguin! I don't see why, after all the conversations that we have about these things, people still come onto the forum and get into long winded debates about this rubbish! The Admins should add to the banner "USE REPUTABLE SOURCES ONLY!". I don't think, however, that we can call old-school classiscists and ancient historians "rascist" - they subscribed to the Roman-centric view that was typical of the age and so can't be held responsable. ------------- |
Posted By: Flipper
Date Posted: 18-Sep-2007 at 08:18
I agree...Strongly agree! They's always a page made by a romantic person that is not a historian, that appears here adnd there. -------------
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Posted By: andrew
Date Posted: 19-Sep-2007 at 20:52
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Greek philosophers felt that being Greeks is more of a state of being rather then a race similarly to how the Egyptians viewed themselves.
A lot of Greek culture is home grown unlike 'Black Athena' which I read and think is rubbish. For example the use of columns was believed to be given to the Greeks from the Egyptians and Phoenicians...not true. Looking at history by taking a holistic aproach we can see how the Greeks used the idea of a column.
Egypt--->Phoenicia/Persia--->Asia Minor--->Greece.
As you can see ideas travel and so do people. Were their Black people in Greece? Sure, but many of their culture was home grown showing that Blacks, unlike Black Athena states, was just a type of people living contrary to their belief thinking it was a direct influence of sub-Saharan Africans.
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 19-Sep-2007 at 21:25
Yes, "Black Athena" is rubbish, and that has been exposed already by books like "Not out of Africa".
Now, the idea there were many "Sub-Saharian" Africans in Greece is also false. First, Blacks weren't many in Greece to start with, because "native" Greeks, or the "greek people" is Indoeuropean (or Caucasian if you preffer). Multiracial societies, like Chicago or New York of today, where not common in the ancient world and people was usually more uniform than today. Yes, there are exceptions. Egypt and Ethiopia come to mind. However that wasn't the case of Greece in classical times.
In second place, the only "Black" people that was known in classical times in the Mediterranean world were the Ethiopians. The fact is, Ethiopia was part of the network of civilizations that spread from Spain and Carthago to Mesopotamia, and from there to India and even China. Because it was part of that network, ethiopian merchants were "present" in lot of old civilizations, and also "white" foreigners usually visited Ethiopia as well.
West Africans, on the other hand, were a quite mysterious people. No real large scale contact existed with Western SS Africa up to Middle Ages times. So, "those blacks" would hardly be "present" in Greece in classical times at all. Exceptions exist, of course.
I abandon this thread here, before it goes in circles..
Pinguin
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Posted By: hugoestr
Date Posted: 19-Sep-2007 at 21:42
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No, they weren't. :)
I know that I am coming very late to the conversation, but here is my little contribution, which I am sure that others have already said. The main source of attributing Greek thought to Africa is a Greek, Herodotus. Herodotus, the traditional Western father of history, was an early traveler, and it appears that he spent some time in Egypt. He recognized that it was a great and old civilization, and reported on it. Because he felt that it was older, he makes some claims that certain Greek practices or technology comes from Egypt. And he is right, in a very general sense. People in the Mediterranean had frequent cultural exchanges, and Egypt, being an older civilization, may have been the source of many practices. At the same time, if you read Herodotus, you will realize that the man is what we today call "ethnocentric." So he misreads other culture by assuming that many practices and features are the same as the Greek ones that he was familiar with. (And for an ancient, he is actually pretty good at understanding cultural differences, if I remember correctly) In other words, Herodotus may attribute to the Egyptians things that are purely Greek though cultural misunderstanding. Also, if I remember correctly, this, and the curly hair found in pottery, is pretty much the heart of the evidence for Black Athena. A pretty hollow heart, I would say 
Black Athena is probably the book that hurts Afrocentrism the most. Is debating an unwinnable position. It is a lot more productive to look at the modern history of Africa and the Africa diaspora, and to explore the great diversity of African throughout the years. ------------- |
Posted By: AndronicusRex
Date Posted: 27-Sep-2007 at 17:33
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Sure, as slaves. They never had any real influence on Hellenic culture, to suggest otherwise is absurd. A brief survey of ancient Greek history and art will suffice to prove this. ------------- Andronicus Rex, Noble of the Republic http://angryamericanaristocrat.blogspot.com/ |
Posted By: Anton
Date Posted: 27-Sep-2007 at 22:14
To compare things you need to know them both. ------------- . |
Posted By: AndronicusRex
Date Posted: 28-Sep-2007 at 03:21
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I do know them, and I know that Greek writers mention no blacks of note as contributing majorly to Hellenic civilization, and their artwork depicts an exclusively White European population, with the exception of a few minor works depicting slaves or foreigners. ------------- Andronicus Rex, Noble of the Republic http://angryamericanaristocrat.blogspot.com/ |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 28-Sep-2007 at 04:10
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It is amazing how much pseudohistory has made inroads into reality. The idea that there was a major Black minority in Greece comes from the United States. It is just a projection of the reality of the United States back to ancient Greece by a group of writers with an agenda: Afrocentrism. Books like "Black Athena" were the beginning of it. However, serious schollars have shown already that most of those claims are just lunacy.
Two books:
(1) Not Out of Africa
Was Greek Culture Stolen from Africa? Modern Myth vs. Ancient History
Amazon.com
Wellesley classics professor Mary Lefkowitz takes aim at the basic claims of leading proponents of Afro-centrism, in this expansion of her New Republic article exposing flaws in the argument that black Africans were responsible for the great civilizations of Egypt and Greece that brought praise from historians and criticism from Afrocentrists. Lefkowitz argues that the Greeks' African heritage touted by Senegalese scholar Cheikh Anta Diop is based upon a single dubious source and that Egyptians never considered themselves black Africans, in fact, that they consciously disassociated themselves from blacks. She argues that the legacy of these two cultures remains so rich even foes of European civilization want to claim that legacy for themselves. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. From Publishers Weekly "I am defending academic standards," declares Wellesley College classics professor Lefkowitz, expanding on a New Republic article that brought her praise from historians and criticism from Afro-centrists. Her methodical study, moderate in tone, does not survey the full flower of Afro-centrism in American curricula but takes potent aim at some of the basic claims of leading proponents of Afro-centrism. For example, she shows that influential Senegalese scholar Cheikh Anta Diop asserted the Greeks' African heritage based on a single, highly dubious source. Similarly, she explains how claims tracing Greek religion and philosophy to Egyptian origins are based on clearly suspect Greek sources. Moreover, she shows how those Afro-centrists who say the Greeks borrowed an "Egyptian Mystery System" from Africa are actually relying on an 18th-century French novel. This book is a sobering rebuttal of those academics too spineless to challenge teachings based more on identity politics than on solid scholarship. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. (2) Afrocentrism: Mythical Pasts and Imagined Homes (Paperback)
by http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/103-0231558-2213447?%5Fencoding=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=books&field-author=Stephen%20Howe - Stephen Howe (Author) Afrocentrism, asserts Oxford historian Howe in this forceful scholarly critique, is a dogmatic ideology promoting a mythical vision of the past that involves an erroneous belief in fundamentally distinct African ways of knowing and feeling. Using archaeological and other studies, he refutes the claims of influential Afrocentrist Senegalese historian Cheikh Anta Diop, who held that ancient Egypt was a black African civilization and that a single cultural system unified the African continent. Howe deftly exposes the shaky underpinnings of Cornell historian Martin Bernal's popular tome, Black Athena, which claims that classical Greece was massively indebted to Egyptian and Semitic sources, and to Egyptian colonization. Tracing the evolution of Afrocentric views from 19th-century pamphleteers, romantic anthropologists, occultists and political activistsAboth black and whiteAthrough contemporary Black Muslim doctrine and what he considers the distortions of U.S. academics such as Leonard Jeffries, Ron Karenga and Molefi Asante, Howe finds that much Afrocentric writing "slips from ethnocentrism and neoconservatism into full-blown racism, sexism and homophobia." A major contribution to the debate, this dense study will appeal mostly to scholars. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc |
Posted By: Aster Thrax Eupator
Date Posted: 28-Sep-2007 at 10:15
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Well then, those titles should quieten our Afrocentrists...if they can be made to! ------------- |